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CNN Live Today

Baseball Players, Team Owners Still Meeting

Aired August 26, 2002 - 12:44   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KYRA PHILLIPS, CNN ANCHOR: Right now, it remains scoreless in the talks between major league players and team owners. Fans are hoping they will be the winners come Friday. That is when players have vowed to strike if there is no deal.
Josie Karp with CNN Sports is monitoring the talks in New York -- how are they going, Josie?

JOSIE KARP, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Well, they are continuing, and that is a good sign in and of itself. You know, we have four days until this strike deadline, and to put it in baseball lingo, the players are at the plate. They are expected to make their latest proposal on the economic issues sometime very soon, perhaps even today. It was their last proposal on the economic issues that really sent these negotiations into sort of a freefall on Saturday night because the owners from their perspective were very disappointed in that proposal. They came out and said they thought it moved the process backward.

They called it a regressive proposal, and it touched off a series of conference calls. Both sides, owners and players, had with the media and it was during those conference calls that they exchanged some angry words. We hadn't heard a lot of the anger and the bitterness in this negotiation that we heard in all the previous ones that took place over the last 30 years. So that kind of changed the tone a little bit.

However, on Sunday, both sides did get back to the table, and tensions appeared to ease a little bit. Again, the three things standing in the way of the two sides right now are: the core economic issues of revenue sharing and a luxury tax. And also, the issue of drug testing is still out there. They haven't come to any firm agreement on how they are going to test for steroids, how long they are going to test for steroids, if they are only going to test for steroids. So between now and Friday, there is certainly a lot to get done, and a lot of things that need to be worked out. Again, they are meeting every day. They have met every day since the strike deadline was imposed back on August 16, except for they took last Sunday off, but not this one. They could meet anywhere from one, two, three times a day. As soon as we have any news, we'll get back to it, and get it to you -- Kyra.

PHILLIPS: All right. Josie Karp, thank you.

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