Let’s start with a sliver of hope, because that’s the kind of guy I am.If there is one positive to draw from the initial labor salvos, one sentiment both Major League Baseball and the Players Association seem to share, it’s that revenue disparity between large- and small-market clubs is a problem worth addressing.Mind you, the parties are probably nine months away — at least — from talking the same language. But after 50-plus years of fear and loathing, what were you expecting? Instantaneous bliss?The league is proposing a salary cap. The union is saying no chance. And the battle for the hearts and minds of the public is already at full roar, as evidenced by a 22-page report the league released to reporters Thursday, essentially arguing that the sport — while enjoying a surge of popularity — is competitively broken.My advice to fans trying to make sense of the dueling proposals from the league and union is to take a deep breath, exhale slowly and then repeat as needed for however long this stare down lasts.To put the state of negotiations in baseball terms, we’re still in the first inning. Actually, that might be overstating it. The teams are not even in their respective clubhouses yet. I’m not even sure they’ve left their hotels.Whenever the next collective bargaining agreement is struck — next March, next July or, if complete idiocy reigns, sometime after a cancelled 2027 season — the terms likely will bear little resemblance to those in the initial proposals.I’m guessing the players will never accept a cap. I’m thinking they had better be prepared for the moment when the owners say, “We’ll drop our demand for a cap, but only in exchange for a slew of concessions.” And until then, I’m bracing for the usual sniping between the parties, the usual cherry-picking of arguments, the usual noise.Heck, it already has started. And as usual, MLB’s favorite bogeymen, the Los Angeles Dodgers, are at the center of the discussion, singled out by the league to demonstrate all that is wrong.The sport isn’t broken because the Dodgers won back-to-back World Series. It isn’t broken even though no small-market team has won the Series since the Kansas City Royals in 2015. But the economic playing field should be more level. The question is how to get there.In the past, some on the players’ side privately resisted the notion that revenue disparity was a problem, saying, in essence, that small-market teams had the money and just needed to spend it. Those people were not necessarily wrong, but their view was a bit disingenuous, ignoring the reality that revenues in, say, Pittsburgh and Cleveland are not nearly what they are in New York and Los Angeles.Now, the union is proposing enhancements in revenue sharing to guarantee each small-market club a minimum of $240 million per season. Those enhancements would be accompanied by “protections to ensure clubs prioritize winning over profiteering” — stronger protections than exist in the current CBA, protections that would include a soft floor.I suggested such a floor in February in a story about how the league could address revenue disparity without introducing a cap. The idea would be to provide a mechanism at the bottom of the pay structure mirroring the thresholds and penalties at the top.The league cannot philosophically oppose the concept when it’s essentially the flip side of the luxury-tax system. But of course, the league has its own idea on how to address the matter. The union wants to penalize teams that fall below 50 percent of the first tier of the luxury-tax threshold. It proposed a $300 million first tier in year one – good luck with that – which translates to a soft floor of $150 million.The league wants both a hard cap and floor, insisting in a statement that “fans in too many markets have too little hope their team has a fair chance to win.” That’s what this is all about, the league keeps telling us. Bowing to the wishes of fans who “overwhelmingly” support a cap, out of the goodness of the owners’ hearts.Please.I’m sure fans want lower ticket prices and lower beer prices, too, but the owners aren’t about to introduce those, are they? No, the owners act only when it’s in their financial interests.A cap that fixes costs and enhances franchise values is most definitely in the owners’ interests. Missing games, the possible cost of all this, is not. How about asking fans if they want that?As other professional leagues demonstrate, a cap is not a magic bullet for ensuring competitive balance. Former New York Mets acting GM Zack Scott, who spent 20 years inside major-league front offices, wrote Thursday on X, “Payroll explains about 1/3 of why teams win. The other 2/3 is the part the cap conversation isn’t actually about.”What makes up the other two-thirds?Scott listed four buckets, roughly in order of importance: “Acquisition (scouting, draft, trades, signings); Development (turning B prospects into major leaguers); Governance (owner alignment, who’s in the room, how much runway baseball ops gets). Luck.”If the cap is such a great equalizer, why are the Cleveland Guardians more frequently in the playoffs than the NFL’s Cleveland Browns? If payroll is so important, how do the Tampa Bay Rays and Milwaukee Brewers often succeed while the New York Mets do not? The answer to both questions – and the reason the Dodgers are consistently at the top of the sport — is superior management.But for a moment, let’s follow the money.For 2027, the league proposed a cap of $245.3 million and a floor of $171.2 million. Those numbers, based on competitive-balance payrolls, would include approximately $23 million per team in player benefits. So for each club, the actual money going to current players would be lower by that amount.How exactly would the Dodgers get to $245.3 million when their 2027 CBT number currently projects to $358.3 million? And how amusing would it be to see the lowest payroll teams scrambling to get to a floor under either the league’s or union’s plan?Increased revenue sharing would provide those teams with the necessary money. But those teams, if suddenly forced to spend, would be in unfamiliar territory. It might take years for them to find their equilibrium. Maybe we all should be careful what we wish for.In any case, the league would need to offer a variety of enticements for some players to even consider a cap — five-year free agency, increased eligibility for salary arbitration, higher minimum salaries, etc. But the league to this point is holding back on the divide-and-conquer strategy it used in previous negotiations against players — unsuccessfully.The union was predictably as appalled by the league’s proposal as the league was by the union’s. The league believes the union’s plan would not actually benefit small-market clubs, saying it would, “exacerbate the competitive-balance problem.” The union believes that under the league’s proposal, the players would get less money overall.And, in a sport in which virtually all contracts are historically guaranteed, the players already are pushing back on the idea of giving up salary through escrow in a year in which revenues were down, something that would be necessary under the 50-50 split the league is proposing. The NBA escrow system slashed salaries by nearly $500 million in 2024-25.Thrust and parry, parry and thrust. The small-market teams will benefit once a new agreement is reached. Just don’t ask me when we will get there.