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The Major League Baseball Players Association has banned prominent sports agent Jim Murray for working as a “mole” for MLB and its commissioner Rob Manfred. Murray has been banned from negotiating player contracts for four years and been fined $100,000 for working with the MLB commissioner’s office during negotiations to play the pandemic-delayed 2020 season.
Murray, who was was working for Excel Sports Management at the time, was the agent for New York Yankees players Andy Pettitte, Adam Ottavino, and Anthony Volpe, as well as Chicago Cubs player Ian Happ.
According to a new report by Evan Drellich of The Athletic, a five-page memo and a detailed 71-page disciplinary letter the Major League Baseball Players Association sent to its player leadership on Thursday states Jim Murray “revealed confidential union information” and “acted as a ‘mole'” for MLB commissioner Rob Manfred and his top lieutenants.
In the documents, the MLBPA says Murray communicated with Manfred, telling to not “give in regarding the [MLBPA’s proposed] October language” during negotiations. He also told Manfred, “You will get the deal done without it.”
A few weeks after that message, Murray exchanged messages with MLB chief communications officer Pat Courtney. In those texts, Courtney asked if “players should be paid 100% in empty ballparks?”
“You guys should just ignore. Let Tony hang himself,” Murray replied, referring to MLBPA president Tony Clark.
The MLBPA says those are just a few of the hundreds of texts and emails between Murray and Major League Baseball executives during that time period.
Both the agent and MLB tried to downplay the ban and what led to it
Murray, through his attorney, claims he was not “banned” by the MLBPA, but instead came to a settlement on Wednesday – a day before the matter was to be heard by an arbitrator. This despite the MLBPA memo referring to “Mr. Murray’s ban.”
“James Murray was not banned by the MLBPA; rather, Mr. Murray voluntarily agreed to a resolution that permits him to continue to provide certain services to current and future players, while taking a step back from player contracts for a period of time,” Murray’s attorney Christina Sarchio said in a statement Friday. “Within hours of the resolution — and on the same day that an article about the criminal investigation into the MLBPA was published – the MLBPA distributed selective information to players that tried to portray Mr. Murray as negatively as possible while failing to tell the whole story by providing Mr. Murray’s appeal.”
Major League Baseball also feigned innocence. “In the history of labor negotiations in baseball, player representatives have often reached out to the commissioner’s office to express their views, and help facilitate an agreement between the parties,” League spokesperson Glen Caplin said in a statement.