[Hendu Style]

One of the unexpected impacts of World War II on baseball was the art of negotiation between players and owners. The Reserve Clause gave all negotiating leverage to a team that drafted a player. But if a player were to enlist and fight in World War II, he would be granted the right to choose which team he played for upon his return to SimNation. The very threat of leaving for War, in fact, gave players a rare bargaining chip.

Take, for example, the case of Bill Bedford. The Irontown first baseman was coming off of his second straight MVP campaign, and had led the Black Sox to their first winning season (87-75) since 1950, and just their third winning season in the last 21 years. Attendance had nearly doubled at 1.3 million fans that season, and their end-of-year balance had spiked from a *loss* of $100,000 in 1955 to a *profit* of $1,000,000 in 1958. When the Irontown front office got wind of Bedford considering enlistment, they immediately came to their slugger with a salary increase to $100,700, making him baseball's first 100-thousand dollar player.

It made good fiscal sense for Irontown. Pay a guy an extra $40,000 a year (he had made $60,000 the year prior), keep a competitive team on the field, and get a solid reputation among players from around the league. This, of course, rubbed some owners the wrong way. Bayouville owner Tom Elkins felt that all players were lucky to be playing baseball, and should take whatever salary owners deemed appropriate. This was the prevailing wisdom among baseball, but players were finally beginning to see the light. Perhaps it was the owners who were lucky to have the players...