[swabie2424]

Also read “Mint Condition” by Jamieson. Whole chapter devoted to this.

The key here is Marvin Miller battled Topps for several reasons. Yeah, he got the players some extra money and made a progressive and visionary deal to make the union self funding, which was important as it had little/no resources. He also got language into the contract that gave the union rights to bargain all collective deals for the players, but the biggest thing was he proved to the players the union could get things done for them. He gained their trust in the process. Remember he came from steelworkers union with an economics background and was a relative outsider. This deal built the foundation for him to gain the juice to take on the league on major issues (obviously free agency being one of the biggest.) It’s an absolute master class in trade unionism. Miller remains a huge hero to those of in the labor world.