The Summer Games are scheduled to take place in Los Angeles that year, and Major League Baseball and the Players Association are already working out the cost and logistics of sending big leaguers to international tournaments.
“Obviously, the WBC is great, but it’s not the Olympics,” Harper said Friday in Houston. Where he is playing for Team USA in WBC. “This is no disrespect to the WBC or anything. But everyone knows when the Olympics are on, everyone is watching. It doesn’t matter what sport it is. It could be the most random sport and it has all the fans watching. I hope there will be LA ’28.”
MLB Commissioner Rob Manfred believes that will happen.
“We’re a lot closer to there than the last time we talked about it,” Manfred said after last month’s league owners meeting. “There are some issues with the MLBPA that we need to resolve. I feel a lot of momentum toward playing in L.A. in 2028. I think we’ll overcome those issues. I think people are beginning to appreciate that the Olympics on American soil is a unique marketing opportunity for sports.
“We have a lot of players that are interested in doing it, and I feel pretty good about the idea that we’ll get there.”
Players union head Bruce Meyer confirmed on Saturday that active discussions were underway.
The scheduling for the league and union is top notch. MLB wants to fit the All-Star Game and the Olympics into the same summer break, extending the league’s normal downtime to half of its calendar.
The league and players could potentially accommodate the Olympics without moving the All-Star Game to its normal Tuesday date. Attempts to reschedule it would affect another stakeholder, Fox, which broadcasts the game.
The league office believes it would make the most sense geographically to play the All-Star Game on the West Coast in 2028, said a person briefed on the league’s thinking who was not authorized to speak publicly. It has not yet awarded the Midsummer Classic to a host city, but San Francisco is the frontrunner, the San Francisco Standard reports.
The Giants have not hosted an All-Star Game since 2007. A formal bidding process has to begin before the host can be finalised.
MLB players are required to have insurance to play in the WBC, and that will certainly be the case during the Olympics. MLB teams will want protection for their investments, and players will not risk their salaries to participate.
But insurance has thrown the WBC into crisis, with star players turned away because the policy won’t cover them – a problem that may only increase in the run-up to the Olympics.
Insurance issues are unique to MLB, where players receive higher salaries than their counterparts in other top baseball leagues. For example, the Japan national team has never signed a player away from the WBC due to insurance concerns, according to a Japanese baseball official who was not authorized to speak publicly.
“From an ownership standpoint, I completely understand it,” Harper said. “As players and owners, we have to come to a compromise that works for everyone… understanding that you can get injured playing during the regular season, you can get injured playing during the Olympics.
“And I think if you look at it the hockey way, you look at it. Sidney Crosby got hurt and missed the gold medal game. And his team knows he’s going to be in that tournament. So you just have to understand that it’s real. It can happen.
“But there’s nothing like representing your country.”
For insurance and all other costs, the league and federation must figure out which party – the league, the federation or the Olympic organizing committee – pays the bill.
In that vein, housing will be part of the discussion. Would MLB players be comfortable living in the Olympic Village?
Also to be determined is what will happen to the rest of the league’s players, including those who are not participating in the All-Star Game or the Olympics. MLB may try to hold exhibitions during that time to keep them fresh and keep fans from coming through the gates.
MLB has not sent a team to the Olympics before.
However, the National Hockey League has often sent its players to winter sports, and if hockey’s negotiation process is any indication, baseball could run through 2027.
The NHL and its players’ union announced an agreement for the 2026 Winter Olympics in July of 2025, less than a year before the competition began.
In baseball, the Olympic discussion will likely be factored into the overall collective bargaining negotiations between the league and union, which are scheduled to begin in the next few months. But if necessary, after the completion of general bargaining, both the parties can reach a separate agreement.
“I’m hopeful that the next (collective bargaining) agreement can be reached where teams and players can come to an agreement on taking a two-week break, especially if it’s in our home country,” Harper said. “It would be great for baseball.”
Two years ago, Casey Wasserman, an entertainment executive and head of the organizing effort for the 2028 LA Games, met with MLB owners to discuss the potential of bringing big leaguers to the games.
However, Wasserman’s future leading LA28 is in limbo following the Justice Department’s disclosure of files related to Jeffrey Epstein, who committed suicide in his jail cell in August 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex trafficking charges. Wasserman’s name appeared in the documents. He has said that he has had no contact with Epstein in 20 years.
Asked last month whether he worried that an association with Epstein would be harmful to baseball, Manfred said he “don’t like answering hypothetical questions.” Manfred then said that MLB’s efforts to participate in the Olympics are not dependent on Wasserman.
“Look, we’re not dealing with Casey,” Manfred said. “Our relationship is with the Olympic organization.”
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