For the first time since the mid-1990s, the MLB season will have regular-season games canceled over a labor dispute. Michael LeRoy, an expert in labor law and labor relations at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, spoke with News Bureau business and law editor Phil Ciciora about the years-in-the-making labor strife engulfing professional baseball.

The owners locked the players out in early December. For the average baseball fan, what’s the difference between a lockout and a strike?

For the average fan, there’s no major difference, but it does matter down the road for a possible complaint to the National Labor Relations Board. A “defensive lockout”– as the owners call it – occurs when an employer seeks to affect the timing of a labor dispute. The last collective bargaining agreement between Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association expired Dec. 1, which is much better timing for the owners than a contract that expires April 1 and exposes them to a strike on Opening Day.

The apparent impasse was essentially foretold long before the December lockout. Both sides have been preparing for this possibility for five years.

How does the current imbroglio compare with baseball labor strife of the past?

Generally speaking, players’ unions in the four major professional sports – MLB, NFL, NBA and the NHL – have lost most strikes and lockouts. However, this is already the second most pivotal labor dispute in professional baseball, ranking only behind the colossal...