Hope is supposed to spring eternal for baseball fans on opening day. But it will take wild-eyed optimism, naiveté and/or a case of amnesia for a fan to be confident that what is set to begin well this Sunday will end well in October.

Commissioner Bud Selig pledged this week not to lock out the players or unilaterally impose a new collective bargaining agreement during the course of the season. But the union, with some justification, sees that statement as a near declaration of war, not a peace offering.

For one thing, the pledge is self-serving. It's better for owners to lock out players or impose an agreement during the off-season, before players' guaranteed contracts are signed. Once the season has begun, ownership has more to lose than the players in a work action because of the loss of ticket and broadcast revenue.

For another, the pledge can be seen as a threat. Major League Baseball Players Association Executive Director Don Fehr said Selig's statement shows he is planning to try to impose a new agreement immediately after the season. And because Fehr sees that as ownership's intention, he won't rule out a strike this season.

Marvin Miller, the union's former executive director and the man credited (or blamed) with making the MLBPA arguably the nation's most powerful union, told me this week that he thinks a strike would be the wisest strategy for the union, unless management drops its demands for significant changes in the game's economic structure.

Bud Selig's pledge not to lock out players was taken by the union as a declaration of war, not a peace offering.

"What the owners are doing calls for a strike," Miller said. "I think it's fair to say owners are on track to commit same errors as in 1994. But I'm the last person to ask if there will be a strike because I don't have any management connections. I can't say how far management is going to go being stupid again."

Management and union spokesmen both say on-the-record that they are hopeful of reaching an agreement at the bargaining table without a work stoppage. But if they do, it'll be the first time that has happened since baseball, not football or lawsuits, was indisputably the national pastime.

"We want to get to the bargaining table and get it done," said union spokesman Greg Bouris. "Is it idealistic to think that's possible? Maybe, given the history. But we're still committed to getting it done in negotiations."

What the owners are doing calls for a strike. I think it's fair to say owners are on track to commit same errors as in 1994. Marvin Miller Former players union executive director

Still the two sides are far apart in their positions on two key issues that affect how much money teams have to spend on player salaries - the sharing of ticket sales, television money and other local revenue between franchises, and a management proposal, known as a luxury or payroll tax, that would impose a penalty on teams that spend the most on player salaries, shifting those payments to the low payroll teams.

At this point the players recommend raising revenue sharing to 22.5 percent of local revenue from the current 20 percent level, while owners seek sharing 50 percent of revenue. And players concerned that a payroll tax will effectively limit the total amount teams will spend on salaries, oppose any kind of tax. In addition management says it is still committed to its plans to disband two teams, eliminating 50 major league roster spots, before next season, a move the union successfully held off during this past off-season.

Unless this considerable distance can be closed at the bargaining table, some kind of work stoppage is looming.

One team executive told me he had wanted Selig to lock out players and impose a freeze on contract signings when the last agreement expired immediately after last year's World Series. He was not alone, and the union knows that is many owners' desire again this year.

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In the past, the union has been willing to go on a pre-emptive strike when it believed an off-season lockout was in the works -- even if that strike means the loss of months of games and pay.

The players know that their leverage ends with the last pitch of the Series. Their only chance to block management once the season ends is to go to court. Given the game's history, it's a promising but by no means certain avenue.

There are close observers of the game who believe that a strike will be avoided this time. They believe the union is reluctant to stop the games after the last strike cost baseball the 1994 postseason and did untold damage to fans' loyalties.

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"My best guess is they won't strike," said Andrew Zimbalist, a professor of economics at Smith College who has advised the union in the past. "They know they'll hurt the game and themselves too much if they strike. I don't think they'll tip their hand right now - I'm sure they'll make it sound like they're willing to strike. But my best guess is players will fight the owners with litigation."

But Miller said he would not recommend shying away from a strike even though he's confident that the union would win the legal battle Zimbalist envisions.

"My feeling is never count on an arbitrator or courts," said Miller. "You may think you know how it will come out but don't count on it. A strike you can count on because you only call a strike when you know you can win."