ALL THE COMMISSIONER’S MEN
Looks like it won’t be easy replacing Bud
HIS HALL OF FAME legacy now secured as the commissioner who presided over historic revenue growth (from $1.2 billion in 1972 to an estimated $9 billion by the end of 2014), record franchise values (average team value now $1 billion), 20 years of labor peace, 22 new ballparks and, perhaps most importantly, the most comprehensive drug-testing program in all of professional sports, Bud Selig now begins his victory lap to his retirement, Jan.24 of next year. But is it? Selig has said it time and again — as recently as a couple of weeks ago when we talked on the phone about his 22-year commissionership, second-longest in baseball history to the first commissioner, Kenesaw Mountain Landis, who served from 1919 to his death in 1944 — “I’m done.” And as sure as he intends to go on a sort of farewell tour to all the major league parks this season, interacting, as Mariano Rivera did, with fans and workers in baseball, Selig is ready to hand off the baton to his successor with plenty of time to separate himself from the expiration of the current labor agreement in 2016. But who will that successor be? That is the $9 billion question. Because right now, with less than a year to go in Selig’s commissionership, the owners have no idea. In a few weeks, Selig is said to be convening a meeting of the Executive Council, most of which is comprised of his closest owner allies, to discuss the issue of his successor and presumably put together a search committee. But as one baseball official said Friday: “When in doubt, put it off.” In other words, considering the circumstances and the difficulty of finding someone, especially outside of baseball, who could muster the necessary 24 votes needed to win the job, one would have thought a search panel would have been put in place long ago. Even Selig conceded in our conversation there is probably no one right now who could get the votes.
The closest, most baseball people I surveyed agreed, is Rob Manfred, Selig’s No. 2 man who has been MLB’s chief negotiator through all this labor peace, as well as the man who brokered the historic drug agreement with the union, then served as the enforcer of it with his successful prosecution of Alex Rodriguez and all the other Biogenesis steroids cheats. But as one Manfred supporter told me: “I think Rob is definitely the right guy, the most logical guy given his record of accomplishment in the labor and drug agreements — which would seem to give him a leg up on the other people in baseball like ( Tim) Brosnan (executive VP/business) and (Bob) Bowman (CEO of baseball advanced media). The problem is, in that job, you can’t help but make enemies.” Another baseball person said: “I have no idea who the next commissioner will be, but it’s going to be very hard for anyone to get the votes, and especially hard for someone outside of baseball with the unknown factor.” (From the outside, the one name most mentioned is deputy National Hockey League commissioner Bill Daly, the bulldog labor attorney who negotiated the hardest of all salary caps in professional sports, albeit after canceling an entire season).
“For 20 years,” the baseball person continued, “Bud has managed to keep all the owners reined in, but with him leaving, you’ve suddenly got 30 owners feeling like Hercules unchained, with 30 different agendas, especially the newer ones who were never in Bud’s inner circle.”
For this reason, a lot of people in baseball still believe Selig will stay on another year. “If, at the end of season, the owners come to him and say, ‘We don’t have anyone who can get the 24 votes,’ I can’t see Bud walking away and telling them to figure it out,” one official said. But as another countered: “Eventually someone is going to have to get the votes. There’s no way Bud is going to jeopardize his legacy by getting involved in another labor negotiation.”
Which brings us to the issues the next commissioner, whoever that may be, is going to need to address:
Continuing payroll disparity
Even with increased rev
enue sharing, the small- and middle-market clubs are still distressed over the high cost of retaining their best players. The 2015 labor negotiations may well return to the rancorous old days, with the owners again pushing for a salary cap and a much stricter luxury tax.
The designated hitter
It remains absurd that baseball is the only sport with different rules for each league, especially with interleague play now expanded to an everyday affair. The DH — which the American League first adopted in 1973 as a means of creating more offense while extending the playing days of veteran sluggers such as Orlando Cepeda and Hank Aaron — has lost its usefulness. If you don’t believe that, just look at the decrease of production by DH’s. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the 29.1 atbats per home run ratio for DH’s in 2013 was the lowest since 1992 and, in reality, there are only two or three pure DH’s ( David Ortiz, Kendry Morales) left in baseball. “The union continues to believe the DH is a highsalaried position they don’t want to give up,” said one owner. “But in reality, it isn’t. Look around and most of the DH’s today are extra guys off the bench who don’t scare anyone. What the union needs to understand is we’re gonna spend the money anyway on other positions.”
September roster disparity
This is another absurd baseball rule — or rather non rule — that must be addressed. It is inconceivable that for years baseball has allowed the integrity of the game to be compromised by allowing teams to have as many players as they want at their disposal for the most important games of the season. “I don’t know why it’s taken so long for us to get this right,” said one executive. “Some clubs want to bring up all their kids to get a look at them, while other clubs don’t want to bring them up and give them service time, especially if they’re not going to play. Clubs should be allowed to call up as many players as they want, but there should be a limit to the number of players who are eligible to play in each game. It ain’t that hard, but somehow we’ve made it hard.”
The T.B / Oakland situations
Neither one of these franchises can continue to operate in its current venue. One owner said, if it were up to him, he’d contract them both. That’s not going to happen, but neither Selig nor any successor is going to take away the Giants’ territorial rights to San Jose (for fear of opening up a pandora’s box on territorial rights everywhere), so the A’s are going to have to find a suitable stadium site in Oakland. And the Rays are going to have to somehow be allowed to move across the causeway to Tampa.
For all Selig has accomplished in his two decades of rule, there is still a lot of heavy lifting ahead for his successor. The heaviest lifting, however, may be just getting the votes to be that
next commissioner.