Leaders too quick to bow

SHELTON E-mail: Click here Archive

© St. Petersburg Times
published August 31, 2002

Now, I suppose, we cheer.

After a brief pause to pat its own back, baseball bravely marches on. Yay. For once, there will not be a strike. Rah. The sides have voted to continue to make multimillions. Whoopie.

This is the reaction Bud and Don, the bobbleheads in the front of the room, wish for you to have this morning.

The baseball players aren't striking? Wonderful. Where can we get tickets? Lots of tickets.

This is terrific stuff. Players and owners are making millions, and now they want applause because, by golly, they're going to keep on doing it! In further developments, Adam Sandler announced he will continue to make movies.

Yep, this is historic, all right. We know this because Bud Selig used "historic" a historic number of times Friday, when baseball met throughout the night and decided, pending ratification of owners and players, not to cut its own throat. Now, we are expected to forget about the knife.

Yippee.

Details? Oh, Bud and Don didn't want to talk about details! Bud and Don wanted to take a few bows and tell you how wonderful it was that a sport that has punched its fans in the gut eight times in 30 years wasn't going to be doing it again. Not that it doesn't reserve the right to do so in the future.

You would have thought these guys had reached an accord on the Gaza Strip. Selig played the part of the grand peacemaker. Fehr kept thanking everyone, as if he had won the Nobel Peace Prize. The rest of us? We were supposed to throw confetti.

What arrogance. For almost a year, Selig has told you what a horrible, awful situation baseball was in, how it was on its deathbed and could expire at any moment. Now, when the sickness supposedly has been healed, he wants to keep its condition a secret.

It was also precious when Selig quoted the Beatles, which made most of us feel, oh, about 117 years old. If John Lennon were alive, that would have killed him. It was the worst quotation of a rock star since Reagan quoted Springsteen, maybe since Hugh Culverhouse quoted Dionne Warwick.

Bottom line: Is baseball better today than it was yesterday?

Answer: Yes. But not as much as we'd hoped.

There is a lingering suspicion that baseball didn't go far enough. It applied a larger bandage than you might have believed, and it did it faster than you would have expected. But don't take this to be a cure.

Baseball still has competitive imbalance, economic disparity and the threat of contraction, although it has been delayed until 2007. Baseball still has arbitration, infighting and inflated expectations of its fans.

Worst of all, baseball still has Bud and Don.

If nothing else, you would have enjoyed the news conference if Selig and Fehr had taken the chance to say this was their last fight. That both were handing whatever traces of leadership over to the next guy.

It's time, guys. If those who love the game of baseball want to continue to love the sport of baseball -- and if you think those two are the same, you haven't been paying attention -- then it's time for new leadership.

Fehr? For a long time, owners have suspected this is all about Fehr, about Fehr's ego, about Fehr's wallet. Maybe that isn't true. But in the line of negotiating contracts, perception is a big part.

Selig? His credibility tank is empty, and his time is up. For one thing, he absolutely refuses to let you feel good about his sport. You know that guy in your office who hates baseball, who constantly tells you what a waste of time it is? Over the past 10 months, that guy hasn't ripped baseball as often as Selig has.

So, how good is this deal? It depends on what you thought was achievable. It isn't as good as full revenue sharing and a salary cap, for instance. It didn't level the playing field. But the players did take a backward step, and peace was achieved.

Look, I'm tickled on every rib the players aren't going to strike. For one thing, who wanted to read the daily stories in which each side postured? Who wants to listen to fans say they'll never go back? Ha. Fans always go back. Except in Tampa Bay, where they have been protesting a strike for years.

Still, for the teams holding a tin cup outward, it's something. It could allow a team, say a local team, to sign a player, for instance B.J. Upton. It could allow a smart team to retain a player or two it might have lost otherwise.

And if the team isn't smart?

Well, it will pay for a Wilson Alvarez or two, too.

According to reports, the new deal will transfer millions from the top teams to the bottom ones, which will allow them to buy all the Wilson Alvarezes they desire. It's going to take some money out of George Steinbrenner's wallet and put in the pockets of small-market owners.

What we do not know at this point is how the small-market owners will spend it. If I were Steinbrenner, this would drive my blood pressure through the top of my scalp. It's one thing to pay a luxury tax so teams can try to beat yours. It's another to pay for an owner's vacation home in the Hamptons. There should have been some guarantee the new money would be spent the right way.

Instead, we'll have to wait and see. And trust baseball to make it work.

The Beatles said something about that, too.

It was called The Fool on the Hill.

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