The Keepers of Baseball
On Saturday, Phil Sheridan published a piece in the Inquirer entitled, It’s time for Fehr, Selig to go. He basically chastises them for reigning over two of baseball’s biggest black eyes: the strike of ’94 and the current steroids conflagration. This is definitely warranted, but is not sufficient rationale to call for their sacking. Rather, these two issues arose due to systemic deficiencies within the management of MLB and MLBPA. Both individuals are only the latest incarnations of baseball royalty, a lineage that is so detached from the day-to-day workings of baseball that it is no wonder these problems have surfaced. Last year, in commenting on the impending NHL lockout, John Kruk argued that Donald Fehr runs the union more like a dictatorship than a democracy. It’s known the commissioner wields broad powers backed by baseball’s anti-trust exemption — guaranteed in 1922 and implicitly again in 1998. Therefore the apparent incompatibility of Bud Selig and Donald Fehr should not be surprising. The two are nothing more than the latest example of baseball’s structural dilemma. Their replacements will inevitablity follow in their predeceor’s footsteps.
