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Baseball's long-standing problems start at the top

If we're to learn anything from our national pastime, it's that if we just ignore our problems, they will conveniently go away. For this has been the mantra of the powers that be in Major League Baseball over the last decade or so. Close your ears, close your eyes, pretend it will all go away. Pretend there's no problem. This way of thinking is nothing new, of course - such logic has been employed for years by alcoholics everywhere.

Now, what were once small, manageable problems have grown and multiplied into great big problems, shattering the image and respectability of the once-sacred game of baseball. But that should come as no surprise given the MLB's central leadership - namely commissioner Bud Selig.

With all the gusto of a used car salesman, Selig keeps sweet-talking his way out of every problem, saying all the right things, trying to convince us he knows what he's doing. He's been pulling this shtick for years - and what does he have to show for it? Not a single thing. Things have only gotten worse since he took over as commish.

Sure, the ratings are good - and to someone like Selig, maybe that's all that matters. But the game is hardly in tip-top shape - and everyone knows it. All those unresolved issues that Selig and his executive branch have been avoiding for so long are still on the table, growing more and more glaring every year. Steroids. Overexpansion. Competitive imbalance, revenue sharing, salary caps. The list goes on.

Hop over to the other side of the sports spectrum, to the National Football League and its head honcho, Paul Tagliabue, and you'll find a stark contrast. The NFL, or any pro sports league for that matter, could be just as susceptible to the same problems that plague baseball today. The NFL could be in the exact same state as the MLB. Except, of course, Tagliabue and the NFL solved all of these problems years ago. (You know, before they had the chance to become serious and tarnish the league as we know it.)

Baseball fans should have been so lucky.

Thanks to Selig's "leadership," baseball finds itself at a crisis, while the NFL is flourishing like no other sport ever has.

Selig calls himself a friend of the small-market teams. So how is it that he has let competitive imbalance get this far out of whack? Since the early '90s - notably the advent of open-market free agency - the face of sports has changed forever for one reason: money, of course. Money is at the root of all of baseball's problems - and all of the NFL's successes. Selig and his minions have failed (or refused) to understand the need for a salary cap and a fair revenue-sharing system. Tagliabue and the NFL's owners, on the other hand, implemented a salary cap and equal revenue-sharing almost immediately, once modern free agency went into effect, way back in 1994, preempting the kind of disaster that the MLB faces right now.

And now, the MLB's gross failure in this regard has resulted in competitive imbalance of ridiculously lopsided proportions. As salaries and payrolls continue to skyrocket (without, of course, any kind of salary cap as a safety net), the financial disparity between the big- and small-market teams grows with each season. The rich get richer, the poor get poorer. In a sport where a $100 million payroll was big news as recently as a few years ago, the payroll of the New York Yankees now approaches $200 million, while small-market clubs like Montreal and Tampa Bay hover around the $20-30 million mark year after year. If baseball followed the lead of the NFL, league profits would be split evenly among every team, thus assuring a level playing field (so to speak).

Some might ask, If this is such an obvious solution, why hasn't it happened after all these years? Three words: George Bleeping Steinbrenner, the tyrannical Yankees owner himself. I know, I know - it's much too simplistic and narrow-minded to point to one person as the scapegoat. But let me put it to you this way: George Steinbrenner is Halliburton. He's Big Tobacco. He's the NRA. He may not officially have executive power, but trust me - he's got Bud Selig in his back pocket. He's a neighborhood bully with a billionaire's bankroll.

Without Steinbrenner, baseball might have a fair revenue-sharing program in place. There might be a salary cap in place. It stands to reason - I mean, practically every owner in both leagues knows these things need to happen. Every owner, of course, except Steinbrenner. No, Steinbrenner likes things just the way they are - he can do whatever he wants, sign whomever he wants, spend as much as he wants. No limits. No restraints.

The only safeguard levied on the Yanks' spending habits came two years ago, when the owners voted to assess a luxury tax on any team whose payroll exceeded $117 million. Only one owner voted against the proposal. Anyone have any guesses?

Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?

Still, that hasn't stopped Steinbrenner from spending.

But despite the facts, and despite the overwhelming consensus among baseball's owners and fans, nothing gets done. Selig may say the right things - he may even believe the right things. But when it comes to the MLB's most powerful owner of its most lucrative franchise, Selig dons his Cowardly Lion suit and bows down. (After all, we wouldn't want to upset The Boss, now would we?) But the fact remains - competitive imbalance is a problem, one that will only continue to get worse. And baseball's balance of power will continue to be distorted until it's solved.

Oh yeah . . . and wasn't there a little steroids problem, too?

This, too, is an issue that should have already been taken care of. There have been whispers and rumors and grumblings for years. As home run totals - not to mention biceps - ballooned to never-before-seen levels, steroid abuse became the worst-kept secret in sports. As McGwire and Sosa chased Roger Maris in '98, the whispers grew louder. When former MVPs Jose Canseco and Ken Caminiti came out and admitted rampant steroid use, it turned into an all-out yell. And with the ongoing BALCO controversy, it's finally hit the fan. And all this time, Selig has done nothing. He's told us that he needs "definitive proof" before anything can be done, while desperately trying to cover up the yellow streak running down his back.

On this and practically every other issue, Tagliabue and the NFL have gotten it done right. The NFL warded off its steroid problem years ago, before it had the chance to become a national controversy. Nowadays, the league boasts a strict drug treatment and suspension program.

When the NFL faced a public outcry over poor officiating a few years ago, it wasn't long before the league re-installed a much-needed instant replay system.

Most recently, the NFL faced a big challenge when college underclassman Maurice Clarett challenged the NFL's eligibility rules (one must be three years removed from high school to be eligible), arguing that prospects should be allowed to enter the draft immediately following high school. While Clarett won the initial case (thanks to a short-sighted judge, I might add), Tagliabue was quick to respond. Knowing how damaging such a rule change would be to both pro and college football - not to mention countless unwitting 18-year-olds - Tagliabue and the league's lawyers immediately got to work on the appeals process, and the verdict has been overturned. Were Selig in charge of the NFL, he'd probably let the problem build for a decade or so before even acknowledging it.

The difference is clear - Paul Tagliabue has undeniable foresight, and the NFL has reaped the benefits. Bud Selig has only hindsight - and trust me, that sight ain't pretty. Tags would never allow a steroid problem to get so out of hand. He would never allow the league's balance of power to become so skewed. And he would certainly never allow a new franchise to call itself the Devil Rays.

Solving baseball's problems might not be as easy as I make it sound. There's a lot of red tape to go through to get things done - owners' groups, the players' union and so forth. But somehow, the NFL has managed to work through all that and solve its problems before they really became problems, while the MLB has floundered into a quagmire of drugs, greed and decidedly unfair play. Commissioner Selig has kept those blinders on real tight. He intoxicates himself on baseball's highs - McGwire's and Sosa's run for 61, Barry Bonds' run for 73, Cal Ripken's Iron Man record, the Red Sox-Yankees ALCS - and hides behind the illusion that baseball's problems are solved.

But he better get himself back to earth quick, 'cause those problems are catching up with him. It would be tragic to see baseball - at its heart, still the purest sport of 'em all - suffer the same fate as boxing, where years of unchecked corruption finally caught up to the sport and reduced it to a page 3 afterthought. If things keep up, baseball will continue to be taken less and less seriously as the years pass by. (I mean, really, the Devil Rays?)

Hopefully, such a fate doesn't await the MLB. No one can say for certain. But I can promise that, unless things change, baseball's best days are gone for good. National pastime, indeed.

Copyright © 2004 by Chris Bellamy

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