Former Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig was – and still is – the target of wrath from hard core baseball fans who blame him for the stain that performance enhancing substances put on the game in the late 1990’s.
Looking back now, perhaps some of those who’ve griped about Selig would consider taking another look at his body of work. You can make a strong argument for Selig being the best Commissioner MLB has ever had. Not because he did everything right. He didn’t. The collective bargaining mess that happened late in 1994 and spilled over into 1995 happened under his watch. And up until now, it was the ugliest period in baseball history.
Still, Selig – a former season ticket holder for the Milwaukee Braves who bought the Seattle Pilots and moved them to Milwaukee in 1970 – was always a fan first, and a businessman second. He cared about what was best for the game, and after 1995, made sure that there was never another damaging work stoppage under his watch. Bud grew the game like no one else ever has.
Contrast that with the guy who followed him behind the Commissioner’s desk. The guy self-proclaimed “transactional attorney” who called the World Series trophy “a piece of metal” and who smiled, lied and practiced his golf swing while announcing the cancellation of big league baseball games.
Rob Manfred – an employee of the owners – isn’t the reason there’s an on-going lockout doing serious damage to Major League Baseball. He’s a symbol. A sign that these owners – the supposed caretakers of the game – don’t care about the game itself anymore. For them, it’s just an investment opportunity. And according to Manfred, not all that great of one.
Unlike Selig, the guy currently representing the 30 MLB owners is not a fan-first and doesn’t have the best interests of the game or it’s players at the forefront of his thought process. He’s worried only about the bottom line of those who employ him. Just like they do.
Therefore, it’s time for the Players to take control of the game they actually do care about.
Just spitballin’ here, but what if there was a way that the employees became the employers?
A players league. Where it was product first, mega profit second.
While rich owners play a significant role in the success of an organization – think Pat Bowlen, Robert Kraft, Jerry Buss, etc – there is no product without the players. Remember when the NFL owners (1987) and the MLB owners (1995) each thought they could just throw out anyone in a uniform on the field (“replacement players” they called it) and fans would be glad to pay to watch? They were wrong.
Without the elite players, there are no phat TV deals.
So what if the players organized a little better on the business side and along with their agents and attorney’s formed…wait for it…A League of Their Own?
A players league could still have 30 teams, could make agreements with minor league affiliates (remember the current MLB owners are cutting ties with a lot of the low level minor league clubs and forcing them to become independents) and most importantly, cut their own TV and media deals.
There are plenty of ballparks that could be renovated and used to play games in – think about all the spring training sites that are owned by the local municipalities they reside in. The city of Omaha owns TD Ameritrade Park, home of the College World Series. That would be a fine place for a new player-run Royals-type organization to land, for example.
There are other towns that would be willing partners that could build new ballparks and facilities.
The players would do a much better job of promoting their membership via social media, for example. It was recently brought to my attention that the Miami Heat’s Tyler Herro has a better social media following than Mike Trout. That being the case, it’s up to the MLB players to improve the profile of their high profile players.
The current MLB owners couldn’t care less.
The idea of alternate leagues has been tried in football recently. Before the pandemic, the new XFL seemed to be heading in the right direction. The new USFL debuts soon, and the revamped XFL will follow, owned by a group that includes Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. They have different business models that could be used as a template.
What they don’t have is that an alternate baseball league could feature the best players on the planet.
Imagine what an XFL-style baseball league, where the players – collectively – were the principal owners, could do when they did have the best players on the planet taking the field?
This might seem over the top considering that the current owners and players are likely to get to a point of some sort of agreement in time to play the great majority of the season. But the issues aren’t going away, and the next time they have to negotiate a deal, it will be more of the same…
Unless….
Unless the players have an alternative place of employment. That would change everything.
More from The Woody Paige Sports Network:
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- Woody Paige: Ranking the Denver Broncos head coaching candidates
- Woody Paige: A tribute to the legendary John Madden
