Sports Illustrated: Why Bud Selig Should Not Be in the HOF

[Machado13]

And how would Selig have come up with a salary cap? He was up against the most powerful sports players union that has ever existed.

He cancelled an entire postseason and wasn't able to get the players to budge at all, not even an increase in free agent compensation. Let alone impose a salary cap.

I don't like Selig, but blaming him for the lack of a salary cap is like blaming someone because it's snowing. Totally out of his control. As long as the union is strong, and, unlike NFL players, MLB players have long careers and are willing to give up an entire season if necessary to prevent any kind of significant change to the system to limit their earning potential because one year out of a 10+ year career isnt' that much... baseball will NOT have a salary cap.

I'm not blaming him directly for no salary cap...I agree with your point about strength of union.

Just think for a guy who owned a small market team; he totally neglected small markets. Just witness what happened in San Diego recently. I live in SD now and padres fans are livid about selig plaza at the park.

I just don't think he did enough for baseball. It's only the past few years where mlb was losing it's relevance and grip that they started opening up to the times.

Baseball is the only professional North American sport where like 20 teams simply do not have a chance just because of the landscape. And there should be a cap and one day maybe there will be; otherwise just make it a 6 team league

Dodgers, angels, Yankees, Red Sox, giants, cards...

Maybe make it 10 with cubs, phillies, blue jays and Texas

[crawjo]

And yet baseball enjoys more parity than the NFL, which has a salary cap, and the NBA, which also has a salary cap. Saying that MLB is a defacto 10-team league just ignores reality completely. Small and mid-market teams have shown themselves to be very competitive in recent years.

Just look at the standings last year. The Orioles, Royals, A's, and Pirates all did very well. In the last decade the smallest markets, like Milwaukee, Tampa, and Minnesota, have also seen real success.

[DrungoHazewood]

The Hall put Bowie Kuhn in. Bowie Kuhn. They have a fa?ade of independence, but they know who runs the show. Bud will skate into the Hall.

[DrungoHazewood]

And yet baseball enjoys more parity than the NFL, which has a salary cap, and the NBA, which also has a salary cap. Saying that MLB is a defacto 10-team league just ignores reality completely. Small and mid-market teams have shown themselves to be very competitive in recent years.

Just look at the standings last year. The Orioles, Royals, A's, and Pirates all did very well. In the last decade the smallest markets, like Milwaukee, Tampa, and Minnesota, have also seen real success.

Bud did a very good job in wrangling a plan B when he knew they'd never be able to implement real parity (i.e. expanded playoffs, luxury taxes and the like). But you just can't trust him. I don't think he has integrity. At his core he's still the used car dealer that he was 50 years ago. That's why I don't like him.

[25 Nuggets]

http://www.si.com/mlb/2015/01/26/bud-selig-commissioner-hall-fame

Why is this even a question? The only reason why he'll get in is because he's buddies with the right people.

[25 Nuggets]

The Hall put Bowie Kuhn in. Bowie Kuhn. They have a fa?ade of independence, but they know who runs the show. Bud will skate into the Hall.

Pretty much. Oh and Marvin Miller is still outside looking in.

[OFFNY]

The Hall put Bowie Kuhn in. Bowie Kuhn. They have a fa?ade of independence, but they know who runs the show. Bud will skate into the Hall.

Bowie "I Was Wrong About Everything" Kuhn:

Let's Talk About How Wrong Bowie Kuhn Was About Basically Everything

(By Emma Span)

http://oldtimefamilybaseball.com/post/73886697009/everything-bowie-kuhn-wrong

[spiritof66]

To me, the questions of Bud Selig's legacy and whether he deserves enshrinement in the HoF are pretty simple. If he's to be judged by the financial well-being of the club owners while he was commissioner, he deserves praise and a plaque. If he's to be judged by how well he served the progress and integrity of MLB, he deserves neither. I'd like to think that the HofF belongs to the fans and the public, but that's probably naive. Election to the Hall belongs to the media, and that's not too different from having it belong to the clubs whose interest Selig served.

What really grinds my gears about Selig :angryfire: is his constantly pointing out, and taking credit for, the small steps taken that promote competitive balance, like the wild card (not really competitive balance, but let that go for now), sharing of some revenues and the luxury tax. During the last World Series, he suggested that he had pretty much fixed the problems of competitive imbalance that he had inherited:

"The '90s were painful. We had to change the whole economic structure," Selig, 80, said. "So today there's hope and faith in Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, the Twin Cities, on and on and on. As a result, baseball is so much stronger and so much better."

I hadn't noticed that the "whole economic structure" of baseball has changed in the past 15-20 years, but maybe I just missed it.

Apart from the facts -- some of the teams Bud listed had success in the 90s, and is there really much hope of contending today in Cincy and the Twin Cities? -- you'll note that he cited only teams (he also was including, by implication, the Royals) from the Central Divisions. Those divisions do not have teams from the largest markets, and the Central franchises from the largest market, Chicago, generally have been run with an ineptness that may be exceeded only by that of the Mets. I doubt that Bud deserves credit for the fact that many of the teams with the most financial resources (the Mets, the Dodgers until recently, the Chicago teams, the NYY and Red Sox at least temporarily, the BJs, and now the Phillies) at times have been managed badly enough that their less affluent rivals have found windows in which they could compete effectively.

[Big Al]

I don't think Bud ever understood that the job description of the commissioner is to "act in the best interest of baseball" and that is not necessarily synonymis with making as much money as possible for the owners.

To me his legacy will always be:

Killing half the regular season and entire post season in 1994

Steroids (it was congress, not Bud that implemented testing)

A complete competitive imbalance (but because some shrewd GMs (see Dan Duquette) can make small market teams competitive in a limited window time frame this is often swept under the rug)

Interleague play.

Over expansion of the post season (devaluing the regular season)

3 divisions with unbalanced schedules

He can enter the HOF if he buys a ticket, just like anyone else.

[crawjo]

To me, the questions of Bud Selig's legacy and whether he deserves enshrinement in the HoF are pretty simple. If he's to be judged by the financial well-being of the club owners while he was commissioner, he deserves praise and a plaque. If he's to be judged by how well he served the progress and integrity of MLB, he deserves neither. I'd like to think that the HofF belongs to the fans and the public, but that's probably naive. Election to the Hall belongs to the media, and that's not too different from having it belong to the clubs whose interest Selig served.

What really grinds my gears about Selig :angryfire: is his constantly pointing out, and taking credit for, the small steps taken that promote competitive balance, like the wild card (not really competitive balance, but let that go for now), sharing of some revenues and the luxury tax. During the last World Series, he suggested that he had pretty much fixed the problems of competitive imbalance that he had inherited:

"The '90s were painful. We had to change the whole economic structure," Selig, 80, said. "So today there's hope and faith in Milwaukee, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, the Twin Cities, on and on and on. As a result, baseball is so much stronger and so much better."

I hadn't noticed that the "whole economic structure" of baseball has changed in the past 15-20 years, but maybe I just missed it.

Apart from the facts -- some of the teams Bud listed had success in the 90s, and is there really much hope of contending today in Cincy and the Twin Cities? -- you'll note that he cited only teams (he also was including, by implication, the Royals) from the Central Divisions. Those divisions do not have teams from the largest markets, and the Central franchises from the largest market, Chicago, generally have been run with an ineptness that may be exceeded only by that of the Mets. I doubt that Bud deserves credit for the fact that many of the teams with the most financial resources (the Mets, the Dodgers until recently, the Chicago teams, the NYY and Red Sox at least temporarily, the BJs, and now the Phillies) at times have been managed badly enough that their less affluent rivals have found windows in which they could compete effectively.

I think you are wrong here. The Rays have been very competitive in recent years. So have the Orioles. So have the A's. They've shown that it's entirely possible to win through player development and trades rather than through free agency. And the structure has changed. You just don't see young players in their prime entering free agency anymore. It's always veterans who end up getting overpaid by the teams with big wallets. I think it has gotten to the point where it is a bad idea to build through free agency.

I think that by the standards of his predecessors, Bud Selig was a good commissioner. Again, two decades of labor peace, huge growth for baseball internationally, and decent competitive balance without a salary cap. Those all seem like significant accomplishments to me. And I think some of his other tweaks have been good as well. I like, for instance, that the ASG decides home field in the World Series. It kept the All Star Game relevant. I like that he resisted instant replay for as long as he did, because I think instant replay in most cases is bad for the game. I'm very worried what's going to happen now that Manfred is in charge.

[crawjo]

To me his legacy will always be:

Killing half the regular season and entire post season in 1994

Steroids (it was congress, not Bud that implemented testing)

A complete competitive imbalance (but because some shrewd GMs (see Dan Duquette) can make small market teams competitive in a limited window time frame this is often swept under the rug)

Interleague play.

Over expansion of the post season (devaluing the regular season)

3 divisions with unbalanced schedules

I think some of those things are good. The wild card was bad for the game, but turning the wild card into a one-game playoff was very good, and I think the regular season is now properly valued. There's no way you can lay all the blame for the 1994 season on Selig. The players went on strike; they made the decision. And especially if you are going to then blame him for the imbalance in payrolls, considering that it was the players who were fighting to maintain that.

I don't blame him, or frankly care, about the steroids issue. Testing should have been implemented earlier, sure, but again, it was the players union that resisted that.

[BohKnowsBmore]

I don't think Bud ever understood that the job description of the commissioner is to "act in the best interest of baseball" and that is not necessarily synonymis with making as much money as possible for the owners.

To me his legacy will always be:

Killing half the regular season and entire post season in 1994

Steroids (it was congress, not Bud that implemented testing)

A complete competitive imbalance (but because some shrewd GMs (see Dan Duquette) can make small market teams competitive in a limited window time frame this is often swept under the rug)

Interleague play.

Over expansion of the post season (devaluing the regular season)

3 divisions with unbalanced schedules

He can enter the HOF if he buys a ticket, just like anyone else.

I think you make some good points, but completely writing off all evidence of smaller-market teams succeeding doesn't really enhance your point.

[Mayor McCheese]

All that above and he made the All-star game determine home field advantage for the World Series :angryfire:

[Machado13]

A complete competitive imbalance (but because some shrewd GMs (see Dan Duquette) can make small market teams competitive in a limited window time frame this is often swept under the rug)

.

This is my beef with him. Oakland, rays, Os type teams will always be around but it's for a limited window of 2-3 years at most and those teams never have the high priced talent to push them over the top.

It's just Red Sox, Yankees, giants and other high payroll teams over and over.

In the nfl, any team can win the Super Bowl. Wouldn't surprise anyone. Same in nhl or nba. In mlb, that's not the case.

Revenue sharing closes the gap a little bit but cap is the way to go in today's sports if you want to maintain fan interest in your markets.

Small to mid markets fans will stop showing up or watching if the champs are always the usual aforementioned teams

[eddie83]

Bud did a very good job in wrangling a plan B when he knew they'd never be able to implement real parity (i.e. expanded playoffs, luxury taxes and the like). But you just can't trust him. I don't think he has integrity. At his core he's still the used car dealer that he was 50 years ago. That's why I don't like him.

Pretty strong to say he lacks integrity. If you do not like him so be it, but I think he cares about the game.