Over In Today's Washington Post. . . Both Tom Boswell and Len Shapiro take their turns battering Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig. And, as you might guess, both score big points taking pot shots at Selig, battering him about the head for the All-Star Game debacle, as well as a number of other missteps.
But I think a larger point is being missed, and the abuse (deserved though it may be) is the prime example of why. Over time, it is becoming more and more apparent that Selig is simply out of his league when it comes to his current job. When he was a car dealer who made it big, and managed to bring baseball back to Milwaukee (buying the Seattle Pilots and bringing them to the Midwest), Bud really was at the top of his game. In the old world of baseball, he was the sort of owner who could manage to keep his team in the mix from year to year.
But in baseball's new economic environment, Selig is out of his depth -- his All-Star Game troubles merely being the latest example. So, how did he get his job? From the rest of the owners, that's how. They needed somebody to be their front man. Somebody who would take orders from the George Steinbrenners and Jerry Reinsdorfs of the world, and not cause trouble. Somebody, who when confronted by Joe Torre and Bob Brenly with the fact that they had run out of players, would simply call the game rather than tell the two managers to stay on the field until the game was decided.
Someone who, in all of the aftermath, would be there to take the rap while everybody else skates. Call him a judas goat, a canary in a coal mine, or just a lightning rod. Everybody else screws up, and Bud is there to take the blame. He takes shots because of the owners, and shots because of the players.
If anything, Selig ought to be pitied. He didn't deserve this, not after working as hard as he did to bring, and keep baseball in Milwaukee, a city that didn't deserve to be abandoned by the Braves in the first place.
So the next time you're about to curse Bud Selig's name, just know this: that's exactly the way the folks who hired him want it to be. And we need to ask ourselves why that is.
