From: roger@crux.Princeton.EDU (Roger Lustig)
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball
Subject: Re: Baseball and Billions
Date: 27 Aug 92 18:29:42 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: Princeton University
Originator: news@nimaster

In article <1992Aug27.180411.18814@cis.ohio-state.edu> miked@pterodactyl.cis.ohio-state.edu (Michael Davey) writes:
>In article <1992Aug27.170710.3110@adobe.com> snichols@adobe.com (Sherri Nichols) writes:

>	There is no obvious and objective definition of what the game ought
>to be.  And your wrong, your a baseball fan and I disagree with you and other
>people I know who are baseball fans. I just do not think that your 
>"don't spend money on what you don't like" factor is realistic. I 
>have no choice but to sit in an ashtray shaped stadium with artificial turf 
>when I attend a Reds game, and many fans that I 
>have talked to liked Crosley Field better, and do not like Riverfront, but
>we still go to games and spend money. If you think most people do not prefer
>a more, shall we say, asthetically correct (Ha, Ha) ballpark, I would
>say Camden Yards and the new stadiums being built in Cleveland, Denver
>and Arlington are evidence that your wrong. 

Sherri thinks that?  News to me.  What's in the pipe?

>>What are the tenets and traditions of "The Game" that are important, and
>>should be preserved?
>	This is not the issue. And your still trying to comparet the past to
>the present do defend the present, and I have never invoked the past as
>representative of how things should be.

Well, how *should* things be?  All we hear from you is how they shouldn't
be, and little enough of that.  And we never hear *why.*

>>Since you think the commissioner ought to have more power than the owners,
>>exactly what is it that you think he ought to do?  How should he decide
>>what it is he ought to do?  What if the fans don't like the decisions he
>>makes?  How does giving the commissioner more power give any additional
>>power to the fans at all?

>	I would like to see a commissioner that tries to weigh  all three 
>elements, players, owners and fans alike in any decision that affects the game.

And I'd like to see Italian wool suits for $39.50.  Now, exactly what
would that *mean* in practice?  How would the commish weigh "fan interests"
in a decision -- especially since fans disagree a good deal, too?

>Bart Giammatti said that it was unreasonable to expect cities to build a
>stadium just for baseball when they need to hold other events there to make
>it financially viable. I understand and agree with this, but it seems
>that the cities of Cleveland, Denver, Baltimore and Arlington figured
>it was possible to finance baseball-only stadiums and none of these are
>huge markets.

Sure it was possible.  Was it politically responsible?  

And what does any of this have to do with the commissioner?  He doesn't
design ballparks.  Nor will he.  Are you telling us he should replace
the mayors, city councils, and voters, too?  THEY are the ones who
build stadiums.  

> Further, although I have never been to either place, both
>Atlanta-Fulton County and Anaheim are two-sport stadium that are supposedly
>very asthetically correct. These would be a nice compromise between the
>Camden Yards and the Three Rivers/Riverfronts of the world.

Remind me again: where does the commissioner come into this?  

>>No, I'm not arguing that at all.  I've made *no* statement in this
>>discussion about whether the state of the game was good or bad.  You've
>>claimed that the state of the game is bad, and it's because of the owners.
>>I'm trying to get you to be more specific about what about the state of the
>>game is bad, and *why* it's bad, and who decides it's bad.

>	No, but you contiually try to invoke the past to compare it to
>the present to defend the owners. The owners are not solely responsible for
>the problems affecting the game. But they do play a role and without taking
>away some, I said SOME of their power, they are never held accountable.

Reet.  Like, they weren't held responsible for collusion.

>Next year, in all likelyhood, the owners will lock out the players and some
>people (writers, commentators, etc) have indicated the owners are ready to 
>lose a whole year's revenue in order to re-open the basic agreement and 
>restructure the present free-agency system, salary-structure, etc. If this is 
>the case, hopefully, all the issues will finally get resolved by salary-caps
>(an inevitability), 

Call us when it happens, OK?

>shared t.v. revenue (a possibility), and maybe ten
>years could go by without a strike or lock-out shortened season. The point

We've lost exactly one day of play in the last ten years.  

>is the owners are just as responsible for the conditions that exist now  that
>they feel will force them to initiate the lock out, and self-regulation 
>by the owners has not worked, strikes by the players have not worked, 
>and fans are still going to games (although attendence is down, see 
>this weeks BB weekly) and it would be nice if a strong commissioner 
>like Landis (not that I want us to go back to the golden days of old!) 
>could emerge to help initiate the type of restructuring that is going to be
>needed.

Why not wait until this actually happens?  Until then, I'd like to see some
evidence that a strong commissioner would even *know* how to fix baseball.

Roger
Newsgroups: rec.sport.baseball