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If they don't win, it's a shame He's Just Our BudBy Rick Horowitz
MILWAUKEE -- And for his next trick, Bud Selig will turn gold into gravel. Why not? It would hardly be a stretch. After all, it requires a special talent to take an event as entertaining and exciting as baseball's 73rd All-Star Game had been, and with a wave of the hands and a shrug of the shoulders, fling the whole thing right into the nearest trash can. But that's our Bud. Our hometown hero. "It was a great, great five days," the commish explained, "but for a couple minutes." You bet it was. And it was a great, great flight until we missed the runway. It was a great, great meal until the salmonella kicked in. It was -- So here the local citizens sit, impassioned, jamming the phone lines, rushing once again to our Bud's defense, or proclaiming that this was the final straw -- for our Bud, and for the sport he's (sadly) come to symbolize so well. But mostly mortified, trying desperately to believe that the fiasco in Miller Park won't reflect poorly on all of Milwaukee, that with the whole world watching, we didn't wind up with sausage-and-egg on our face. The "couple minutes" our Bud had in mind, presumably, were the ones in the middle of the 11th inning on Tuesday night, when he and the two managers had their little chat about a sudden labor shortage. Bob Brenly and Joe Torre had tried to get everyone into the game, and they'd been so successful at it that the nine players in each of their lineups at that moment were the only players they had left. And after a mere 25 pitches, the National League's final pitcher, Vicente Padilla, was back in the dugout feeling a bit fatigued. What to do? A commissioner with a backbone might have said, "Deal with it." A commissioner with imagination might have said, "Well, we let catchers come back into the All-Star Game if the only remaining catcher gets injured -- I guess we could do it with a pitcher, too." A commissioner with a sense of humor might have said, "How's your shortstop's curve ball?" A commissioner with even a clue about dealing with fans might have said, "These folks deserve to see somebody win this thing, but if there's absolutely no other option, then at least let's do it in a way that's fair to both teams, and give the fans some advance warning, and explain what we're doing, and why we're doing it." But this is our Bud. So suddenly, the word went out: The National League would get this one last chance to score another run. If they did, they'd win. If they didn't, the game would end in a tie. "In our wildest dreams," our Bud said later, "we never thought this would happen." He needs to get out more. In baseball, the term for "this" is "extra innings." It's not uncommon. Or maybe the "couple minutes" our Bud had in mind were the ones right after the announcement was made, when the boos and the chants came cascading out of the stands. Or maybe they were the ones right after the National League went down without further scoring and the game was declared over -- only this time it was boos and bottles and souvenir seat cushions. Right here in our Bud's hometown. How sad. And how perfect. He's had it coming. Our Bud, you'll recall, was the commissioner who once cancelled a World Series. He was the commissioner when baseball went through its most recent expansion, only to turn around and now say that baseball can't support so many teams. (Then why did they expand? What information wasn't in his "wildest dreams" back then that has him talking "contraction" now? That players' salaries would be going up? This is a surprise?) But before any of that, he was owner of the Milwaukee Brewers, a franchise that hasn't made the playoffs in 20 years, that (now under his daughter's equally adept management) is well on its way to its tenth consecutive losing season. None of which kept him a few years back from whining his way to a spanking new, retractable-roof stadium at taxpayer expense. But not one of those downtown gems that have been the catalysts for so much welcome development in Baltimore, in Cleveland, in Denver, in Seattle... No, our Bud insisted on his new park being built right next to his old park, out along the interstate, where nothing grows. Just another momentary lack of vision. Let's be fair: Our Bud was instrumental, more than three decades ago, in bringing major league baseball back to Milwaukee. It was a wonderful thing he did. It was also more than three decades ago, and he's been living off the goodwill ever since. Milwaukee is a loyal town. But he's pushing it. "It was a great, great five days," our Bud wants you to know, "but for a couple minutes." Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play? Posted 7/11/02. You
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Rick Horowitz
