Baseball / Daily Report

A secret meeting of major league owners has been scheduled for Wednesday in Itasca, Ill., apparently to plot labor strategy and remove Chuck O’Connor as lead lawyer and replace him with Robert Ballow.

An American League owner said that only acting Commissioner Bud Selig knows the meeting’s agenda.

“We have to get back to the [bargaining] table at some point, and Bud feels there is a need for meeting amid less fanfare,” the owner said, adding that attendance on Wednesday is restricted to one representative per club.

Selig refused comment, and Dodger owner Peter O’Malley said, “We’ve been asked not to comment on time and place of any future meetings.”

Ballow, of the Nashville firm of King & Ballow, has a reputation as a union buster and has been advising owners for several months as counsel to the Chicago Tribune, which owns the Chicago Cubs.