Ventura Works High and Tight to Selig

There are sights you don’t forget. Bud Selig sitting next to Gov. Jesse Ventura at a House Judiciary Committee hearing is one of them. Sometimes the punishment actually fits the crime.

Next time baseball wants to contract a team out of existence, the commissioner may ask his owners to pick one from a state with a smaller governor. Or at least one who hasn’t been trained in military special ops and pro wrestling.

Selig arrived with so many good intentions. He wanted to explain why baseball needed to keep its 79-year-old antitrust exemption. He had a two-inch thick volume of financial data purporting to prove that owners lost $519 million in ’01 and need to take drastic action to “fix the system.” He wanted to dangle the carrot of relocation in front of congressmen who demanded to know why, if baseball has so many sick teams, one of them cannot move--immediately--to this, the prosperous Washington area.

What the commissioner didn’t want was a full dose of the very large governor of Minnesota. But that’s what he got.

“These owners are not losing the money they claim to be losing. If they were, they wouldn’t be paying the salaries they’re paying,” Ventura said. Then, looking at Selig, inches away, he said: “It’s asinine. These people did not get the wealth they have by being stupid.”

Minutes later, during an adjournment, word arrived of a report, later rescinded, that Jason Giambi had agreed to a $128 million, seven-year contract with the Yankees.

When Selig bemoaned the vast losses, Ventura sneered, “These losses, do the owners not deduct them off their taxes?”

When Selig claimed that, without its exemption, baseball could not keep teams from relocating--”leaving in the night”--Ventura posed a question that was more eloquent than any answer.

“What is the difference between leaving in the night and being contracted?” asked the governor.

No telltale tire tracks?

Above all, Ventura was furious about baseball’s eternal carrot-and-stick tactics. The game is always threatening to leave your town or tempting you with hints that they’ll come to your town.

“If we funded a stadium, we would mysteriously disappear from the ‘contraction list,’ ” Ventura said. “The stadium we have, the Metrodome, is only 20 years old. It’s younger than my child. The trees around the Dome are so young they still have tape around them. . . .

“(Baseball) wants to come into my (state) budget and build a park at public expense. Then they’ll come back in five years, eight years, and say, ‘This isn’t good enough either.’

“When we build a public library, we don’t have to pay to get in. But when we build a stadium, we have to pay the owner every time we go to a game.”

So, otherwise, how was your day in Washington, Mr. Commissioner?

Not so fabulous, actually.

Cursory analysis shows that of the $519 million in baseball’s losses, $174 million is amortization. Owners get to depreciate their players over a five-year period, as though they were factory equipment. It’s a great tax break, an incentive to buy a team. So now baseball trots out those “losses” to back up more than a one-third of its poverty claim?

Another $112 million in losses is due to interest payments on debt. The owners choose to carry high debt -- rather than paying more cash -- so that, when they sell their teams, their return is higher. According to Forbes, the value of all franchises was $3.2 billion in ‘96, but $7.9 billion in ’01. So, this leverage gambit seems to work in general.

That leaves $232 million in operating losses. Which is plenty. Why couldn’t baseball just emphasize that number? But, no, “half-a-billion” sounded so much better.

For a century, baseball owners had every motive to hide their books. But that changed in 1995 with revenue sharing. The owners now watch each other like hawks to make sure nobody is hiding revenue. To a degree, they’ve become their own financial watchdogs.

Here’s what Selig should have said: We had an after-tax operating loss from operations in ’01 of almost $200 million.

He could even have noted that almost half baseball’s losses are from four teams owned by media companies. These owners often see their teams as loss leaders that provide good TV ratings.

For 25 years, baseball has had a basic problem with telling the unvarnished truth. It goes against the game’s grain. The owners have to spin, put on a perfect face.

People can deal with the truth. But they resent it when you only turn to the truth as a last resort, while kicking and screaming. That’s why baseball’s messenger was greeted so acerbically. Baseball should know congressional hearings are a nightmare for the game. It’s primo farce as the politicians--masters of the sound-bite cheap shot--duel with Selig and his genial obfuscation.

When Selig was asked the price of the last team sale, he said, “Kansas City for $96 million” in ’96. Then told the tale of how hard it was to find a buyer. Minutes later, a member pointed out that the Dodgers sold for $300 million in ’98 and the Indians for $323 million in ’99. Stuff like that just starts the feeding frenzy.

“What about the stuff I just asked for? We don’t have the numbers,” asked another member.

“What numbers?” said Selig.

“Could I see you immediately after the hearing?” snapped the visibly angry congressman.

“In public or outside” in the parking lot, quipped the committee chairman to lighten the mood.

Baseball had its share of supporters on the committee. But its adversaries left the emotional impression and the one-liners.

Selig repeatedly cited the authority of the Blue Ribbon Panel report until one member retorted: “That Blue Ribbon Panel guy (former Sen. George Mitchell) is now trying to buy a team (the Red Sox)! He studied your sport, said you were losing money and now he wants to buy in. That leaves me a little shaky about his judgment.”

Selig emphasized several times that, if baseball gets contraction and a new labor agreement, relocation will be the game’s next issue. And a fast-track item. Promises, promises. Even on baseball-for-Washington, it is the union, not the owners, who are pushing hard.

“How are Washington, D.C., and Northern Virginia being helped by the monopoly control that keeps the Montreal Expos from relocating rather than ceasing to exist . . . even when it leaves a valuable venue that the two leagues should be fighting over vacant?” said Fehr in his statement.

A good question. But, like several others, one baseball could not answer Thursday.