Selig should have been out

Selig should have been out

Kansas City Star : Baseball owners have snubbed millions of fans by handing Commissioner Bud Selig a three-year contract extension. Selig presided over one of the most shameful episodes in the sport’s history. For years he looked the other way as bulked-up players hooked on steroids made a mockery of the rules of the game.

Baseball needs a commissioner with a fresh outlook and the determination to clean up the sport.

Just days ago, Selig had to appear before Congress to explain — yet again — how baseball is trying to solve its problems with performance-enhancing drugs.

Selig played contrite before the politicians, saying at one point: “All of us have to take responsibility, starting with me.”

His own responsibility was certainly extensive. Three years ago he told Congress that the extent of improper drug use in baseball had been blown out of proportion.

What problem?

“Did we have a major problem? No,” Selig said. “So let me say this to you: There is no concrete evidence of that, there is no testing evidence, there is no other kind of evidence.”

And why didn’t that evidence exist?

Because for several years, starting in the late 1990s, Selig and his fellow owners (Selig was part-owner of the Milwaukee Brewers) didn’t want to know what substances players were injecting into their bodies. Business was great at the time. Home runs were flying out of the park.

Thanks to a recent report by former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell, now the public knows that dozens of players were using performance-enhancing drugs during Selig’s reign.

Instead of giving Selig a new contract, the owners should have found a more credible leader.