Majors Try To Unravel Tangled Knot
After a meeting of the sport’s ruling executive council Tuesday night, it appeared baseball owners won’t approve any realignment plans this week.
Unable to issue a 1998 schedule because they can’t figure out where to put the two expansion teams, owners had many different proposals under consideration as they began their quarterly session with a 5-hour meeting of the sport’s ruling executive council.
And when the council recessed after midnight, even more ideas had been presented for consideration.
“Every day my fax is busy, clubs sending different plans,” acting commissioner Bud Selig said.
A council member, speaking on the condition he not be identified, said it was “highly unlikely” a plan could be formulated that would win approval in the next two days.
Going into the meeting, realignment committee chairman John Harrington said his goal was “to eliminate some alternatives.” But several committee members said the number of plans had grown Tuesday, not shrunk.
Some teams favor the realignment plan that would have 15 teams switch leagues next season, basically turning the American League into an East Coast circuit and the National League into a West Coast circuit.
Seven N.L. teams have threatened to vote against it, including four with veto power.
Futility flourishes
Casey Stengel once said of the comically awful 1962 New York Mets, “Can’t anybody here play this game?”
Imagine what Stengel would say of the 1997 N.L. Central race - baseball’s version of a futility stakes. Maybe, “Can’t anybody here win this thing?”
Laughingly called the N.L. Comedy Central, it is the only division where .500 is good enough for first place. Where a big winning streak is two games. Where the contending - or is it pretending? - Pirates may finish without a single player hitting 20 home runs or driving in 75 runs.
The Houston Astros (76-74), despite being only two games over .500 after defeating San Diego 15-3 Tuesday, hold a 3-1/2-game lead over Pittsburgh (73-78) a day before the teams begin a two-game series in Three Rivers Stadium.
Vaughn goes to bat
Fearful of an off-season trade and a hurtful public-relations campaign like the one he thinks the Red Sox launched against Roger Clemens, Mo Vaughn said Tuesday it won’t be his fault if he’s not playing for Boston next year.
“I’m not going to go out like Roger Clemens and be questioned for my integrity and questioned as a man,” Vaughn said of the three-time Cy Young Award winner’s bitter departure last winter. “The Red Sox can’t act as if our camp didn’t do everything possible to make a deal get done.”
Vaughn is in the second year of a three-year, $18.6 million deal, and he has reportedly been offered a new contract for $8.5 million a year. But the former A.L. MVP believes he could get more by filing for free agency after the 1998 season.
Like Clemens before him, Vaughn believes the team’s offer indicates it isn’t really interested in signing him, and he won’t accept less to stay with an organization he doesn’t trust.
In this corner…
George Steinbrenner vs. David Wells? Knock it off, guys!
In a twist to an already bizarre story, Steinbrenner issued a kooky statement about his reported altercation with Wells last month, an alleged incident in which the pitcher supposedly threatened to knock out the New York Yankees owner.
Steinbrenner joked that he recently turned down a chance to fight Evander Holyfield, and also passed up an opportunity to appear on a boxing card with media moguls Ted Turner and Rupert Murdoch.
“The Boss on the undercard? Get serious,” said Steinbrenner’s statement, passed out during the first game of a Yankees-Boston doubleheader.
“But now you guys have me taking on Wells,” he said. “The only thing that really bothers me about that is I really need him down the stretch. I’m counting on him! So why hurt our chances?”