Posted by
Ed Lilly on Saturday, November 08, 2008 1:55:17 PM
There's
news out of Chicago on the potential sale of the sports world's most inept and disappointing professional franchise, the Cubs:
Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban remains as interested as ever in buying the Chicago Cubs, dismissing a report that Major League Baseball might not want him as an owner.
According to a Chicago Sun-Times report that cited a baseball source, there was "zero chance" of Cuban taking over the Cubs.
The Sun-Times source said the Internet billionaire would meet with resistance in trying to get approval from Major League Baseball.
Things I know, or think I know, about Mark Cuban: 1) he went to IU; 2) he has made a gazillion dollars in the high tech world; 3) he now owns the Dallas Mavericks NBA franchise; 4) he has spent a lot of money on amenities for the Dallas Mavericks players; 5) he has been somewhat controversial with his unusually intimate involvement in games, perceived bad calls, and interactions with fans both live and online; and 6) the Mavericks have not won an NBA title despite all the money Cuban has thrown at them.
Things I know about the Chicago Cubs: 1) they have not won a World Series Title in 100 years, and counting.
That said, do I want Mark Cuban to be the new Cubs owner? I don’t know. The MLB owners are private citizens, running privately held businesses, and apparently they can make whatever decision they want on whether to allow a person, group, entity, or combination thereof to take over an available MLB franchise. I can’t begin to name the owners of all the MLB teams, but certain owners come to mind, like Steinbrenner, Selig (Yeah, I know, he’s technically the commissioner and his daughter owns the team. Maybe that’s true, maybe it’s not. Who knows, and who really cares?), Peter Angelos, maybe Ted Turner if he still owns the Braves (can’t remember - he may have sold the team but still hangs around).
Are the four guys I can name off the top of my head somehow in a different class than Mark Cuban? I doubt it. I can’t say I’d want to spend 5 minutes with any of them. Well, maybe Steinbrenner just to be sniggering in my head thinking of Larry David’s Steinbrenner the entire time I’m listening to the real thing.
But the Cubs could do a lot worse than having an owner who’s freakishly wealthy, freakishly involved in the team's operation, and freakishly willing to try to throw money at the team to make it into a winner, and maybe even a place where winning players want to be.
I’m just saying, the past 100 seasons without a title don’t exactly recommend the approach the owners have been taking. Of course, as I noted above, Cuban’s Mavericks haven’t managed to win a title either. So it’s a crap shoot. But I would love to know what the criteria are that the other MLB owners use to evaluate a potential new owner. A really good investigative reporter would get that story for the public. Cubs fans need to know.