4 more years of Good Ol'e Bud

Selig should have been in the firing squad for PEDs and he should not have a job anymore.  I am extremely pleased about the financial progress the game has made, but I am going to go out on a limb and say that someone else can duplicate that feat.

I am more upset about the lack of leadership during the steroid era than I am happy about financial goals met.  I think another commish could maintain economic growth in the sport and also provide clear leadership in the steroid issue.  Therefore, Bud has to go.

But for the actual game, the wild card, interleague play and the new divisional system are all good things.  The post-season is always tricky in sports, because you want to allow enough teams in that a decent number of teams that deserve a chance to keep playing actually get to, but you don't want to dilute the meaning of actually making the playoffs.  Baseball's system allows 8 out of 30 teams to make it.  That's an excellent balance, and fewer than any of the other 3 major sports (that includes Hockey, which arguably may or may not still be a major sport--regardless though, you actually still have a full roster of players with a pulse at the end of the season and you get to play Detroit in the first round.)

Bud's been a good commissioner overall.  

Despite this, I also agree that the PED's are a major weakness of his tenure as commish and I think he should NOT have been given the extension, but rather let go so that someone else can clean up the one big mess that he and the rest of baseball made during his time.

Bud's got a lot of weaknesses and I think his time is over, but it drives me a little nuts when people tend to be overly anti-Bud.

He'll always be the commissioner who "cancelled" the World Series in 1994; and the commissioner who called the All-Star Game a tie.

I believe he's decided to remain in the job precisely to be seen as the commish who "cleaned up" the PEDs issue... even though the problem began on his watch. I still am of the opinion that baseball takes too much flak from the MSM (and Congress) over PEDs, compared to the rest of the sports world... how does the NFL continue to get a "pass" when their defensive MVP (of a season ago) missed four freakin' games because of a failed drug test???

Remember that any pro sports commissioner is the employee of management, no matter how much power he holds. Why shouldn't MLB's owners want to keep Bud on the job? They're making more money than they ever have!

Neither Bud nor Stern nor Goodell nor Bettman represent their sport's fans, no matter how often they claim they do; they represent their team owners. Job One for all these guys is negotiating with their sport's players union; all (save Goodell) have failed; games have been cancelled; championships have gone vacant; the ticket-buying public has been alienated.

In Selig's case, '98's Home Run Derby made baseball popular again. He had every reason to ignore any warning signs that the "burst" of homers was coming because of the widespread use of "performance-enhancing" drugs (some of which were illegal under Federal law, some of which were not at the time.)

Selig may even "crack down" on one of his employers, if the stories about a possible suspension for Giants' owner Peter Magowan are true. I'm of the opinion that Selig is trying to paint the "Steroid Era" as the fault of the players and their dastardly union... while the "fault" should extend to management as well.

But he's made baseball's owners a lot of money; so he's done the job he was hired to do!