He’s been called the best commissioner ever by everyone from Bob Uecker to MLB historian Jerome Holtzman, and Milwaukee native Bud Selig’s tenure as Commissioner of Major League Baseball is coming to a close. The 80-year-old Selig will step aside in January after 17 years as commissioner. He also served as interim commissioner from 1992 to 1998. He’ll be succeeded MLB CEO Rob Manfred.
Wisconsin Radio Network Sports Director Bill Scott agrees with assessments of Selig as the best commissioner ever. Scott recalls Selig DID catch a lot of flak for allowing the 2002 All-Star Game at Miller Park. “I’m not ready to say he really dropped the ball on anything, other than the All Star Game itself,” Scott says. “There’s a few things that fans and owners and players alike would say could have gone a little bit smoother.”
Selig introduced revenue sharing and is credited for MLB’s financial turnaround of baseball during his time as commissioner, a period which has also seen record-breaking seasonal attendance.
Scott said Selig, despite working for the MLB owners and being a former owner of the Milwaukee Brewers, earned a reputation of being evenhanded. “What Bud Selig did, in a position where he was hired by and worked for the owners, still maintained a fresh approach and a fresh idea, and really did not bow to the will of the individual owners on really any issue,” he said. “It is what it is, and it’s up to that individual to see baseball as it is, and want to be able to rule over it as fairly as possible without having the owners pocketbooks totally making the call on everything. And I think Bud’s done a pretty good job of that.”