Sunday, October 25, 1998

BY JOHN ERARDI and GEOFF HOBSON
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Marge Schott made insensitive remarks about Asian-Americans, Jews and women in the May 20, 1996 Sports Illustrated. | ZOOM |

Marge Schott could have compromised that day in 1995.

Her beloved Reds were stalking the National League Central Division title and General Manager Jim Bowden had given her three options to pick up a veteran starting pitcher.

Former Cy Young Award winner David Cone would cost $6 million, a tough hit for the medium-market Reds. Jim Abbott, the nasty but inconsistent lefty, was risky. Chunky but steady David Wells, already a World Series veteran three years before his perfection with the Yankees, was Mr. Bowden's recommendation.

The compromise choice.

"But she looked across the table and told me to go get Cone," Mr. Bowden said. "She wanted to win. She wanted to win for the fans. We couldn't get him and got Wells, but she had the eye of the tiger. She didn't want the compromise."

That's how Mrs. Schott ran the Reds for 14 years.

With the eye of a tiger and a dog by her side, she bossed the club in uncompromising fashion.

Last September, Mrs. Schott insisted on rubbing dog hair on Mark McGwire for good luck, even though McGwire is allergic to dogs. | ZOOM |

It was that aggressive -- often abrasive -- style that led to Friday's announcement that she has agreed to entertain offers to sell her controlling interest in the team.

It's also that style that has people wondering if the story is really over.

One source close to the Reds said Saturday, "Knowing her, this is the top of the first inning."

The agreement announced Friday says Reds managing executive John Allen will continue to run the team until Dec. 31, or until she sells her shares, whichever comes first. Regardless, MLB insiders suggest, the agreement will keep being extended until the club is sold.

Mrs. Schott's tumultuous reign began with great promise.

In December 1984, Mrs. Schott brought her St. Bernard, Schottzie, to a press conference to announce she had bought a controlling interest in the club from the reticent Williams brothers, William and James. Mrs. Schott said she bought the Reds "because it was Christmastime, and I get carried away at Christmas."

The fans and media ate it up.

The Williams brothers had presided over one of the franchise's gloomiest eras (1980-84) and Mrs. Schott was seen as its savior.

Mrs. Schott greeted kids warmly and often invited them onto the field before or after the game. | ZOOM |

In the midst of all that ineptitude of the early 1980s, Mrs. Schott had staked out her claim as an outspoken, lovable limited partner when she hired a helicopter pilot to fly over the stadium on a day the Philadelphia Phillies were in town.

Three of the Phillies were Pete Rose, Joe Morgan and Tony Perez, former stars of the Big Red Machine.

The helicopter carried a banner that read, "Tony, Pete, Joe. Help. Love, Marge."

The fans and media ate that up, too.

No sooner than she had bought the club, though, did complaints surface about treatment of front-office employees and scouts, the lifeblood of the Reds' system.

She gave out small or no bonuses, audited scouts' laundry bills, and made them drive smaller cars.

Some employees (and the Reds limited partners) sued her. Some fought the war of words. Some quit. Some were fired.

But most fans didn't care.

Mrs. Schott with Cincinnati's other baseball hero-turned-pariah. They sat together for Pete Rose Jr.'s major league debut in 1997. | ZOOM |

Image begins to erode

The Reds were a young, talented, exciting team and the fans flocked to the ballpark. Mrs. Schott's reign hit its zenith in 1990, when the Reds won the world championship. She had a top manager in Lou Piniella and great players, like Eric Davis.

But Mrs. Schott came off as too much of a cheapskate when she wouldn't pay $15,000 to bring an injured Mr. Davis back to Cincinnati from the World Series in Oakland.

"The only thing I've got against Marge is she left me in Oakland," Mr. Davis said this weekend.

"But she ended up paying for it. I sent her the bill. I don't put all of the blame on Marge. There were other people who knew the situation who could have told her. Her problem was she didn't surround herself with good baseball people. And maybe it was because she didn't pay. You have to if you want quality."

She came off as a bumbler when she failed to re-sign Mr. Piniella in 1992.

Eric Davis says he has no hard feelings for Mrs. Schott. "I'll give her a call in a few days and see how she's doing." | ZOOM |

After that season, documents filed in Hamilton County Common Pleas Court claimed Mrs. Schott had called Mr. Davis and another former Red, Dave Parker her "million-dollar niggers."

Suspensions followed.

Almost all of Mrs. Schott's lovable "image" had eroded.

"I think she ran her mouth at the wrong times and got caught," Mr. Davis said. "But you've got to think what she was saying is what a lot of people in baseball think."

In the blizzard of national and local fallout, leaders such as the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the Rev. Al Sharpton called for baseball to punish Mrs. Schott, and a local group of minority leaders met to counsel her.

Michael Rapp, director of the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Jewish Federation of Cincinnati, had hoped to see more tangible results come from the meetings.

BORGMAN ON SCHOTT

Cartoon gallery

"My feelings today are the same as several years ago," Mr. Rapp said. "Marge Schott as an individual was irrelevant to the problem of how to respond to vicious remarks.

"Whether she remained owner of the team was immaterial. I would have liked to have seen more from (her). I wish she would have appreciated the impact of her remarks and I don't think she did. It's a shame her career is ending on such a down note. She had a great thing with the city. It was a squandered patrimony."

SATURDAY STORIES

• Schott's reign over • Schott chronology

The players' strike of August 1994 shrunk her support.

"The thing that always saved Marge with the fans was that she was able to spend money to put good teams on the field," a source close to Reds ownership said. "But after (the strike) wiped out the end of the '94 season and the entire postseason, the money wasn't there any more to spend on payroll.

"She took another shot at it (winning) in '95, but it (the chance of the Reds succeeding in the near term) was over. Attendance was down 18 percent in Cincinnati, and when they had those 16,000 empty seats for Game 1 of the NLCS (the National League Championship Series) with the Braves (on Oct. 10, 1995), it was obvious. Her way of operating the team in Cincinnati was no longer feasible."

If there were two things that undid Mrs. Schott, it was all the money she didn't put into scouting and player development, and the strike, sources say.

She no longer had the base of support that might have saved her ownership.

Observers say Mrs. Schott was "good" for the Reds' on-the-field success of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Her money -- and willingness to spend it on big-league players -- supplemented the talent that was already in the pipeline when she bought the club.

Thanks to the Big Red Machine-era scouts of then-General Manager Bob Howsam, such players as Mr. Davis, Barry Larkin, Paul O'Neill, Chris Sabo, Rob Dibble and Tom Browning were either already playing for the Reds or soon would be.

They formed the core of the world champions of 1990.

With the cash of Mrs. Schott -- who loved being able to field a winner -- Mr. Bowden refortified the Reds in the early 1990s.

He acquired such key players as Ron Gant, Benito Santiago and Tony Fernandez to produce the first-place team of 1994, and he acquired Mr. Wells, Mark Portugal and Dave Burba to produce the 1995 division winners.

SCHOTT-GM STORIES

Seven Reds employees on Schott buyers list Jan. 4, 1997 GM'S list of 57 allegedly faked sale Jan. 4, 1997 GM says Schott faked sales Dec. 24, 1996

But the 16,000 empty seats opening night of the 1995 NLCS put a public face on what Mrs. Schott already knew: no longer would she be able to pour money into the big-league payroll to produce a winner. The crowd of only 36,762 was the smallest for a playoff game in Riverfront Stadium's 25-year history.

Mrs. Schott lost some supporters when she described the size of the crowd as "disgusting."

"They're just spoiled here," she said.

Nothing has hurt her more than her perception of fan ingratitude. She kept ticket prices low, and hot dogs at a dollar, and she said she did it for the fans. Now, she thought, the fans were thanking her by staying home.

And she didn't like it.

Times have changed

The next Reds owner won't be able to make a difference with a checkbook the way Mrs. Schott did.

Mr. Bowden knows it. He knows the only way to success now is to continue to emphasize scouting and player development and to replenish the farm system so that a talented team of young players with long-term contracts is in place when the new stadium opens in 2003.

That was the blueprint the Cleveland Indians followed in the years leading to the opening of Jacobs Field in 1994.

Former Reds slugger Dave Parker, who played here during the 1985-88 period of the Schott era, thinks the Reds have a good foundation. "They have a lot of great, young talent, so if they can retain those guys (financially) when they start winning 20 games, hitting .300 and 30 home runs, they'll be OK," Mr. Parker said. "It has to start with retaining the foundation -- Barry Larkin. He's the catalyst. Build around him with the young guys.

"Guys like Dmitri Young are important. He plays the game in a way that's contagious. Yeah, he could be a little better defensively, but he's an offensive machine. And they (the Reds) have the core of a great, young pitching staff. I think the future is bright."

Fighting the "haves'

There is a much wider disparity in baseball these days between the haves and have-nots. The Reds' payroll this year was $23 million, compared to the Yankees' payroll in the upper-$60 million range.

Of the 12 teams in baseball with less than a $40 million payroll this year, none had a winning record. The Reds had the second-best record of those clubs under $40 million. The best record of the under-40s was the Chicago White Sox, whose payroll was $39 million.

The have-nots can compete only through building a farm system so as to produce young (i.e., cheaper) talent.

The farm system is something Mrs. Schott didn't believe in. She wanted to see results on the major-league level immediately. "Marge wanted a lot of bang for her buck," a source close to the Reds ownership group said. "She didn't like to spend the quiet money."

Many observers think it will be the most damning of her mixed legacies.

"She did a lot of positive things," Mr. Bowden said. "She signed autographs all night long. She overspent to put a winner on the field. (On Friday), she didn't talk to me about selling the team. She wanted to know about my twin boys. She's always been good to me and my family and to the fans. Those are things she cares about."

Mr. Davis knows Mrs. Schott is hurting.

"Sure," he said. "I'll give her a call in a few days and see how she's doing."