Bud Selig has pledged to play ball. The commissioner of baseball decreed Tuesday that the 2002 season would be lockout-free. The owners promise not to padlock their gates, at least until the World Series is over.

        On the theory that no news is good news, this was good news. Next, Selig will announce that three strikes are an out, four balls are worth a walk and 900 lawyers at the bottom of the sea are a good beginning.

        He ought to tell us something we don't know, such as how the Cincinnati Reds might scout, draft and develop a starting pitcher. He ought to say something that isn't obvious.

        Were the owners inclined to call a lockout to impose working conditions or as a means of extracting concessions in collective bargaining, they would have been better served to do it in November — after baseball's labor agreement expired and before the players signed contracts for the coming season. At the time, however, the tragic events of Sept.11 made such a strategy untenable. Locking out the players now, with salaries already set and tickets already sold, would be a pointless blow to the already tenuous bond baseball has with its paying customers.

        Lockout useless

        An in-season lockout would bring no immediate economic benefit to the owners and would have no certainty of long-term success. It would further imperil those franchises with massive debt and probably lead baseball back to the courts, where the players have drubbed the owners the way Perry Mason did Hamilton Burger. This would be about as shrewd as confronting Randy Johnson with an all-lefty lineup.

        Thus Selig's pledge was more of a con than a concession. It was a transparent attempt to claim the moral high ground for the forthcoming fight over a new set of working conditions. Nothing wrong with that. Any business is entitled to seek favorable publicity. Yet because baseball operates so publicly, and its haggling history is so painfully familiar, its public is not easily impressed with ploys.

        After eight work stoppages in 30 years, baseball fans are conditioned to cut to the chase. They aren't interested in promises. They want peace. They want to know the season will be played to its conclusion; that ticket prices will cease their staggering upward spiral; that players will sign autographs with a smile; that nine innings can be played before last call; and that the home team has a reasonable chance to contend.

        Forcing union's hand

        Bud Selig alone can guarantee none of this. With no tangible progress on the labor front, the commissioner's no-lockout pledge is as hollow as John Rocker's heart. What it probably means is the owners are trying to provoke the union into firing the first shot.

        Paul Beeston's recent resignation removed the most conciliatory voice from baseball's bargaining team and may signal the adoption of a harder line. Because the baseball union expects ownership to impose changes once the 2002 season is over, another pre-emptive strike appears inevitable.

        It's starting to look like 1994 all over again.

        “The sanctity of the season,” Selig acknowledged Tuesday, “... is only partially within my control.”

        Play ball. While you can.

        Contact Tim Sullivan at 768-8456 or e-mail: tsullivan@enquirer.com.

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