By John Fay
The Cincinnati Enquirer

PHILADELPHIA - Baseball commissioner Bud Selig said Monday that Reds fans who are frustrated with the team's payroll should be patient, and hinted that the club needs time to rebound from some poor management decisions in recent years.

Selig, in Philadelphia for the opening of $435 million Citizens Bank Park, said new stadiums help teams like the Reds and Phillies.

"It will give (the Phillies) the revenue sources they need," Selig said.

Some Reds fans have questioned that analysis. The Reds' payroll this season - the team's second in Great American Ball Park - is the same as it was in the final year of Cinergy Field.

On Monday, Selig said Reds fans should be patient.

"I would say wait and see how it plays out," Selig said. "The new ballpark gives you an opportunity to build a good team. Let's wait more than a year before we judge that."

Selig also offered this critique of the Reds: "If you made questionable baseball decisions for years leading up to the park, it's not going to change that in a year."

Building new sport venues with public funds has become a hot-button issue. The value of such ventures is still being debated, but Selig defended building new parks for both economic and social reasons.

"I was raised in a family of economists, and I would argue the economics," he said. "At worst, a new ballpark is a break-even proposition. What other public expenditure can you say that about? Sociologically, it makes the community a better place to live."

Selig said the opening of Camden Yards in Baltimore in 1992, the first of the new retro stadiums, was one of the biggest developments in baseball in the last 40 or 50 years.

He added that new stadiums are not catch-all solutions to Baseball's problems.

"New parks are not a panacea for the economic problems of the game," Selig said. "Solving the economic problems is what I'm supposed to do. I'm working on that."

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E-mail jfay@enquirer.com