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| Frank Mccourt |
With Selig, however, there's sometimes a caveat, and in this case, there is this: He and baseball's owners, were the ones who approved McCourt as Dodgers owner in the first place.
That was a curious act, to be sure. When McCourt purchased the Dodgers in a heavily-leveraged deal for $430 million in 2004, he already was a two-time loser in trying to crack baseball's ownership fraternity.
He tried buying the Red Sox in 2001, but was rebuffed. And that was probably a good thing for Red Sox fans: McCourt's grand plan was to turn his south Boston parking lot empire into a new waterfront stadium.
As we know now, Fenway Park is still a very viable ballpark as it rounds third and heads for its 100th birthday.
He tried buying the Angels in 2003, but was beaten out by Arte Moreno, then an anonymous billboard mogul, now known as one of the most fan-friendly owners in sports. Angels fans remain grateful for what now looks like a lucky bounce.
So if McCourt got out-bid for the $183 million Angels in 2003, how, suddenly, was he a viable candidate to buy the Dodgers for $430 million less than a year later?
Well, Selig and Co. were motivated sellers.
As grim as the McCourt era has been for the Dodgers, it was similarly chaotic when Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. owned the club. Just a few years after purchasing the club from the O'Malley family, Fox wanted to wash its hands of the Dodgers -- pronto.
And given Fox's importance to baseball -- in 2006, it re-upped for seven more years of regular season and playoff coverage -- if it wanted out, it was going to get out.
So enter McCourt, who promised to keep the payroll high and aspirations higher.
Instead, it was his debt on the club that skyrocketed. Almost makes the Fox days -- when non-baseball personnel thought it a good idea to trade Mike Piazza-- look quaint.
Seven years and one ugly, public divorce later, McCourt is out,though he's going down fighting. Dodgers fans are grateful.
And Selig, known for his deliberate decision-making, reacted with relative dispatch this time. It may not undo the original mistake of handing McCourt the keys to one of baseball's storied franchises, but it was the right decision this time.
