July 21, 2004

All-Star punishment for SF?

On the baseball All-Star Game carrot-and-stick tip, reader Chris Tate writes:

There was some chitchat on Gary Radnich's morning segment on the Giants station (KNBR, www.knbr.com) recently about new parks and the All-Star Game. The selection of Pittsburgh for the '06 ASG is seen as quite a snub by some folks hereabouts, and the rumor is that the ASG is being withheld from San Francisco - which as you know full well has rather a nice park [ed. note: opened in 2000, and 90% privately funded] - because Selig and MLB are angry at the Giants for having set an example of teams being able to buy their own stadiums.

This conspiracy theory has apparently been kicking around for at least a year, and it's got friends - like the one about how Bud Selig keeps passing over Arizona because he's pissed at the Diamondbacks for buying a World Series winner and then turning around and asking MLB for a loan. Whether it's conspiracy to blame or just Kevin McClatchy's relentless autodialer, though, the whole mess is a great reminder of why competitive bidding rules were invented in the first place.