Professional Sport Commissioners
A professional pro sport commissioner should not be picked by the owners. If I had my choice cities would own the teams and the huge profits targeted to help educate and clean up the ghettoes of cities. The owners getting to pick the Commissioner is not fair to fans or players. These businesses are monopolies, the most pure form still existing of the 'good ole boys' clubs. The Commissioners should be appointed by the Federal Courts----these are national sports and the fans need protection. The players have a union and between these two greedy and corrupt cabals, the owners and the players get the gold mine, the fans get the shaft.
The most ludicrous part of a football game telecast is the obligatory shot of the owner, sitting in his skybox, and the commentators lavishing nonsensical praise on them for fear the network will have a hard time retaining the lucrative contract to get the games if they don't lavish praise.
Common sense dictates that any business as vast and lucrative as professional sport franchises ought to be held accountable. If not, all kinds of abuses will occur. When is the last time any of us saw an owner of a professional sport team hauled into court for illegal financial schemes, fraud, racketeering, money laundering, etc.?
We are supposed to believe, I guess, that by some kind of miracle these CEO's are all honest, not addicted to money, and therefore when they say all their decisions are done in the best interest of the game, we should dutifully believe them. And amazingly, most people I guess do. From contracts, to ticket prices, to rules, to arbitration----you name it, and the process is stacked, unregulated, outside the normal accountability to government or the courts. If all of this is not wrong, nothing that goes on in the corporate world is wrong. They even get to choose who prospective new owners will be. How cozy.
I think Commissioners should be appointed by the Federal Courts, answer to the Courts, and fans should have a Union, just like the players do, and all agreements be decided by all three parties---owners, players, and FANS. "Pray tell" one might ask, "how do these owners get away with all this?" Simple. Even I like sports, and as long as I do, I watch the games. It is like sex, maybe we shouldn't be having sex out of marriage, but some like the sex so it happens. Everyone knows, in their heart, that giving the owners of professional sport teams so much unregulated power is wrong, but we like to watch sports, so the situation is allowed to slide.
