Saturday, April 03, 1999
Lindner will restore stability to Reds
BY TIM SULLIVAN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Marge Schott is amazing. First, no one could convince her to sell the Cincinnati Reds. Now, no one can convince her to stop.
Schott has sold her controlling interest in baseball's oldest ballclub at least twice in the last five weeks, and it's still not entirely clear that she's out once and for all.
A group of Schott's limited partners have invoked their right to match Larry Dolan's February deal to buy the ballclub. This is a sign of tangible progress, but it is inadequate proof of resolution. For Schott has also sold the club to her cousin, Steve Schott. And Lord knows who else.
She is the Max Bialystock of baseball — a producer who sees no peril in selling more than 100 percent of the inventory. If Carl Lindner and associates had not stepped up to the plate and asserted their overriding interest in the ballclub, the rightful claim to the Reds might have been as murky as Howard Hughes' estate plan.
It may yet get messy — where there are disputes involving millions of dollars, lawsuits follow like lemmings — but at least the ultimate outcome looks reasonably obvious. Lindner's group should soon control baseball's oldest ballclub, which formerly operated out of control under Marge Schott's slapdash stewardship.
Peace in our time.
“I think about what Gerald Ford said when Richard Nixon got on the helicopter (after resigning as President),” a Reds source said Friday afternoon. “Our long national nightmare is over.”
Stability restored
Through suspensions and restrictions, baseball succeeded in reducing Schott from a menace to a mere annoyance in recent years. John Allen was appointed to restore balance to the books and General Manager Jim Bowden was allowed to begin the long process of rebuilding an organization Schott had systematically strip-mined. Gradually, the Reds regained profitability, returned to an emphasis on player development and moved away from the patchwork and panic characteristic of Schott's management style.
The situation was stabilized. The bleeding was stopped. But the Reds' ability to move forward continued to be compromised by the owner's unreasoning obstinance, by her flat-footed failures on the stadium front, by the residue of her reckless tongue, by an enduring image of ditzy intolerance.
Carl Lindner will change all that. He will bring tranquility where there was turmoil and structure where there was chaos. He can be counted on to run the Reds shrewdly, like a real business instead of as an enterprise devoted to his ego or his dog. And, if he should choose, he has some cash he probably could spend on starting pitching.
Either way, the Reds represent such a small part of his empire that Lindner likely will leave the team in the hands of the management team already in place, and keep himself in the shadows. It is as if P.T. Barnum had been replaced by E.F. Hutton.
“Peace and quiet,” Reds partner Bill Reik prophesied Friday. “My goal for 10 years has been to get the spotlight off the ownership and onto the field where it belongs.”
Lindner waited too long
Schott bought the team at a time when its ownership was largely invisible and enormously out-of-touch with baseball evolution. The Williams brothers — Bill and Jim — responded to the advent of free agency by wishing it would go away. Schott recognized baseball as show business. She just never understood the need to develop talent.
She didn't appreciate the significance of scouts. She didn't recognize the need to cultivate the Caribbean. She fired clever executives for no good reason and averted her eyes at the many excesses of Pete Rose. She ran off Davey Johnson, one of baseball's best managers, because he was living in sin with a woman he later married.
She won a World Series with a team composed primarily of inherited players, and she likes to think she saved the Reds from skipping town.
The truth is Carl Lindner would never have let that happen. The tragedy is that he has waited until now to take charge.
Enquirer columnist Tim Sullivan welcomes your E-mail. Message him at tsullivan@enquirer.com.
Limiteds step up to buy Reds
