Seven times since 1994, John Fairfield has instructed Xavier University students on the history of Major League Baseball.

        “A civic institution worth saving,” he calls it, something “to represent our better selves.”

        On the last day of this summer's one-week seminar Friday, he and his students took a swing at some ideas on how to save the game.

        “We need to repossess the national pastime,” he said to the dozen students taking “Baseball and American Culture.” “We need to take it back from the owners.”

        The century-old struggle between players and owners has tilted in favor of those in uniform, even as the game has become more corporate and distant from fans. A strike this year seems inevitable with rumors floating of a date in mid-September. Player salaries tops the list of contentious issues, as it has for decades. But new speed bumps like testing for steroids are emerging.

        With Internet efforts by fans to organize boycotts of games, a walkout could be the third and final strike, the one to break the faith of even the most faithful of baseball enthusiasts.

        “Baseball is more than a market thing,” said Dr. Fairfield, an urban historian with an interest in baseball. “It matters, and if we as a people can't preserve this, I have no hope for us.”

        Discussion on how to save the national pastime ranged from ideas found mostly in academic journals to more broadly discussed movements such as examining Major League Baseball's 1922 exemption from anti-trust legislation.

        Even high-profile politicians have entered the fray. Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Ky., wrote in a recent New York Times opinion piece that owners should start sharing revenues, that players must agree to a salary cap and suggested an independent auditor take a look at baseball's books. Mr. Bunning, a Southgate native, played in the major leagues from 1955 to 1971. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1998, the same year he was elected to the Senate after serving six terms in the U.S. House of Representatives.

        Another idea from Friday's class: Return the game to the public by removing ball clubs from private ownership. Instead, put them in the hands of cities or nonprofits.

        “Municipalities should be allowed, indeed encouraged, to form their own teams and build their own parks as a matter of civic pride and development, plowing the profits back into their cities,” Dr. Fairfield said.

        Some have even argued that franchises could be confiscated by eminent domain, especially for teams trying to leave a city.

        Severing Major League Baseball's ties with minor leagues also could allow those teams to cultivate good players themselves, spreading out resources.

        Steve Eder contributed.

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