Yankees Owner George Steinbrenner joined Lou Dobbs on
"Moneyline" to discuss the state of the game.
OVERVIEW: "Well, for the last two years, baseball has gone
through a very difficult time, but I think last year's playoff,
particularly our playoff with Seattle, proved that when you
change and go one more level of playoffs, it excited everybody
about baseball. ... Baseball is climbing back now. Some of the
other sports are suffering. It's all hills and valleys, but I
think baseball is on the ascent."
ON THE LACK OF A LABOR DEAL: "I am not a Don Fehr basher,
never have been. I think between Fehr, [Gene] Orza and that
group on the union side, and Randy Levine [the owner's chief
negotiator] and his people on our side, it's going to happen and
baseball is going to be stronger when it's finished. We're going
to play a full season this year. I feel confident of that and I
think we have to get labor peace. We must. ... They're playing
football now in July and finishing in January and they're playing
hockey and basketball now in October and they're not finished
until June. So, we've got a lot of competition out there and
we've got to be making innovations and improvements in baseball.
If we don't we're killing ourselves."
ON FINDING A NEW COMMISSIONER: "There's going to come a
time soon, I think when labor peace comes, Bud Selig will say,
'OK, that's it, I've done my job.' I fully expect when we get
labor peace, we'll look for a new commissioner. ... What we need
is a genius like David Stern or the new fellow in hockey [Gary
Bettman], who comes from the same law firm. He's going to do for
hockey what Stern did for basketball, I'm sure" ("Moneyline,"
CNN, 2/27).
