Jerry Reinsdorf was profiled in an extensive piece by
Andrew Gottesman in the CHICAGO TRIBUNE's Sunday Magazine.
Gottesman: "Reinsdorf, by controlling two successful
franchises in this country's third-largest city and by
taking an active role in Major League Baseball, is among the
most influential figures in America's sports establishment.
... As an owner who has helped transform sports into
business, according to allies and opponents alike, Reinsdorf
is considered so powerful because he is so knowledgeable."
More Gottesman: "Largely because of his year-round exposure
in a major-media market, perceptions of his power have taken
on sometimes mythic proportions. Reinsdorf, for example, is
credited by many observers with controlling baseball. That
idea is probably unwarranted. ... But even if Reinsdorf's
influence is waning a bit in baseball, as evidenced by that
lopsided defeat on the collective bargaining vote, his place
as a sports industrialist remains unequalled in Chicago and
rarely surpassed nationally." Reinsdorf: "I don't deny
influence, I deny power. ... Power is the ability to make
people do things whether they want to do them or not, and I
don't have that. Influence is the ability to persuade
people that it's in their best interest to do something."
SLOW DOWN? Reinsdorf said he plans to "leave some" MLB
committees, partially "out of frustration with management's
willingness to compromise last fall." However, he "will not
reduce his involvement in baseball the way he has in
basketball -- where he doesn't do much at all. He stopped
attending NBA meetings "about three years ago." Reinsdorf:
"I once asked David Stern what the purpose of an owners
meeting was, and he told me: 'So I can inform the owners of
what I've done.' Based upon that, I can send somebody to
take notes" (CHICAGO TRIBUNE SUNDAY MAGAZINE, 4/6).