A Losing Game

A rousing rhubarb is often the best part of a ball game. But after weeks of haggling and threats of an all-out strike, the long-winded dispute between the major-league team owners and the Players Association was getting to be a bore. No one was more annoyed than Bowie Kuhn, the newly appointed commissioner of baseball. Last week, as the negotiators were about to call for yet another vote from the 700 members of the association--a process that would have taken at least two more weeks--Kuhn cut short a Florida vacation and flew back to Manhattan to offer a suggestion. Lock the door, he said succinctly, sit down and settle the damn thing. Both sides got the message. After a session that dragged on until 5 a.m., a settlement was made.

It called for the owners to pad the players' pension fund with $5,450,000 for the next three years. The owners had been holding out for $5,300,000, the players for $5,900,000. So who won? Most fans, noting the embarrassment that the boycott of spring training caused both players and management, agreed with Chicago White Sox Owner Arthur Allyn: "As I see it, it was a loss for all parties concerned."

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