New commissioner Rob Manfred unanimously given five-year deal, knows he has big shoes to fill
MLB chief operating officer Rob Manfred, center, smiles after team owners elected him as the next MLB commissioner during an owners' quarterly meeting in Baltimore on Thursday, Aug. 14, 2014. Credit: AP / Steve Ruark
What outgoing commissioner Bud Selig described as a "quiet'' transition of power in Major League Baseball continued Thursday morning when club owners unanimously voted to give his successor, Rob Manfred, a five-year contract.
"I agree with commissioner Selig, we've had a really productive and smooth transition,'' Manfred said after the unsurprising vote, the most significant order of business to take place during the owners' meetings here.
Manfred, voted the commissioner-elect in August after a far from smooth and quiet process -- it took six rounds of balloting for him to get the necessary 23 votes -- will officially take the reins from Selig after the owners' meetings in January.
Though he's worked closely with Selig, having been a senior MLB executive since 1998, Manfred, 55, knows he has sizable shoes to fill.
"You do realize what a big job he's had all these years,'' said Manfred, who will be baseball's 10th commissioner. "It's not like it's new to me, I've seen him, I've watched him, but when you start to realize it's going to be you, it does hit you.''
Selig used "quiet'' to describe the transition to Manfred but it also synopsized these meetings.
Besides what amounted to rubber-stamping Manfred's deal, pace of play and possible tweaks to instant replay were the major items addressed during Thursday morning's general session.
MLB used the Arizona Fall League as a petri dish with a handful of initiatives to speed up games, including a 20-second "shot clock'' between pitches and not allowing batters to step out of the box between pitches.
"The experience at the Arizona Fall League made quite an impact on a lot of people,'' Selig said. "I know I saw Tony La Russa during the World Series in San Francisco and he said to me at the time, 'You're going to be surprised at how good it's working.' No question it [pace of play] needs to be addressed, and I know Rob agrees with that. I'll be able to tell you more in the next 30 to 60 days.''
It's unlikely that any changes will be implemented in time for this season, and any changes must be done in conjunction with the Players Association.
As for replay, no major adjustments are expected to be made for 2015. MLB executive vice president of baseball operations Joe Torre said at last week's general managers' meetings in Phoenix that there is concern about the time wasted on the field by "meandering'' managers deciding whether to challenge a call.
"I think the core of replay is going to be similar,'' Manfred said. "I think the changes we're contemplating are largely technology improvements; cameras, things like that. There's some issues related to exactly how long it takes to get the replay going we're looking at, but we haven't made a decision on what those changes will look like.''
Selig put his stamp on the game in his 23 years -- increased revenue-sharing, interleague play, the wild card, instant replay, to name a few -- and also presided over unprecedented labor peace. What kinds of changes Manfred brings to the commissioner's office will be closely watched.
"I think commissioner Selig may be the best one-on-one politician that I've ever seen,'' Manfred said. "And I don't use the word politician in any derogatory way. I mean it in the most complimentary way.''
Yankees president Randy Levine called Selig "the greatest commissioner'' of them all.
"Rob Manfred's going to be a great commissioner, but I think to hold this group together for 23 years, it's almost irreplaceable,'' Levine said. "I think every owner, every president, believed in him. He has tremendous credibility. It's quite a characteristic . . . He was able to keep this very, very different economic and many times self-interested group unified for all these years. It's an incredible accomplishment.''
Erik Boland started in Newsday's sports department in 2002. He covered high school and college sports, then shifted to the Jets beat. He has covered the Yankees since 2009.
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