The Diamond Revolution: The Prospects for Baseball After the Collapse of Its Ruling Class

Baseball fans were either shocked or numbed when Ryne Sandberg and Bobby Bonilla signed contracts that would pay them millions more than any player in history. But these deals were only the symptoms of a war that has been going on for decades.
While baseball is played much the same as it was in the past, behind the scenes a revolution has transformed the sport. Once an all-white game performed before local audiences in cities of the north and midwest and controlled by an old guard of owners who held players in feudal bondage, baseball today is an international affair, fueled by beer and television revenues, where players enjoy free agency's lucrative bounty.
In The Diamond Revolution, Neil Sullivan examines the fall of baseball's ruling class and the rise of its new order. With a scholar's expertise and a fan's passion, Sullivan illuminates the key areas of change and what they mean for the future of baseball. Along the way he raises provocative issues, such as: how baseball's racist policies helped maintain the famous team dynasties; the El Dorado option: how owners use the threat of franchise movement to win huge taxpayer-funded concessions; free agency and arbitration: the twin demons the owners brought upon themselves; and beer and baseball: the game's golden goose and the movement that might kill it.
These and dozens of other topics reveal the side of baseball that most fans never see--a field of play where the stakes are not just games but the future of the sport itself.

Contemporary baseball fans frequently bemoan the current state of the game, especially what they see as an increased emphasis on business instead of sport. But Sullivan ( Minors ), an associate professor of public administration at the City University of New York, questions whether there ever was a golden age for the national pastime. He gives a laundry list of past ills, reminding readers that for many years players were virtual slaves, working for wretched pay; that owners enforced a color bar, moved teams from city to city in search of more spectators, and overexpanded league memberships, perhaps even to the point of spreading the talent pool too thin; and that over time very few teams have dominated the sport. Previous eras were golden for the owners, but not for anyone else, he concludes. Sullivan finishes with a short and superficial list of the steps baseball can take to survive and grow. An unimpressive study. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Nine innings' worth of baseball as Big Business, by Sullivan (The Minors, 1990, etc.). Baseball, argues Sullivan, is not the eternal cathedral of Field of Dreams, but rather a boisterous, bickering marketplace. The sport evolves along with the nation, he contends, and here he charts its changes and makes suggestions to secure baseball's future. Racism, the author believes, is gone from the field, but he urges owners to hire more black executives before black fans turn elsewhere in disgust. Sullivan counsels against moving teams to new cities, a maneuver that almost always backfires, and urges better management instead. He finds the stadiums of the 60's and 70's to be ``uniform utilitarian mediocrities,'' with the notable exception of Dodger Stadium, built with private funds. In a cheerier vein, he argues convincingly that league expansion doesn't dilute the quality of play (the US population, and thus the pool of available players, grows faster than baseball can handle). Sullivan sees a bright future for cable broadcasting and imagines futuristic developments like cameras secreted in the pitcher's uniform or tickets spewed out by home computers. He admonishes owners to share revenue decisions with players and urges a reassessment of baseball's romance with beer. Dull and scattered: a grab bag without a drawstring to hold it together. Sullivan offers intelligent advice, but only team owners and managers need take time out to listen. (Eight pages of b&w photos--not seen.) -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Sullivan ( The Minors , LJ 3/1/90; The Dodgers Move West , LJ 6/1/87) appraises the economic, social, and demographic changes that have reshaped baseball and those that will govern its future. He assesses indistinguishable cookie-cutter ballparks, the rise of unions, team moves, race relations, and drug problems in an often critical survey. Though failing to explore the proposed Japanese ownership of the Seattle Mariners, this candid look at pro baseball is more timely and pertinent than Gerald Scully's The Business of Major League Baseball ( LJ 11/1/89) and is recommended for most sports collections.
-Morey Berger, St. Joseph's Hosp . Medical Lib., Tucson
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.