For the Good of the Game: The Inside Story of the Surprising and Dramatic Transformation of Major League Baseball

Selig, who served as the ninth commissioner of Major League Baseball from 1998 to 2015, delivers a straightforward, insightful account of his life and how he dealt with challenges in a quickly changing sport. Starting with his ownership of his hometown Milwaukee Brewers in 1970, through his becoming commissioner after the resignation of Fay Vincent, Selig gives an honest account of his struggles with what he believed were owners “stuck in the past” and “planted on the wrong side of history” when it came to modernizing the league’s economic system and forging a partnership with the Players Association. Selig praises union negotiator Marvin Miller, who understood “that the union, and not management, controlled the players.” After the baseball strike of 1994, Selig was hard on team owners, who he felt needed “to see that they could not rely on a union-based solution” to fix the economic problems they faced, but instead “had to look beyond the players and union for ways to increase revenue and ensure their teams’ solvency.” Selig doesn’t shy from the many controversies in MLB, and is equally hard on the players—and himself—especially his role during the league’s widespread steroid issues that lasted until the end of his tenure. Baseball fans looking for a straight-talking, insider look into the business of the sport will delight in this outing. (July)