by Amaury Pi Gonzalez

LOS ANGELES–With the upcoming election for the next Major League Baseball Commissioner Los Angeles Angels and Chicago White Sox owners Artie Moreno and Jerry Renisdorf are ready to campaign against Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig’s top choice and frontrunner for the job Rob Manfred. The owners will hold elections next week on August 14th where the winner must get 23 of 30 of the vote. Moreno and Reinsdorf are pushing for the other candidate to win Boston Red Sox Chairman Tom Werner. If Moreno and Reinsdorf can get eight votes for Werner it would block Manfred from becoming the next commissioner.

I’m not a big fan of Selig but I wish him nothing but the best in his retirement in January 2015 he lacked the leadership under the steroids era and he came to the party a little too late. Then again money talks and you know the rest walks, the owners like him because he ruled over the tremendous era of prosperity.

One of the best candidates for the job should be the General Manager of the Detroit Tigers Dave Dombrowski would be a terrific commissioner, another guy who would be a good commissioner Joe Torre. Torre the former Dodgers manager was watching batting practice at Dodgers Stadium on Tuesday night he works as baseball’s disciplinarian.

I prefer not to see Manfred get the job baseball should get somebody who is dynamic, well known, Torre will be that type of guy, Selig is getting old 79 and you want somebody younger to run the game. Last year in Anaheim when the Tigers came to town I got to speak with Dombrowski and I know him well when he used to run the Miami Marlins before coming to Detroit.

I asked Dombrowski point blank if he would like to be MLB Commissioner? He said,”I would not do a campaign for it but if they asked me I would consider it.” So that means yes when a General Manager who has a lot of pull with the Detroit Tigers says he would take the job. There’s many good young people out there and when I say young people I don’t mean people under 25 but Dombrowski has experience.

Dombrowski is 58 years old and Torre is 74, but baseball could do better than Manfred as successor to Selig,I’d like to see a different face there I like to see somebody that really knows baseball that knew the game that knows the game like Dombrowski and Torre. One of those guys, somebody mentioned to me about NBC Sports talent Bob Costas he’s a broadcaster he lives in St.Louis he knows the game he’s well respected.

I want somebody whose been inside the game and I’m throwing my hat in the ring for Dombrowski, and there are so many qualified people out there but I hate to see somebody who would be a rubber stamp like Manfred with the same kind of politics as Selig. I wish the Commissioner all the best and in a few months he’s going to retire but I think we could do better.

Amaury Pi Gonzalez is the Spanish TV voice for Los Angeles Angels baseball and does News and Commentary each week for http://www.sportsradioservice.com