How to read this item about Boras and Baseball Awards***Oscars***

Boras' idea for an Oscar-type tv show for baseball awards has already been pitched according to the APSE website Sept '05 and Oct. '05 memos, following url's. Dick Clark Productions was in talks with the BBWAA (The Awards show would be called the "Baseball Writers' Association Awards"). Strange in that fewer and fewer newspapers allow their employees to vote on these awards, especially the League Awards--Cy Young, MVP, ROY, etc.--due to ethics concerns. The last paragraph of the 9/28/05 memo states that Dick Clark Productions would NEGOTIATE DIRECTLY WITH THE PLAYERS ASSN. FOR ACCESS, INCENTIVES, ETC. WITH THE PLAYERS. They thought of everything.

• Memo 1, APSE website, 9/28/05 to vote for or against the idea at their upcoming meeting at the World Series. Details proposal of Dick Clark Productions, how evening would be staged, how events would be timed leading up to the TV awards show, etc. Handled by the BBWAA "Television Committee."

• Memo 2, APSE website, 10/31/05 notes the vote was taken and failed.

• TAKE A LOOK AT DICE-K'S AND AROD'S CONTRACTS--BORAS HAS DETAILED INCENTIVES IN EACH ONE SHOULD A BBWAA MEMBER SNEEZE. THERE ARE NUMEROUS FINANCIAL INCENTIVES FOR VARIOUS BORAS' CLIENTS FOR 1ST PLACE VOTES, 2ND, 3RD, ETC. SORT OF GIVES THE BBWAA SYSTEM A REASON FOR EXISTING, NO?

From Boras' Bloomberg article via Newsday, "Major League Baseball also could hand out annual awards then in an Oscar-style show, rather than releasing them to the news media on weekday afternoons following the season. "We have to have the stars of our game noticed," Boras said in an interview. "To deliver the awards through a wire service, I've never understood that."

• Boras, 54, said he's sent a letter to Commissioner Bud Selig about his idea. The NFL plays the Super Bowl at a predetermined neutral site, and has become a magnet for business entertaining.

"The key to this is the business dynamic," Boras said. "We need to embrace corporate America." Major League Baseball spokesman Pat Courtney said Selig received the letter and declined to comment further. The first modern World Series, won by the Boston Americans over the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1903, was a best-of-nine matchup. After skipping 1904, the National and American leagues resumed the title series in 1905 in a best-of-seven format. They played best of nine again from 1919-21."

• The opening paragraph was: "Agent Scott Boras, who counts Alex Rodriguez and Daisuke Matsuzaka among his clients, said baseball's best deserve a bigger stage than the best-of-seven World Series championship.

The title round should be best of nine games instead, and feature the first two on a weekend at a neutral site to create an atmosphere similar to the Super Bowl, Boras said."

• Article by Bloomberg News published in Newsday, 5/11/07, "Superagent Borus Pitches World Series Reform."

(The article's title references "World Series Reform," but there's quite a bit more going on). If your aim isn't to make money trafficking in human beings (baseball) then this might concern you.

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