MLB lockout only reinforces a certain ugliness about the game

Baseball's offseason has now entered what is supposed to be the preseason, the clean-slate rebirth, the start of spring training and the new calendar. But commissioner Rob Manfred's so-called «defensive lockout» has been very much offensive. There is no new season as of yet.

Spring training games have been canceled. Barring an agreement in the next several hours, regular-season games are undoubtedly next.

This, following January's Hall of Fame announcement, which signified another of the game's lowest points: the iconic Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and David Ortiz reduced to a self-imposed spectacle of steroid suspicion and the display of selective justice. Even Derek Jeter, one of the few recent Hall of Famers whose induction came without controversy, made news of his own during the lockout. Jeter, once part-owner of the Miami Marlins, just quit his post as CEO and dumped his equity stake, too. Baseball still can't get it right.

Over the years, as acrimony rose between management and players, one line of thinking suggested the relationship was so toxic that what baseball really needed was new leadership — that fresh new voices and a new approach on both sides would be the answer to the more-than-half-century of labor conflict between players and owners.

The appointment of Tony Clark as executive director of the MLB players' union was exactly that. Since its inception in 1966 as a real collective bargaining unit, the union had never been run by an ex-player. Clark's arrival in 2013 — after the death of Donald Fehr's successor, Michael Weiner — signaled a different approach. The MLBPA still had its requisite share of lawyers and negotiators, but Clark's vision was a true player's union — for players, run by players.

MLB's