The Legacy Of Bowie Kuhn

The most excellent Michael McCann over at Sportslaw promos Les Carpenter's Washington Post item on an unusual aspect of the quarter-century old Iran hostage crisis.

The released hostages were showered with ticker tape and novelty gifts: Electrolux vacuums, bar-b-ques, blue jeans, potatoes and Mardi Gras excursions. But it was baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn who came up with the most extraordinary gift: a lifetime pass to baseball.


McCann wonders about some interesting complications: can the pass be transferred? If it can't, wouldn't non-baseball loving recipients rather have something else (or be able to sell it)?

What I wonder is this: is there a sport other than baseball that could make such a beneficent gesture and have it mean so much? Didn't think so.