
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, July 1, 1990                   TAG: 9007010089
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B3   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: NEW YORK                                 LENGTH: Medium

VINCENT USES GIAMATTI GUIDELINES IN STEINBRENNER CASE

The hearing that Commissioner Fay Vincent will oversee Thursday on baseball's investigation of George Steinbrenner will be based largely on guidelines set last year by A. Bartlett Giamatti for his planned hearing on Pete Rose's gambling activities.

Giamatti, then the commissioner, outlined the process for Rose in a letter dated May 11, 1989.

He informed Rose that he could be represented by counsel, that the hearing was to be on the record and that Rose could present any statements of witnesses or testimony of witnesses.

"We certainly used that letter for the basis of this procedure," Vincent said Friday.

Giamatti never did hold the hearing because Rose, after a court fight, opted to accept a lifetime ban instead.

The Steinbrenner hearing will take place, the commissioner said, because there has been absolutely no attempt by either side to settle the matter beforehand and he would choose not to because he wants to hear Steinbrenner's presentation.

While the guidelines for the hearing may be in place, what occurs afterward is still not defined.

Vincent is not even ready to call the hearing the final step before he renders a decision, or say when a decision will come.

"I just don't know enough at this point to make those kinds of judgments," Vincent said. "We have to wait to see how sharply focused the hearing is, if other steps are needed. We have to keep all the possibilities open."

Those possibilities range from the commissioner's dismissing the investigation altogether or, having found a violation of baseball's rules, meting out punishment, as is the commissioner's right under Baseball's Rules of Procedure.

In 1943, Kenesaw Mountain Landis forced William Cox to sell his controlling interest in the Phillies after Cox was found to have bet on his team's games.

In the early 1950s, Ford Frick forced the Cardinals' owner, Fred Saigh, to do the same, after Saigh was convicted of tax fraud.

In 1974, Bowie Kuhn suspended Steinbrenner after Steinbrenner pleaded guilty to a felony charge of violating federal campaign-contribution laws.

Kuhn also suspended Ted Turner, the Braves' owner, for a year after Turner was found to have tampered with potential free agents.

Steinbrenner is being investigated for having made payments to Howard Spira, a 31-year-old Bronx resident who says he was paid for providing detrimental information on Dave Winfield, the former Yankee right fielder.

by CNB