If you ever wished you could be a professional sports league commissioner you may want to change your mind, unless of course that league would be the NHL whose only problem is lack of any kind of support. With the recent problems involving Michael Vick, Barry Bonds breaking the home run record, and Tim Donaghy helping to cover the over/under on NBA games for the past two seasons I wouldn’t want to take their place for anything.

Michael Vick came out early on in the investigation of a dog fighting ring that was found on his property in Virginia. Two days ago he was told by Commissioner Roger Goodell not to report to training camp. How long this quasi suspension will be is yet to be determined but the case could take as long as a year? The plaintiff in the case rarely loses cases just to keep that in mind.

Where is Bud Selig? Well for one thing he is not in San Francisco where Barry Bonds is a mere two homeruns shy of tying Hank Aaron and three away from a new mark. With the absence of the Commissioner of baseball missing in action you have to wonder if MLB will even celebrate the feat. When Hank Aaron broke the record the game was stopped and he spoke to the crowd right in the middle of the game. I think the baseball world can’t wait until this over and neither can Selig. My only wish is that he breaks it on the road.

This brings us to commissioner number three. David Stern spoke yesterday morning about Tim Donaghy being an “isolated case”. How many NBA fans have ever watched a game and thought a ref had it out for your team. The hardest thing facing the Commish in this situation is bringing integrity and validity back to a profession which is already be raided with doubts. Good luck with that one, David.

All the NHL fans must be laughing inside about the legal issues surrounding their professional counterparts. But then again, it’s hard to have coverage of your legal issues when you are stuck behind soccer, high school sports, and local amateur events in your local newspapers. It could be worse Gary, trust me.