BBA suffers self important deception neurosis - eats it own

(This piece has been held in draft since early December)

So the Baseball Bloggers Alliance has a constitution now, and publishing quotas, and content regulations.

A member must vote on at least one of the BBA's year-end Major League Baseball awards and must be posted to your blog - or the Hall of Fame ballot. One must also publish the results of the BBA's Hall of Fame balloting. And one must publish at least once a month (see Article II below).

Well holy shit! I haven't published anything here since November; so here goes.

I became aware that these conditions existed last month, as several blogs were sent packing for not being on point enough to just answer an email from the BBA. It was at this point I found out I had to vote on one of the years ballots, so as it was Hall of Fame voting time; I check-marked some squares and pushed "Submit", to the democratic (w)ill.

You may be able to tell, I'm not a big fan of Major League Baseball. If it wasn't for Marvin Miller and the Professional Baseball Player's Association, this corporate club of crooks would still be sending great stars off to live their retirements in poverty. If Congress, towards their own ends, didn't happen to be in a position to wield the anti-trust hammer over this group of goons - they would have crushed that union by legal or extra legal means long ago I'm sure.

So when a group of Baseball Bloggers who couldn't even write a proper press release last year start telling me what content I have to include in my Blog... well you can guess I'm going to to find a way to skewer those BBA rule fetishists and MLB at the same time.

Welcome to the nightmare.

BBA Constitution

Baseball Bloggers Alliance
Constitution
Article I: Purpose
The purpose of the Baseball Bloggers Alliance (BBA) is to foster communication and collaboration amongst bloggers across baseball, increasing understanding and knowledge about the game.
Article II: Membership
Any blog that has been in existence three months or has 20 posts is eligible to become a member of the BBA. Members are placed into chapters that correspond with their blogging focus.
To retain membership, a blogger must meet three criteria.

• Criteria 1: A blogger must not have a gap longer than one (1) month between posts on his/her blog.
• Criteria 2: A blogger must have at least thirty (30) posts during a calendar year, save the year that they join the BBA.
• Criteria 3: A blogger must vote in at least one (1) of the three (3) voting opportunities during the year. (See Article III.)

If the criteria are not maintained, a blog may be placed on inactive status or dropped from the organization, depending on circumstances.
The criteria above for eligibility and retaining membership will go into effect January 1, 2011.
A blogger may not have more than one voting blog in the organization at a time. Blogs, websites, or individuals may also be listed as a “Friend of the BBA.” Friends receive e-mailings, are listed on the official BBA website, and may post the BBA logo on their site, but may not participate in any of the voting opportunities. Friends also do not have any requirements to retain their status.
Article III: Voting
There will be three (3) different voting opportunities during a calendar year. As noted in Article II, a member must participate in at least one (1) of these opportunities.

• In January, there will be a vote based on the official Hall of Fame ballot for the BBA recommendation of who should be selected. This will be done either via e-mail or internet form. All active members are eligible to participate.
• In June, there will be a vote for those to be selected to the Major League Baseball (MLB) All-Star Game. This voting will be done via posts on member blogs detailing their selections. All active members are eligible to participate.
• In October, there will be voting for post-season awards.

There will be five awards voted on. Newbie of the Year (to correspond with the official Rookie of the Year), Skipper of the Year (Manager of the Year), Pitcher of the Year (Cy Young Award), Player of the Year (MVP Award), and Goose Gossage Award (given to top reliever in each league).
Each chapter will receive two votes for each award. Votes will be delegated in a manner designated by the chapter president. Voters will vote for the league their team is in. In the case of the general, non-team-specific chapters, the voter may vote for whichever league they wish.
Ballots must be posted to the member’s blog (or another designated publically viewable area on the internet) by the deadline set for the award.
Article IV: Miscellaneous
Chapter presidents will be initially selected by the BBA President. Chapters are then free to set up their own methods of changing those presidents in the future, if they wish. If a chapter president resigns with no mechanism in place to select a replacement, the BBA President in consultation with other members of that chapter will appoint a new president.
Members are encouraged to link to other members and the official BBA website as well as posting a BBA logo on their site.