Columnists offer varying views on A-Rod talks

What newspapers across the country are saying about the proposed trade of Alex Rodriguez for Manny Ramirez, which has bogged down over the players' association's rejection of a proposed restructuring of A-Rod's $252 million contract:

"Had [union official Gene] Orza rolled over on this one, had he allowed an exception to a hard-and-fast rule collectively bargained between the Players Assocation and the owners, Marvin Miller would have rolled over in his grave. And probably, George Meany, Samuel Gompers, and Jimmy Hoffa would have, too. Which, in the case of Hoffa, would have the most exciting thing to happen in the Meadowlands this fall, considering the way the Jets and Giants have played." -- Jim Donaldson, The Providence Journal

"For some fans, baseball has been ruined by players' lack of loyalty and their ability to shop themselves to the highest bidder every few years. The union likes that. Here, the league's best player wanted to play for a winner in a move that would heighten interest in the game. The union should like that, too, but it didn't. Dollars outweighed common sense." -- Tim Cowlishaw, The Dallas Morning News

" ... A-Rod made his choice. He took the money. He could have taken $18 million or $20 million, but he gleefully accepted an average annual salary of $25.2 million, and now he wishes to God he were making a lot less money because now he is miserable in Texas. He wants to come to Boston, and he still might. But the truth is that he'd already be house-hunting in Greater Boston if he hadn't already made a bad decision to go for every last buck three years ago." -- Bob Ryan, The Boston Globe

"The long national ordeal now known now as "The A-Rod Deal" has finally resolved itself to one issue: Do Larry Lucchino, Tom Hicks and Bud Selig detest Gene Orza, Don Fehr and Scott Boras enough to screw up what may be the most entertaining trade -- or sequence of interlocking trades -- in the whole history of American sports? Will baseball's decades of labor-management animosity, which finally began to dissipate when a strike was averted 15 months ago, be re-ignited because money and ego once again defeat common sense?" -- Thomas Boswell, The Washington Post

"If the Red Sox have given up hope, they are the dopes. They are the ones who can least afford to turn back. If they take Nomar back into their clubhouse, they invite disaster. If they bring back Ramirez after treating him like a pariah, they will have trouble. Kevin Millar already has pronounced the Nomah era ovah. If Boston can finish this trade, it will have executed the greatest offseason of dealing ever. If it fails, it will have bungled the baseball opportunity of a generation." -- Jon Heyman, Newsday

"A-Rod will be gone soon in this Manny swap, and that's a mistake that will officially label the Rangers nationally as not only the worst franchise in professional sports but also the dumbest. Instead of 'last place is not an excuse,' out of fairness to the team's sales staff, [owner Tom] Hicks should change the new hard-sell pitch to 'our stupidity is not an excuse.' If nothing else, it might generate some sympathy buys." -- Randy Galloway, Fort Worth Star-Telegram