Down to two and up to Bud

“This is very difficult to handicap.”

Those are the words of someone with a direct stake in handicapping the competition for ownership of the Washington Nationals.

“It depends on who you talk to and what time of day you talk to them. Bud can change his mind 10 more times before he makes a final decision.”

Those are the words of someone who knows Cadillac Bud Selig well enough to know the commissioner’s decision-making process.

But after rounding up the usual suspects in an exercise that has gone on way too long, the consensus is the selection is down to two groups. But there is no consensus over which two those are.

Some believe it is down to the Washington Baseball Club and the Lerner family-Stan Kasten merger. But many others think it is between the Lerner-Kasten group and Jeff Smulyan.

Since Lerner-Kasten is a finalist in both scenarios, it would appear to be the choice.

“Bud is very comfortable with the Lerners,” said one baseball insider familiar with the process.

But he also is comfortable with Smulyan. And, perhaps just as important, his lieutenant, Chicago White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf, considers Smulyan a close friend.

That’s why, until Cadillac Bud issues the final decree about the Nationals’ new owner, it will be difficult to believe it won’t be Smulyan, the Indianapolis radio mogul and former owner of the Seattle Mariners.

It could come down to Cadillac Bud, Reinsdorf and baseball chief operating officer Bob DuPuy sitting together in one room in the next several days, with Reinsdorf pushing Smulyan and DuPuy making the case for the Lerners.

And from a distance, a host of powerful and influential voices could be reaching Cadillac Bud through the walls of that room to make the case for Washington financier Fred Malek and the Washington Baseball Club — Capitol Hill voices, the sort that have dragged baseball officials to Washington in the past to make their lives miserable.

“There is a lot of pressure from Washington for baseball to name Malek,” one observer said.

Malek and his Washington Baseball Club can bring that kind of heat.

Malek has been a major figure in the Republican party for more than 30 years. His so-called “Jewish cabal list” duties in the Nixon administration may have hurt his image but certainly not his influence. He was a close political associate of former President George H.W. Bush and helped set up his son — President George W. — as the front man in the ownership of the Texas Rangers. People in power take Fred Malek’s phone calls.

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