MLB

Mavericks owner Cuban: Selig’s treatment of A-Rod ‘disgraceful’

Mark Cuban has racked up millions of dollars in fines from NBA commissioner David Stern. Bud Selig probably wishes he had the same authority.

The Mavericks owner went on a blistering tirade of the MLB commissioner Thursday night for the treatment Yankees star Alex Rodriguez has received from baseball.

“Horrible,” Cuban said on “The Tonight Show” when asked by Jay Leno for his thoughts on the 211-game suspension Selig stuck A-Rod with on Monday.

“I think it’s disgraceful what Major League Baseball is trying to do to him. Look, it’s not that he doesn’t deserve to be suspended. He does. They have policies in place: A first-time offender is 50 games, and a second time is 100. [Two hundred and eleven games], that’s personal.”

Rodriguez was one of 13 players suspended this week, but the other dozen all accepted 50-game suspensions for their connections to Biogenesis and alleged PED use. Rodriguez was suspended for the rest of this season and all of 2014. He has appealed the suspension and is expected to play through 2013 until the process is completed in November or December.

“Obviously Bud Selig does not like to be tested, he does not want anyone to stand up to him,” Cuban said.

The two biggest names connected to the now-shuttered anti-aging clinic were Rodriguez and Brewers star Ryan Braun, who accepted a 65-game ban two weeks ago.

“How much money a player makes should have nothing to do with how you treat them. The reality is the guy broke the rules…but to come out [with 211] games and try to give him a lifetime ban, that’s just wrong,” Cuban said.

Cuban put in a bid to buy the Cubs in 2008 and had interest in the Rangers in 2009. He was rumored to have interest in the Mets if the Wilpons opted to sell when they were at the height of their financial trouble during the Madoff mess.

“I’ve got to tell you, with my experiences with Major League Baseball — and after all of this, there’s no chance I’m getting to buy a team — it’s basically become Bud Selig’s mafia,” Cuban said.

“He runs it the way he wants to run it. They don’t want me to own a team. When I was trying the buy the Rangers, even after the Cubs, when I was trying to buy the Texas Rangers, it was an open option. I sat in there with my good, hard-earned money trying to bid, and they did everything possible to keep me from buying the team. They had lawyers in there trying to change the rules; they had people trying to put up more money. It was horrible.”