Monday Morning Manager...Who will own the Rangers?

What we know about the Rangers ownership situation...

* For some reason, a business transaction has become a big public relations campaign...

* Chuck Greenberg decided to let everybody know that he is working hard to get local investors involved in his ownership. He already has the big ace in Nolan Ryan.

* Ryan is being pulled in all directions like the wishbone off a Thanksgiving turkey. Rangers owner Tom Hicks has a commitment from Ryan to be a part of his potential ownership group.

* Hicks badly wants to retain control of the team and is trying to get local investors to back him up. He scored major public relation points by announcing last week that he also has a commitment from NFL icon Roger Staubach to be a part of his group.

* He missed on Troy Aikman, who is in with the ownership group of the Padres.

* Hicks definitely knows that he still has a major sales job ahead of him with many fans who are quite frustrated with what has transpired over the past ten years. These are the ones who have been pining for Mark Cuban to buy the team. But Cuban's name has not come up.

* Hicks strongly believes the club is headed in the right direction and there is strong evidence in that regard but he still has to convince a large segment of the fan base that is the case. The Rangers just have not been able to get that point across to as many fans as possible. Tom Grieve/Mike Stone and Doug Melvin/Tom Schieffer were much better at selling the direction of the team.

* Dennis Gilbert wants the team badly and has been busy behind the scene trying to drum up support for his cause. Here is what Nick Cafardo, an outstanding baseball writer for the Boston Globe, wrote on Sunday.

Tom Hicks, who has to sell the team because of financial woes, is organizing a group of local investors in an effort to remain majority owner. Is this best for the Rangers? Gilbert, who submitted a sealed bid Friday, is clearly better, a real baseball man who understands how teams work. Gilbert has been an agent and an adviser to White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf, and his charitable work - for the RBI Program and the Scouts Foundation he started - has earned him great respect around the game. This one is a no-brainer.

* Gilbert might have one advantage. He's likely to have the support of Commissioner Bud Selig. That, in normal circumstances, is huge. Selig often has a huge say in who buys these teams.

* Jim Crane (right), blandly called the "Houston businessman," seems to be keeping a low profile in all of this. Even when he visited with Rangers front office people last month, he didn't ask many questions or talk much. One of his assistants did most of that.

* Greenberg, one the other hand, was much more gregariously warm and friendly with all the people he met during his visit.

* Crane does love baseball. He was a star pitcher at the University of Central Missouri in 1973-76 and a member of the school's Hall of Fame. He funded $1.2 million in improvements to the school's baseball field, which is named after both him and his former coach. They call it James R. Crane Stadium/Robert N. Tompkins Field.

* Greenberg owns two Minor League teams, sold another and has won several awards for marketing and promotional campaigns. He's also a sports attorney who is big pals with Mario Lemieux, the hockey Hall of Famer. But a Cowboys quarterback beats a Penguins puck-handler in Texas.

* Bottom line: None of this really matters!!!

For all the public relations postering, it's not going to matter what Hall of Famer is in your ownership group, how much baseball you've played in your life, how close you are with Bud Selig or how many friends you have in the media.

Understand this: it's all about paying off the debt accumulated by Hicks Sports Group. That's why the team is for sale, that's what the New York banks are interested in and that's also what concerns Major League Baseball above everything else. Hicks wouldn't be selling if not for the oppressive debt.

The proposal that best addresses that situation is the one that will like get accepted. All other considerations take a back-seat to that single stipulation.

This is ultimately a business transaction. Answers should come by New Years Day...Spring Training at the latest. People want this thing done.