With the election of a new president, this seems to be a good time to retell a story that may still not generally be known. It’s about the baseball owner.

That is how, for eight years, I have referred to President George W. Bush. That, after all, is how I know him. I have had no contact with him during his presidency, but when he was the managing general partner of the Texas Rangers, I occasionally talked to him and asked him questions.

He was amiable and abundantly approachable. If the owners were meeting in a hotel and they emerged from their meeting room, most of them would run away from the group of waiting reporters. Not Bush. He would walk right up to the group and make it obvious that he was willing to talk. When your ability to do your job depends on accessibility and availability, it’s hard not to like a guy like that.

But in his current job? Let me just say I’m happy that presidents can’t serve three terms.

Actually, you have to tip your cap to George W. He parlayed the family name into wealth and the White House. He turned a relatively minor investment of borrowed money into being a millionaire, then converted his ownership position with the Rangers into a political career probably unparalleled in American history.

This is where the story comes in. In 1993, when the president was still the baseball owner, before he was president, before he was governor of Texas, Major League Baseball needed a commissioner. Fay Vincent had resigned under pressure in September 1992, and the owners had not designated a successor. Instead the executive council was the ruling entity.

As chairman of the council, Bud Selig was the de facto, acting or interim commissioner, take your pick, but he steadfastly denied that he was commissioner by any title and denied that he wanted to be the permanent commissioner.

“The answer is no, it’s been no, everybody knows it’s no,” Selig said a year after Vincent resigned. “I’m not going to change my mind. Nothing that I could perceive could change it. I have no interest in the job.”

Some people actually took Selig at his word. Len Coleman, the National League president at the time (league presidents existed then), was one, and once he let it be known that he was interested in becoming commissioner he was finished as a viable baseball executive.

Bush was another, and he let Selig know that he would accept the job if the owners were interested in having him serve. Bush, however, waited and heard nothing, then waited some more and still heard nothing. He said he had to know because some Texas Republicans wanted him to run for governor. Nothing.

He ran for governor. He won. He ran for re-election. He won. He ran for president. He won. He ran for re-election. He won. All of this, one of the most successful careers in political history, because Selig didn’t tell him he could be commissioner.

Selig didn’t tell him because he wanted to be commissioner himself, forceful, repeated denials notwithstanding. Selig has denied that he knew Bush wanted to be commissioner, but in his book, “The Last Commissioner,” Vincent quotes telephone conversations he had with Bush on the subject in which Bush talked about his conversations with Selig.

Selig has also denied that he himself wanted the job. But he eventually took the job, while Governor Bush was in his first term, and he will continue to serve as commissioner after President Bush has returned to civilian life.

When Bush’s presidency ends on Jan. 20, will he send Selig a thank you note? Not that Selig singlehandedly made Bush president, but he receives credit (blame?) for lighting the match that lit the flame that propelled Bush to the White House.

Had Selig given Bush the go-ahead, he would very likely be commissioner today. It’s safe to say that he would have done a better job as commissioner than he has done as president. He also could have been more himself. People who knew Bush before he became president generally agree that he is a good guy, a friendly sort with whom you could be comfortable having a beer.

Few people who knew the pre-political Bush would have predicted or guessed that he would someday be president. But he was a political person.

When a group of owners led by Selig and Jerry Reinsdorf of the Chicago White Sox wanted to oust Vincent as commissioner in 1992, Bush was the most outspoken in support of Vincent. Bush, however, was also annoyed that Vincent had not conducted himself in a politically savvy way, keeping count of owners for and against so he would know where he stood.

Vincent’s successor, Selig, was a counter and always knew where the owners stood on issues. Selig rarely called for a vote unless he knew where all of the owners stood and therefore where he stood.

One owners meeting comes to mind where, it turned out, Selig did not know and a vote backfired on him. That evening he emerged from the meeting room and, walking down the hall, spotted a reporter and made a gesture as if he were holding a machine gun and aiming it at the owners back in the room. That was a rare instance, though.

Bush opposed Selig on one issue – realignment – because the format under consideration would have put the Rangers in a division with three West Coast teams, all in a time zone two hours from the Rangers’ time zone.

“I don’t want to be in the American League West, where most of our games are in the middle of the night and most of our fans are asleep,” Bush said. “I’m against the playoffs. I think they’re bad for baseball.”

Bush meant the expanded playoffs that would add a wild-card team to what would be champions of three divisions, doubling the number of playoff teams in each league from two to four.

In this instance Selig prevailed. Bush became a lone holdout against the plan, and the realignment of divisions and the addition of wild cards have served baseball well. Bush was wrong in his opposition to the plan, but he was wrong far more often in his ultimate job.