While the shark that is Mark Cuban circles and waits for the Cubs bidders' deals to fall apart due to strained credit markets and refinance risk, the final three identified bidders are being told by the Tribune to "polish" their finals offers. Translation: Increase your bid.

As we've known since December Tom Ricketts, Marc Utay and Hersch Klaff are the main candidates to complete a purchase. Fans should probably rank their rooting interests is the order of the names listed above. While none of these guys have ever owned a sports franchise themselves before, giving us no track record on which to base what kind of owner they would be (fan friendly, hands off, Dan Snyder-esque whacko, etc.), Ricketts is likely the best bet.

The subtle piece of the Trib bio was this line:

Tom Ricketts wanted to make it on his own and never worked at Ameritrade (the Ricketts family business)

What you want with an owner is a guy who wants to show that he's smarter than everyone else and has the disposable cash to treat a sport franchise as their personal yacht, not a profit center.

That Tom wants to make it on his own suggests just such an ego. The question is, does he have a Mark Cuban ego which has learned that good GM's make good teams? Or does he have the Dan Snyder ego where you go get the best, shiniest toy and throw it into your pile?

If it is to be Ricketts, let's hope it's more Type A than B.