Baseball Flu: Contract It!
I saw a batter’s worth of my first spring training baseball game on television today. And I learned that it’s never too early in the year to hate the New York Yankees.
My own personal off-season from baseball works in two parts. After the World Series, I take it easy. I try not to think too much about the game, because after watching 75 hours of postseason baseball, I’m exhausted. And I don’t care what anyone says, even if regular season baseball lacks excitement, the postseason’s normally unbelievable. Especially when Curses are involved.
I relax until the end of January, when the first half of my offseason stops when the Super Bowl ends, someone arranges to go to Disneyworld, a bad TV show gets a good time slot, and I’m the happiest man on the planet.
‘Cause football couldn’t be further away, and I have about two months of looking forward to baseball to look forward to. Sweet.
Oh, and screw the hooplah around steroids. It’s important, but not nearly as big a deal when you ignore the press. Drugs have always been around, always. But there’s regulation now, and that’s good for morale, I suppose.
Baseball didn’t implement a plan sooner, and that’s of its own doing, because (shhh): Steroids = Home Runs = Ratings = $$$$.
And why do people only start to care when records are falling? Like with McGwire and Sosa in 1998, and Bonds now. What about the “integrity” of the everyday game? It’s like politics in non-election years.
I say, care often or care not at all, because otherwise you’re as fair-weather as a newly-minted Red Sox fan who claims rooting rights because his great-great-uncle once tipped a cow named “Mayflower.”
And all that asterisk talk, check it out: Hank Aaron hit more home runs than Babe Ruth. But Aaron never hit more than 50 homers in a year, while Ruth’s single-season record of 60 stood for more than 30 years, and his career mark stood for almost 40. Who’s better? Should Aaron’s career mark have an asterisk because he played in a longer season? Or in the National League?
Was the dominant but injured Sandy Koufax better than Nolan Ryan, whose storied career was more than twice as long?
Who knows — the debate is a big part of the fun.
Stats aren’t everything. Records aren’t everything. Relax. Discuss. Fight. Enjoy.
Incidentally, I believe the relationship I have with baseball is much like the one I’ll have with my future wife:
She’ll be around to hang out almost every day. If I have something else planned, something better to do, I can ignore her, do my thing and catch up with her later that night or the next morning. Sometimes we’ll go on road trips here and there. Mostly local excursions, but I’m not averse to flying. Some moments will be exciting, others low-key. We’ll go to the DR or Venezuela in the winter. We’ll drink and sit in the sun.
And I’ll always be excited for the next year.
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