JUST PLAY BALL ALREADY!

JUST PLAY BALL ALREADY!

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 2009

JUST PLAY BALL ALREADY!


You may think I’m in the minority, but I’d disagree.I’m a Yankee fan – so perhaps that helps to sway my opinion one way or another about all the A-Rod steroid use in the news. Everywhere you turn, you have to hear about it. I’ve got a very strong opinion on the whole episode.I don’t give a fuck.

Seriously, can we all step back for a moment and realize what baseball really is in the scope of life. It’s a game. More than that it’s a diversion from the harsh reality that is life. Look around, we’re all in a world of shit, we need something to offer us a means of escape from the dire worry we’re all staring down. That’s what sports are supposed to be. Sure, teams are worth huge piles of money, and it’s a big business. But other than the business of entertaining us, allowing us to cheer for ur favorite teams and players, none of us are owed any explanation as to what any player does when they’re off the field. Frankly, I really don’t care. I want to watch a baseball game, hope my team wins, and enjoy the time I get to escape from the day to day.

It gets harder every day to pay attention to the game that takes place between the white lines – but I’m going to try. Although the naysayers will claim that steroids and the cheaters have ruined the game, it’s only the fact that the media finds it a juicy story that keeps it in the forefront of everywhere we turn.

There was the Black Sox scandal of 1919. That didn’t ruin the game. There’s a spitballer named Gaylord Perry in the Hall of Fame – and he wrote a book describing how he cheated to gain an advantage. Hell, even Yankee greats of the past did what they could – Whitey Ford was known to use sandpaper to scuff the ball to gain an advantage over the hitters and Graig Nettles was caught with a corked bat to gain an advantage over pitchers. I’m still a fan of both – they’re Yankees.

Nope, the steriods and the scandal won’t destroy the sport, only the constant bombardment of it being the only thing put in front of us can do that. Fear not, because as long as true baseball fans remember the immortal words of Mr. Jones

The one constant through all the years
Has been baseball
America is ruled by it like an army of steamrollers
It’s been erased like a blackboard
Rebuilt
And erased again
But baseball has marked the time
This field, this game
Is a part of our past Ray
It reminds us of all that once was good
And it could be again

It can be if they’d just…