December 05, 2006
Why Baseball
By Karlsie
Someone asked me recently: why baseball? It's come up in a couple of different settings recently. It's a question I find myself trying to answer frequently - so let me try again.
Why baseball? It is something that reaches deep into your soul and releases a breathe of fresh air that lifts the spirit. Most people don't understand the poetry in motion on the field - the subtle position shifts and the dance between the pitcher, catcher and batter that makes West Side Story choreography look like amateur hour. Many miss it because the television cameras don't cover it while others miss it because they don't understand.
But I do and I love watching for it.
It's not only about the big guys - it's about the everyday players that people get. It's about guys like Gabe Kapler, Kevin Millar and so many others who are grateful they get to play baseball for a living and it shows.
It's about watching parents teach their kids how to score a game or watch for the shift. It's about the summer and warmth and time when you were a kid and you used someone's sweatshirt for home, the chair pad for first, the big rock for second (no sliding) and someone else's backpack for third. And yet every time you stepped up to that sweatshirt, you were standing at home plate in Fenway or Yankee Stadium or Municipal Park or Candlestick or where ever.
Baseball is about heart and soul and memory filled with the warmth of the sun, the smell of fresh mown grass and a cold beer on a hot day.
My husband grew up admiring the Yankees of Mantle and Maris and others. But when most people speak with that loathing tone of voice about the Yankees, it's really about things like when they sort of bought the KC Royals to use as their advanced farm team or Steinbrenner's open checkbook that has lead to such unprecedented greed that there is no other word than "disgusting" to describe it.
From the day he bought Catfish Hunter (the first free agent) right down to the horrific display of "my checkbook's bigger" with the Sox over D-Mat (and I'm sad to say we won that one).
I still remember when my oldest was little and I used to read Bart Giamatti's "Green Fields of the Mind" to him. One day he looked up at me and said, "If I'm not a starting player for the Sox, maybe I could be the president of Yale. Would tha be OK?"
I had to laugh.. most parents would prefer the president of Yale.
This is the same boy who looked at me when he was 13 and said, "I'm never going to be a great ball player, am I?"
I replied, "No, but I expect you to be a great coach some day when your kids want to play. I expect you to be the guy that teaches the kids more than the fundementals. I expect you to be the guy to teach them that you don't have to be a Manny or a Papi or a Nomar to love the game. You just have to love the game."
So... that's why I love baseball and that's what I teach to anyone willing to learn.
TrackBack
Riiiiiight...because the Red Sox are masters of the clutch.
2004.
'Nuff said.
Cheers,
Jack Jablin
C'mon Jack. Do you really want me to post all 26 championship years? Do I have to mention 1978, 1986, 2003 et al?
One year does not a team legacy define - either for the Sox or the Yanks
It was the worst choke of all time, Donny Brasco.
Nobody in any sport has had such a shameful choke; and despite spending record amounts of money, the team hasn't been able to overcome that 'one year' since. That one year has now spanned into three, painful, downbeat years in the Bronx.
Defining? No, but pretty telling.
Cheers,
Jack Jablin
We haven't gotten over it? We've won the AL East the past two years since 2004. Cashman rebuilds the farm system by muzzling Steinbrenner, unloads superstars like Sheffield for hoards of young talent which goes against EVERYTHING the Yankees have done in the Steinbrenner era when they've lost big, and WE haven't gotten over it? If anything, the outlook for the Yankees is BETTER than what it was before 2004. Read the Gammons article
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?id=2692259
2004, 2004, 2004, 2004.....Blowing a 14 game lead in 1978 in a little over a month and a half is far worse...and that's only ONE of the Red Sox's atrocities!
BTW 6 years w/o a championship is NOTHING to any Yankee fan born in the late 70's
Peter Gammons is a nitwit.
The Yankees still have the worst choke in baseball history.
They still haven't won in this millenium. I'm not trying to pick a fight - I'm stating facts.
Cheers,
Jack Jablin
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