There's just something about kids and baseball. I love watching kids play the game. I love their innocence, their enthusiasm, and their passion. Watching children hit the ball and run the bases reminds me all over again why I love the game of baseball.
I love the game of baseball, it's just those who turn it into a business that I don't like. The "professionalism" of baseball has created an ugly caricature that only dimly approximates the game I love. Professional baseball has exchanged teams for markets, players for agents, fans for media outlets, and hand shakes for contracts.
Professional baseball has created stars like Alex Rodriguez who recently opted out of his $252 million contract, demanding that the Yankees put $350 million on the table before he would even talk to them. Professional baseball has created managers like Joe Torre, who turned down $5 million a year from the Yankees with incentives that would guarantee $8 million if he took the team to the World Series. Torre turned down the offer that would have made him the best paid manager in baseball because he didn't feel respected.
Events like these remind me that the game I see played on television is entertainment. It's a business that's dominated by stars, controlled by money and managed to maximize profit. It's entertainment that resembles the game of baseball. It's an imitation of the real game that I played as a child.
The real game of baseball that I have come to love is played by people who compete for the love of the game. It's played by children, teens and adults who gather in neighborhood parks to play catch. The spirit of the game of baseball is alive and well. It's untarnished by large egos, spiraling salaries, steroid and human growth hormone scandals, escalating ticket prices and labor disputes.
The game of baseball that I've come to love is played by children who know nothing of contracts, agents or naming rights. It's played by people whose only negotiation is what time they have to come home for dinner. It's played by those who compete for the love of the game.
2 comments:
This one touched my heart. I wish I would have spent more time with my son with athletics. I grew up playing baseball with the Cook boys, a Catholic family with 9 boys. Those were great days. Steroids, multi-million dollar contracts, and spoiled-rotten brats have hurt the game.
Let's go see the Kernels a couple times next year and enjoy "real" baseball. Tye out.
That's pretty cool for a family to have their own baseball team! Nine boys, God bless the mom! Have you seen the movie Sandlot?
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