We don’t love baseball anymore.
We might like it, the way we like blue skies, underdogs and tax refunds. We don’t love it, not anymore. What once was truly, madly, deeply is now casual. “I love you as a friend’’ is what we’d say or hear in high school, when the breakup happened. It’s like that. The thrill is gone.
We could discuss the Whys all day, but I’m not doing that. It’s been done, and it’s boring. What interests me is, what does baseball’s waning popularity say about the nation as a whole?
Going all existential on us today, Main Mobster? Do we have to scratch our chins?
Every generation believes its time was better, kinder, gentler and — all together now — simpler. Maybe only in sports is that actually true. Maybe especially as it applies to baseball.
Things I saw growing up: Wiffleball, box scores, having a catch, keeping score, knowing the lineup of my favorite team.
Things I see now: None of the above.
Baseball is closer to the time capsule than to our consciousness. Think about that. The national pastime, homeplace of Babe and Willie and the 68-year idyll that was the Brooklyn Dodgers. The game that defined us, same as jazz and Ellis Island. On Okinawa in 1945, Japanese soldiers screamed “To hell with Babe Ruth!’’ in the throes of combat.
How many generations of Cincinnatians saw baseball as a touchstone, an heirloom, a gift? How many people have mentioned that on the West Side, the sound of summer was the Reds radio broadcast? Waite and Joe and Marty, offering hardball lullabies, as their listeners lounged away their evenings on the front porch, a Wiedemann or three in their grasp.
You could walk down any street in Delhi Township and hear it.
We’re a different country without our game. Not worse, necessarily. Getoffamylawn Guy won’t go that far. No doubt, today’s kids and their parents will feel the same about football and soccer, when they make withdrawals from their own memory banks. Life goes on.
Here’s what we’re losing, though. Here’s what baseball offers that we politely decline in 2023:
A respite. A refuge, a constancy that’s reassuring. A pace that begs us to put up our feet and stare at the moon.
We love football. Football is an angry game. After I watch football, I’m worn out. It feels like I spent 3 hours clenching my fists. I’m a little mad, even if my team won. Rest and relaxation? Doing your taxes offers better R-n-R than the NFL. We don’t know how to take it easy anymore. Baseball was a good teacher.
What did Terence Mann say to Ray Kinsella? “It’s money they have. It’s peace they lack.’’
It’s no coincidence (and barely ironic) that baseball’s biggest triumph in ‘23 is to shorten its games. Less baseball is better baseball, evidently.
More scoring is better, too, because attention spans lack. It’s a quaint notion that baseball’s pace allows time for folks to converse while also being entertained. Conversing is what happens when we’re done playing Call of Duty. Which, as we know, is never. Conversing now involves texting and Zoom-ing, about as intimate an experience as watching all those helmet-headed football players.
The season starts Thursday. I’m going to enjoy it for all the reasons most people do not, and that’s a problem if you still love the game. We’re not a nation of front porches anymore, of neighbors and conversations and dreams of baseball. Something useful is being lost. Baseball helped define us.
What defines us now?
Now, then. . .
NOT TO BELABOR THE POINT, but here is James Earl Jones’ soliloquy from Field of Dreams. “All that once was good and could be again. . .’’
ALONG THOSE LINES, some Reds optimism, from MLB.com and Yahoo!
MLB Pipeline rates the Reds minor leagues as 5th-best, up from 15th last opening day.
Reds (15 to 5): Cincinnati graduated its top two prospects (Hunter Greene, Nick Lodolo), yet still climbed into the top five. The Reds landed two Top 100 Prospects (Noelvi Marte, Edwin Arroyo) in the Luis Castillo trade with the Mariners in July and two more solid guys (Spencer Steer, Christian Encarnacion-Strande) in the Tyler Mahle deal with the Twins in August. Elly de la Cruz developing into perhaps the most electrifying athlete in the Minors helped, as did adding one of the best young hitters in the 2022 Draft (Cam Collier).
Yahoo! says Spencer Steer is worth watching. The past two seasons, he has hit 47 homers in the minor leagues. Graham Ashcraft as well:
His high-velocity sinker-cutter-slider mix is sort of a nightmare for opposing batters. He struck out 25 batters over 17.1 frames this spring, walking only two and producing a WHIP of 0.87.
THE EFFECTS OF THE RULES TWEAKS:
Stolen base attempts in spring jumped from 1.6 to 2.4 per game, and BABIP on ground balls was up from .235 to .258.
Game length decreased by 23 minutes in the first week of spring games. Previously, spring games lasted roughly three hours, but this season, they’ve been much closer to 2.5 hours.
PROGRAMMING NOTE. . . Always on the lookout for Thursday/Friday Hemingways. Who’ll be the Next Jay Brinker, breakout TML Star? If you’re interested, email me and give me a brief synopsis of what you might write.
Pdoc53@gmail.com. Thanks.
TUNE O’ THE DAY. . . Youse are gonna crush me for this one. I’m unapologetic about most of the bands I like. If you’re not a big fan of 60s Motown, OK. I am. Southern beach music — Drifters, Tams, Embers etc. — is great, to me at least.
But here’s one guy I really like that I really can’t defend. This is a great tune. Sorry.
So. . . any bands/singers you like that have people shaking their heads at you?
There is ZERO reason that ANYONE should be crushed for liking "What Am I Gonna Do With You" by Barry White. Zero. Keep on unapologetically owning it, Doc.
I actually keep a Spotify playlist of songs that I like and would probably get crushed for that I've titled "Sorry, Not Sorry" and it includes gems like Do Ya Think I'm Sexy by Rod Stewart, True by Spandau Ballet and Brandy by Looking Glass. Plenty of haters for those songs (and others), but not me.
I still love baseball. The mid-week business day specials are the best games to go to. They never get old to me.