Baseballhead:
Let Yourself Go

Michael Cox

Here we are again, with spring in the air and a whole day full of TV baseball. I've got 16 hours' supply of venison jerky and cold strawberry Quik, and I'm feeling like it's about bloody time.

Frankly, with current world events as they are—hell, let's face it, we're at freakin' war, and the only good that can possibly come out of it is that our country will eventually win—we'll have a lot of personal and national rebuilding to do before we're back to "normal." I think it's about time we all watched a game of baseball.

As much as Bud Selig has backed off his pronouncement that baseball is an international game, it is just that—a place where we can watch Americans, Canadians, Puerto Ricans, Japanese and a dozen other nationalities play side-by-side. Working towards a common goal (even if they're without much success in Detroit). Speaking a common language (even if they sometimes can't remember it's one finger for the fastball, two fingers for the curve). From the world over, major-league players have shared the experience of growing from child to man with baseball.

And if baseball is a powerful force in bringing peoples together, it's even more powerful for keeping us sane as individuals when there's insanity all around. Call it your "happy place" or your "inner child" (okay, maybe you shouldn't do that), those nine innings are an anchor, cheaper than therapy and healthier than liquor.

Sparing you the Field Of Dreams speech, baseball may not be a direct cure for our ills—and heaven knows that the big-league version has ills of its own—but it is a reminder that life isn't always blood and guts, or bills and paychecks, or aliens walking among us disguised as terriers, or whatever your personal version of hell may be.

Turn off the CNN, open the bills another day, and curtail the fruitless search for the special sunglasses they used in They Live. Get yourself into the bleachers and spend three hours thinking about simpler things, like just how lucky you are to be able to sit in ballpark bleachers in the first place.

Moving on, I couldn't let the season begin (and I don't want them holding it up on my account) without a few predictions:

• Cablevision will again insist that only Yankee fans pay for Yankee games on the YES network. By the season's end baseball-deprived New Yorkers will be able to identify Mike Piazza even without his facial hair.

• Sports Illustrated will expose Jeff Bagwell as a "clubhouse cancer" after he fails to return Rick Reilly's calls.

• Kauffman Stadium will continue to be one of the most beautiful places in the world to watch a baseball game. Fans will continue to turn up hoping that they'll get to see one.

• Lou Piniella will punch a player for the first time since tackling Rob Dibble. This time he'll cold-cock Rey Ordonez just on principle.

• Brewers fans will once again have to explain themselves.

• Angered by his own team's GM, Ken Griffey Jr. will have a career year. The Reds will work the reverse psychology angle, leaking "rejected trade offers" to Jayson Stark, selling "Griffey Sucks" t-shirts, and hiring Carrot Top as a bat boy.

• Frank Thomas will spend at least one morning looking at his 1994 Baseball Weekly "Big Hurt, Inc." cover story and quietly weeping.

• The Yankees will pick up Miguel Tejada at the trading deadline. Tejada's sole duty will be to stand behind Derek Jeter during infield practice with his arms folded and impatiently tapping his foot. This will earn Tejada a $50 million, five-year contract.

• The first fan entering an ER to have ThunderStix removed from their nether regions: May.

about the author

Michael Cox hopes you drink responsibly at the game—and if you don't, please avoid television cameras. Take the no-streaking pledge at mc@strikethree.com.