Major League Baseball – Take the Field!

After what is amounting to a historically bad year for this country, we desperately need our national pastime to help us pass time. Given the multitude of problems we are experiencing right now, a friendly diversion would be welcome.

Anyone that is a lifelong Cub fan like me will remember the smiling face of the great Ernie Banks, who famously coined, “Let’s play two!” Hey Ernie, right now I would be thrilled if they just played one. You have any pull up there?

Since all of us were kids, there has been baseball. Either to play, watch, or coach. Some fans are fanatical and some casual. Either way, there have been lots of us watching.

We need you right now, MLB. More than you need to be squabbling about money. Sure, there are safety issues and organization needing to be ironed out, and some players may not want to participate, which is fine. But those aren’t the real obstacles. Owners and players have the right to earn big dollars, but when mega-millionaires argue about compensation for playing the game that made them rich, it’s tough to absorb.

The thought of salvaging most or even some of the season is refreshing. But losing it due to greed? Say it ain’t so.

Now, the way I figure it, the owners and players owe me nothing. Business owners and their employees have the right to do as they wish.

But they owe it to the 11-year-old me.

At that age, me and Joe Torres, who was ready to play strikeout at any time on any day, idolized the players. We tried to imitate their batting stances and pitching deliveries. Sometimes we announced our own games. The dozens of baseball cards we bought and traded served as proof of our loyalty. We even chewed the hard, powdery, pink gum that came in the package. That’s dedication.

You see, MLB, the 11- year-old-me grew up to raise three more diehard Cub fans. We bought them Cub stuff as kids and took them to Wrigley Field. We had pennants, posters, and paraphernalia all over the house for years. Guess who their favorite baseball team is, and then guess who their kids will cheer for, and want pennants and posters hanging in their rooms? It is a pattern that has been going on for generations and demonstrates how to build a fan base.

You also owe it to the groups of kids that played together across the country just because they loved to play. We regularly showed up at Rowan Park for years to play about twenty innings a day during summer break. Regular kids relentlessly dedicated themselves to the fun of playing the game.

Perhaps players and owners should rent Field of Dreams and replay the scene where James Earl Jones, who as Terrance Mann, delivered this beauty right across the heart of the plate:

“The one constant throughout all the years has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has 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. It reminds us of all that once was good. And it could be good again.”

Holy cow!

I don’t want to hear about lead negotiators, media leaks, national television rights, new revenues, and executive directors. I want to hear a bat smashing a ball. I want to remember the smell of ballpark hot dogs and popcorn, imagining the heat of the sun in the bleachers, even if relegated to my TV room. I want fans to lose their minds when the home team wins one in the bottom of the ninth.

Most of all, I want all associated with MLB to recognize just how much the game means to us, especially the kids. I would remind the professionals that most, if not all, of the amateurs lost their chance to play this year through no fault of their own, giving anything to get their senior year of high school or college back. Not because of money, but because of their intense desire to compete in the sport they love.

You definitely owe it to them.

You can learn from them. Or remember what that feeling was like when you were their age.

So, here we are, waiting and hoping that you want to play as much as we want to watch.

MLB did not create today’s problems, but they can help us get through them.

“Batter up!” or “Man up?” Either way, just play ball.