This post talks about baseball. (Fair warning, I told you I was crazy.)
I used to play fantasy basketball with my brother. We started to get too old to play competitive basketball, even in pickup games. So, even though my brother is a CPA and basketball season usually coincides with his busiest time of year, he’d put together a tournament with family and some friends.
I don’t really follow the NBA much. The stars of my youth have mostly retired. I follow baseball. . .a lot.
I believe in the Church of Baseball. I’ve tried all the major religions, and most of the minor ones. I’ve worshipped Buddha, Allah, Brahma, Vishnu, Siva, trees, mushrooms, and Isadora Duncan. I know things. For instance, there are 108 beads in a Catholic rosary and there are 108 stitches in a baseball. When I heard that, I gave Jesus a chance. But it just didn’t work out between us. The Lord laid too much guilt on me. I prefer metaphysics to theology. You see, there’s no guilt in baseball, and it’s never boring… Making love is like hitting a baseball: you just gotta relax and concentrate. . . You see, there’s a certain amount of life wisdom I give these boys. I can expand their minds. Sometimes when I’ve got a ballplayer alone, I’ll just read Emily Dickinson or Walt Whitman to him, and the guys are so sweet, they always stay and listen. . . I make them feel confident, and they make me feel safe, and pretty. ‘Course, what I give them lasts a lifetime; what they give me lasts 142 games. Sometimes it seems like a bad trade. But bad trades are part of baseball – now who can forget Frank Robinson for Milt Pappas, for God’s sake? It’s a long season and you gotta trust. I’ve tried ’em all, I really have, and the only church that truly feeds the soul, day in, day out, is the Church of Baseball.
– Annie Savoy “Bull Durham”
My brother wanted to know why as a big baseball fan I didn’t play fantasy baseball?
I couldn’t bear it?
Why? What do you mean?
I mean in fantasy sports you end up rooting for players regardless of what team they are on. If I played fantasy baseball there would be times I had to root against the Mariners. . .or worse, I’d have to root for a Yankee.
For me and millions of baseball fans, Spring isn’t a date on the calendar, it’s starts in February when pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training and it finally arrives on a day in March when someone sings the National Anthem, a retired ballplayer throws out the ceremonial first pitch and a man in a blue suit, a chest protector and a funny hat yells,
PLAY BALL!
That’s why this year has been so hard. Sure, the virus has kept us locked in our homes. But, like the Kingdom of Naria, baseball fans are stuck in perpetual winter without the blessed release of Spring.
I do two things every February. First, I pay $120 to get access to the every Major League Baseball game through the magic of the Internet. Sometimes I listen to the radio broadcast, other times, I’ll put the TV broadcast on my third monitor at my workstation.
The other thing I do is I download the Seattle Mariners schedule and import it into my calendar. Living in Utah, I have to remember to switch my time zone from Mountain Time to Pacific Time Zone before the import. See, once the schedule is imported, it can’t be exported. One year, I forgot to change my timezone before the import and all season the games were off by an hour.
See, that’s why I do it. I get notified each day of the Mariners game. It shows up like any other meeting appointment. It even blocks out time in my schedule. (Wednesday getaway games are the best.) From March through October, 162 times, I get a pop up telling me the Mariners game will start in an hour.
And that is why I’m crazy. It’s crazy that I spent $120 for the broadcast for a league that is cancelled. Could I ask for my money back? Sure. Why would I? They still might salvage part of the season.
But, being crazy for dropping over a hundred dollars for something I can’t use is bad enough. But, I also get reminded nearly every day that they are still not playing baseball. I could go through and remove the games, but it would take awhile to delete 162 individual appointments.
So, I’ll continue sitting at home, and despite the trees leafing out, the grass turning green, the days warming up, I’m still stuck in the Winter of the off-season.
Not even World War II could shut down baseball. And the latest plan suggests an 82 game season starting in July. And if that plan is approved, while the calendar might say we are already into mid summer, for baseball fans everywhere it will finally be Spring.
Stay Safe
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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