quote:The game has been sacrificed in favor of ownership profit.
The game at the MLB level is not the same game you see played at your local youth field, high school or the DIII in your home town. The Commissioner and his 30 knights of the roundtable ensure that. It is no more comparable than the famous Hegins pigeon shoot in Pennsylvania is to real hunting. The Pittsburgh Pirates are perfect proof of that. Losing 19 seasons in a row and showing a profit for their owners in as many seasons. Playing in possibly the most perfect ball park in the nation, almost entirely funded with public (that's you and me) tax money. There were 228 million dollars alotted for the park and the Pirate's ownership pledged only $40 million. The threat was, "build it or we will go". The Buccos were going to leave town so they built it. Nice neighbors, eh? Then they proceeded to stink more than any other team in baseball history as a pay back to their fans.
There are grand bronze statues outside of PNC Park, Wagner, Clemente, Stargell and Mazeroski to name four. But there is no one to memorialize from the past 20 years. An entire baseball generation bereft of any significance whatsoever. Fans don't sit in PNC park and say, "Hey you remember when so and so hit the home run that won this or that championship? Or , "you know who hit his 3,000th hit and I was here to see it." No, the owners are making sure that an entire generation will never have a meaningful memory of the game of baseball viewed at PNC Park but they are making plenty of money from naming rights, television contracts and corporate suites. The fans can come if they like.
Meanwhile, the baseball fan like the world war II veteran dies off, a few each year taking their enthusiasm for the game with them. Having had no real reason to take their children to the ballpark and pass on the love of the game, they die. Their children walk through the house claiming this or that item. A dull colored dusty old baseball sits on a shelf in the corner of a dim lit bedroom. On it the autographs of every member of the 1971 World Championship Pittsburgh Pirates Team including Roberto Clemente. No one picks it up. It is left for the auctioneer to find it a new home, along with the shoebox full of topps trading cards under the bed.
If my kids ask, tell them my Bob Feller ball and my cards are hidden in a Mason jar box in the fruit cellar. I know they'll be looking because I'm not going to let the dirty *******s win.