Beep. Beep. Beep. There is it, our National Past Time is on Life Support. It's chances for recovery are fading away. How long can something that is dead be held onto by reputation alone? We all remember growing up on hot summer days searching to find a game, any game. We remember rooting for teams, not because we cared where they were at or about their financial situation, but because they were the only game we could find. WE LOVED BASEBALL. The hated Yankees. The lovable losers in Chicago. Thanks to Ted Turner, we even had America's team The Atlanta Braves. However, all of this is fading. There is no importance to watch the game that so many of us grew up loving. Baseball has been surpassed by College Football, NFL, March Madness, and even MMA have risen up to try to put baseball out of its misery. Fear not my friends, I am here today to perform a modern day miracle. I AM GOING TO RAISE THE DEAD!!! Before i can do this, we must identify the problems that got us into the mess that we are in now, so here goes...
1. SALARIES. I know it is easy to hammer the players for this getting out of control, however IT'S NOT THE PLAYERS FAULT!!! Who is going to walk into their office tomorrow and tell their boss, "I really think you are overpaying me, please don't give me more money." Nobody would do that, so why do we give athletes so much trouble over the amount of money they make? PLEASE JUST SHUT UP about the amount of money the players make. They live in a different world. I get that. You really want to tackle a problem, tackle the fact that Tom Cruise gets paid $20 million a movie, and has not made a movie worth seeing in 15 years. The fix for this is coming.
2. STEROIDS. WE LOVED 1998. McGwire v. Sosa for the most sacred record in all of sports. Everyone stuck their head in the sand because the game needing saving. But what about when Barry Bonds, ALLEGEDLY, uses and breaks Hank Aaron's record. Now we have a problem. WHAT A JOKE!!! Don't worry, I can solve this crisis too.
3. EXPANSION. Expansion of more teams, expansion in technology. EXPANSION KILLED BASEBALL. It became less important to go to the game. It was always on. You can watch it. Then came cable and more channels. Then came sports networks. Then came games on every night of the week. What happened to the Sunday, Wednesday, Friday ESPN Doubleheaders? 6 chances to watch baseball all week. This played a huge roll in getting us to where we are today, this too, will be fixed under my proposed changes.
A very wise man says "Don't bring me problems, without solutions." So here they are, MY PLANS TO RESURRECT THE GAME OF BASEBALL FROM THE DEAD!!!
1. SALARY CAP. It works in EVERY OTHER SPORT. They are all doing well. You have to set a minimum cap for these small market teams. "Oh we can meet that, we lose to much money." I am sorry, you have lost the right to own a team. There are people who want to buy teams (Mark Cuban, good job keeping him out with your "he's not one of us stupid mentality."). MLB can buy them out, until they sell. It will happen. I know what you are saying, MLB would end up owning 6 or 8 teams...
2. CONTRACTION. Time to start cutting. Bye Bye Kansas City Royals. Bye Bye Pittsburgh Pirates. Bye bye Florida Marlins. Bye bye Washington Nationals. Just because you are a big city, does not give you the right to have a major league team. I'm sorry and I know the Marlins are the farm system for the major market teams, but they are run TERRIBLY and it is time we change that. You also have to relocate the Tampa Bay Rays. They dropped the wrong part of their name a coupe of years back when they removed the Devil from their name, the franchise would have been a whole lot better off if they could have forsaken the Tam Bay part of their name. Contraction leads me to the next area of concern...
3. LESS GAMES. I know this will not happen, but it is better to lose a little by cutting 25 - 40 games a season then have your sport fold like the Arena League. You cut a game a week, on some weeks you cut 2 games a week. This will help you to create some excitement for match ups. Have DAYS where there are no games played. That is the solution. LESS IS MORE!!!
I have left some of my thoughts on this subject out, because I want to generate some conversation on the subject. Please leave feed back on what you think. How crazy are these thoughts? What would you change? Can baseball be saved? I am very curious to get some feedback, so please post and let's see what you think, but TRUST ME, unlike that garbage in November of 2008, THIS IS REAL A CHANGE YOU CAN BELIEVE IN!!!
Until Next Time...
what is wrong with baseball. is that it has become hard to believe.the only thng to come out of baseball lately is drama and steroids.if someone does exceptionally well all the sudden he is put under the microscope and whispers of steriods start to surface.steriods started the down fall of baseball. we need the next down to earth humble player to come up and revive the game.
ReplyDeleteIt is not any of the above suggested problems. Problem is, we need to revitalize the sports biggest pool. The children. Baseball is not electronic, it can't be played in an air conditioned house. Take video games, X-box, nofriendo, and play station out and you may see a future again.
ReplyDeleteBuckmaster, I am sorry to disagree with you, but I have to disagree with you. There are plenty of up and comers who are performing exceptionally well and there is no mention of steriods with them. LAbert Pujols, Ryan Howard, Jose Reyes, Hanley Ramierez, and Joe Mauer all come to mind. None of these players have ever been mentioned in relation to steriods and there is no reason to believe that these guys are using steriods. There are lots of "ggod guys" who people can root for in the game. This is still where baseball is ok. As bad of a hit as steriods has given baseball, they still have some good guys. I do think steriods has made some fans harsh with criticism on players, but I do believe this problem is beyond "a down to earth humble player" or two.
ReplyDeleteTell me what you think about this...What if there were a team of down to earth "everyday" guys who put together a real run. Similiar to what the Braves did in the early 90's with young guys who were playing, having a good time, and were not worried about being traded off after the season (very similiar to the Marlins or what the Brewers did a couple years back where the got Sabathia & had Sheets in his final year). Do you think this would help? Obviously it would have to be in the right city, it would not matter in Tampa, but do you think this would help the state of baseball?
Chris, this is a valid concern. We do live in a day of laziness. Do you think the lack of baseball interest is this or does it have more to do with the fact that it takes so many people to get a pick up game going. It's not like basketball or football where you can play 2 on 2. Little League Baseball is still the most played sport by children in the US. Kids love TO PLAY the game. They love playing the video games. It's the major leagues that have a problem. I truly believe that comes from the parents. What do you think? If you agree, how do we get the parents back?
ReplyDeleteI absolutely agree. The parents use the "digital babysitter" or use the the ballfield as a daycare. There is little parental involvement. Mostly due to the fact that the world we live in today requires most parents to both work...provided it is even a 2 parent household and the "fatherly" involvement is inconsistent at best. And, in our case, the particular rec center my family has had to deal with for years is such a terribly run bureaucratic nightmare, it actually discourages participation. Address those issues and. I think it will "pay it forward" with a trickle "forward" effect all the way up to the majors. It all starts in the grass roots.
ReplyDeletei agree with most of what you said. i think a braves type run in any city would help the game.if you give the people something to believe in they will come with the exception of the marlins.as far as steriods go you just don't know what to believe anymore it is almost like wreslting.i would never thought mannyand ortiz would test positive maybe i was so naive before that it made me cynical people still look up to players they are just tired of being let down because of cheating it gets old and tiring. and yes kids are lazy and the parents are to i see it alot on dylans team. parents do a drive by at practice and the games pushing the kids out and driving off. me and kristin make sacrifices to be sure we are there every practice and game (one reason is the coach won't "motivate" dylan like i do. luckily he rather be outside than playing video games.the game has lost alot of good players due to video games.like i tell dylan you don't know how good you are till you give it 110%. i hear it on the bench alot i'm tired i don't won't to run and then there parent shows up afterwards taling about what they watched on t.v. and they are exhasted frm work and it is hard to be there .sometimes i worked 10 hrs and drove 3 and half hours and helped in practice and they are tired. one kid told me the only reason he was there was because his parents made him. they haven't been to one game, why should a kid try if his parents aren't there, he's not stupid he knows what's up.if the parents put forth the effort the kids will respond and think of the good home grown players we could have.most of your blog i agree with i just don't think it is as simple as you think,people got used to the salary and other things i just think that steriods and attitudes drove people away.there are some stadiums that still sell out every season.tampa bay needs to go, marlins need to stop selling players off and if washington can win some games and go to the post season that will give shurholtz something ot build on and recruit young players.it seems thats where you go when you are past you prime.
ReplyDeleteCASE IN POINT J-HEY KID BREATES LIFE INTO DEFLATED BRAVES.THINK THIS MAY BE THE NEXT HAMMERIN HANK.I HAVE READ A LOT ON THIS KID.HE IS WELL GROUNDED AND HUMBLE AND IS NOT FULL OF HIMSELF.DYLAN TRAINS AT THE SAME COMPLEX HE DID EVERYONE LOKED HIM HAVE NOT HEARD A BAD THING ABOUT HIM.I JUST HOPE HE IS PREPARED FOR THE LONG STRANGE TRIP HE IS ABOUT TO EMBARK ON AND STAYS GROUNDED.
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