I Hate Major League Baseball (Venting with Joe)
Tuesday afternoon, Major League Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred announced the cancellation of games due to the labor stoppage. It sent our Joe Swenson over the edge.
At 1:24 p.m. Pacific Standard Time on Tuesday, March 1st, 2022, the Major League Baseball Players Association unilaterally rejected the owner’s “Best and Final Offer.” The sides are so far apart that there doesn’t seem to be an end in sight for this stupid lockout that is literally ruining my favorite sport.
For 34 years, I’ve eaten, slept, dreamt, and everything else baseball (I’ve sprinkled in a little theater and occasional family). Baseball is my first love. I remember being 15 years old and watching Junior and Senior go back-to-back. I remember listening to Rick Rizz and Dave Niehaus on the radio.
Baseball cards, I collected so many stupid baseball cards, for the gum first, and then for the value of the cards. I remember trading a 1985 Donruss Alvin Davis for a 1984 Fleer Kirby Puckett. It wasn’t even the worst trade I ever made; that came later when I traded a 1984 Topps Olympic Card of Mark McGwire for a 1991 Alex Rodriguez. I was such a homer back then.
Romantic notions
I fell in love with the game of baseball. The smell of fresh-cut grass, the imperfectly perfect chalk lines that arbitrarily end in a rectangular batter’s box. The sound of the crowd, the pop of the mitt. Baseball gets all of the senses going. Then there’s playing the actual game. The strategy and nuances that make baseball a game of inches. A place where you can get so much accomplished by being slightly more aware than your opponents.
The romance of it all. The history, the stories upon stories. My first game was at the Kingdome when I was 13 years old. I had gone to Cheney Stadium a couple of times to see the Tacoma Tigers, but nothing compared to being inside the Kingdome. It had this smell too, it was a different smell, but to me, it was baseball.