Summer
posted in General |SUMMER
The 2004 baseball World Series is now underway and the games offer a delighful respite from the constant campaigning for the Presidency. I was born in a family baseball environment at a time when the World series was the sporting highlight of the year. My Dad was a good player and also managed the local team for a few years in which I learned the game as a batboy and scorekeeper. Baseball was always known as a summer game — as a matter of fact one of the best baseball books ever written was entitled, “The Boys of Summer”. Now the 154 game season has been extended, playoffs have ben added, and TV is in command of the post season scheduling. Baseball starts in the early spring with frost on the grass and ends just a few weeks short of Thanksgiving. It really isn't fun to sit all bundled up for 4+ hours to watch a baseball game at 40-45 degrees.
Anyone who has played the game knows that baseball is a warm weather sport. Throwing and catching a baseball in cold weather is like tossing a rock back and forth. And it is easy to get pulled muscles or other injuries in colder weather. Somehow, it doesn't seem right that baseball draws to an end when the football season is 2 months underway. TV has its place, but it shouldn't dictate the playing of the World series. There are many things awry in baseball, but I won't start down that path. Let it suffice to say that a summer sport played in the summer is much better than stretching the season into 7 months. Snowballs, bone-chilling rain and ice patches just are not in tune with baseball.
If the Redsox win, maybe they will be called the Boys of Autumn.