BASEBALL, I GRIEVE FOR YOU
By Jim Kittelberger
"What is happening to the sport I love?" Baseball owners, who must be some of the richest people in the world, are paying players sums of money that are destined to destroy the professional game. The sport of baseball will still continue as the best game ever devised for the enjoyment of the player and the followers of the game, at a non-professional level. But at the professional level, the die has been cast. Take Boston for example; what is going to happen when the current contract of the best pitcher in baseball runs out? What will happen when arguably the best shortstop in baseball re-negotiates a new contract? Each will want more money than was dished out to Manny, because it really is all about money, you know. How can the owner of the Boston Red Sox pay out the money these guys will demand and still operate a farm system, which is the life-blood of the professional game? How high can the prices of tickets go? How many scouts can they fire? How much can they charge for a hot dog? What is going to happen to teams such as Minnesota, Kansas City, and a host of others who will never to able to enter the bidding wars for these neo-mega-rich athletes? My friends, I think the year 2000 will be remembered as the beginning of the end for baseball as we know it, and it really saddens me. I can visualize a nightmare scenario where a team comprised of all the rich athletes will tour the country, ala the Harlem Globetrotters, and play the local patsies, e.g. the Minnesota Twins, Kansas City Royals, to a contest with the rich mega-richies of course winning. But giving the local townsfolk a glimpse of their great skills, that we can ooh and ahh over. After the game, the mega-richies will sit at a table and sell their autographs to the little kids for fifty dollars a pop. The local press will of course make pre-arrangements with their agents to acquire the right to photograph the mega-richies and to make sure they have the proper filters on their lenses to ward off the glitter from the golden chains, rings, and earrings that dangle from their ears. Alas, I am indeed sad for the game I love, but will never again be able to afford to see in person. But, perhaps it can become a featured trip the travel agents can market and if your credit limit on your credit card can handle it, 'a day at the ballpark' will be featured, and you will be able to pay it all off in seventeen monthly payments. So good-bye beautiful stadiums paid for by the taxes of local citizens helping out their 'poor' ballclub owner. But hello to amateur baseball, the kind that God, or maybe it was Abner Doubleday invented and baseball will become a sport again.
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