Truth be told, I have never played organized baseball but I have followed major league baseball since the mid 50’s and now sixty some years later I still follow and love the game. But baseball has changed and is changing at a faster pace than ever before. The so-called baseball experts say that baseball is better than ever, the players are bigger, faster and stronger than ever before.
I am not so sure. Oh, I agree that the players are probably more athletic and they have better equipment at their disposal but that doesn’t necessarily make baseball a better or more fun game to watch today than it was back in the day.
Earlier this week I was out at the CenturyLink Sports complex watching the Minnesota Twins and some of their minor league players work out and it got me to thinking how much the game has evolved since I started to follow America’s pastime.
Things I miss, watching baseball today
I grew up back in the day when starting pitchers pitched complete games, relief pitchers were starting pitchers who couldn’t cut it any more as a starter. Starters were on the mound every fourth day and relief pitchers often pitched multiple innings on consecutive days and all pitchers batted for themselves.
Pitchers didn’t throw 100 MPH and most games lasted about 2 1/2 hours and it wasn’t that unusual to see games of less than two hours. Players came to play the game day in day out, there were always numerous players that played in all 162 games, sometimes for many years in a row.
An “Opener”, what the hell, the only openers we had were used to open a beer or a can of pop.
Thirty home runs in a season was considered pretty darn good, .300 plus batting averages were common and strikeouts by batters were a bad thing.
Baseball contracts for the most part were one-year affairs. You had a good year you got a raise, you had a bad year, you got a cut, not like today when no one gets a cut and the only difference between a bad year and a good year is the size of the increase you get.
Baseball agents didn’t exist and the players negotiated their own contracts. Players would on occasion hold out and not report to spring training. This not reporting to spring training thing might be making a come-back but in a bit of different form today as players sit out waiting for that extra $50 million versus players sitting out in the past for a couple of thousand dollars.
There was no free agency so players stayed on the same team for most of their careers unless they were traded. You pretty much knew the players on your favorite team year in and year out.
Trades were made to help both teams and were determined by the players abilities and the teams needs, not the size and length of the contracts involved and how long the players remain under team control.
When a minor league player was ready for the “bigs” he made the team out of spring training versus being sent back to the minors and called up in mid-May so the team can have control over the player for another year.
Teams were run by a handful of people not the “armies” that make up the front offices of todays baseball organizations. The on the field staff was usually a manager and a couple of coaches where as now there is a coach for anything and everything and they each have an assistant.
I loved Topps baseball cards and I used to get them for a nickel a pack or six packs for a quarter that had cardboard cards and a slab of that pink horrible tasting gum that was so old it usually shattered into fifty pieces if you dropped it on something hard. We enjoyed our baseball cards, showing them to friends and trading them versus putting them away so they could become collectibles. Today there are more companies making slick cards and charging you an arm and a leg.
Tickets to a baseball game were inexpensive and there were usually just a couple of types of tickets, reserved seats, box seats and the grandstand. Today teams like the Minnesota Twins have about a 100 different categories and ticket prices are variable based on demand and a beer will set you back $10 or more. Some teams have even banned peanut sales due to peanut allergies.
I miss seeing a good manager and umpire “disagreement” when I go to the baseball game. Once of those times when a manager is sent to the showers early after throwing his cap, kicking dirt on home plate, telling the umpire how blind he is, maybe running over and grabbing first base and throwing it towards the outfield, and throwing about a dozen bats on to the playing field as he heads for the runway where he will manage the remainder of the game. Baseball is a game and as such is considered entertainment, what is more entertaining than what I just mentioned? No one in their right mind will complain that a game was 10 minutes too long because of an exciting ejection that witnessed. Plus, they will probably never forget it.
Back then every team tried to win as many games as possible, they didn’t trade their good players at the trade deadline to get minor league players for the future and finish with a bad record so they could get a high draft choice.
I saw some shifts now and then for a few players but I never saw four outfielders or all of the infielders on one side of the infield, of course back then batters knew how to bunt.
Now I hear rumblings of a billion dollar player, pitch clocks, pushing the mound back, and automated ball and strike calls. Fans that can afford the price of tickets go to the ballpark to socialize, not to watch the game.
Baseball has always been a business to some degree but now it has gone off the deep end with lawyers, economic majors, and IT professionals taking over a game they weren’t good enough to play but feel they are smart enough to teach and tell the players how it should be done. Reminds me of the old saying, “those that can play do, those that can’t teach and manage”.
When I watch and listen to a game I want to know what is going on with the game and with baseball in general. I could care less about spin rate, elevation angles, how fast the ball came off the bat, how big a lead a baserunner has in terms of feet or how far an outfielder has to run to catch the ball. You’re killing me with that technical crap.
This is just a short list of things about the game of baseball that concern me today and if things continue to go down this path I feel sorry for the game of baseball and its fans. Baseball needs to stop trying to fix the game and go out and talk with the players and true baseball fans and see what they want the game to be. Start listening to players and fans that have played and watched the game for years and you might learn something. I understand that change is sometimes needed but if you take out too many parts of the foundation you will not like what it will look like when you are done.