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After being delayed by a pandemic, and being slashed to 60 games thanks to an icy face-off between players’ unions and owners, baseball has finally come back.
Come back to do what, no one is quite sure. After so many months with zero professional sports, the atmosphere should be one of anticipation and excitement. Yet, this entire moment just feels like we might be watching the swan song of professional sports. Baseball could have really seized the moment when the pandemic started, and made plans to strategize, to reach out to fans, to make every effort to get back on the field. Instead, we got a labor dispute with fingers pointed at both sides, some big name players who are declining to play this season for a myriad of reasons, and fans submitting cardboard cutouts of themselves to sit in empty stadium seats. Nothing feels right, and yet baseball should feel familiar and comforting.
But it doesn’t, because first we have to sit through another lecture and demonstration on the social justice cause du jour. Given everything that’s happened, and still happening, the message that could have been has long since been lost. In the months since George Floyd was murdered, we have seen riots, looting, rebranding, endless lecturing, and naked people – not to mention performance art and a missed opportunity for police reform.
Baseball, in particular, having such a long and successful story of combating racism (Robin DiAngelo’s dissing of Jackie Robinson’s accomplishments notwithstanding) could have created a compelling message all their own about the values of equality and tolerance and sportsmanship. But thanks to the “wokeness” of the moment, the league has simply given up the message to Black Lives Matter. And that is a damned shame, because they could have done this SO MUCH BETTER. But MLB took the lazy way out, and let the BLM mob dictate what happened. All that MLB had to do was rubber stamp it, and do a little preachy performance art of their own, narrated by Morgan Freeman (no, I’m not joking).
Today, and every day, we come together as brothers. As equals, all with the same goal – to level the playing field. To change the injustices. Equality is not just a word. It’s our right!
Today we stand as men from 25 nations on 6 continents.
Today, we are one. pic.twitter.com/vKUGdRfwgQ
— MLB (@MLB) July 23, 2020
And at first, the compromise seemed okay. Kneel before the anthem, stand for the anthem.
The Yankees made the decision to kneel for 60 seconds as a team before the anthem during a Wednesday night team meeting, then gave the Nationals advance notice, according to James Wagner of the The New York Times.”
But then it just became the same old thing.
A similar story played out in the day’s second game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants, except several players stayed kneeling for the anthem. The group included Dodgers star Mookie Betts, Giants manager Gabe Kaple(sic) and Giants veterans Pablo Sandoval and Hunter Pence.”
Mookie Betts takes a knee during the National Anthem, supported by teammates Cody Bellinger and Max Muncy. pic.twitter.com/OJyZ84hMLV
— MLB (@MLB) July 24, 2020
Are we really going to have to see this every single time we try to watch a baseball game? The sport is on a knife’s edge thanks to overtweaking by the commissioner, bleeding cash thanks to the pandemic, and the fans are disgruntled by the labor dispute. All we wanted was a baseball season. Instead, we’ve got social justice lectures, kneeling, silent stadiums with cardboard fans, and an uninspiring atmosphere.
Dr. Anthony Fauci’s first pitch of the Yankees-Nationals game sums up how many fans are feeling right now.
Dr. Fauci throws out the first pitch at the Nationals game.
— Benny (@bennyjohnson) July 23, 2020
Baseball seems to have been thrown off line, and I’m not sure if the fans that MLB thinks they are placating are going to hang around for long, compared to the fans they will likely lose. I love the game, but like all the other major sports, baseball seems determined that they are going to be “woke” in a season where they could, by the very rules they made in face of the pandemic, go quite broke.
Featured image via Pixabay, cropped, Pixabay license
Scott says: At this point, the only sport i’ll be watching is Hockey, and if they go down the same woke road, they’ll go away too. As you pointed out, MLB had a great opportunity here, and pissed it away by knuckling under to the mob.
Never forget,(B)urn (L)oot (M)urder is not about justice or equality, they’re about destroying the country. As their leaders have clearly stated, they are “trained marxists”.. This is NOT compatible with the Constitution and our Republic
Gridlock says: Baseball may be back, but I will not be.
Baseball is a feeling. It is an atmosphere. It is a state of mind.
I can not have that feeling, create the atmosphere, or have the proper state of mind if I am going to be preached at with BLM nonsense. That is not what baseball is about.
If I want woke PC nonsense, I will watch CNN. I can be aggravated more efficiently and be on my way.
kilgore trout says: MLB has chosen to turn their games into a 3hr re-education seminar. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet; just wait for the NFL to begin.
Drew458 says: Big thumbs up for Scott and Gridlock. Agree 100%.
AAA league hockey is my last remaining straw. Arenas are smaller, local , inexpensive. Any player gets too good an he goes to the bigs. But if NHL goes BLM and it trickles down, then forget it. Never did like basketball, football killed itself several ways, baseball is losing it. Soccer, track, golf, tennis, and gymnastics bore me to death. I have no hope for woke NASCAR and all their fake noose. What’s left … bowling, boat racing, and curling.
With the pandemic, we’ve all had >100 days to see just how unimportant pro sports are, and movies too. I could never watch another of either and not miss them a bit.
Arnold H Christensen says: BLM is MLB backwards
Baseball, NBA and NFL can go to Hades as far as I’m concerned as can the NHL if they embrace this this cockamamie B.S.
Having said that, all of this hatred towards our country reminds me of the greatest play ever made as far as Major League Baseball, that being Rick Monday rescuing the American Flag that a morn tried to burn during a game years ago. I remember Lasorda rumbling out to to assist and he probably would have cold cocked the hippie morn.
I wonder how those two feel about this B.S.
SFC D says: I spent very little cash on professional sports and that has dropped to zero. You are grown men, playing a child’s game, under the watchful eyes of your PC, “woke” masters. You’ve chosen your chains, may they rest lightly upon your shoulders.
Ted says: Chavez Ravine-O’Malley and the strike kiboshed MLB for me, kneeling is just another coffin nail. Also, the grammar totalitarian insists on –fewer games–, not “less games.” Don’t get me started on almost everyone’s misuse of –fascist–.
Cameron says: I’m not into guys so their kneeling isn’t interesting to me.
MLB lost me a long time ago and they are actively doing as much as they can to make sure I don’t come back.
Amateur Brain Surgeon says: Baseball returns with fewer games…not less games
kilgore trout says: MLB has chosen to turn their games into a 3hr re-education seminar. You ain’t seen nothin’ yet; just wait for the NFL to begin.
Skillyboo says: When the networks and professional sports leagues find out that the Woke crowd doesn’t make them a profit it should make the negotiations for new TV contracts very interesting.
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