These days I am really missing three great outfielders:Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente, and Henry Aaron. Why? Probably because in my early days of paying attention to professional sports this trio represented a fresh if long overdue surge of greatness, humility, and raw courage in major league baseball. A decade after the Brooklyn Dodgers signed Jackie Robinson to break what was euphemistically called “the color barrier”, people with dark skin were filling the rosters of teams in the National and, to lesser extent, American Leagues. Many of them were doing quite well, which surprised only a small percentage of knowledgeable followers of what was still being called the “National Pastime”.

Seven decades later the fact that players of various different skin colors haven’t always played together professionally seems a bit odd even though the scourges of racism, discrimination and ignorance are proven daily to live on. Speaking of prejudice, one of my own still exists. I’m a bit ashamed to admit that when well to do people adopt or take over something that originated with we common folk, like opera for instance, I automatically develop a disdain for whatever that thing is. Golf, for instance and tennis. Things that require a bit more cash than I usually have had in order to play. Then there is the thing that, to my perception, is a sign of weakness in the general culture: we are becoming a nation of spectators rather than players. I believe that that is the reason for three bad things First, it means that the person who has watched but not played has less understanding of the game. I’ve been watching soccer (futbol) for 35 years now and I understand a lot more than I once did but it still doesn’t come automatically Second, it seems that whatever game is being played, there is more attraction to the violence involved than there is to the skill. I’d say that, on average, those of us who haven’t blocked or tackled much get more of a thrill seeing it than those of us who have. When John Madden shouted “Bam!” into his microphone I was seldom moved to smile. The Charles Barkley school of basketball was cool to me only in the early years of testosterone. Third, as television and video games have surpassed actually playing the sports in our involvement, money has steadily risen as an important part of all pro sports.

Yes, the players cannot be faulted for having found a way to make a good living for a short time while risking very serious injury. But you can easily see who is benefiting from contests with numerous “time outs” and “huddles” and other ways, like “penalties” to sell shit like car insurance and bad food. Baseball is still the one most dear to me and I continue to be fascinated with it but, can I have your attention , MLB club owners? It’s the GAME that I love, not the adoration of money that seems to rule the leagues more and more as time goes on. I used to play pickup games at the local yard. I used to watch my older brothers play in American Legion or amateur or Little League games with small groups of spectators who understood the game and what it took to do what was being done. Low paid or no paid coaches who worked for a living but loved the game made it happen.

When Mays, Clemente, and Aaron were written about in newspapers or magazines it was about their accomplishments: batting average, home runs, runs batted in, earned run average, strikeouts, fielding percentage. I knew what all that meant and how difficult it was to do that stuff. Now I read more about how long the contract is for and how much money is paid. When something becomes primarily a business as opposed to what you do for fun,its appeal begins to slowly but surely diminish. Again, I’m not complaining about the players; they don’t make the rules. If you want to attract business fans, go work for the Wall Street Journal Give us back our game. Think about Willie Mays. You may remember him. Author Jackson Arn used a good phrase recently. He wrote about a rising tide that lifts only yachts.