Of all the various examples of baseball as a cultural practice on our planet, most of us have experience and knowledge with little more than the major leagues. Little league games, for example, are a blast -- both as a kid and as a coach -- with all of the excitement and 10 times the humor of professional ball. And nothing beats playing in a summer baseball/softball league; whether it's drinking beers, havin' a smoke and a laugh with some friends or extending yourself athletically. And the best new tournament in transnational sports -- The World Baseball Classic -- is a window into wonderfully different ways of playing and appreciating the game.
It's opening day (night, actually) in the mlb, prefabricated to be a Yankees/Red-Sox matchup. The Bronx Dynasty came out aggressive, with Jeter grounding out on the first pitch of the season. Ellsbury led off with an equally anxious lineout to center on Sabathia's first offering. Beckett buckled in the 2nd -- back-to-back solo homers by an increasingly oldschool-looking Posada, smothered in pinetar (George Brettian graffitti, coloring both his helmet and the ash Lousville Slugger weilded in his characteristic loosefingred, barehanded grip) and by Curtis "Mayfielder" Granderson -- looking out of place in that Bronx business suit, his smoothnfluid swing sends a low fastball deeeeep into the centerfield bleachers.
Learning to appreciate all of the multifarious ways in which a baseball game can be enjoyed, is a lot like learning how to play a good game of chess.
The bizarre right hand of Youkilis is in perfect sync with all orthodox elements of the Hebrew Hammerstrike. He clobbers a double. Moments later, trots home on a sac fly ... Beckett slings one high-and-tight on Jeter, sending the captain pirouetting twenty feet back out of the box like a ballerina. After a primadonna pause allows the shortstop to smirk just long enough at the game so as to question its grit, he smacks a worm-burner by Scutaro, for an acerbic RBI single ... Pedroia beats out Teixiera's nifty infield play by diving headfirst into the bag, but the callous ump calls him out.
Umpires and Empires are obsessed with administering control, maintaining order, and executing discipline. Profit-minded, closed-minded and efficient creatures, their accomplices go by names like Sports Psychologist, General Manager, and Agent. It is in their interest to control and constrain baseball discourse and practices, ultimately for power and profit.
Sabathia looks strong and smooth ... Double-steal with the speedy Gardner at third catches the Beantowners with their pants down ... The old numbercards under the green monster flip to 5-1 for the visitors and Beckett hits the showers ... But the Boston bats come to life in the 6th: Pedroia walks, longtime Yankee-killer Victor Martinez doubles, Youk shoots one to opposite field for a 2-run triple. CC Rider now riding the pine in time to see the Sox tie it at 5.
Striving for power and profit defines the capitalist project; objectifying, essentializing, commodifying all cultures and forms of life into the predictable, predetermined discourse of the marketplace.
Some dude slithers out on the diamond during the stretch. A lovely looking woman at his side, he grabs a mic instead and performs a putrid patriot act. Suddenly, Carlos Delgado's missing presence is felt more than ever ...
... Pedroia the wee strongman wallops one over the monster. 7-7 in the 7th. Youk clobbers a double, again; sprints home, again. All part of the script? ...
... Sleazy Neil Diamond saunters up the firstbase line with an unworn hometeam cap and a worndown voice to sing his song on schedule. How much - if any - of this shit are fans expected to endure?
The pre-written narratives -- unchanging and mind-numbingly predictable -- spew forth from the shitbox as they have for generations. In baseball, it's the melodramatic backstories. The pompous tone and vapid, humorless rhetoric. The bombardment of images to combat uncomfortable cadences. The inability to reflect and a refusal to involve. Ted Williams refused to tip his hat to the pre-scripted "natural" ending, ending his career with a homer on his final at-bat and ducking quietly into the dugout to disappear from the public eye. Outta sight, outta mind. He left the fans with room for new memories of new endings.
Little Bigman once again blasts a basehit, this time toward the flatulent Nick Swisher who has no hope of throwing out lightning fast veteran Mike Cameron. The Sox can breathe a bit easier, up two runs ... Posada plays the part and plops a basehit, his third of the game, to give his team a chance. Yet, it's all for naught, as the Bo-Sox quickly close out the ninth with a 9-7 win, sending many a drunk New Englander home happy on a balmy Boston night.
New endings and new beginnings in the unwritten narratives-to-come. We gotta think outside the box, in new vocabularies, creating new concepts and meanings -- and experiment with living them out, putting these linguistic/cultural practices to use, embodying those very changes we hope to see. Still centered on the actualities, while striving for the potentialities.
The batter sits on the loopy curve, squares it up and bludgeons the soft offering past the hot corner - fair ball! He's got wheels, so he's digging for three right out of the box. Scampering after the ricochet, our leftfielder heaves the ball from the deepest corner of the park toward third base. Headfirst slide...the tag...he's SAFE!
The End of Week one.
ReplyDeleteSheesh... the excitement of MLB week one can only be truly matched by the ultimate frustration of watching Mr. Ortiz go 2-14.
Though I would like to vouch for the gastrointestinal health of N. Swisher Esq. I will have to digress and move to some ramblings on this great game of ours in the full swing of or new and expanded league system.
Some of the many meanings and beauties of this game are these:
that it matches mind over matter, it shows you that youth does not always triumph over age and wisdom, and that the spectacle of the moment can be made insignificant by the collective moments of a grand time continuum.
Take what I think is one of sports most intense competitions, the pitcher/batter duel. Most people see a mindless combination of chance that sometimes leads to bat on ball action but the reality of the Cat and Mouse strategy is magnified by the fact that Cat can become mouse in the space of 1/3 of an inning. Pitch selection and placement meets the whimsy and discipline of the batter and the outcome always seems uncertain until it happens
The journeyman batter or pitcher is often at the advantage of his more youthful comrades and can still make them look like the children they are. Skills honed over time have great value in baseball.
Though Comm. Selig would have you believe that opening night is like some sort of adolescent Super Bowl the players knew better and made you see that the greatest show on earth Neil Diamond does not make ( My apologies to sweet ass Caroline where ever you are baby). The painful performances of opening week will ultimately fade in comparison to the marathon that is yet to come.
To me all this does not even begin to cover the grace of the very game itself that appears when the teams hit the field. Just watching Ichiro swing a bat can be a Zen like experience in itself
Why is baseball not as popular now compared to some other American sports? Who Knows!??! No! It is because all these things are not evident under quick passing examination. Baseball is not to be understood by simply being watched, it only becomes truly great when it is actively "followed"