Rocket Man

Sorry to mislead anybody hoping for a few words on Sir Elton, but my column space is dedicated to something of even less interest to me – baseball. I intend to say two things about the sport and hope to never deal with it again…this being the first, and an upcoming post when Barroid Bonds “breaks” Hank Aaron’s record. My biggest issue with baseball is that it’s a boring sport. Paint drying on walls boring. The action is sporadic at best, with lots of standing around – there’s perhaps five minutes out of three hours where there’s any movement on the field at all, and 90 percent of that is swinging misses or a simple base hit. Yawn. Ever see a “highlight” on TV? It may as well be the same long shot of a ball going over a wall. Totally indistinguishable. Half these players are built like bowling pins, and looking at guys with guts drooping over their stirrups and their chubby thighs doesn’t scream “athlete”. The only thing that separates the fan and the player is that fans get to eat continuously and drink beer during the game, lending credence to the saying that amidst all the gluttony that a baseball game happened to break out.

I didn’t always loathe baseball. In fact, I witnessed the single greatest moment of modern baseball history in person – the 1988 World Series Game 1 game winning home run by Kirk Gibson. Sadly nothing in the last twenty years has ever come close to being as picturesque or triumphantly magical a sports moment – it was a Hollywood ending come to life. but it’s been rapidly downhill since then. The sport may lay claim to being America’s pastime, but football really dominates in terns of numbers and popularity. Stickball is a dinosaur in the age of man, lumbering around, not knowing it’s obsolescence. And piss on Lloyd Dobbler and kickboxing – hockey is the sport of the future.

baseball at it's most brilliant moment

All athletes are foolishly overpaid, and none more grossly than in baseball. This morning I caught the news that journeyman Roger Clemens is getting $28 million to throw the ball for one more season with the Yankees. Yes, $28,000,000. I bothered to look up some info on the statistics and averages for pitchers and games played, and Rog will be lucky to start 28 games. Of course, they’ll be whipping his 45 year old ass to perform as much as possible to get a return on their investment, but anything less than a series ring makes it an incredible waste of money. Hell, even with a ring, he better wash a few cars and help fold some laundry. Of course, that’s not an issue for the Yankees.

When you think of the term “the best that money can buy” few can argue that’s not relative to the Yankees. New York has the resources to cherry pick the top players season in and season out, and their pedigree is attractive enough to seal the deal…which is why they are the perennially most hated team. They don’t build teams as much as purchase them, and their failure in the post season gives the rest of the league’s fans much to cheer. Whenever Goliath falls to another David, it proves that guts and talent are not always translatable into dollar signs. Although they don’t spend as much as the Yanks, it’s the same reason people hated the Lakers or the Red Wings or the Patriots – you want the top team to get taken down and hate them for being as goods as they are.

But beyond not liking baseball, routing for every team that plays the Yankees, and pulling for the underdog, I’m just straight up floored how much goddamned money they’re paying this guy for a few months of work. You know people are going to be hoping he gets a rotator cuff injury in the first week, and I don’t think they’re wrong to want it. It’s just obscene the value they’re placing on a middle age pitcher, and while they’ll pay the extra money in luxury taxes, the savings are going to be passed on to everybody else as tickets to games have another reason to go up. Don’t think for a minute that the consumer isn’t going to end up footing that bill. Just like Hollywood movies cost more to make, the price of a ticket goes up to defray the expenses, and as long as some dumb ass feels it prudent to pay their star actor, or in this case, pitcher, a grossly inflated amount for their services, they’ll be the only ones laughing all the way to the bank.