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There’s No Spitting in Baseball!

 

In these strange days we are living through, a major holiday is upon us. The 4th of July, when we celebrate our independence and freedom…I don’t know how much you are feeling either of other cities do have major league teams.

With baseball shut down, the Pirates are currently at 500, 0-0. It would be their first non-losing season for a few years…and there haven’t been many in the last 25.

The Pirates opening day payroll this year was less than a large family take out order at McDonalds during the pandemic…thanks to tight fisted owner Bob (Ka-Ching) Nutting. Any money that could go toward the team is much better served in his pockets.

Anyway, even though baseball won’t be played on the holiday this year, they are trying to come back. Teams are headed for spring training…in their home parks and promise to be back in a few weeks.

You’re guess is as good as mine if this will actually happen, but we have hope.

There will be rule changes because of the virus. The most interesting is…

“There will be no spitting in Baseball.”

“Spitting…you’re spitting…There’s no spitting in Baseball.”

Yes, I borrowed that from “A League of Their Own.” It’s just ridiculous. Spitting and baseball go together like…well, baseball and the 4th of July.

So, you can’t spit…no tobacco, no sunflower seeds…OK, what happens if you hack up a loogie? I guess you have to call a timeout and run out to the parking lot. Yeah, like the games not long enough.

When I was a kid we watched our favorite players and learned all of the idiosyncrasies. Spitting was on the top of the list.

Before we knew how to hold a bat the right way, we learned how to spit like a major leaguer.

After that, you learned how to fix and adjust things…which we really didn’t have much of as kids, but we fixed them anyway.

I always liked mine even. I don’t know if some guys feel like they get a better pull if one hangs lower, but it’s nothing we ever discuss. Everyone has their own way of hitting.

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I’m So Bored I Would Watch the Pirates

I’m So Bored I’d Watch the Pirates

 

The Stanley Cup and NBA finals should be finishing up. Baseball should be into its second month. The Pirates should be mathematically eliminated for the post season. We should be talking about what players the team could get in Bob Nutting’s annual midseason salary dump. This year, we have nothing.

My wife and I re-watched Super Bowl Forty-Three last night on the NFL network. The Steelers won again, but it was close.

There’s a pandemic, protests, looting, Murder Hornets, an asteroid headed towards earth and nothing to take our minds off any of it.

We’ve had seasons stopped and canceled because of strikes and contract disputes before. Fortunately, there was always another sport to focus on. This time, we have nothing.

People are betting on table-tennis…you know, Ping Pong…just for some action. That’s how bored we are. We need sports.

I know, I’m a frequent critic of the Pirates and this year would have been no exception. With no pitching, no catcher and a payroll lower than some beer league softball teams, there wasn’t much hope.

But, I would watch. If they were on right now, I would be paying attention. After they removed the starting pitcher, down 17 to nothing with one out in the first, I would watch.

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Juice Them Up!

Juice Them Up!

 

Baseball season opens this week and I find myself being a bit nostalgic for the old days. I never wanted to be one of those old guys talking about how things were better when I was younger.

“These guys are nowhere as good as the players I used to watch.”

Problem is, you can’t argue with me about that statement. Guys were way better twenty years ago, it’s not even close…that’s because they were all on steroids!

I miss those days. Guys would come out of the dugout and be twice the size of the other players. When they batted, it looked like King Kong holding a twig. There was always a chance they were going to hit a screeching liner up the middle and leave a hole in the pitcher’s torso. Just like it happens in the cartoons.

Up until the late nineties, only two guys had hit more than sixty homers in a season. The first was Babe Ruth. If you’ve ever seen a picture of the Babe, you know he wasn’t using performance enhancing drugs.

The second was Roger Maris who did it in the sixties before anybody was taking steroids. Players were more into amphetamines then. Amphetamines don’t make you hit the ball farther, they just make you annoying to be around.

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