CJ's Duck Pond

I LOVE Baseball

Hey Ducklings,

By the time you see this, game one of the 2013 World Series will probably be long over, the winner being either the Boston Red Sox or the St Louis Cardinals. Anyone who knows me knows which side I’ll be routing for. But regardless of who wins the game, I hope for a good series, an epic back and forth with clutch performances and surprises from players you didn’t expect.

I love baseball. Let me restate that. In capital letters. I LOVE baseball. I love baseball some like some people love football… or cars.. or clothes.. or a lot of other things. I’ll be the first to admit I’m not a stats guy. I cant tell you what David Ortiz’s OPS was in 2004 against Lefties. I’m not really a history guy either. With a few exceptions like Brooks Robinson playing 3rd base for the Orioles, thanks to my HS baseball coach for drilling that into my head, I couldn’t tell you who caught for who in the World Series in 1987.

But I love baseball. I love baseball like Kevin Costner’s character Ray Kinsella loved baseball. If you haven’t seen the movie, first off, go see it. Its brilliant and warm and amazing, regardless if you like baseball or not, second, I’ll give you a short synopsis. Ray is a corn farmer who on blind faith plows under his corn fields in order to build a baseball field, all on the command of a voice only he can hear. Ray faces scorn, ridicule and the possible loss of his family’s farm. I’m not going to spoil the rest, but trust me, its worth it. Plus it has James Earl Jones and Burt Lancaster, two acting heavyweights.

But the way Ray loves baseball is how I love baseball. Ray believes in baseball, that it can bring people together, connect people when they have nothing else they can talk about. I got that love of baseball from my Grandfather. He took me to my first game when I was 7, I’m pretty sure I still have the program in storage. We didn’t go often, but we watched together and talked about it often.  The last conversation I had with him before he passed away was about baseball in fact, who was being inducted into the Hall of Fame the next summer, as the announcement has been made after he went into the hospital. Cal Ripken and Tony Gywnn were the two going in. Ok, maybe I remember some more history than i thought.

So watching baseball and the world series, especially when my team is one of the participants, is special to me but also a little sad. I’ll cheer hearing him cheer next to me. But whether we win or lose i’ll still get the impulse to call him and talk about it, before remembering he isn’t there to answer. But baseball is eternal. No matter where he is, I know he’s cheering. And that makes me happy.