29 January 2002
I've complained about Bud Light, the sometimes owner of the Brewers and the sometimes pretend commissioner of baseball, already of late. Since that time, he's gone so far into Bizarro World that I can only shake my head. In particular, I'm astounded to learn that he violated the rule prohibiting owners from making secret deals with each other, by borrowing money from the owner of the Twins, Carl Pohlad. He's still saying that there might be two teams contracted this year - it's so ludicrous.
A recent article in the Dallas Morning News (the DaMN paper) listed all of the litigation going on in baseball - Bud and the Congress, Bud and the state of Minnesota, Bud and the people of Florida, Bud and the players. There must be a hundred lawyers with kids in private schools that love Bud.
Right after the Arizona beat the Yankees in a great World Series, the public interest in baseball was high, and the buzz was very positive. Bud picked that week to announce contraction plans. "Let's take away two teams, because two guys don't want to field teams anymore. More beer for the rest of us." A master stroke of timing, it reminded everyone that these guys are not interested in baseball and they can't even pretend long enough to fool people.
The price of free agents this year looks a lot like it did the last time that baseball got into trouble for collusion. I'm really suspicious. Maybe I'd be less suspicious if these same people hadn't been found guilty of collusion (and fined $200 million) the only other time that free agent salaries fell in the past 25 years.
Write this down: the owners of MLB and their lead droog, Budzilla, will destroy the leagues that they play in. I'm not as upset about this as I used to be - I no longer fear that they will destroy the game. They'll only destroy their own companies, and the game will survive without them, and probably prosper. I wish they would hurry up and flush themselves into sports history so I can watch Bonds, Griffey, and Sosa chase the Babe.
I saw a frightening sight last Sunday At Attleboro High School, in Attleboro MA, there was a swim meet. In one room that they called the "Sports Bar" they were serving pizza, hot dogs and sodas at a concession stand, and watching the pool and the NFL Conference finals on 2 television sets.
I'm afraid to say how many people crowded into that room, but I'm glad that the fire marshal didn't come by. I hope that he was watching the Pats at the firehouse. Everyone in there was pulling for the Pats, they all knew about the differences in Tom Brady and Drue Bledsoe, and they all booed when Bledsoe came on the field.
I realized that they all shared a connection here - that the story of the Pats was a story for all of them. It gave me pause.
Pro sports teams have been conning cities and states into subsidies for years, and I've written many times that I oppose this practice. Teams should build their own stadiums, and then they wouldn't be able to move away from a big asset like that. It's also been a lot easier to divorce myself from the local teams by judiciously monitoring my speech and replaceing the word "we" with "The Rangers" and the word "us" with "them." I'm not part of the team and they don't know that I exist.
That cynicism ran off a cliff in Attleboro. Unnamed millions of New Englanders make an emotional investment in the success of the Pats. When they made a good play, the room rocked with cheers. These aren't naive fans. They've been watching the Red Sox play bridesmaid since 1918. They can spot a team that is good enough to make them hope but not good enough to be champions. Yet here they were, cautiously pulling for the Patriots to beat the Steelers in Pittsburgh and earn a trip to New Orleans for the Super Bowl.
And when they did win, every man in the place seemed to exhale and relax. I must have heard, "I don't mind. The Pats won" a dozen times. People all over five states mellowed out because some company (the New England Patriots) performed well in a trial (the conference championships). Maybe the social benefits of having a team to unite a region are worth some of the extortion that they pay to keep their teams.
Its probably a good idea to point out that I haven't heard any rumors about the Pats moving - they're just the most obvious recent example of what having a good team can do for an area. In comparison, I wonder what event or announcement could come from the mayor of Boston or the governor of Massachusetts that would create the same reaction. I mean, if they voted to give every family in New England $20, I don't think that it would produce as much good will - and it would certainly cost more.
Maybe I was wrong, and the teams DO belong to the regions. If that's true, there are a lot of regions that ought to get their sleazy owners out of there so that they can have better teams. Maybe it makes sense for the governor to review the performance of a state's pro teams and protect the public interest. "Pass more." "Get some better linebackers." Why stop at the pros? It would make sense for the mayor of Houston to look over the shoulder of Mack Brown at Texas. "Win a bowl game."
In case it's not clear yet, I think that sports are bread and circuses. They take our minds off the jobs lost at Enron or the price of electricity and help us deal with a difficult life. What I saw last weekend was how much good it can create when people feel that a team represents them, and they take pride in the performance of their champions. Being a Houston native, I'm not very familiar with this. A New York native who was a close friend was incredulous, "You've never had a World Series?" You'd think that they had one every year in New York. Okay, they have a lot of them. Don't rub it in.
Before you decide that I became a Pats fan for a day, I want to point out that I picked them to win the AFC before the playoffs began. I guess you don't have to live in New England to enjoy the Pats.
Each year for a long time, I've loaded up a spreadsheet withthe movies that get the most nominations and raced the clock to see them before the Academy Awards. I rate them from 1 to 4 cows and then see how much I agree with the Academy. Okay, I admit it, I understand that the purpose of the whole Oscar deal is to run a commercial for people to go see movies. I have no problem with that. I love movies. I like shows about movies. I'm not going to tell you what's wrong with the Academy and their choices of winners, because the academy is its own game, and isn't subject to some standard that I might imagine that they should follow. I accept that. I want more of it.
The last few years, I've tried to anticipate the nominations by starting on a tentative list and seeing the slam dunks early. This year that means seeing Lord of the Rings and A Beautiful Mind and maybe Mulholland Drive and some others. I haven't made much progress but I'm getting into the mood.
My personal taste in movies keeps me from ever seeing my favorites get involved. They never nominated Independence Day for best picture in 1997, and they won't nominate Spy Kids this year. No problem, I'll just watch more movies.
Why do I like the movies so much? Well, besides the fact that a lot of people are trying really hard t do something well, I like them because it's a two hour dream about our culture, a vision, a myth retelling using cameras and surround sound. I think I could get through life describing every situation as being like some scene in a movie and probably get rpetty close to describing a re-occurance of some fictitious events with imaginary characters - and then I could make choices in the real world based on the outcomes that those people had! I think some people probably get thru life just fine like that. And isn't that my point? That movies teach us about life?
I'm sure that most of the people I know get all of their history from Robert Redford and Mel Brooks. Most people seem to have computer network understandings based on the systems that they use in the movies. That is generally very fake and done because it photographs well - it ain't real.
We'll talk about movies a lot in the coming weeks, the high season for them is upon us.