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Hernando Today

Reprise: Puhleez Take Me Out Of This Ball Game!

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By JOE KLOCK SR.

Published: January 2, 2008

To echo a confession (and book title) of the late and inflated How-ward Co-sell, I never played the game. Well, not much, anyway.
I didn't like baseball as a kid, partially because I was no good at it ("Okay, we'll take Klockie for right field"); but there was also my opinion - which I hold resolutely to this day — that, except for pitchers and catchers, there isn't much for participants to do, or spectators to spectate.
Activists at the professional level include bat boys, umpires, refreshment vendors, sportswriters and ravenous agents, but most principals in the great American wastetime are occupied with little more than trotting on or off the field, scratching wherever it itches, or "chatting it up," either from their playing positions or that elongated spittoon called the dugout.
That said, I admit to (but can't explain) my many hours glued to the radio in pre-TV days, while announcers droned such unstimulating drivel as "Goes to the resin bag, shakes off one signal, shakes off another, steps up to the rubber, checks the runner at first, stretches, pitches...ball two!"
I further concede that baseball has its moments of suspense, drama and excitement, such as stolen bases, home runs, spectacular catches and dazzling double plays. However, for both observers and players alike (exceptions noted above), it's pretty dull stuff.
Aside: I can't get Google to confirm this, but I'm pretty sure that the late and great sports scribe, Red Smith, once accurately characterized it as "stallball."
On now to the point — always an elusive target in these opusettes:
More than four years and 200 columns ago, I ranted against a proposal to spend (read squander) $325 million on a 38,000-seat baseball park with a retractable roof and a non-retractable public subsidy in my winter headquarters of South Florida.
That particular boondoggle died a-bornin', due to the reluctance of some hard-nosed and level-headed elected officials to pony up a bonanza of public funds and an underwhelming groundswell of public support.
The idea, though, like a congenital disease, keeps cropping up and has done so again - here as elsewhere in an otherwise cash-strapped America.
In the latest local mutation, the retractable roof remains, the crowd capacity has been reduced to 37,000 and the estimated sticker price has swollen to $525 mill.
Also, the bothersome problem of public non-support has been solved by borrowing the end run from football and bypassing any need for voter approval (so much for taxation without representation, eh?).
Surviving in the resurrected plan, of course, are a bunch of Tajmahallic "sky boxes," to be occupied in part (and free of charge) by some of the shameless end-runners aforementioned. Somewhat obscure is how this perk relates to good government and distances itself from naked payola.
Most of the sybaritic skybox occupants will be well-heeled aficionados of the game and/or beneficiaries of tax deductible expense accounts — another sucker punch at the public's purse.
Less endowed are the ordinary fans, who will be rewarded by seat prices more than a pop fly higher than before and such dubious luxuries as hot dogs at a cost level approaching that of filet mignon.
Interestingly, and significantly, a mini-mob of just fifty faithfuls showed up recently for a 2008 "Pick-A-Seat" session at the present venue, rivaling the outpouring of support at the latest Marilyn Manson Fan Club rally.
This underscores the overshadowed reality that Miami just isn't a baseball town, diehard devotees notwithstanding — despite the fact that it hosted a team which won two World Series before reaching teen age.
Denizens of this sun-drenched slice of paradise tend to regard baseball with a degree of enthusiasm only a tad higher than that which is lavished on polo, curling, cricket and bowling on the green.
The real winners in this scheme are a cluster of millionaires, headed by the owners, who could easily afford to finance their playground without raiding the public piggy bank.
Despite flagging attendance, which is unlikely to surge dramatically in a new supervenue, the bucks are there in ancillary income (TV revenues, inter alia) to provide a generous margin of profit to Marlins ownership, even if future paid attendance totals resemble those of a convention of broccoli fanciers.
That buxomly bountiful bottom line is further assured by one of the more miserly payrolls in the major leagues.
Hey, play ball if you'd like, Boys of Summer, but count this former right fielder out of the accounting!

Freelance writer Joe Klock Sr. (joeklock@aol.com) is a winter Floridian who summers in New Hampshire. More of his "Klockwork" can be found at www.joeklock.com.

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