We are doing this again? Really?
I mean we are going through this same rigmarole, and antiquated ritual?
I love baseball. But baseball people can be dumb as hell sometimes.
This is one of those cases. And the dumbest of them all right now is Tony La Russa who, quizzically, is viewed as a very smart baseball man.
You probably know the story by now. La Russa is the manager for the Chicago White Sox and one of his best players, Yermin Mercedes, hit a home run off a Twins position player the other night with a 3-0 count in an 11-run game.
The Twins apparently didn’t like it.
The Twins announcers didn’t like it.
More so --- and this should be to your amazement --- La Russa didn’t like it.
Something about unwritten rules or some nonsense. You got all that? La Russa didn’t like his own player hitting a home run because it violated some arbitrary, made up and antediluvian code.
Tell you what, Tony, if you are worried about players actually getting hits when they are at-bat, send them up there without a bat. Because otherwise, I mean, their duty and obligation is to get a hit. They owe that to integrity, themselves and most of all the true spirit of the game.
Hitters hit, you know?
But, wait, this all gets better …
The Twins, the next night, threw behind Mercedes because they were still mad about this and in one of the most absurd and turncoat displays in sports history, La Russa actually sided with the opposition in a postgame news conference. He said he didn’t have a problem with it.
What a self-centered jerk. La Russa should be terminated immediately because there is no way in the world his own players can trust him again. Ever.
But now we reach the most important portion of this column. Here goes: Major League Baseball should create a position and appoint me the arbiter of all these Unwritten Rules.
I would be more than willing to moonlight and undertake such a duty.
On top of that, I already have a plan and have had one for quite some time as to how all these instances should go and how with which they should be dealt.
In actuality, I’d install a rule into Major League Baseball and make a written one --- and anyone in violation of said rule would be banished for life.
The rule, clearly stated would go like this: You worry about your team and the other team will worry about their team.
That’s it.
Simple.
Done.
That one steadfast and foundational rule. It seems like any time we have a problem due to a violation of these Unwritten Rules (whether it is showboating or bunting when you aren’t supposed to or swinging away or whatever) it is brought about because one team is worried about the behavior and/or actions of the other team.
So, you got it now? Worry about you. That’s it. Play your game and let the other team play theirs.
If that would have happened in this case, we wouldn’t have started this snowball that has no trundled out of control.
If Mercedes would have simply hit a home run (as is his job) and the Twins would have shut the hell up and just worried about the Twins, we wouldn’t be mired in any of this nonsense.
So, yes, put me in charge of the easiest way to fix all of this. Get me a job with MLB and I’ll fix it.
Just mind your own damn business.
As with a lot of things in life, it could go a long way in baseball.
Related
