Bernie Plays Baseball

(With apologies to the great Bernie Williams)

I finally figured out what Major League Baseball reminds me of. It's just a big old Ponzi scheme.

Today, LA Dodger Manny Ramirez was suspended for 50 games for testing positive for a banned substance. Honestly, when the story first broke and they were reporting Manny violated "the drug policy," I thought immediately, Marijuana. Manny being Manny and all that. Then it was determined that he was suspended for a banned substance that he claims came from a prescription from a doctor. Now, Manny Ramirez is a great hitter, one considered to have natural talent, but he's 37 years old and his numbers are still THAT good.

Back to the Ponzi scheme. How does it work? Well, people put their money in, they know it's too good to be true, but as long as the cash is coming in they don't ask too many questions. They don't ask how they can get such a high yield year after year when no one else shows returns like that. If they own a hedge fund they don't ask what they are invested in that's making them so much money in fees. No, everybody just enjoys the ride.

This is baseball. This is baseball in the era of Sammy Sosa, Mark Mcgwire, and Barry Bonds, and hundreds of other players. Everyone just kept their mouth shut and went to the games, because really, who doesn't like to watch it sail out of the park? Ever been to a night game, when the white ball with faint red stitching arches up into the air, framed against the black night sky with thousands of watts of light beaming on it, and tens of thousands of voices carrying it as it makes its fateful journey over the wall? It's a beautiful, thrilling sight. Who cares if the guy who hit it did so under false pretenses? For a good ticket that cost an arm and a leg, and a beer that costs $8, people want to be entertained, do they care how?

They care now. Why? Because we've pulled back the curtain. Like a magician whose tricks have been revealed, it's not that much fun to watch. Baseball is a sport of history. Fans love to talk about history and make comparison, old players to new players. That's all a sham now. In this era of ESPN and every stat known to man, it all means nothing now. Players make millions for cheating, and every team is under a cloud. Nothing is real.

It wasn't only the players union and baseball commissioner who looked away for so long, it was the networks who payed millions to air the games, and the fans who continued to show up. Money talks, and in this case no one used the power of the purse to force anything from Major League Baseball. Not the straight players (if there are any), not the owners and not the media or the public.

So the national past time has been sullied. That's OK, only a few more months until football season.