Heart Break Kids Alive and Well in the Majors

    A large part of the mystery of the United States is baseball. It has spread across large swaths of Latin America and East Asia, but it is still not as popular as cricket, according to some. It is a kid's game at heart, but it involves a lot of superior strength and skills. It can wreak havoc on the bodies of otherwise healthy, strong men.

    Sometimes a team may hit 15 or more hits, and score 10 or more runs. But usually it is less. The teams aim for the ultimate championship in the fall, after a cold spring and hot summer. It survived the pandemic of 2020 with a 60 game shortened season. It crowned a champ, unlike the strike fiasco of 1994.

    Some of us are in love with the numbers and stats. 

    Beautiful. Hitting .300, what a wonderful thing. A pitcher for the Dodgers is undefeated. Two teams now have 10 game winning streaks, the Orioles and Mariners, of all things.

    The wealthy Yankees look hard to stop, as do the other coast rich Dodgers. But any other threat can own the day by the end, such as Boston or Saint Louis, traditionally competitive franchises.

    My Nats won one a couple years ago, and it has been a long road since.

    Some never-been-there teams are doing okay, like San Diego and Tampa Bay. All right, they have "been there". But they have not won it all.

    There is much more to say, but Pete Rose and Bart Giamatti and all the other ghosts of this traditional game wish us to simply, build it, and they will come. 

    Go the distance.

    And what else do the ghosts say? 

    Play ball.