MURPHY’S TAVERN

Major League Baseball may implement video re-plays.  They may do it soon, perhaps introducing it during the upcoming division play-offs.  Is bringing this technology to the National Pastime a good thing?

Baseball is pastoral.  It is at once aesthetic and intellectual.  It is a rite of spring, a contest between two teams afield a lush green lawn and a stone-red clay diamond.  It is an intricate web of numbers and statistics, batting and earned-run averages, and wins versus losses.

It is the exhilaration of a close play at home plate and the tension awaiting the umpire’s verdict.  It is a fleeting hopefulness reluctantly ceding way to a wrenching agony as a home-run slam veers foul at just the last second.

It is as much the taste of the hot dog as the smell of the gloves of leather wafting in on the spring breeze blowing in from center.  It is the crack of the bat and the ovations spurred on by the flight of a ball passing beyond the park’s outermost boundary.

There is no clock.  There is no rush. Instead, there is leisure in the pace, a welcome escape from Monday thru Friday’s nine-to-five brain-numbing grind. There is a solace to be known in realizing the game just might go on forever.

It is the pride in our nation and the patriotism we demonstrate in the preamble to every game – the anthem. It is peanuts and cracker jacks and hot dogs and beer and “Take me out to the ballgame.”  It is the camaraderie amongst the fans and the seventh inning stretch.

There is enough technology at the ballpark now: Monster digital scoreboards playing funnies between innings, state of the art sound systems blasting loud rock and rap music between innings, and cell phones a plenty in the hands of the ‘casual’ fan, the one who would rather be somewhere else.  There are iPods to amuse listeners lest they be bored as the game slows.  And there are radar guns and dozens of TV cameras that make us witness to every single angle of the game.

Who needs video replay? The game has gotten along just fine for over 100 years. And besides, arguments over close calls are in the culture of the game.  The resulting antics are pure entertainment: An irate manager, claiming to have been wronged by a bone-headed call, kicking up dirt and yelling face to face at a resolute, unyielding umpire while the fans erupt in ecstasy.  It is pure baseball lore. It is classic.  It should not be infringed upon.

It has gained a wider audience in recent years. It has become an international spectacle owing to the success of contemporary marketing techniques and gadgetry. But at its core, the game’s tradition is uniquely American. It is Mom and Dad’s, and Grandpa and Grandma’s game.

I hope we keep it that way for there is value in leaving the finer things “un-modernized.”  They have survived the passing fads, resisted profound change, and emerged just as they have always been because they are good just as they are. They are the best.  They should remain as they are:  A perpetual reminder that the past was simpler, hot dogs with dad tasted better, and spring was longer.  And maybe, just maybe the game will go on forever.