Whatever the pace of the particular baseball game
we are watching, whatever its outcome, it holds us in its own continuum and
mercifully releases us from our own. Any
persistent effort to destroy this unique phenomenon, to “use up” baseball’s
time with planned distractions, will in fact transform the sport into another
mere entertainment and thus hasten its descent to the status of a boring and
stylized curiosity.
So wrote Roger Angell in The Summer Game, in 1966. As someone who despises the idea espoused by
a growing number of baseball executives that it doesn’t matter if fans don’t
remember the score of the game they’ve just witnessed, I view Roger Angell as a
prophet. Think about his words from over
40 years ago in light of the news that Alex Rodriguez was using steroids. Without making any excuses for Rodriguez or
any other player, it has been the Lords of Baseball who have reduced the game
to another “stylized curiosity.” For any
real baseball fan, the well-turned double play is just as thrilling to watch as
a home run, but the owners clearly do not understand the appeal of their own
game. It is not much of a leap from an
exploding scoreboard to an exploding Mark McGwire. (What the owners have done to baseball is
another post altogether!)
I don’t care about Alex
Rodriguez nor do I much care anymore about the “stylized curiosity” into which
major league owners have turned major league baseball. An excellent antidote to steroids,
Congressional hearings, perjury charges, etc. is Angell’s The Summer Game.
Angell is certainly a
gifted Philosopher of Baseball and The
Summer Game contains many insightful observations about, and beautiful
descriptions of baseball. The final
chapter, “The Interior Stadium” is worth the price of the book itself. In it, Angell describes how baseball sticks
in ones memory: This inner game—baseball in the mind—has no season, but it is best
played in the winter, without the distraction of other baseball news.
The Summer Game is based on a collection of Angell’s essays that cover the game from
1962 to 1971. Most of the book is devoted
to the World Series from each of those years.
It is probably best enjoyed by those who can conjure up memories of
players such as Dick McAuliffe, Don Buford, Ed Kranepool, Jim Lonborg, and
others from that era. All true baseball
fans regardless of age will enjoy this work, however, if for nothing else than
the poetic musings about our favorite game.
A fairly quick read, I
highly recommend The Summer Game. It will take your mind off Alex Rodriguez,
not that you should pay him much mind anyway.
BELOW: The Summer Game in New Market
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