Spring Training

Yessssssss!!!!

Major League Baseball Spring Training has arrived. Finally. Yessssssssss.

The long dark nights are getting shorter as the dawn of the non-keyboard favorite pastime is emerging. Certainly not all is right with the world, but at least the sounds of horsehide meeting leather and Louisville Sluggers have added at least a tinge of silver to the edge of some of the densest clouds the nation has experienced.

Have you ever noticed how much national elections and baseball have in common?

I never really gave it much thought until a few months ago while daydreaming of the approaching start of baseball season.

Of course, the calendar still reads winter but I don't care. Opening of Spring Training (I capitalize the term on purpose) is surpassed in my leisure time only by Opening Day.

Certainly, I haven't done any real research on the subject, if there is anything to research, but the comparisons just keep running through my mind, where I admit there is lots of available space.

There are hundreds, if not thousands of new faces in Washington (the government, not the baseball team many of us have never heard of). And, just like in baseball, there are still a lot of veterans on the major political teams. Some of them are facing new challenges and find themselves in new positions, sometimes not in spots they are used to or want to be. Some will be bench warmers, some will be end up being utility players after being removed from big soft chairs at the head of the table to a wooden straight-back seat.

And a great many others will have been kicked off the team completely and have packed their bags and headed home, likely not to return for at least two or four years, if ever.

Then we have money.

Big Leaguers get lots of money, one way or another. A Big League baseball player gets a contract for millions, many times involving a signing bonus. A Big League political candidate usually doesn't get a contract but garners millions in campaign funds from those who want him or her to make the team. Most of the political bonuses come via speaking gigs and insider books written by former, and sometimes current, office holders. As we all know, the player, even an unknown rookie once in a while, who collects the most money, gets elected or receives a spot on the team roster.

Ballplayers have agents. Politicians have supporters, PACS (political action groups), political party fundraising functions, cronies and assorted characters, including some who find secret ways of getting money to their candidates.

Many office holders and political leaders have had their playing careers ended by money, either by the way it was gathered, used or kept from the taxmen. Some have spent money on friends, acquaintances or activities they didn't want their fans to know.

Ballplayers have lost or tarnished their careers in some of the same ways.

Performance enhancement has emerged as a major issue in today's top ballplayers and political leaders. While money is the heavy hitter in political pitfalls, past and present use of steroids and other performance enhancements has put the grand old game of baseball and some of its greatest players in the modern era in an awful mess.
Many of the games most cherished records and performances are being overshadowed by clouds so dark that even the most powerful stadiums light systems can't penetrate the darkness.

But even so, I firmly believe baseball will outscore all of today's ersatz heroes and hope will continue to spring eternal each spring long after the end of my ninth inning.

Despite all these concerns, let us all rejoice.

Spring Training is here!

Miles can be reached at mshuper@valleyvoicenewspaper.com