THE SIDELINES : Opening Day Parade Strikes Out

Cincinnati’s traditional parade for the opening day of the baseball season was called off today because of the uncertainty created by the contract dispute between owners and players.

“This would have been our 70th consecutive parade,” said chairman Tony Bare of the sponsoring Findlay Market Assn. “We’re just going to have to postpone it until the next time.”

“I hate to see something like this scrubbed,” said Bare, a meat merchant at the Findlay Market, a street market near downtown Cincinnati. “I’ve been involved in the parade for 20 years. It’s been a tradition in my family, as well as all the other merchants and folks down at Findlay Market.”

Bare said the parade cannot be rescheduled because it is a volunteer event and its participants cannot all rearrange their schedules for whenever club owners and players reach a collective bargaining agreement and start the season.

Cincinnati has annually been the traditional site of the National League’s season opener because the city is regarded as home of the nation’s oldest professional team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, predecessors of today’s Cincinnati Reds.