Say It’s Not Over for Good So Soon

Say it ain’t so, Bo.

Tell us you aren’t going, going, gone. Tell us you don’t intend to go from two-sport man to no-sport man. Tell us there is nothing wrong with the greatest body we’ve seen since Michelangelo used a chisel. Tell us we haven’t seen the last of you.

Tell us again what you told us on Page 201 of “Bo Knows Bo,” the Bo-ography you wrote with Dick Schaap.

“When I decide to give up football, or baseball, or both, I won’t have any regrets, and I won’t miss it--as long as I’m the one who makes the decision, as long as I’m not forced to quit.”

Tell us it isn’t too late.

“I know I want to get out while I’m healthy. I want to get out with sound knees and a strong back. I want to be able to take my kids hiking and fishing and horseback riding and mountain climbing and camping.”

Tell us you shall return.

“I know people are going to keep talking about me, about what they think I could do, and what they think I should do, and why I should give up baseball, and why I should give up football, and I don’t mind them talking--when people stop talking about Bo, that’s when I’ll start to worry.”

Tell us you don’t mind us worrying. Tell us you understand why we want to see more of you. Why we can’t picture you 28 years old and out of the picture. Why we will always picture you homering over Anaheim Stadium’s center-field fence . . . running 90 yards down the Coliseum’s sideline . . . gunning down a runner at home plate with a throw from the warning track . . . using Brian Bozworth’s fallen body for a doormat.

Tell us you have another 10 years left, maybe more.

Tell us that this isn’t avascular necrosis, and that it isn’t congenital, and that it isn’t anything more serious than the dislocation of your left hip and that the Raiders won’t need to release you the way the Kansas City Royals did Monday.

Tell the Royals that you can play better baseball on crutches than half the outfielders they still have. Tell them that they took a chance on Jim Eisenreich after his Tourette’s Syndrome threatened his career; that they took a chance on Kirk Gibson when his knee surgery threatened his career; that they never abandoned George Brett when a rotator cuff and bursitis threatened his career.

Tell them how Brett had a folded piece of cartilage and a small piece of the clavicle from his right shoulder removed and then returned to make the All-Star team and win the batting championship again. Tell them how Gibson had a pin placed inside his left wrist and still came back to hit homers for the winning team in two World Series.

Tell them, “Don’t count me out,” the way you told reporters Monday in Alabama.

Tell the Royals that the money they save--now that they are obligated to pay only a sixth of your salary--is another reason the Rickey Hendersons and Ryne Sandbergs of the world keep demanding more and more, because they know it could all be gone at the drop of a cap.

Tell the Raiders that you realize you don’t always give them a full season’s work for a full season’s wages--reporting late for the beginning of the season and departing early because of injuries near the end of the season--but that they should remember what a difference you make whenever you are there.

Tell us that we won’t have to remember you as one of those great athletes who never took a team to a World Series or Super Bowl.

Tell us that the Raiders wouldn’t have been beaten by 50 points or whatever at Buffalo in the playoffs if you had been there.

Tell us that the Royals don’t know Bo when they insist that you could have become one of the great baseball players of the ages if you would have devoted more time to perfecting your craft and spent less time relying on your awesome physical skill.

Tell us you comprehend what Seattle Manager Jim Lefebvre meant when he said: “He’s such an incredible baseball talent, God, I don’t know why he even considers football.”

Tell us in that half-proud, half-snide manner of yours to mind our own business.

Tell us the doctors will be able to repair the damage to the body of Vincent Edward Jackson, the young man so named because his mother’s favorite television actor was the man who played doctor “Ben Casey,” Vince Edwards.

Tell us again how: “When I die, I want my tombstone to say: ‘Here Lies a Ballplayer.’ ” Or how: “When I come back, I want to be reincarnated as a dolphin.”

Most of all, tell us not to believe any headlines reporting No Mo Bo.

Tell us that you’ll see us later. And vice versa. Already we miss you, and you aren’t even gone.