Boxing Social Fizzles

Anyone who came to the stadium Thursday night hoping to see a fight was in the wrong place.

Sorry, the fights were at the Sports Arena.

Of course, the type of person who would show up at a baseball game hoping to see a fight would probably go to professional wrestling and gawk at auto accidents. A certain mentality is involved. You know, pickup trucks with shotguns in the back window.

This notion that a fight might break out was caused, to be sure, by the fact that a fight did break out exactly a week ago when the Padres and San Francisco Giants met in the bullring by the bay. As baseball skirmishes go, this was not exactly the Thrilla in Manila but it was much livelier than what folks paid $44.95 to watch a night later.

Whenever these things happen, the multitudes come to expect that lingering animosity makes a rematch a lock. Fortunately, Don King has nothing to do with baseball.

Disc jockeys, the masters of hype, babbled about it all day Thursday, but that was to be expected. They have air to fill.

However, the Padres themselves--the organization, not the players--exacerbated the situation earlier this week by actually running a promo on DiamondVision that urged that fans come to the Giant series to watch these two teams do battle. As if to make the less-the-vague message perfectly clear, it came with a clip of last week’s fight.

“Whose idea was that ?” gasped Tony Gwynn.

Good question.

If the key players involved in that brawl got four days suspension for their roles, the person responsible (irresponsible?) for this promo should get four months suspension. The club should have enough sense to market the game, not the shenanigans.

Consequently, the club itself was a part of pregame hype that was actually rather unrealistic.

When something such as this is expected to happen, it never does. Period.

After the battle royal between the Padres and Atlanta Braves in 1984, players on both sides were loudly vowing revenge. The idea did not seem too far-fetched, that fight being so wild that last week’s looked like a square dance in comparison.

Absolutely nothing happened when next those teams met and absolutely nothing since has happened between them.

This having been said, it should be noted that National League President Bill White was at the ballpark early Thursday evening. It might have been assumed that his visit had everything to do with lending his stern stare to the participants lest they be tempted to engage in extracurricular activities. Apparently, San Diego’s radio stations can be picked up in the National League offices in New York.

Wrong.

“It was just a visit to greet old acquaintances,” White smiled benignly. “That’s all.”

Some of Bill White’s very best friends of all time must have been at the stadium Thursday, because he flew from New York to San Diego, landed at 2 p.m., went to the stadium for his “visit” and then caught an 8 p.m. flight back to New York.

“I’ll be back in my office in the morning,” he said.

For the record, White’s very best of friends included Padre Manager Greg Riddoch and General Manager Joe McIlvaine and Giant Manager Roger Craig. Presumably they chatted about grandchildren and maybe the NBA draft and surely where they would all meet this year for Thanksgiving dinner.

White had a little time to kill before he had to catch his flight home, but the only people available to join him for dinner were the Padres’ Fred McGriff and the Giants’ Trevor Wilson. That McGriff and Wilson made each other’s acquaintance last Thursday night cost them each four-game suspensions and $1,000 fines, but it did make them available for dinner should the prez be inclined to invite them.

He wasn’t and didn’t, though the $2,000 they paid him would have provided the nicest of repasts with the finest of wines.

What better way to make peace between erstwhile combatants?

Apparently, White discussed more than the warm and personal with his good chums, at least with Roger Craig.

“This has really been blown out of proportion,” Craig fumed. “I hadn’t even thought about it. I get here and all I hear is all this talk about retaliation. I don’t want to see nobody get hurt. And it’s too bad Bill White had to fly 6,000 miles to tell me that. He could have just called me if he wanted to talk to me.”

Geez, Roger, give the guy a break. He comes to chat about your ranch and your horses and maybe makes one innocent suggestion that your pitchers not use Padre batters for target practice. And there you go, questioning his motives for being sociable.

More than a few of the 22,681 fans came hoping to see a ballgame with a fight attached, and here Mr. White traveled 6,000 miles for a visit. He didn’t have time to see a ballgame and didn’t want to see a fight.