Baseball’s Threatened Walkout Strikes Many Observers as Curious

I’d bet my life that team owners are responsible for the juiced baseball. It’s their most potent strike-breaker. They knew that by feeding the egomaniacal prima donna players a juiced ball, many would be flirting with statistically magical seasons.

If there’s a strike, all possibilities vanish. Any impressive achievement would be asterisked into obscurity. The owners are not as dumb as they look. Next year, the ball will be unjuiced, lest their employees start thinking they deserve more money.

DONALD E. FRICKE

Northridge

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Ozzie Smith hopes it will be a short strike because the younger players really can’t afford to be out of work.

Excuse me, Ozzie, but aren’t these same young players making $115,000 a year?

Here’s hoping the owners use Ozzie’s $25,000-per-game salary to keep the peanut vendors, line cooks and ushers on the payroll during the players’ strike. They are the ones who really can’t afford this.

RON ANTONETTE

Seal Beach

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It’s hard to feel sorry for a bunch of guys who make millions of dollars each year, stay in nice hotels, eat free meals, are paid a per diem so they can eat elsewhere too, get to play free golf, and play mediocre baseball, all with a negative attitude.

I say cap them out at $100,000 because it’s a hell of a lot more than they would make in the real world, where accountability really means something.

JOE LINS

Corona

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Strike or no strike, you can bet the Dodgers will have a salary cap night for all the fans in attendance.

DWIGHT CATES

Ventura

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During a strike, it’s not unusual to find management stepping in to take over for the workers. Here are some early scouting reports on some future major leaguers.

Marge Schott: Like Dykstra; chews tobacco.

Ted Turner: Hits to all fields; wife’s a drag.

Peter O’Malley: Looks like Clark Kent, hits like Lois Lane.

Fred Claire: No help coming out of the pen.

Tom Lasorda: Crafty left-hander; Seems to have conquered weight problem.

George Steinbrenner: Pain in arm; pain in knee; pain in butt.

STEVE POSS

Long Beach

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Baseball strike?

Yawn.

Who cares?

KEITH ROBERTS

Mission Viejo

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Attention, baseball owners! I used to say if given the chance, I would play for a bus ticket and a sack lunch. I’m over 50 now, but I haven’t changed my mind.

KERRY BURNSIDE

La Habra

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If the main thing for the owners is a cap on salaries, return to one-year contracts and the salary risk is almost eliminated.

JOHN H. STEVENSON

San Marino

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Hey, guys, if there’s a strike, you won’t be able to watch 10 players scratch, spit and twitch for minutes on end while waiting for an occasional foot to touch home plate guarded by a padded, well-protected player.

Back to soccer, where 22 players are working hard, nonstop against one another all over a field larger than any football field, whether the ball goes near or into a 24-foot by 8-foot net protected by an unpadded player. You want action?

BOB ALBERT

Claremont