Just How Creepy Can Baseball Be?

Headline: “No Game Today On Account Of Pain! Baseball Strikes Out!”

We take you now to the Radio City office of our old friend, C.B. Culturevulture, head of sports programming for the Calculated Broadcasting System.

You will remember old C.B. as the entrepreneur who rose to network executive on the strength of owning the only all-gorilla band in history that could ride bicycles and play Beethoven at the same time. Smashed all records on the old Ed Sullivan show, even out-polling the Beatles.

The network decided he was a sports figure when, as a publicity stunt, he entered one of his musicians in the Tour de France. The big ape got disqualified when he tried to take the mademoiselle from Armentieres and climb the Eiffel tower with her.

As we look in, C.B. is busy with negotiations with labor: i.e., he is trying to talk his secretary into going to the Virgin Islands with him for the weekend. He is interrupted when his assistant, Watt A. Creep, comes in. The Creep is agitated.

Creep: Boss, I’ve got some bad news for you.

C.B. (irritated): Not now, Creepy, I’ve got some urgent company business to attend to. I’m trying to get Miss Oklahoma 1993 here some overtime. Keep the help happy, eh? Besides, I’m working on the baseball playoff schedules for next month.

Creep (unhappy): That’s exactly it, sir. There’ll be no playoffs. The jerks won’t play. They’ve gone on strike.

C.B. (astonished): Who’s gone on strike? The umpires? The parking attendants? The hot dog vendors?

Creep (unhappily): The players, sir.

C.B. (turning purple): The players? You’re kidding! What do they think they are--the United Mine Workers? The Teamsters, for cryin’ out loud? You’re not talking about all those crummy left halfbacks, goalies or point guards and things?

Creep: The left fielders and shortstops and second basemen. Baseball has gone on strike.

C.B.: Wait just a darn minute! You’re joking. You mean all those guys who get 7 mil a year for two hours’ work a day, six months a year? They’re striking?

Creep: That’s right, Boss. Walked off the job.

C.B.: But you strike for better wages, hours, working conditions! What do these guys want, four-inning games? One-month seasons? A mil a game?

Creep: It’s not that simple, Boss. They’re striking against a salary cap. They don’t want one.

C.B.: A salary cap? What’s that?

Creep: Well, that’s where you have a limit on the amount of money you can spend for labor. The owners want one.

C.B.: You mean they don’t already have one? Somebody makes them pay more for services than they want? More than they can afford?

Creep: No, sir. They want the players to let them put one in place.

C.B.: That’s crazy. Why don’t they just put in their own salary cap, like every other business? I mean, do we in this business have to ask Dan Rather to agree to how we pay out our money? We just offer him what we want. If he doesn’t want it, we get Connie Chung. Why don’t they just get together and work out their own salary cap?

Creep (clearing his throat): They did once and it was ruled collusion. Cost them hundreds of millions of dollars.

C.B.: “Wait a minute! I don’t have to collude to stop spending more money than I’m taking in. A simple meeting with my accountant will do it. Don’t these guys have their own accountants? Their own cap?

Creep: They’d exceed it. You see, Boss, ever since Colonel Ruppert bought Babe Ruth and built him a ballpark and founded a dynasty, every owner figures there’s another Babe Ruth out there who will win everything for him. That’s why they give 7 mil to a player like Barry Bonds.

C.B.: Who?

Creep: Barry Bonds, sir. A very good ballplayer.

C.B.: For very good, you don’t give 7 mil. For Babe Ruth you give 7 mil. Barry Bonds is not a candy bar. Barry Bonds is just a nice kid with an earring. Babe Ruth you give 7 mil to. Willie Mays. Barry Bonds you give him what you have left over.

Creep (shrugging): You know that. I know that. But does George Steinbrenner know that? He wants to be another Colonel Ruppert.

C.B.: Tell him to buy a brewery. For a brewery you don’t need a salary cap. Ruppert just bought the ball team to advertise his beer. Why don’t these guys just say to the players, “You don’t want a salary cap? OK, we won’t have a salary cap.” Then, have one. Who’s gonna know?

Creep: Maybe the antitrust department.

C.B.: Baseball’s outside the antitrust department. Some judge ruled the game was a sport, not a business. Boy, would I like to get that guy in a poker game! But why do they need a salary cap anyway?

Creep: Well, they say 19 franchises are losing money.

C.B.: I can believe it, the way they’re throwing money off the back of trains at these guys.

Creep: They say they need revenue sharing to bail out the bankrupt teams.

C.B.: So, is revenue sharing against the law too?

Creep: No, it’s just against their public policy. A team making 80 mil a year off its local television doesn’t want to split it with a small-market team making 3 mil a year.

C.B.: Well, I can see why they won’t go for that! That’s socialism!

Creep: So they get the players to take up the slack. Pass on the cost to them.

C.B.: Now, that’s more like it! That’s fascism!

Creep: Well, the owners figure they’re going to lose $140 million in the strike. Some ballplayers are losing 30 grand a day. What kind of “ism” is that?

C.B.: Bolshevism! These guys are Laurel and Hardy! As Ollie used to say, “Another fine mess you’ve gotten us into!” Are they going to get out of this mess?

Creep: Nope. Looks as if we’ll lose the World Series.

C.B.: Lose the World Series? You’re kidding! That’s like motherhood, the flag, apple pie, hot-fudge sundaes, the Alamo, the Fourth of July! The World Series! There wouldn’t have been a razor blade sold in this country for 20 years if it wasn’t for the World Series.

Now, this is serious. This is against everything we’ve always held dear. Like money. Do you realize we’ve sold all the spots? Why, we’ll lose millions!

How dare those guys trifle with the dreams of young boys? And account executives? Can’t the U.N. step in here? Forget about Bosnia or Cuba for a week! Get busy on this!

Creep: Even the federal government can’t help. It’s up to Richard Ravitch for the owners and Donald Fehr for the players.

C.B.: I’ve seen them. They need a charisma transplant. Tell them to lighten up! That Fehr looks as if he’s got a chronic stomach ache. In his contract he can’t smile? If I got 750 grand a year just to say, “No salary cap!” I’d laugh all the way to the bank. Where’s Jimmy Hoffa when you need him? John Gotti? The Gambino family?

Creep: Maybe if you sat down and talked to them . . .

C.B.: I’d rather go back to training apes. These guys all test positive for jerk.

Creep: How about if we just brought up minor leaguers? Hey, we could get “Air” Jordan in a Series!

C.B.: Yeah, they call him that ‘cause that’s all he hits nowadays!