BASEBALL ‘94: Going, Going. . .Gone : The Game Takes a Classic Fall

Whereas, the 28 Major League Baseball Clubs have really mucked this thing up; and

Whereas, the Major League Baseball Players Assn. made demands that insisted upon “More,” “Much More,” and “Lots More;” and

Whereas, neither side has the integrity of a gnat.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that:

In order to pulverize the integrity of this Game, this Season, this Business, this Pastime, this Farce, this Travesty, this Mockery, this Sham, this Mockery of a Travesty of a Sham, the owners and players have agreed to sell the American public down the river without a paddle and flush the World Series and everything else down the old commode, hear ye, hear ye.

Signed,

Baseball Murder, Inc.

(And P.S.: Be sure to come to our big Going Out of Business Memorabilia Sale from the 23rd through the 25th! Bargains! Bargains! Bargains!)

*

No, Virginia, there is no baseball.

Thank you for your letter, little girl. I am so sorry that you will not get to see your favorite team again this year. Please come back when you’re older.

How did this happen? How did everybody get so knuckleheaded that an entire baseball season had to be scrapped? What went so wrong that the World has to do without a Series for the first time since men started automobiles with a crank?

Virginia, I wish I knew.

All I know is that the players called for an intentional walk.

All I know is that the owners called for the squeeze.

All I know is that they both struck out.

What did the players want? They wanted to increase the minimum salary from $109,000 to between $175,000 and $200,000. They wanted alterations in arbitration and free agency. They wanted home teams sharing 25% of ticket money with visiting teams. They wanted to make as much as they could make.

What did the owners want? They wanted to divvy up revenue, 50-50. They wanted arbitration terminated. They wanted to match any offer to keep any player who had been with them for fewer than six years. And they wanted to make as much as they could make.

What killed baseball, Virginia?

Money, honey.

Fools and their ballclubs are soon parted. The workers walked out and the bosses said, “Stay out.” The union spokesman and the management spokesman fiddled while baseball burned. The commissioner did nothing because there is no commissioner. The President of the United States did nothing because his job is to protect and preserve the public welfare, not the public recreation.

And so, on Sept. 14, 1994, a day that will live in idiocy, baseball dropped dead.

It was hara-kiri. Self-inflicted.

Black armbands for everybody.

Signs on every doorknob:

CLOSED TILL FURTHER NOTICE

One, two, three strikes, they’re out.

Going, going, gone.

The Dodgers finished first. Congratulations. Tony Gwynn hit .394, the highest batting average since 1941. Congratulations. Matt Williams won the major league home run title with 43. Way to go. Greg Maddux’s earned-run average, a sweet 1.56. Hell of a season, kid. Buff that big Cy Young trophy until it gleams.

Save those ticket stubs, Virginia, because you never know, you might never see a baseball game again. Maybe somebody will create a new league. Maybe next spring you can see Barry Bonds and the Sacramento Gold Sox versus Ken Griffey Jr. and the Tacoma Tyrannosaurus. Maybe the union organizers can call up Donald Trump and Oprah Winfrey and the heirs of Sam Walton and some more of America’s Richest People and organize their own league, with no rules and no obligations, $1,000 for a single, $2,000 for a double, $5,000 for a triple and $10,000 for a homer, sign right here on the bottom line.

The owners called the players’ bluff, Virginia.

Never, never, never, never, never, never, never did the players truly believe that the owners would close the cookie jar on their fingers this way. Oh, the jokes they made about going out to the golf course and having a wonderful time washing the doggy with the kids. In their hearts, they believed every owner would crumble like a mummy in a wind storm. Give up. Go limp. Chicken out.

Some of them nearly did. That owner from Colorado wavered and quavered for a while. Poor fellow, packin’ ‘em in 70,000 at a pop, raking in the dough with a sophomore-year team. Rocky in more ways than one, that guy.

And, when the formal resolution came down from the mount Wednesday, with all of its whereases and therefores and valedictory jabberwocky, a couple of signatures remained missing, one from the owner of the Baltimore Orioles, who might have been too sorrowful for words, and one from the owner of the Cincinnati Reds, who probably had stepped out for a smoke.

The season of ’94 was dead as a cow turned into a fielder’s mitt. And nothing, not a stay of execution and not a writ of habeas corpus, could bring it back.

1984 gave us a Detroit gang that won 35 of its first 40.

1974 gave us some scraggly, scrappy Oakland A’s.

1964 was worth a whole David Halberstam book.

1954 was Willie Mays vs. the Indians.

1944 put St. Louis against St. Louis.

1934, Van Lingle Mungo lost the All-Star game.

1924, the Washington Senators won it all.

1914, Boston (not the Red Sox) swept the Series.

1904, there was no Series.

We thought such a thing could never happen again, Virginia. Baseball was enduring and permanent, perpetual motion and perpetual emotion. Carpetbaggers and money-grubbers had been around forever--crooks and tinhorns even rigged a bogus World Series once--but always was it played. Never in 90 years was it dangled in front of us like a purse on a string, then yanked away, leaving us feeling like chumps.

The World Series is just like the World Cup, a scoreless tie. Maybe they could stick the names of all the first-place teams into a hat and pick out a winner. It beats penalty kicks.

Read elsewhere, Virginia, for actual results of actual games. Baseball doesn’t belong on the sports pages now, but on the obit pages. Be sure to tell your children and grandchildren someday that when you were young, you were there on the day greed and avarice corrupted the sport you so loved. Kiss this one goodby, kid. Baseball has gone foul.

BASEBALL STRIKE: DEVELOPMENTS FROM DAY 34

* Games lost: 14.

* Total games lost: 434.

* Games remaining: 235.

* Total income lost by players: $150.2 million.

* Estimated revenue lost by owners: $289 million.

* Estimated loss by owners through World Series: $580 million.

* Total lost by players through end of season: $230 million.

* Key development: Acting commissioner Bud Selig canceled the remainder of the season, including the World Series.

* Quote: “I guess I can put my glove away now.”

Ken Ryan, Boston relief pitcher

* AN EARLY END: After a 34-day strike, owners cancel the rest of the 1994 season. The World Series will not be played for the first time since 1904. A1

* BUD SELIG: Baseball’s unlikely leader is also its goat. C6

* STRIKE CHRONOLOGY: C7

* Q&A;: Abrupt end brings many questions, few answers. C9