Adults Cry Foul; Little Boys Just Cry

A father writes to Texas Ranger shortstop Alex Rodriguez and New York Yankee owner George Steinbrenner about the effect of a possible baseball strike on his son.

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I am writing to tell you about my son.

He is 7 1/2, and this summer he became a baseball fan.

Nate made his Pee-Wee League debut this season, got several hits, even caught a pop fly. He is still talking about that pop fly. But he is not just a fan of the game. To the amazement of a father who gave up on baseball three strikes ago, my son has become a major fan of the major leagues.

He has your baseball card, Mr. Rodriguez, along with 40 others. Every morning, he gets up, puts on his Red Sox cap and begins fingering through his cards. I have told him about Koufax and Mays and Babe Ruth, but Nate prefers to talk about players I’ve never heard of, the current crop I long ago dismissed as greedheads. He knows precisely 40 of them by name, team and position, and he has changed his dream from becoming a rock musician to playing in the major leagues.

We’ve been to a few minor league games, but Nate already knows the difference between the minors and “The Show.” He wants more than anything to go to a big league game. I have better ways to blow $150--on things like groceries and gas.

I am writing to seek your expertise.

I have taught my son everything I know about baseball. The lessons started when we lost a few balls in the backyard. I explained what I learned as a boy--that baseballs don’t merely fly into bushes; they vanish into them. I went on to clarify the force play, bunting, the sacrifice fly. I even tackled the infield fly rule.

But I haven’t figured out how to explain to a gap-toothed, freckle-faced kid why men who average $2.4 million a year might go on strike.

At first, I dodged the topic. It never came up when watching games on TV, so I decided to wait until late August when there might be no more games. Then, last week, my wife brought it up at dinner, and suddenly there it was on the table.

First I had to redefine “strike.” It wasn’t just a 95-mph fastball that caught the inside corner. It also meant workers refusing to work. Or play, I guess.

“Refuse to play baseball?” Nate asked. “Why?”

“Well, there’s a pile of money in baseball, from TV contracts and $50 tickets. The players and owners can’t agree on how to share it.”

“They get paid for playing baseball?”

Seeing how far apart we were, I decided to postpone further talks. But Nate still wants to know why. Why would Mike Piazza, whom he insists on calling Mike Pizza, refuse to play? Would Joe Nathan (who?) go on strike?

Will there be baseball next season? Ever again?

Though I tell him baseball is a business, Nate still sees it as a game, so I’m writing to ask you a favor.

If a strike begins, you won’t have much to do for a while. Could you come to my house and tell my son why players and owners might choose once again to tarnish the game?

Nate may not want to hear it, but as a father, I’d love to know at what age a boy in love with the open space of a diamond becomes a man concerned with “revenue sharing.”

I’d like to know when you traded your baseball cap, like the one my son puts on each morning, for talk about “salary caps.” And I’m dying to hear a man who makes $23 million a year explain just how rich he’s entitled to become playing a boy’s game, one for which I would have surrendered my entire card collection, including Mickey Mantle, to play for a living?

My son already knows that baseball is a game of thorny questions. “Dad,” he asked while playing catch, “if the ball hits first base, is it fair or foul?”

“Fair,” I said, tossing the ball back.

Two throws later: “Dad, what about a fly ball that goes over first base and lands foul?”

“Foul.”

So, Mr. Rodriguez and Mr. Steinbrenner, the question is: fair or foul?

If you could just explain why it’s fair for you to play games with the faith of a young boy, then I might cough up $150 for a game. But if you can’t explain, then the game is even more foul than I expected. And when my son asks where baseball went, I’ll have to tell him that, like a ball that flew into the bushes, it just vanished.