Time to play ball!

OK, I’ve gone without baseball long enough. I know this pandemic is still happening, but there’s got to be a way to play baseball and not catch the coronavirus.

I mean, baseball is already a pretty “socially distant” sport… the defensive players are very spread out, and the only contact is between the bat and the ball. OK, sure the batter, catcher and umpire are pretty close together, but hey, the catcher and ump already have masks on!

Yeah, I’m (mostly) joking about that but for real. The National Women’s Indoor Soccer League, the National Hockey League and the Premier League are all coming back soon. It’s time to bring back baseball. I even saw on Facebook that a local cornhole league is starting back up, so let’s mow the grass, put down a couple of chalk lines and get back out there.

I have seen proposals that suggest Major League Baseball is eyeing a July 4th weekend re-start. That would be cool, and a pretty symbolic start date to boot. That would be right at the traditional start of the second half of the season, so we’d get three solid months of baseball plus a month of playoffs, plus a World Series, which has only not happened twice since 1903.

Yes, it’s probably a little selfish, wanting to see baseball games while people are still getting sick and dying, but if it can be done safely, I say go for it. If that means empty stadium games or limited capacity crowds, I’m down for that. I (and all the other fans) would happily watch from home where I can shelter in place… in my Braves jersey, of course.

It’s summer time… time to ‘Play Ball!’