Out In Left Field

By Clark Westfied

"You can observe alot just by watching."
-Yogi Berra




Give Peace a Chance - At the Ball Park

For me the baseball season was over when the Yankees got knocked out of the playoffs quickly. But I do want to comment on a disturbing trend in baseball stadium decorum, including at Yankee Stadium. Baseball parks were set up as a sports oasis amidst the hustle and bustle of big American cities. As cities grew rapidly around the turn of the twentieth century, baseball fields, like urban parks, became a reminder of the pastoral days of yesteryear. Ball parks with their manicured grass and smooth dirt in the base paths provided calm from the horse and carriages and then automobiles rushing to and fro on the cobblestone and asphalt streets around them. Inside the park, away from blaring car horns and shouting people, the only noise spectators heard was the crack of the ball on the bat, the chatter of the infielders encouraging the pitcher, and the roar in unison of the crowd when the home team did something exciting. Even the slow pace of the game (though they moved much faster before the 1980s) contributed to the tranquil atmosphere, quiet conversation, and peaceful contemplation that baseball games (not football or basketball) allow.

Times have changed, however, and not for the better.

No longer does a baseball game bring peace and quiet from the hubbub of daily life. If you go to Yankee Stadium you will be attacked by the clatter of noise generated by high-volume loudspeakers imploring fans during an inning to make more noise (can’t they figure out for themselves when to clap and scream?). Worst of all is what happens between innings. The Jumbotron (or whatever it’s called) in centerfield broadcasts loudly all sorts of filler to drown out relaxed conversation. At Yankee Stadium there is such silly-made-up stuff as a three-card Monte version of shifting baseball caps and balls and a race between the B, C, and 4 trains. Of course each of these is sponsored by some corporation whose advertisements we have gone to the ball park to flee. Then there are segments on Yankee trivia, players’ favorite songs, uniform numbers, and a kind of bingo of player identification. But that’s not all. Each player now has a song that introduces his at-bat and during the fifth inning even the groundskeepers become performers dancing to a recording of the Village People’s “YMCA.” The seventh inning stretch no longer has only the traditional “Take Me Out to the Ballgame,” but now is accompanied by Kate Smith singing “God Bless America.” The latter squeezed out the rousing “Cotton Eyed-Joe,” which used to go along with the seventh-inning stretch, but now comes in the eighth inning. And I haven’t even mentioned the music that accompanies the list of birthdays announced on the scoreboard.

Can’t we just watch a baseball game in peace and quiet and enjoy it without loud advertisements and silly scoreboard games? The fan-made sounds that accompany what happens on the field are surely enough. If I wanted to be bombarded by noise and flashing advertisements I would just go to 42nd Street and Times Square. The only saving grace is that I have been to Shea Stadium and noise oppression there is even worse. And, by the way, whatever happened to infield chatter?

Clark Westfield is a pseudonym for a Professor at Rutgers University and a non-fiction writer, who in the twilight of his distinguished career, wishes to fan the flame of mystery. Out In Left Field is a column devoted to all things New York, Baseball, Entertainment, Politics, and History.

Out in Left Field...

By Clark Westfied

"You can observe alot just by watching."
-Yogi Berra

756

Let me start out by saying that I am not a Barry Bonds fan. It’s as likely for me to call him “Bobby” Bonds, mistaking him for his father who was also a major league ball player. I haven’t paid close attention to his career over the years and have not watched him play on many occasions. I think I saw him hit a towering home run into the upper deck in right field at Yankee Stadium last year when the Giants played New York in an inter league game. Most of what I have seen and heard of Bonds comes from newspaper, T.V., and radio reports dealing with matters outside of his on field performance (though most would say it has enhanced that performance). Reporters and commentators describe Bonds as “surly,” “moody,” and “uncooperative.” Yet I have seen him interviewed when he seems pleasant and quick to flash a big smile.

Bonds has been in the news for the past several years for two reasons. He has been accused of using steroids, an accusation he has denied publicly and presumably before a grand jury. His personal trainer, the man who has been accused of supplying him the drugs, has been in jail for quite some time for refusing to name names to the grand jury. If you press me, I would have to say that Bonds probably used some banned substance to transform his body, once on the lean side, to that of a modern-day Hercules. All of this is news because it relates to the second reason that Bonds has dominated the sports pages: he has pursued and now broken the most hallowed record in all of sports and not just baseball--Hank Aaron’s hitting 755 home runs. Many if not most fans outside of San Francisco want to have an asterisk placed next to Bonds’ record of 756 (or whatever number he finally reaches) because they argue that the slugger achieved this feat illegitimately.

Whatever the legal system and the baseball record keepers may decide, I believe that Bonds should keep his record without the placement of any asterisks, or worse, having the record erased from the books altogether. First, let’s remember that Bonds is entitled to his constitutional rights, the most important of which is that he is innocent until proven guilty. He cannot be convicted without due process of law, which means a trial before a judge and jury and representation by an attorney. Also, Bonds does not have to tell reporters or radio talk show hosts that he used steroids, let alone federal prosecutors and grand juries, even if he did, because of another of his constitutional rights—the Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate himself (though this does not give him the right to commit perjury). In these post-9/11, Patriot Act years, the Bill of Rights often has less meaning than its language specifies, and although the Bonds controversy does not rise to the importance of national security, it is important that the civil liberties of any individual, no matter how poor or rich, be respected.

Bonds deserves official recognition for his accomplishment because of his extraordinary baseball skills on the field where it most counts. Even if he used steroids or some equivalent, it did not guarantee that he would belt a record-full of home runs. We suspect many others of taking prohibited drugs, but they have not come close to achieving what Bonds has done. Hitting home runs requires more than a Paul Bunyanesque physique, or Arnold Schwartzenegger would have played baseball and challenged Aaron and Bonds. It demands phenomenal bat speed, hand-eye coordination, plate discipline, and a bit of luck. Bonds has all these which, much more than any man-made substance, allowed him to surpass Aaron’s record. Besides, if he did use steroids, he did not violate any baseball rule that existed at the time. It is hard to believe that baseball owners and players’ union executives did not suspect the existence of performance enhancing agents that boosted the offense or that they did not want exactly that—to get more scoring in the game, mainly through the long ball. Indeed, over the more than 100 years of major league history, players have used substances like amphetamines to enhance their energy, and when they get an injury trainers give them shots of cortisone to get them back on the field, thereby enhancing their performance. Drugs, illegal and otherwise, have always gone hand in hand with performance on the field of dreams.

Why should we turn Bonds into the national nightmare?

Is it racism that has demonized Bonds? Some say that this African-American player is a victim of those who always see the worst in black men or conversely want to knock them down a peg. I don’t find this explanation compelling in this instance. After all, Bonds threatened the record held by another African American. It was Henry Aaron who was subjected to genuine racism as he challenged the home run record of the legendary Babe Ruth. Aaron, who was playing for the Atlanta Braves in a region only recently liberated from segregation, received death threats and racial slurs as he approached his 714th home run, which stood at the time as the record.

Nevertheless, racism plays a significant role in the public’s understanding of the Bonds affair. As in many important areas of public opinion, African Americans and white Americans view the subject in opposite fashion. A majority of blacks defend Bonds’ record and doubt his use of steroids, while for whites the position is reversed. As long as the legacy of racism and the failure to achieve genuine racial equality exists, then blacks will view white criticism and opposition to members of their race from a conspiratorial point of view.

It’s what America deserves until it can demonstrate that race no longer matters and a colorblind society really exists.

Until then, debate will continue over the record and the character of Barry Bonds. Or, it might end in a few years when Alex Rodriguez nudges Bonds aside and breaks his record.

Clark Westfield is a pseudonym for a Professor at Rutgers University and a non-fiction writer, who in the twilight of his distinguished career, wishes to fan the flame of mystery. Out In Left Field is a column devoted to all things New York, Baseball, Entertainment, Politics, and History.

Out In Left Field...

By Clark Westfied

"You can observe alot just by watching."
-Yogi Berra




“Where Have you Gone Joe DiMaggio?”

I grew up in the Bronx in the 1950s and inherited my religion (Jewish) and politics (Democratic) from my parents. I also inherited my baseball team—the New York Yankees. Despite the image of the Yankees as the “Evil Empire,” the team of multimillion dollar players, and an owner who buys his way to the playoffs and World Series, I have remained a faithful Yankees fan for the past fifty years. I do so because for me the Yankees will always represent the working-class Bronx neighborhoods in which I lived that surrounded the Stadium and to this day remain the home of a new generation of immigrants. The Yankees were my neighborhood team. On game days and nights I could hear the cheers rise up above the Stadium whenever something good happened for the home team on the field. I also remember seeing some of the ballplayers walk along 161st Street on their way to the apartments they rented during the season or to the Concourse Plaza, the hotel in which they stayed.

My earliest baseball memories date back to 1951 when Joe DiMaggio still strode center field, a majestic figure who looked like he was a member of the British royal family. He only looked that way, but like me he was the son of working-class immigrants who settled on the West Coast in search of the American Dream. “Joltin’ Joe” more than fulfilled their dreams by becoming the highest paid baseball player of his era and marrying the all-American dream girl, Marilyn Monroe. My family loved DiMaggio, even idolized him, I think, because he represented hard work, grace under pressure, discipline, and success. You didn’t have to be Italian to worship Joe and see him as a symbol for all ethnic-Americans. They also revered him because DiMaggio remained aloof, somewhat apart from the rest of us. His regal manner did not put people off from him; it made them believe that he was a demi-God and deserved to be worshipped. His popularity came, in part, because he seemed patrician and above it all. He stayed in the penthouse and did not mingle with the people like his contemporary, another Joe, Senator Joseph McCarthy, who attracted fame by dwelling in the gutter and acting like a demagogue (not a demi-God).

I think about all this upon hearing the news that the diaries Joe D. kept from 1982-1993 are up for sale. Those who have seen them emphasize their quotidian nature. He jotted down his routine appointments, tabulated his daily expenses, and brooded about how many people made demands upon him for his autograph or interrupted his dinner to shake his hand (indeed, my father who was retired and living near Fort Lauderdale in the 1980s, ran into DiMaggio in a restaurant and did just that). Whatever grace and charisma old number 5 showed on the ball field, in his private life he was boring and uncomfortable around most folks. Even the Yankees Hall of Famer, Whitey Ford, who played with Joe in 1950, recently remarked that he never understood DiMaggio. Who else’s humdrum writings could command the asking price of $1.5 million? Yet none of this bothers me or diminishes my reverence for this son of immigrants who brought so much happiness to us Bronxites. The fact that he was uncomfortable with celebrity only enhances his appeal. In an age of false stardom, i.e., Paris Hilton and her ilk, it is refreshing to recall a man who derived his fame through his abundant talents in his chosen profession and not through a publicist’s fantasies and the unrelenting demands of entertainment T.V.

America needs more of you Joe DiMaggio

"56"

July 17, 1941

Clark Westfield is a pseudonym for a Professor at Rutgers University and a non-fiction writer, who in the twilight of his distinguished career, wishes to fan the flame of mystery. Out In Left Field is a column devoted to all things New York, Baseball, Entertainment, Politics, and History.