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Hey all,
So I just wanted to say I a feeling pretty depressed in regards to baseball and the Cardinals.
Usually I am excited about Spring Training, checking the prospect listings, seeing if any late deals could be made, even scoping flights to Florida. But right now, even if they said Spring Training started tomorrow, I’d have a pretty “blah” feeling. I am sure this is mostly the abrupt lockout and halt to the offseason news, and even COVID depression and malaise. And to be clear I am not excited about other sports that much outside of Bayern Munich football.
This isn’t a loss of care and love for the Cardinals, i guess it just feels like a loss of passion. The squabbling over money and greed and just how much the players are willing to let themselves and the fans be controlled and taken advantage of is just really depressing I guess. The business side of things was never NOT there, but it seems times like these are when it really feels like they don’t care about the fans really at all. They blatantly treat us like addicted sheep and we probably deserve it. I guess I just want to be blissfully ignorant to the money and greed and let the game be a game. I guess I don’t mind be an addicted sheep as long as I get something good out of it, like a game i love to watch and follow.
I watch every day and night, I havent missed a game in years now. I will probably fall right back in line, but i do feel like this is a wound that won’t really ever heal. Maybe this is healthy. It just doesn’t feel that way.
For all the vets out there that went through this before in the 90’s how did you deal with it? how are you dealing with it now? I was a fan then, but didn’t follow the day to day like i do now.
Is it just withdrawal from an addiction to baseball or at least the constant new information baseball media cycle I am feeling?
As always, I know i am babbling…
I don’t really know why I am posting this, I guess for some advice, maybe for some empathy or sympathy. Not for attention I don’t think.
Anyways, I HOPE i am the only one feeling this way and you are well and excited, but i fear others may have similar feelings and to them I guess i just say “you’re not alone”
Thanks for being there Cardinal Nation and thanks Brian for keeping us all together in our weird little forum family.
Jager, thanks for sharing your thoughts. The ‘94 strike really got me P.O.’d and I didn’t watch another game until the ‘01 playoffs following 9-11. I’m not at that point yet for the current situation, and still holding out hope for a full season, but agree that even if the lockout ends tomorrow, the season is tainted. Fans have been an afterthought since free agency and insane money made their way into baseball. Not being critical of the players for bargaining hard or the owners for making a profit, it’s just an observation. But if they don’t play a full season and start with some semblance of a pre-season, it will take a lot more than some free t-shirts at the park to earn back our loyalty, Cards included. All that said, I hope they end the lockout and give us another exciting season this year!
In recent years the depth of my enthusiasm as a fan has waned enough that I am not much bothered by the prospect of a delayed season. I did tune in more during the pandemic, but I think mostly for want of much else to do. MiLB will start on schedule. That would be enough of a baseball fix for me. TCN is just the thing to make the most of that scenario.
Imagine if all employees acted like the MLBPA.
We are getting a small dose of that with the service industry, particularly restaurants right now.
Yes, I understand the pool of people who can hit a 95 mph pitch is much smaller than the pool of people who can drop an order of fries or sling a salad but there are also more short order cook / waiter positions available.
I agree with thejager and he has my sympathy. I think that all hardcore fans are in the same boat and disappointed about all that C-19 and now the labor negotiations are effecting the game we love. There are so many unanswered questions that are causing our frustration. Its almost impossible to wrap one’s head around what is happening to our whole world.
We are altered forever…. all of us… and in so many ways… its not just the game either. Will our fears of the unbelievability ever end? The culture of this country is changed forever…. pre-epidemic days will never return.
There is a long list of other concerns facing us everyday…. locally, nationally and world-wide that add to the confusion. The doubt and frustration have continued now for two full years and putting a strain on everyone. But then again, I sense that everyone will approach the future in their own way.
The billions upon billions of money spent and lost on this curse all over the world is mind blowing.
When will enough be enough?
Just keep the faith fellow die-hards.
Anyway….when some semblance of “normal” returns…. I’ll read the book.
While I am very frustrated I wouldn’t consider myself depressed. I have too many other things (job, spouse, kid in college) going on to keep me distracted from the lockout. We could all see it coming a mile away. These two sides haven’t been able to agree on anything for several years so this isn’t a big surprise.
And that is what frustrates me so much, the lack of urgency to do a deal. It is my nature to be a deal maker. I pride myself at my office as the guy who makes sure the trains run on time. I do not like it when people take the approach of my way or the highway. We see it in our government and we are certainly seeing it with these CBA negotiations, on BOTH sides. I understand protecting or advancing your interests but you can’t risk blowing everything up to get it just the way you want, whether it is government or baseball negotiations. I just find that approach disgusting.
Great post, gscottar. I cannot over-emphasize my agreement to everything you said.
Right now it is the owners who are exhibiting the worst behavior with the stupid lockout. They are using it in the hopes that the MLBPA will cave. We could be proceeding under the old agreement while working out a new one if the power brokers in MLB were mature adults.
Like you said, the frustrating part is the lack of a sense of urgency. I am one of those guys where when I have a responsibility that is due say a few months out, I use some current down time to get working on it so it does not become a panic deal where I am up all night a few days before the deadline finishing it up. But these guys don’t think that way.
I recently finished a book about Ty Cobb and there was a part in there about the push against the reserve clause way back then, and other issues that beset MLB and the weak ownership that prevailed. The author made the comment, “Baseball must be a great game to have endured despite all those who have been entrusted to manage it.” (paraphrasing)
In any negotiation, you have to know going into it what you HAVE to get vs. what you WANT to get.
Except in rare instances where one side has almost all the leverage there will be compromises so, your opening position cannot be your line in the sand. You almost never get what you started off asking for.
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