Momentum is Tomorrow's Starting Pitcher

Cubeta Stadium -- Stamford, CT. July 21, 2019

The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball.

I love baseball.

I'm sure that comes as no surprise. Yes, I love all sports. Football, hockey, and basketball for sure. I've grown with soccer. I've broadcast field hockey and water polo and lacrosse and cheerleading and wrestling and more. Honestly, more than I can remember.

That's a lot of sports over the years.

I'd go with any team that would like me in any sport. Hire me. I'll love it.

But, when you get right down to it, maybe it was because it was my first love, I'm a baseball person.

And today was a terrible baseball day.

We know what happened: Mike Axisa's parsing of the Rob Manfred report on the Astros' cheating scandal says, essentially, that AJ Hinch and Jeff Luhnow took the fall because Manfred is afraid of the Players Union. Then Jessica Mendoza said some really silly stuff. Then Carlos Beltran was...er...fired by the Mets (there's such weak attempts at wiggle room, as in "it was mutually agreed upon").

Then -- perhaps most egregiously -- rumors began to surface that the Astros players were wearing buzzers under their uniforms. The video of Jose Altuve, following his ALCS-winning home run seems quite damning.

Here’s the clip of Altuve screaming at his teammates not to rip his jersey off including audio from the interview with @Ken_Rosenthal. pic.twitter.com/y7Lv76QFpX

— ً (@NYYDJ2) January 14, 2020

Supposedly, Beltran's niece had some sketchy tweets about more stuff, but it turned out it was NOT Beltran's niece and, at last check, might be a player using a burner account.

By night, Scott Brosius's son was on Instagram saying that Mike Trout is using HGH.

As of now, Major League Baseball is saying there's nothing to the Altuve rumor, but nobody is buying it, except Astros fans.

Even the Mets of a different time are sort of quietly in the news for what went on a few years later. This story is bad, so be forewarned.

Is that everything?

For the love of Christy Mathewson, stop.

Just. Stop.

I realize there are some conspiracy theories in this stew, and I struggled with reporting it, and even got called out on Twitter for doing so. Fair enough. But there just feels like there's a shooter in the Houston grassy knoll tonight (Yes, I realize the grassy knoll was in Dallas, but work with me here).

I'm here to tell you we'll survive.

I don't see this as darker than the awfulness of what the Black Sox scandal was like from 1919-1921, but I realize it's pretty bleak, given baseball's "weakened status."

It will take people to help our grand old game.

We're out here. We need to get people interested. Not through pithy narcissism but through fun, enthusiasm, and passion. It's out there. It's what I'll be doing, most notably when I call games for Brunswick, the FCIAC, Little League Baseball, Babe Ruth Baseball, and the Hudson Valley Renegades.

For what it's worth, even those who don't understand or like baseball have said it gets conveyed during my broadcasts, and I'm going to bring all of that.

People need to understand why this game is so great. I've had to listen to the soccer loyalists explain why it's not boring. Well, they can listen to me.

The history matters. The strategy matters. The drama matters. But the integrity and purity matters also.

America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It's been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again. But baseball has marked the time.

It also needs the right people. That matters a lot.

In a tweet today, I mentioned people who I think help spread the word, but it is more than just Mike Hirn, Nate Stidham, Dan Gardella, Jake Zimmer, Mike Genaro and Alex LoParco. It's Mike Buswell and Mike Scott and Shaun McGee and Myckie Lugbauer and Shawn Sailer and AJ Szymanowski and Paul Silverfarb.

Coaches. Broadcasters. Fans.

It's my beloved coach, Lou D'Aliso, who knows so much about this game that it's scary.

It's my cousin Kris. It's even my son -- if only to explain his dad's passion.

It's even my mom who, at 82, can tell me about my baseball-crazy grandfather who played semi-pro ball in New Jersey and Peekskill.

I can't possibly name everyone (Mick and Steve and the Section 5 gang and Dave Torromeo and Mark Jeffers and Kato and...my God, I can just keep going). It's Jon, who was always this closet baseball fan in some ways that surprised me.

It's Sacha and a whole lot of other women who can more than hold their own talking about it. With Susan comes Lucy and Annabelle, who have both wowed in talent and passion on the softball field (even if Lucy has retired).

It's people. Race, religion, gender, etc does not matter. It's open to all.

It wasn't always. That's part of our history. We need to explain that history.

We -- hell, I -- need all of these people. Then I need it passed on.

Yes, all of this news stinks, but don't buy into silly narratives that the game isn't fun. There are plenty of voices -- mine included -- that will tell you how great it is by simply describing it.

The game is still great. We just all need to get back on the field. More than ever.

Let's learn from this -- expose this -- and get back to playing ball.

We need a rhubarb in the catbird seat.

We need the sounds and the smells.

I need a chili dog or a bratwurst or some nachos or some other stadium concoction. Stat.

Let's argue over all of it. Try to convince Ruth isn't the GOAT (you won't win, but proceed at your own peril).

Or that Derek Jeter (yeah, Jeets!) is overrated.

Or that Tom Seaver is the greatest pitcher ever.

Do you prefer Mantle or DiMaggio?

Teddy Ballgame or Ty Cobb?

Tonight is about the Yankees and Mets and Red Sox and Astros and Rays and Twins and Renegades and literally every other team. It's about the Greenwich Cardinals and the Montgomery Biscuits and the Greenwich Cannons and the Cal Ripken League.

It's about the Mahopac Indians and the John Jay (East Fishkill) Patriots.

It's the whole sport.

Tonight stinks. I get it. I sat in my car, almost paralyzed, as I watched baseball explode today.

Now, I want an uprising.

This is still our game in that it is a motley combination of other games that we dropped into a melting pot.

I realize I sound like the Cooperstown Chamber of Commerce. Understood. The cynic can decry my "Rah! Rah! Baseball!" approach. They can mock my quoting Field of Dreams and "Take Me Out to the Ballgame."

I don't care if I ever get back. Let me root root root...

I want to have a catch. I haven't swung a bat against so much as a hitting machine in years.

Let's. Go.

People will come, Ray.

People will most definitely come.