The other day I wrote about some changing traditions I’ve noticed in America. One long-time reader took this beef up with it:
So the Reds don’t get the first game anymore. Big deal. Does anybody really care? Reds fans do, and the one I know won’t shut up about it. The game goes on, everyone still watches baseball, advertisers still pay for time between innings, and idiots still bet their lives savings on the World Series. That being said, there’s a fun detail about the game that has been lost. Reds fans have lost a big part of their cultural identity.
This is a case where the correct answer is the simplest. Yes, traditions matter. Traditions are the substance cultures are made of. However, traditions can become obsolete over time. New technology can kill a tradition. Maybe your country got conquered by the English and your traditions were made illegal. Maybe people just got bored of doing the same dumb thing every solstice.
The question is- which traditions can go away when things change, and which traditions are integral to one’s cultural identity? Who gets to decide? A shrimpy little general named Napoleon Bonaparte solved that problem when he invented the two-party political system. Yes, the very same system that we pretend to use today- where the Liberal Party believes in progress at all costs, and the Conservative Party believes in retaining everything in the name of Pure Frenchness forever. They debate and make laws accordingly. The terms “left-wing” and “right-wing” originated from where Napoleon made his parliament members put their asses during meetings.
Of course, today, Right and Left don’t mean anything except to give Americans a reason to yell at each other at family reunions. I just got of work and I don’t want to talk about politics today, so let’s take a big step out of the mud and return to baseball. Baseball traditions- which ones matter? Which ones don’t? Who decides?
Baseball is not a democracy. It is a monarchy governed by the all-powerful Commissioner- a man called Rob Manfred. Manfred was elected by the owners of the 30 baseball teams in 2015, and his word is law. If he wants all umpires to be replaced with cameras and AI strike-ball analyzers, then it will be done. If he declares that Aaron Judge has to play the All Star Game in a fluffy pink tutu, then Aaron Judge had better shave his legs. Tradition be damned- any change in the game of Baseball is subject to the whim of the king.
Let’s consider some of the changing traditions that I spoke of in the last article and think again about where some of these things are going.
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Umpires.
We have new technology that renders them practically useless, yet they’re still taking up space behind home plate. We could do away with them completely, film each play from ten angles, and let a freelancer in Sri Lanka make the call using math and AI. Drop a bucket of fresh balls behind the catcher in case one gets scuffed, and the game goes on.
The problem with hyper-optimizing things is that you lose a human element, and without the human element in baseball, the drama is gone. Just the other day I watched Javier Baez get called out on a very iffy pitch, and he turned around to argue with the umpire. Arguing turned to screaming. Screaming became “Yerrrr outta here!” and two teammates holding Baez back from mauling Blue to death. It was fun. It’s unsportsmanlike, it’s dramatic, it gets the crowd riled up, and it’s only possible because we’ve still got umpires making stupid calls.
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Challenging Balls and Strikes.
This is an interesting example of “just because you can, doesn’t mean you have to.” In the past, you weren’t allowed to challenge a ball or a strike call. The Umpire had the last word. Now with the power of cameras and floating rectangles on TV screens, it’s pretty easy to see if a ball was actually within the strike zone, and teams can now challenge home plate calls three times per game.
I haven’t seen it happen yet. Not once. It’s like everyone on the diamond knows how un-baseball this is and just ignored the new rule completely. Now nobody wants to be “the guy” that starts actually doing it, because it’s like being a tattletale.
That said, I wouldn’t be surprised if the Yankees start doing it just to be smug. Everyone hates them already so they’ve got nothing to lose.
The Reds’ Opening Day
For my final example, let’s look at a baseball tradition that probably needed to end. The Reds no longer get the first pitch, on the first day, at home, when the MLB season starts. They still start off with a home series, and Opening Day is still a close-the-banks holiday in Cincinnati. That sounds like a good compromise to me, considering how untenable it is to schedule 162 games for 30 teams around one club’s personal preference.
Keep in mind that there were 16 teams when MLB was officially unified in 1903. They played 140 games a year. The amount of games that need to be scheduled has compounded to the point where they had to move a whole Cubs-Dodgers series across the Pacific Ocean this year. Sorry Reds, you’ll have to take this one for the Good of The Game. ■
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