Column: Thank goodness for baseball

By Justin Prochaska

Published April 6, 2010

After a seemingly never-ending offseason, the boys of summer are back. Thank goodness.

If you don't know me, you should know I live and die through the game of baseball.

Baseball is my religion. I have passed up plans with friends in order to watch a game. I've traveled to Arizona in order to go to Spring Training games. I'm always watching highlights on my laptop and checking scores on my phone if I'm not around a computer or television set.

If there is a game on, I will watch it no matter who is playing. I'll watch a four-hour long Yankees-Red Sox marathon or a dustup between two last place teams. I live in Missouri now, so I'm force-fed a great deal of Royals games. The team is terrible (minus Zach Greinke) yet I'll watch every televised game it plays.

Fortunately, the Cardinals are good, so I can actually see a quality product, too.

Baseball is probably too big a part of my life, but that is neither here nor there. When I'm bored I usually look up random baseball trivia or read baseball books. What an exciting life I lead, eh?

I can recite to you the World Series MVPs for the last 25 plus years, yet I don't have a firm grasp on what supply and demand is or how the democratic system works. Go figure.

I have (probably excessive) team pride. I have posters, magnets and banners in my room, despite the fact that I'm 19 years old. I wore a team shirt on Opening Day despite the fact the game was three states away. Prior to the season, I have looked up just about every statistic on my team's minor and major leaguers. I have checked out the scouting reports for the opponents.

I am a sports nut, but I never got into the NBA (I find it much more boring than college basketball), so the month and half between the end of football season and the beginning of baseball season is the most excruciating time of the year. My life between those times is basically a countdown to opening day.

On opening day, hope springs eternal for all 30 teams. Even though fans in Pittsburgh, Washington and Cleveland know their team will be out of the race by mid-June, they have faith in the season's opening month.

I haven't had much to cheer about for a while. My team, the Texas Rangers, hasn't been to the playoffs in more than a decade. It has only had a winning record twice in that span. Yet every March, I have faith the team will surprise and win the whole thing.

This year is no different. I have the utmost confidence my team could go all the way (even though this year, many prognosticators agree with me).

Sadly, baseball is seen as an old person's sport these days. It's a shame. It is truly the best sport we have.

Players play pretty much every day for six months. In a close game, they can't run out the clock or play keep away. They have to keep pitching it and hope the other team can't hit it. No lead is insurmountable in baseball. Trust me, I've seen my team lose a 10-run lead and the game before.

Other people think the season is too long. I vehemently disagree. Baseball season is just long enough. Many experts and fans want to shorten the season to 154 games and add another round of playoffs (because playoffs generate more money). I think we should leave things as is. For the last three years, the regular season needed an extra game to decide a playoff spot, and all three "Game 163s" were captivating. All of them were decided by a run with two of the games decided in extra innings. If we cut the season by a week, we run the risk of missing out on some of the most exciting games of the year.

The 2010 season is upon us and I'm excited for the ride. Let's just hope it's not the Yankees hoisting the World Series trophy this October.