We're Talking Baseball: A Season of Change, Purpose, and Wrigley Field

“For everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven.”

 –Ecclesiastes 3:1

Baseball is still just like heaven.

In Field of Dreams, “Shoeless” Joe Jackson’s character mistakes an Iowa cornfield for it. And much like in Iowa, the people in Illinois are just as fanatical, showing up in sellout crowds for every home game at Wrigley Field, rooting for their Chicago Cubs at a timeless ballpark under a blue, cloudless sky for another day game in which all they see is the sun shining down on their precious ivy-covered outfield wall, even though the dark clouds of a 100-year old curse loom low over the stadium.

In Philadelphia, fans boo. In L.A., they show up late enough to see the bottom of the third inning, only to leave early in the top of the seventh to beat the traffic.

No matter how baseball fans choose to show it, how they cheer or jeer, they will be there by the masses—except in South Florida, despite two championships in a seven year span for a fifteen-year old franchise—because of what this game means to them, their team, and their city.

Okay, let me address the obvious:

Yes, I realize steroids were discovered in a few lockers. Yes, I also noticed that Barry Bonds suddenly seemed to gain a few pounds. Correct, I heard that the new best-selling author was actually a U.S. Senator. And just like you, I witnessed Roger Clemens’ career take the fastest decline since M.C. Hammer.

To be honest, how could I miss it?

The newspaper didn’t let me. The Internet wouldn’t allow me to surf around it. And ESPN did happen to mention it quite a few times in vivid detail, including expert analysis and a picture of a beer can.

So, while the media are dedicated to their sole purpose of bringing down the next multi-million dollar star athlete in a continued effort to forever taint the game we love, all the while making sure that everyone that owns a television and a computer sees twenty-seven different angles of it, I decided to change my focus this year, and direct it to what was happening on the diamond and between the chalk lines.

I saw a Cleveland Indians’ pitcher named Cliff Lee start 2008 with a 6-0 record and a 0.67 earned run average, despite the fact that he was sent down to the minors just last year due to struggles on the mound.

I watched Arizona Diamondbacks' pitcher Brandon Webb improve to 9-0, the first time a pitcher has consummated that since Andy Hawkins started 10-0 for the San Diego Padres in 1985.

I came across a 36-year-old switch-hitting veteran that the nation calls Chipper—and Shea Stadium calls Larry—rejuvenate himself by hitting .410 with 11 home runs and 32 runs batted in, through his first forty games for the Atlanta Braves.

Then, my attention was beckoned by Houston Astros’ first baseman Lance Berkman, who was first in the National League in both long balls, with 16, in RBI, with 44, and second in the NL in batting average, hitting .399 in 44 games this season.

I even saw a 25-year-old Diamondbacks pitcher by the name of Micah Owings bat his way onto an all-time list of the highest on base percentage plus slugging percentage, (OPS), with a minimum of 75 plate appearances in which only Barry Bonds, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams, and Babe Ruth had higher numbers.

Did you happen to catch all of that— oh, sorry; I didn’t mean to interrupt that special on the perjury hearings.

But, let me have your attention, please.

While Chipper Jones won’t finish the season batting .400 for the first time since Ted Williams in 1941, Berkman won’t be the latest player to hit for the Triple Crown since Carl Yastrzemski accomplished the feat in 1967, and odds are we’re not witnessing the next “Babe” in Micah Owings, there will be joy in “Wrigleyville” come October, turning the curse from hell into a blessing from heaven for some of the truest, most die-hard and deserving baseball fans in America.

Yes, everything will inevitably find its purpose. That, my friends, is the beauty of baseball. But, you have to know where to look to change your view. Start by changing the channel. The game is on the other one.