The Inconvenient Truth About America's Pastime

Pastime.

It isn't a tough word to define. Just visually add an 's' after 'pas' and there you have the definition—to pass time, usually during an activity.

The official definition from Dictionary.com is, "something that serves to make time pass agreeably; a pleasant means of amusement, recreation, or sport."

For all of us sport enthusiasts, we might as well insert the game of baseball into that definition, as the game has been labeled "America's Pastime" for as long as I can recall.

Yet, I whole-heartily disagree with that evaluation—until the past decade or so, that is.

I was sitting in my computer chair, browsing the web while watching a television program in the background.

I had not been completely in tune with the program, which was reliving the history of baseball. Yet, when the story switched to today's game of baseball, I was a little more intrigued.

I had always been fascinated with the relationship from baseball in the olden days to baseball in today's world. There is always new ways to compare the two, so I decided to get up and move closer to the screen.

One of the main points of the segment was that baseball was no longer "America's Pastime."

I beg to differ. In fact, it's the other way around.

The word pastime, as already mentioned above, means to pass the time. In no way, shape, or form was baseball used as an activity to pass the time, even in a pleasant form, up until the turn of the 21st century.

When Ty Cobb played the game of baseball, he played the game the correct way.

He played to win, to enjoy his life, to compete, and to be the best that he could ever be. There wasn't an enormous amount of money being thrown at this all-time great and possibly the purest player to ever play the game.

He played for the enjoyment of the game. The game was not there to pass the time. The game was there because he loved it and it loved him back.

Ted Williams, Pete Rose, Mickey Mantle, Babe Ruth, Willie Mays, all of the all-time greats fall under the same category as Ty Cobb.

The money was not there. Baseball did not pass the time for these icons, baseball was their time. It was all they ever focused on, no matter how poorly they were payed.

When was the last time you saw a professional baseball player in today's game working during the offseason? You don't, plain and simple. It's because they don't have to.

But for the best players in the history of the game to have to work another job during the offseason just to keep their families afloat shows you right there how much they loved and adored the game of baseball.

You had to love baseball to have to play a game for two-thirds of a year, get paid lower than most average citizens, and work another job during the offseason.

Baseball did not pass their time, it was their time.

Yet, as we fast forward into the 21st century, the name "America's Pastime" finally fits.

The game is not played because it is purely loved anymore. No sir, it certainly isn't.

While there are still numerous amounts of players who play the game to win, to enjoy their life, to compete, and to be the best that they could ever be, the majority of baseball's players look at baseball as a business.

That is the harshest reality of all in sports today.

Sports are not sports anymore, they are businesses. Teams are no longer teams, they are franchises. Players are no longer players, they are investments.

That is how it goes and that is how it is going to go for as long as we know.

But who could blame them, them being all of these owners, commissioners, and sponsors? I'd be jumping around like a little girl if I had millions of dollars invested in a professional sports team—or franchise, I should say.

The same goes for the players.

The players of today's game do not always love the game. For a large amount of players, the game does pass the time for them. Baseball could be considered a pastime for many of these players.

These world-class athletes are more talented than 99 percent of the rest of us average human beings, so they use that as an advantage to make millions upon millions of dollars, even if baseball, or any other sport for that matter, is not a high interest of their's.

As a result of this, baseball is not about camaraderie anymore. Baseball is not about winning anymore.

Baseball is not about baseball anymore.

It's about business.

Back in the 1950's, every Major League player would have died just to play in the World Baseball Classic. To play for their country against the rest of the world's best would be an honor to those players.

But not today. Players today make too much money to risk injury.

No matter who the player is, even if he absolutely, positively loves the game, he will not participate in certain events because they have millions of dollars invested in them and risking injury would ruin that.

Chase Utley is as pure as a baseball player you can get, yet even he has to take it easy now-and-then. Risking injury means losing millions of dollars.

Back in the golden days of baseball, you ran down the line as quick as you possibly could. You took out the second baseman or shortstop attempting to complete the double play at all costs.

If you or he were injured, so be it. All you knew was that you had went all out to make sure the second out would not be completed. An injury was worth it, just as long as you had successfully completed your task to eliminate the possibility of the double play.

Yet in baseball today, even among fans, a dirty slide at second base is given a raised eyebrow. It has been ingrained into the minds of players and fans alike that there is too much money to be playing "reckless" ball like that.

As much as it may be true, it's as inconvenient a truth as you will ever see, and you can tell Al Gore to take that to the bank.

Today, players leave cities they have been icons in for ten years just to make an extra million somewhere else. Taking a pay cut to remain home is not too popular among players today.

In the real world, we call those types of people politicians.

In the game of baseball, we are supposed to call them heroes. I don't know if we can anymore.

There are still heroes like Ty Cobb was around in Major League Baseball today.

Chase Utley, Albert Pujols, Grady Sizemore, Justin Morneau, among others, all fall under that category of giving their best out there on the field for every single swing, step, and throw.

Those players are heroes, icons, and legends. Whatever you wish to call them, they are special.

They are baseball purists. Each player is making baseball their life, not just a component to their life.

Yet, for every watched home run from the batter's box, for every lazy step down the first base line, and for every unnecessary extra million, there is a hero, icon, legend, and purist who just became the average business man.

Those players aren't making baseball their life. They are making it their pastime.

Now that is an inconvenient truth.