A long, long time ago... I can still remember how baseball used to make me smile.
When the BoSox still had half a chance to break the jinx and make romance with victory in October for awhile.
But free agency made me shivver, no more team concept to deliver. Megabucks on the dugout step. I couldn't fake one more clap.
I can't remember if fans got cold when big money was new and fun was old. But something felt lighter in my billfold the day the game was sold.
So bye, bye Major League Baseball pride, you traded parity for insincerity, upped the offense then lied. And past heroes with juiced balls and bodies unrelied are singing the Hall Of Fame won't let you slide. By cheating you shall be denied.
Did you write the book of rules? Where hitters were kings and pitchers were fools? Like the experts tell us so. And do you believe in balls and strikes, or dollars and cents and ticket price hikes. And will you build us a new 9 to 5 job site to attract "fans"?
Well, we know you fell in love with fame, cause the team sport became an individual stat/data game. But we all shrugged off the truth as talking heads sugarcoated it from the booth.
Your fans are a humble working class folk. Whose family values make the national pastime a joke. Do you think a tell all book will revoke the day induction's denied?
Soon we'll be singing bye, bye Major League Baseball pride, you traded parity for insincerity, upped the offense then lied. And past heroes with juiced balls and bodies unrelied are singing the Hall Of Fame won't let you slide. By cheating you shall be denied.
Hey batter, batter, it's no matter. The fans will remain loyal while you get fatter. With a strike two months away and coming fast. Fans will cry foul if it lasts. But this time the outcome will not be a gas. With the owners and players at an impass.
The mid season air will be sweet perfume if Fall Classic cancellation doesn't loom. But the league is only Major in name. And only the fans can save the game.
Because our ticket dollars pay the field. And we're the boss to whom they must yield. Should we believe what the Commish revealed if he's a shady guy?
That's why we're singing bye, bye Major League Baseball pride, you traded parity for insincerity, upped the offense then lied. And past heroes with juiced balls and bodies unrelied are singing the Hall Of Fame won't let you slide. By cheating you shall be denied.
Call me a fan who sings the blues, with a glass half empty and no happy news. And I'll just laugh and have my say. Claim you've heard it all before. That the game is a bully rich man's store.
And purists know that just won't play.
When in the streets Joe lunch box fan scrapes by. To be berated for not being a blind diplomatic guy. And put in his place softspoken. While baseball the game is broken. And the three sluggers I admire most, "The Babe", "The Hammer"
and "Teddy Ballgame" I toast. For gracing the Hall without a pick-me-up host. Before the juice was tried.
And now we're left singing bye, bye Major League Baseball pride, you traded parity for insincerity, upped the offense then lied. And past heroes with juiced balls and bodies unrelied are singing the Hall Of Fame won't let you slide. By cheating you shall be denied.
The Hall Of Fame won't let you slide. By cheating you shall be denied.
» Hank Festa is a whiner, he's a rhymer, he's a purist old timer. And he wants to enlighten everyone.
Also by Hank Festa
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» Cramer's DiMaggio Hatchet Job: A Bio Worth Burning
» Looking for Growth ... In All The Right Places
» Get Your Red Sox Here: Weep All About It!
» The Strike Zone Or Your Life: The Bean Ball Debate Exposed
» Seasons In The Sun : Baseball In The 70s
» A Closet GM's Philosophy Of Winning: Stats & Role vs. Heart & Soul
» Gibby's '88 Series Limp Shot: Baseball's Last "Earned Home Run"
» Flamethrower's Epiphany: Confessions Of A Live Arm
» In The Event Of A Strike...: The Time Off Must Be Used to Fix the Game
» More submissions
Copyright © 2002 by Hank Festa. Posted June 26, 2002.
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