As corporate lawyers, professional arbitrators, incredibly rich businessmen and the dorky-as-hell Commissioner of Baseball square off regarding the issues of contraction and the collective bargaining agreement this offseason, I find it remarkably difficult, optimist though I may be, to deny the possibility of a work stoppage in the 2002 baseball season. It seems almost too appropriate then, while the baseball-watching nation focuses on men who obviously got beat up a whole lot in middle school squaring off in court, that we’ve somehow overlooked Mark McGwire’s retirement.
After 10 years of struggling with back, knee and elbow injuries, Mark McGwire’s gargantuan 6-foot-5, 250 pound body couldn’t weather the pain any longer. On Nov. 13, McGwire, in a characteristically soft-spoken manner, released a statement to the press announcing his official retirement. There was no farewell tour, triumphant laps of Busch stadium during his last game. A career marked by thunderous applause and booming home runs concluded with little more than a whisper. While Bud Selig kicked and screamed and whined and bitched and moaned and quite likely jeopardized the condition of Major League Baseball, the sport lost its former savior.
Lots of people claim that Cal Ripken’s pursuit of Lou Gehrig’s consecutive games streak was what called the nation’s attention back to its pastime. Lots of people don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.
Any geek with a calculator and a schedule could figure out exactly when Cal Ripken was going to break Gehrig’s record of 2,130 consecutive games played. There was no magic, mystery, speculation as to when and where he’d do it, good reason to go to game 2,129 or 2,132. Maybe Cal Ripken’s camera-friendly smile or wholesome American family man image have swayed those people’s notions of who or what saved baseball. Maybe those people don’t want to admit that they, like the rest of us, were enraptured and recaptured by an acne-scarred, Andro-juiced divorc? who lacked the capability and durability to epitomize the so-called American working man, like Ripken did.
Since Mark McGwire’s 1998 home run record only stood for three short seasons, he will sink into obscurity with the likes of Ned Williamson, who held the single season homerun record for 35 years before some Babe Ruth guy hit 29 for the Red Sox in 1919. Hopefully, however, his unparalleled importance to the state of Major League Baseball will be remembered. Never has one single man in one single season ever done so much for his sport as McGwire did in pursuing Roger Maris’ homerun record. Baseball became front-page news, St. Louis Cardinal No. 25 jerseys became the hot fashion, and, most importantly, fans came out to stadiums in droves and remembered that, despite exorbitant ticket prices, second-rate food and nosebleed seats, there is nothing quite like going to a game.
Quite likely, the 2002 baseball season will be shortened. In the seasons following, depressed and bitter baseball fans will probably search for a hero, someone to capture their attention again, to make them appreciate the sport that has left them feeling like an abused lover. And just maybe, when baseball is in as dire peril as Lois Lane was when archvillians rampaged the Daily Planet, Mark McGwire will triumphantly return to baseball like Clark Kent returned to crimefighting in Superman II. Even if he doesn’t, however, we must make like the citizens of Metropolis and never, ever forget the man to whom we owe every moment of excitement, emotion and utter joy that we’ve had in the past three spectacular baseball years. The man who saved our sport, and our world. Mark McGwire, our Superman.
