Lauren RabainoLee: No. We want excitement, not a Bonds indictment.
They call baseball our national pastime. Yeah, if by “pastime” you mean “something we never do anymore.” Look, I’m a huge baseball fan, but let’s be honest: when was the last time you watched a baseball game? Probably not since October. Why would America want its pastime to be something nobody’s seen for five months? Baseball’s fun and all, but it’s a terrible choice for a national pastime.
When people say it’s America’s pastime, they should be saying it’s Latin America’s pastime. Let’s look at some of the top draft picks in my fantasy baseball league: Rodriguez, Ramirez, Pujols, Reyes, Cabrera and Guerrero. The “national pastime” should be something only America does – and does well. Remember the World Baseball Classic? America couldn’t even make it to the finals! We’re not even the best at the sport we invented. Why are we so proud of it?
You’d think that the first game of the season of our national pastime would be a huge deal in America. And it usually is, but for some reason, the 2008 opening series is in Japan. The games will be played at 3 a.m. Pacific Time. Nobody in America will even watch a game at that time, let alone celebrate it.
Now let’s see. What does America do best? Football. Let’s look at some of my top draft picks in last year’s fantasy football league: Manning, Tomlinson and Johnson. Good, strong American names. How many foreigners are in the NFL? Sebastian Janikowski and that’s about it. Latin America only plays the lame kind of football. Japan doesn’t even know what football is, but they’ll still watch the Super Bowl. The only football game played outside of America this year was a Dolphins game and it was played at a time when all the Miami fans were awake. Yes, football is a much better choice of our national pastime than baseball.
America shouldn’t worship Adam Dunn grounding out and not running his chubby butt to first. It should worship hitting people as hard as possible and limiting foreigners.
Sean: Yes. Baseball birthed our nation.
Oh, how I fondly remember the founding of our great nation, Mrs. America. You could say I’ve seen it all, from the Boston Tea Party to the Civil Rights marches. Each of these memories is littered with tales of legendary stickball games and rounders matches. I’m talking of course, about baseball. Baseball has always confronted social issues before our nation was able to; hell, it is the reason we can call America home. You see, we won this majestic land from the British during a particularly scuffle-filled stickball match in the summer of 1778.
Oh, how the moon landing captivated our country. NASA was especially proud that we beat the Soviets in our race to that cheese-wheel in the sky. If only I could have shared in their excitement. You see, back in 1814, a boy was born by the name of Jeffery Henderson. Now, ol’ Jeffery came out of his mama already standing at 6 foot 2, weighing as heavy as a sack of cocoa beans. It was only a matter of time before Jeffery became a town stickball hero, forever cementing his reputation on a muggy July night. Facing our cross-town rivals, the Cougars, Jeffery belted a monstrous home run to win the game. Townspeople saw the ball fly all the way to the moon, and it must have, because the next day cheddar cheese rained down upon our grateful heads.
You recall the Titanic, don’t you? What a beautiful ship she was. I was supposed to be on that voyage, ya know, as I had purchased my ticket from a scalper who guaranteed its authenticity. Boy howdy did I give him a licken when I was turned away, but I suppose I should thank him now. Anyhow, more than 2,000 souls died when the Titanic went down, and the world went caddywhampus. If only the media was in Brentown for the 1914 stickball championships. Well, long story short, there was a disputed call at home plate and it left 26,000 men, women and especially children, dead. I still think it was a ball. May that umpire rot in hell.
Well, those are just a few tales of baseball preceding every major event in our grand nation’s history, and is guaranteed to proceed future events. But enough talk, I have to take my HGH injection. This stuff is my secret to be still going strong at 257 years young. Just give it a few years; you may be condemning it now, but you’ll be eating it for breakfast come 2012. Baseball knows.
Lee Barats is a mechanical engineering senior and Sean Michetti is a journalism senior. Barats and Michetti are Mustang Daily humor columnists and can be contacted at TitsforTats@gmail.com.