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Taking its place The grand old game steps back into the box
You want to know why the XFL didn't work? Besides team names like the "Maniax," that is, and guys like Jesse Ventura and Vince McMahon? It's football. It's spring. It's football in the spring. As football-stupid as this country gets, as mad about that game as so many millions of us are from late summer through January, the XFL has proven one inescapable truth. Enough is finally enough. Come February, we are footballed out. It's time for a vacation from all the mayhem. It's time for something a little less taxing. It's time that a little grace takes over from a little grossness, a little sanity for all the insanity. That is what baseball brings to the table. No, this is not another ode to America's pastime. There will be no waxing here about the smell of pine tar. The fact is, though, this time of year is made for baseball. If there's one thing the XFL has proven, that's it. Yeah, there's room for college basketball in March and even the NBA, when the Finals finally roll around in June. Hockey has its fans at this time of year, and golf and tennis and the rest. But for many Americans, once the Super Bowl is done -- certainly once the NCAA's Final Four have done their bit -- the next stop is baseball. "After Christmas, some time around New Year's, that's when I start to get ready, get thinking about the season," says Atlanta pitcher Kevin Millwood, who doesn't get excited about much. "I mean, I work out before then, but I don't want to. But after New Year's ..." It is pretty much the same for anyone who ever has picked up a bat or a ball, or cheered for the home team, or gone to the park with the family. Once the Super Bowl's done, you have your pitchers and catchers in February, your madness in March and then ... Well, not the XFL, that's for sure. Oh, baseball has its problems. It's too slow. Interleague play messes a lot of things up. Juiced balls and diluted pitching. No day games in the playoffs, the 1998 Florida Marlins, Peter Angelos, Carl Everett, Gary Sheffield, the strike of '94. The wild card. Ticket prices and concession prices that are just plain stupid. Greedy agents and greedy players and greedy networks swimming in an impossibly deep pool of money that has washed them farther and farther away from the fans. But here's the thing: There's nothing like the unhurried rhythm of a baseball game. You can see one, or hear one, almost every day of the summer. And what other pro game can you enjoy in the warm afternoon sunshine and in the warm night air? There's always the Yankees -- love 'em or hate 'em -- and guys like Mark McGwire and Sean Casey, the improbably good-hearted Reds' first baseman. There's the awesome talent of Pedro Martinez and the awful curse of the Red Sox. There's the lovable, losing Cubs and smiling Sammy Sosa. There are the voices of Jon Miller and the Carays and the Brennamans and the Bucks and so many more. There's the language and the feel of a game like no other. Baseball brings us the feeling that a long hard winter is finally behind us, that spring finally is here and summer's not far behind. The XFL? It brings dizziness and low-brow humor. It brings an overdose of football. It simply won't fly in the spring. Spring is for baseball. John Donovan is a senior writer for CNNSI.com. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer. Comments? To e-mail Donovan, click here.
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