Its' Tough To Be The Hometown Team In No One's Hometown!

Says Nixon, a most knowledgeable student of Washington sports, "You must remember that there is a close relationship between all sports and politics, but especially in Washington and especially with a combat sport like football. Why, you can take the lingo out of football and apply it directly to any political campaign. The key words are all the same: clash, strategy, momentum, taking the offensive."

To gain popular success in the nation's capital, a team needs a strong (and preferably controversial) presidential-type leader, who can be an easy receptacle for credit or blame: the Griffiths, Preston Marshall, Senator expansion managers Gil Hodges and Ted Williams, Driesell, Allen. The Bullets have overlooked this priority and have, instead, foolishly concentrated on building a winner. There is just no identifiable presidential figure on hand. Abe Pollin, the Bullets' bashful owner, is as decent and honorable as any man in sports, so that lets him out. Dick Motta, the coach, although eminently quotable, has the unfortunate habit, for these precincts, of being too blunt, never the dissembler. He is proud of his squad and calls it "an unpretentious, working-man's team." Unfortunately, a bunch of low-recognition-factor mechanics is the last thing white-collar Washington wants on its teams.

As the Redskins are the presidency, the Bullets are the Senate—but, sadly for them, they are the workaday Senate of whips and subcommittees, the Senate that bores political fans and never makes the six o'clock news. The Senate that attracts interest, the sexy one, is the Senate of strong personalities—Kennedy, Humphrey, Taft. For the Bullets to catch on in the regular season, they need a celebrity figure.

The Capitals are the House of Representatives. Except to the most dedicated scholars, both the hockey team and the House are a faceless rabble of outbackers who never attract any attention until an external agency forces them into the public eye against their will—a controversial tax vote, the Canadiens coming to the Capital Centre.

There are several tennis tournaments in Washington, and they are like the Supreme Court. Tennis is out of sight, hidden behind the presidency/Redskins for much of the year, popping up at intervals with decisions/tournaments. Moreover, because tennis is the In game in government, it has a disproportionate popularity, just as the preponderance of lawyers in town creates a disproportionate and abiding interest in the Court.

The soccer team, the Diplomats, who are—word of honor—known as the Dips, are equivalent to the Vice-President, whoever that is.

College sports are covered far down the list, like the Maryland state legislature. High-flying Maryland politicians are periodically sent to the hoosegow; the Terrapins lose to Penn State every fall and Carolina every winter, just when they start cracking the polls. It's very neat.

The trouble is, this doesn't leave any place for baseball. And that is precisely why baseball has never been able to carve out a place for itself in the capital. Baseball is too much like the government itself, an everyday exercise replete with numbers and a hierarchy. It is true that there were seldom any compelling reasons for the Senators to become a big draw in Washington. So traditionally low were home-team expectations that one season the slogan was "Off the Floor in '64!"—a paean to next-to-last place—but surely it would be healthy for all of America if the measured game of summer came back to Washington and touched the frenetic government.

Unfortunately, Washington has no history of deserving a baseball team, and no person capable of buying one, either, unless possibly the next Arab can be introduced to Charlie Finley. Also, for all its size, Washington is limited as a drawing area and as a TV market by Baltimore's presence to its proximate north.

The matter could be solved by having Baltimore—itself no great shakes at supporting a team—share the Orioles with Washington. The two disparate cities draw closer all the time. Twelve percent of Oriole attendance comes from Washington, and a like percentage of Baltimoreans attend Capital Centre events. Moreover, Washingtonians are starting to speculate in Baltimore real estate and, for the especially venturesome, Baltimore has become sort of a live theme park, an Urbanland you can visit for a day and in which you can munch crab cakes, see a real harbor (as opposed to a marina), perhaps even encounter a union man or a housewife or two. Most significantly, the business leaders of the two cities have formed a revolutionary "Common Market," presenting themselves as a single entity to the commercial world.