By Martin Rogers
Having an Opening Day that started with a few shakes before August is unlike anything we’re used to, naturally.
However, as the balls returned, the strikes, the diners and everything else that is part of the fabric of a national pastime, the most important thing was not the change, but the obvious.
“They played baseball here on Thursday,” wrote ESPN’s Jeff Passan after Game 1 of what will be a truly unique season. “The Washington Nationals hosted the New York Yankees. Attendance was 0. They threw pitches. The hitters lunged for them.
“The game itself, the perfect summer activity, American in the nation’s capital, felt the same, even if nothing is really anymore.”
And collectively, sports fans rejoiced in that perfection (rain delays and all that) as we got to enjoy the game we love.
One of the best pieces of sports cinema ever to exist is Ken Burns’ “Baseball”, an ode that does not hide the documentary filmmaker’s iconic adoration of sport. The theme and tone of that timeless piece is very similar to a typical regular season. Permanent, lasting, setting your own rhythm, reassuring.
This time, it is a sprint. 267 days from the last time we saw a baseball thrown through the plate, welcome to the season, and in the blink of an eye, you will be welcome to the playoffs.
FOX begins its broadcast schedule with a quad header on Saturday, with the Milwaukee Brewers in the Chicago Cubs, the San Francisco Giants in the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Yankees in the Nationals and the Arizona Diamondbacks in the Padres de San Diego.
Just 64 days later, the postseason will be upon us. In a sense, it already is.
“I think you’re going to see more of a playoff attitude management, where it’s a little bit more assertive,” Los Angeles Angels manager Joe Maddon told the New York Times. “Probably the best way to describe it is more aggressive decision making early in the game rather than what you would do in the first few months of the regular season.”
The season will be short, but boy, won’t it be sweet?
Baseball’s comeback is so special because his absence hurt so much. It is the sport that is always there, every day, throughout the summer, until this time, for the first time, it was not.
But finally, on Thursday night, he came back, when Giancarlo Stanton circled triumphant with an all-rounder of a home run, the first of many in 2020.
Sure, you’re likely to hear some complaints about the way baseball has changed, because it’s a sport that doesn’t embrace nostalgia as much as it does clinging to your chest.
And why not? If you have over a hundred years of goodness in your locker, it makes sense to use it.
Baseball not only lasts, it slides through time. Something about his apparent permanence will always calm, and we could all use that feeling right now.
However, it is necessary that things look and feel different, and in some ways it is the greatest compliment you can do to the sport that, after all this time, is still adaptable.
“It will be remembered as the COVID season, one that we will have a better understanding of when we look back on 15 or 20 years,” former Brewers MVP Christian Yelich told USA TODAY Sports. “The unpredictable is going to happen. Crazy things are going to happen. But you have to embrace the unconventional. ”
Inevitably, some teams, coaches, and players will do a better job of dealing with differences than others.
FOX Bet has the Yankees and Dodgers listed as co-favorites for World Series glory at +400 after the postseason expansion, but good luck predicting this. Everyone must deal with the altered rules and try to find ways to take advantage of them.
In the National League, the designated hitter is here all season. In the playoffs, there will be 16 huge teams. In extra inning games, each team will start with a runner at second base, as we first saw on Friday when Opening Day came to a spectacular close at a Grand Slam:
At FOX, we are also adapting. We can’t teleport fans to the seats, but a concerted effort has been made to enhance the viewing experience with digital crowds being used to create a more natural feel for those at home.
Baseball can’t do anything about the realities of 2020 and all that the coronavirus has brought, of course. But it’s summer, and the season’s soundtrack, baseball, is playing.
His return restores some normality, if only a little. The days finally feel longer. The air is sweeter. Sports fans have a little more to look forward to, all because baseball exists.
This year will be a fight to the finish line, a fight between big spending powers and brave and creative teams who see this as a golden opportunity to shake things up. It will be wild and emotional. He will be enraged and captivated.
Most important of all, it will be ours once again. Let’s enjoy it together, shall we?
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