AJC > Sports > Columnists > Archives > 2007 > December > 17 > Entry
DEL.ICIO.USNot even steroids can kill baseball
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
Will the doomsayers ever realize one of sports’ greatest truisms?
Probably not, but here it goes anyway: Nothing can kill baseball.
You know as much, because long before the Mitchell Report revealed that the supposedly saintly Roger Clemens became just as potent through artificial means as the supposedly devilish Barry Bonds, the game survived all of those other things.
The Black Sox Scandal.
Those predicting gloom and doom after the Brooklyn Dodgers were the first to bring somebody darker than a resin bag into the major leagues.
Dead ball era.
Pittsburgh drug trials.
Hefty checks written by the owners for colluding against the players.
All of those work stoppages, including one that wiped away a World Series.
Pete Rose, as in the game’s all-time hits leader, who was banned from baseball for gambling issues before spending time in the slammer for income tax evasion.
“World wars,” said Ernie Johnson Sr., 83, chuckling and remembering. He’s a member of the Braves Hall of Fame after an impressive pitching career with the franchise in Boston and Milwaukee. Later, he completed his more than 50 years in baseball as a Braves radio and television announcer. So Johnson has seen much, especially when it comes to those doomsayers.
Added Johnson, “One sportswriter in Milwaukee wrote when our attendance was falling there [during the 1960s] that baseball was dead. There also was a time here in Atlanta one year when we didn’t draw 500,000 people. You’d meet people on the street, and they’d say, ‘Well, baseball is just gone.’ “
That’s funny. In the decades since Johnson heard and read those comments, Milwaukee lost the Braves but gained the Brewers, along with a state-of-the-art ballpark. Not only that, the Braves spent the 1990s reaching the playoffs every season while attracting 500,000 people — just after a few homestands. You’ve also had the state of baseball overall. It has set attendance records each of the past four seasons, and it has watched its revenues quadruple to $6 billion over the past 15 years.
Johnson chuckled, saying, “The game always bounces back. So I don’t know why people keep predicting otherwise. Well, unless they have a secret, or maybe it’s just that, when they say baseball is dying, they want it to happen.”
They want it to happen, but it won’t. Not even with President Bush saying the game has been “sullied” after George Mitchell delivered his findings last week on the massive use of performance-enhancing drugs in baseball during the stretch drive of the last century.
There were 31 All-Star players and seven MVPs involved, said the Mitchell Report. The names ranged from former Braves David Justice, John Rocker and Gary Sheffield to current stars for other teams such as Andy Pettitte, Miguel Tejada and Eric Gagne. Mostly, there was Clemens, owner of seven Cy Young Awards, mentioned 82 times on nine pages of the report. As a result, Clemens joined Bonds, owner of seven MVP awards, as co-poster boys of baseball’s steroid era.
While Clemens and Bonds will remain the faces of this steroid mess forever, baseball will watch the majority of its fans suffer, but only from collective amnesia. We’re in the middle of winter, with nearly every other sport in high gear to help the Mitchell Report move closer to vanishing in the public’s mind within weeks, maybe days. In fact, by spring training, most folks will be discussing balls and strikes more than syringes and HGH.
“I don’t know if I agree with you on that, because nothing has happened in baseball to this degree,” Johnson said. “There is always going to be a question mark in people’s mind in regard to ‘what if?’ That’s why I feel sorry for guys who kept their nose clean and never took steroids. They could be hurt. I think somebody said the record book is going to be full of asterisks. I don’t know. Maybe I’m putting too much on what could become of these revelations.”
Yes, Johnson was. Then he quickly returned to that truism, saying, “In these situations for baseball, something always comes along that helps.”
Always.
Permalink | Comments (17) | Post your comment | Categories: Terence Moore
Comments
By cityofdecatur
December 17, 2007 7:49 PM | Link to this
good point. good Johnson quotes enjoyed your articals lately Merry Happy the Season and a Merry Christmas
By bruce
December 17, 2007 9:05 PM | Link to this
Spring Training
By Bo
December 17, 2007 9:27 PM | Link to this
Great job on TV last night and good job today.
By Scott
December 18, 2007 3:26 AM | Link to this
I wish baseball season was here now. I’m bored with football and hockey season. Plus the Braves have a good shot at winning the division this year and maybe even the pennant. The NL is down so the time is now to strike and get into the playoffs. Once you get there you never know what will happen.
By Scott
December 18, 2007 3:28 AM | Link to this
I wish baseball season was going now. I’m bored of football and hockey season already. Plus the Braves have a chance to win the NL East this year and maybe even the pennant in the NL. The national league is down right now so if the Braves just get to the tournament they have a shot. As all Braves fans have seen once you get into the playoffs anything can happen.
By Big Ed
December 18, 2007 6:31 AM | Link to this
I agree Baseball will never die but it was very close to collapse before Sosa and McGuire showed us what drugs and corked bats can really do. I feel bad for the players that kept clean but lost their careers because someone else had a competitive advantage. The next step is to see if the players association will consent to blood tests. We will learn just how serious they are about policing their own.
By louis
December 18, 2007 7:21 AM | Link to this
Great Article! All I can say, as a devoted fan and one who suffers through football, basketball etc….. PLAY BALL!!!!!! I agree with Scott! I wish it was Spring Training NOW.
GO BRAVES
By Robert P. Trino
December 18, 2007 8:13 AM | Link to this
So you say baseball is flush with cash? Perhaps there’s some lucrative coaching gig that I could latch on to.
By atown
December 18, 2007 8:36 AM | Link to this
Right on! I’m amazed at the game’s resiliency. You can’t beat it.
By GE
December 18, 2007 10:07 AM | Link to this
Good article Terrence. Baseball will always be America’s greatest past time. Reading Ernie Johnson’s comments speaks volumns for the game. There is nothing like a long home run or a bases loaded triple in the gap where 13 guys are running in different directions as the crowd roars. Bring on spring training.
By 1eyedJack
December 18, 2007 10:45 AM | Link to this
Play Ball!
By jon
December 18, 2007 12:32 PM | Link to this
Sure baseball will survive. It’s part of the woven fabric of our society, you know the society that enjoy’s cheating, trash talking and basic decay of eveything that is right and just. So, no baseball is well and will continue to be, as society goes so goes baseball.
By Terrence Mann
December 18, 2007 1:43 PM | Link to this
…they’ll walk out to the bleachers; sit in shirtsleeves on a perfect afternoon. They’ll find they have reserved seats somewhere along one of the baselines, where they sat when they were children and cheered their heroes. And they’ll watch the game and it’ll be as if they dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick they’ll have to brush them away from their faces. The one constant through all the years has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it’s a part of our past. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again. Oh… people will come. People will most definitely come.
By Dave
December 18, 2007 3:44 PM | Link to this
One thing to correct some poor thinking, baseball will NEVER be able to compare to the Big Daddy, which is college and pro football. Baseball games are too slow and by the time something has happened, you’ve missed it. Wait another 20-30 minutes for the next tidbit of excitement. As far as sheer fan excitement, my bet goes to college football. Seeing a stadium rocking back and forth, even before the kickoff, is something baseball never had and probably never will. I was given 2 x FREE World Series tickets back in the mid 90’s and to tell you the truth, I would have dread going to it. I sold them to a couple in my subdivision. Trust me, baseball season ENDS at the end of August when toe meets leather.
By rick
December 18, 2007 4:47 PM | Link to this
Dave, while you may be correct as far as popularity and TV ratings, baseball has always been my first love. I get so tired of everyone in my office talking about nothing but football, even in the spring and summer. If I bring up a baseball game I watched last night, everyone just nods and goes on. What is wrong with you people down here? Baseball is out national past time! You have the Braves! I’ve been to games and you could hear a pin drop in that stadium. I guess Dave is right. In the south, you live, eat and breathe football.
By ATLFAN
December 18, 2007 5:06 PM | Link to this
All you football fans can bite me!
By Scott
December 19, 2007 12:18 AM | Link to this
Dave, you are ignorant. College football is popular in the south and mid west that’s it. No one in New York is talking college football. And you’ve never seen a baseball stadium rock back and forth? I guess the only games you have been to are Braves ones? Hell even back in the early 90s Braves games were loud. Go to Yankee stadium or Fenway Park and then come talk to me.
And in the south you can’t even get someone who has a knowledgeable opinion about the NFL. They know a few things about the SEC and that’s it. For the most part the south has the least informed sports fans in the country. It’s so backwards here.