So it turns out that I actually got up in time to watch some of the Roger Clemens/Brian McNamee testimony on Capital Hill (and by "got up" I really mean "woke up and turned on the TV in my bedroom".... hey, I'm still sick, give me a break!). Boy am I glad that I took the time to turn this riveting bit of "must-see-TV" on! The first thing I heard was a super-relevant and detailed description of how to keep from bleeding through your pants after receiving multiple injections in the rear-end. That was followed by a detailed line of questioning towards Clemens regarding the length of a golf game he played in 2002 in an effort to determine whether or not he could have made it to a party at Jose Canseco's house that same day (according to The Mitchell Report, Clemens went to this party at Canseco's and chatted it up with The Rosetta Stone of Steroids extensively and that's what turned The Rocket on to performance enhancing drugs). After that I zoned out for a bit and took a shower. When I came back 20 minutes later, the Committee members were knee-deep into another discussion about used gauze pads.
The first thing you need to understand about me: I'm the LEAST political person you'll ever meet. You could call me "moderate", but that would require me to know more. I'm the guy who never gets too excited for Super Tuesday because I just don't like Big Ten basketball that much (get it.. get it!!). But even I think our elected officials can find a better way to spend their time than taking fifteen minutes (or ANY minutes for that matter) analyzing how long it takes Roger Clemens to hit range balls and grab a smoothie at the clubhouse before he tees off. I think they've got much more important things to talk about than whether or not the New England Patriots cheated with video cameras, as they'll discuss next week when NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell appears before Congress.
Don't get me wrong, I think politics and sports do deserve some interaction. Congress should get involved in sports at the appropriate time. I know what some of you are saying, "Ben, sports are insignificant when it comes to the REAL issues that the government should be dealing with.... like that war we're fighting." Then there's the camp that brings up another compelling argument, "Ben, sports teams are private businesses. Unless teams or leagues break federal anti-trust laws, stay out of their business." I understand and agree with both arguments. I especially understand the second point. I mean, we don't drag Hollywood entertainers before congress every two months to complain about the things THEY'RE doing that we don't particularly like. You're not seeing any Congressional hearings into the growing problem of drugged-out starlets just because Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan and Brittney Spears keep ending up in prison and/or rehab. The difference is, actors and musicians entertain us while representing only themselves.
Athletes entertain us while representing not only the fans of the team but the whole community. They trot out onto the field or the court or the ice wearing uniforms with OUR town names emblazoned on the front, often times inside arenas and stadiums that were built with OUR tax dollars. I don't think there are many movies being filmed today that are shot on sets that were built with taxpayer money. If you want to know why baseball keeps getting hauled in front of Congress, the previous point is probably why. Among all the sports, baseball's teams have the strongest roots in the communities in which they play. People feel a strong connection to the baseball teams in their cities because most of those teams have been there for so long. Baseball has had only 4 expansion teams since the 70's (Florida, Tampa, Colorado and Arizona between 1993 and 1998). The rest of the franchises have been in place since 1972. At the same time, communities became even more invested, literally, in their teams when Bud Selig convinced cities across the nation to publicly finance new ballparks. In the late 90's, with baseball's economic structure beginning to swirl out of control, Selig sold medium and small-market cities on the notion that building new stadiums would increase revenue for their teams allowing them to spend more money on good players, making the team better, selling more tickets and merchandise, increasing tourism dollars and sales-tax revenue for the communities and preventing the teams from seeking more lucrative deals in other cities (as had been a problem in the NFL when teams like the Rams, Raiders, Titans and Ravens all ditched their previous cities and moved away). Even though a major league team hadn't moved since the second incarnation of the Washington Senators bolted to Dallas to become the Texas Rangers in 1971, cities like Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Houston, San Diego and Milwaukee all bought the line and built the parks. Since 1994, twelve new ballparks in existing MLB cities have been built (with 5 more on the way in the next 2 years) and only two of them were privately funded (St. Louis and San Francisco) . Guess what.... NONE of those cities that bought Selig's line about a new ballpark curing the revenue problem ranked in the Top 5 in attendance in 2007. Detroit came in 9th, Houston was 10th and Milwaukee was 12th. Cities that REALLY needed the "new ballpark attendance boost" are in TERRIBLE shape: Cincinnati ranked 24th in attendance in 2007 while Pittsburgh came in 27th, only averaging 22, 000 fans per game. Right now the Pirates are just ahead of Kansas City. The Royals fell for the same line, convincing Jackson Country voters to foot $225 million of the $256 million bill for the Kaufman Stadium renovations that should be done in 2010. Kansas City ranked 28th in attendance in 2007, averaging just over 19, 000 fans per game.
The point I'm trying to make here is that while sports teams are privately owned (with the exception of the Green Bay Packers) they are very much public entities. They became so when they started incessantly capitalizing upon the cities in which they play to make money, both from a merchandising standpoint (how many people do you know who where a Yankee cap because they like the "NY") and from a building standpoint (the aforementioned publicly financed stadium-boom). If Congress wants to step in and hold these teams accountable, I'm all for it. But for crying out loud DO SOMETHING! I thought that's what these people are here for: to get things done. Since Congress started calling baseball players to testify in March of 2005, they've done nothing but TALK. I've learned nothing from the Congressional hearings that I couldn't figure out from picking up the San Francisco Chronicle. These men and women have the power to actually DO something to clean up baseball. If they're going to get involved, they need to actually DO IT. These hearings are becoming a waste of time, nothing more than a dog and pony show where people stumble all over themselves and get over-analyzed by SportsCenter for a day... then we hear nothing more of it ever again. If our elected officials think they've got an answer to clean up baseball and get the sport back on track, then by all means DO IT ALREADY. I'll admit that they have applied some pressure in the past and that may or may not have led to the stricter drug policies that MLB enacted in recent years. But I'm tired of Congress threatening to drop the hammer and then doing nothing but talking AGAIN. Until they're done talking and they're actually ready to act, then they should stop wasting everyone's time and get back to doing whatever it is Congresspeople do all day.
By the way, it took me about forty minutes to write this and they're still talking about whether or not Clemens was at the party at Canseco's house... riveting... and highly relevant.
bpa
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