A pitch for Opening Day
Making Sense by Michael Reagan
It’s a great day for America – or at least it should be.
It’s Thursday, April 7. Major League Baseball’s Opening Day.
From Los Angeles to St. Louis to Washington, D.C., 14 teams are kicking off their regular season, and by the weekend all 30 teams will be in action.
Baseball in 2022 isn’t what it used to be – but these days, what is?
In my growing-up days in the 1950s, and decades before that in my dad’s growing-up days, the whole country couldn’t wait for baseball season to start, and Opening Day was treated like an unofficial national holiday.
In nearly two dozen major league cities kids skipped school and adults ducked out early from work so they could go to the home opener, which was usually an afternoon game.
In those days, before the NFL and NBA became wealthy global brands, baseball was our undisputed national pastime.
It was the pro sport everyone in the country religiously followed for six months in the pages of the newspapers and on radio and eventually TV.
Its greatest stars - Ruth, Williams, Robinson, Mays, Mantle and a dozen others - were genuine American superheroes.
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Copyright 2022 Michael Reagan, All Rights Reserved. Credit: Cagle.com
