Media poised to ruin baseball season

Although it's currently tough for many around the country to see past the multiple feet of snow all around them, a rebirth is looming on the horizon. Despite one of the harshest winters on record, before we turn around twice rejuvenation will be upon us once again. Flowers will be blooming, birds will be chirping, and a warm sun will finally break through the seemingly permanent gray cover of winter to thaw our chilled faces.

During this period of the yearly cycle it seems these events will never occur, but experience has proven time and time again that Mother Nature is almost done showing us how harsh she can be. Another consistent experience many spend the long winter in anxious expectation of and hold in parallel with Mother Nature's improving attitude is the rebirth of our national pastime.

Each year with the thawing of the snow and lengthening of the days, many begin not only to anticipate those backyard barbeques and afternoons on the lake with restless excitement, but also the return of baseball, which for some is a more significant date on the calendar than the Spring Equinox. This year, however, I'm afraid the glory around the rebirth of baseball will be short-lived before a rediscovery of a once-thought-to-be-eradicated tumor that plagued the body of our great game takes place. Although this tumor, which infected our game and even threatened its possible demise, has now been all but eradicated, a resurrection of sorts is poised to occur.

It will not be a resurrection of actuality nor of substance, but this re-invigoration of an old disease will have similar abilities to inflict harm. So what am I talking about under the veil of long-winded metaphor and foreshadowing?

I enjoy our national pastime as much if not more than the next guy. I dare say I love our game. It always has and always will give me great joy. I once found my solace, my haven, between the white lines of a baseball diamond. There was nowhere else I would rather be. I now find great pleasure, albeit of a more subdued and tranquil sort, in observing the game along with surrounding myself with any number of media that speak Major League Baseball to me. It's my escape from reality, just as it is for many of you.

I'm afraid there will be no escape this year, however, at least not for a while. You see, Alex Rodriguez will be returning to a Yankee uniform in a matter of days, and there will be no joy in Mudville for the foreseeable future. As I watch and read early spring training coverage with a seething desire to get a jump on this season's expectations, all I find in nearly every direction is a rabid pack of journalists amassed at the border ready to attack Alex as if they were ISIS fighters and he was a small Syrian town.

Read Rocker's firsthand account of his public battle with the PC thought police: "Scars and Strikes," at the WND Superstore

Alex, without a doubt, made quite a few mistakes over the last several years. He's paid for those mistakes and then some in a very tangible and intangible way. That fact, however, is of little consequence to the multitude of tabloidesque sports "journalists" that won't be satisfied until they unwittingly turn the 2015 Major League Baseball season into a glorified Jerry Springer show.

Baseball was once my job. Now, like so many others, it's my escape, a way to forget about the headaches of everyday life for a while and entertain myself by focusing on an activity that in the great scheme of things matters very little. Those who seek to forget about their lives for a brief while and reside in the childlike world baseball provides have already been through this once before. We had to see our national pastime torn to shreds while many who held a special place in our hearts were ripped from their lofty perches and cast into a fiery lake of media vitriol and public scorn. I don't know about you, but I find no joy in witnessing such events. Things of that nature are all around us in our daily lives, while baseball is a place to step away from all of that for a brief period and find some peace from the fist fight that life can sometimes evolve in to.

Alex Rodriguez has paid his debt to the gods of baseball and is now simply trying to pick up the pieces and get back to the sanctuary baseball once provided him. Early indications would have one believe that the media under no circumstances are willing to let that happen. They seem hellbent to destroy any joy Alex would glean from doing what he loves to do. Rest assured the media will get their way, but in the process they will also destroy the joy and solace of many innocent bystanders that are simply looking for a haven.

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