Evening televised sports interfere with sleep
Oh, it is October, that fine time
Which every big sports fan is pleasin’; For on your TV set in prime time Almost every sport is in season.
For the football schedule’s peaking;
Of tackles and blocks no one wearies;
Or if it is baseball you’re seeking,
It’s time for another World Series.
Yes, footballs are flying past goal posts,
And over home plate baseballs zoom; And indoor arenas will soon host, As hockey and basketball loom.
On Thursday and Sunday and Monday The NFL’s playing at night;
And on other evenings there’s baseball As the NL and AL fight.
And even on Fridays, collegians Will offer an evening-time fray, To entertain the viewing legions Thanks to the N C Double A. You’d think that I’d think it’s a dream, That I would cheer louder and louder With games on the tube every p.m. – But ah, there’s a fly in the chowder.
For as a night game nears its climax The late innings or the fourth quarter, I yawn and I look at my Timex. Should I go to bed? Yes, I oughter.
Will there be a ninth-inning rally? A clock-running-out goal-line stand? I won’t know. I can’t dilly-dally.
No, my bedtime hour is at hand.
I wish I could see the conclusion Of night games by athletic troupes, But sleepiness works its confusion; My head nods and my eyelids droop.
In youth, I’d stay up to wee hours And still face the morn with a snap, But now that is beyond my powers. I must get my eight-hour nap.
It’s not that I’m a lazy bozo
Who can’t stay up late with the strong; My stamina’s better than so-so –
The thing is, the games are too long.
For televised football’s extended By the network’s promos and ads,
Plus timeouts and replays, it’s ended With way past three hours gone, egad.
And baseball games now take forever, As relief pitchers file in and out,
With umpires’ reviews and whatever – “Oh, play ball already!” you shout.
Also, it’s our fate here in the East, As victims of geography,
The time zone where daylight has first ceased,
So games end near midnight, you see.
The fans way out in California
Have earlier games to divert –
They can watch a kickoff with their cocktails
And a ninth inning with their dessert.
It’s enough to make a sports fan ponder As he sits in the darkening gloaming, If he should relocate out yonder
To L.A. (or, at least, Wyoming). Or else it will leave him recalling
(For it has been many a moon)
The years when, while the leaves were falling,
The games were all in afternoon.
The era when it was the usual
For World Series played in the sun, Its light shone on Mantle and Musial; Taking off for a day game was fun.
Pro football was likewise diurnal, Which the sun never set upon,
‘Til “Monday Night Football” nocturnal With Cosell and with Dandy Don.
Oh, bring back those old days, I’m praying, I wish that sane schedule they’d mull again:
Sunday afternoon was ballplaying,
Sunday night was for watching Ed Sullivan.
Make every game end before bedtime And I will cheer, whistle, and clap.
But, wait. Day games also commit crime: They interfere with my afternoon nap!