THE BIG HURTS
I’D SURRENDER but I don’t know where to report.
Years ago, government tried to cure us of the habit of referencing the disabled as “handicapped,” as in handicapped parking and handicapped entrances. Fine. “Handicapped” seemed cold, insensitive. So the new word for the disabled became “disabled.” Reasonable, functional, clear.
Now, MLB, so people-sensitive as to approve an ESPN Sunday night game in Colorado this April 7, has determined that disabled, as in “disabled list,” will be replaced with “injured.”
Thus, those unable to play are not disabled. Two different things. Nurse!
But to again quote Maynard G. Krebs — the G stood for Walter — “What an age we live in.”
We spend more time, thought and energy working on the silly and relatively insignificant to the neglect of the things that leave us conspicuously lower.
This MLB “injured list” decree brought to mind a local radio show I was invited on, not knowing that the host planned to jump me, not that it mattered. His position was that I’m an alarmist about the “changes” in sports that seem designed to desensitize the young, encourage them to act like remorseless creeps.
He claimed that kids are no different now than when we were kids or when our fathers were kids, thus I should find better things to whine about.
So if things are no different, I asked, did the NYC public middle and high schools, when he was a kid, have security guards and electronic scanners for weapons at the entrances? He said, “No.” “Well, they do now.” Having just shamelessly quoted myself, we arrive at that incomplete sentence or thought that serves to rationalize diminished standards: “Well, the game has changed.”
Last week, following the death of Frank Robinson, the Boston Globe’s Dan Shaughnessy tran- scribed a story told him by Robinson’s Orioles’ teammate and fellow Hall of Famer Jim Palmer:
“One night in Fenway, he hit a shot off the wall that he thought was going out. He jogged out of the box. But the ball didn’t go out. Yaz [Carl Yastrzemski] played it for a single. We won the game, so it didn’t really matter, but it mattered to Frank.
“When [manager] Earl Weaver got to his office after the game, there was a note and a couple of $100 bills. The note read, ‘I embarrassed the ballclub. I embarrassed myself. It will never happen again.’ ”
Running to first base is now optional, even rationalized as acceptable. And with commissioner Rob Manfred’s full public approval, MLB last year launched a campaign to encourage kids to have “fun” playing baseball by performing acts of obnoxious and risky immodesty, including bat-flipping on expected home runs.
Last week, Bob Friend, a great pitcher on mostly bad Pirates’ teams, died. Curt Block, a longtime media specialist who worked for NBC, sent this:
“I never met Bob Friend. Only spoke to him. Once.
“In 1964 I was a rookie sportswriter at UPI. I was assigned to write the late ‘National League Roundup.’ It was supposed to include quotes from a star of the games.
“Friend threw an outstanding game. He was the guy I needed. I called the Pirates’ clubhouse and was told that he’d return my call. It was probably 10-10:30 p.m. Then it was midnight. Then 1 a.m.
“Around 1:30 somebody yelled from across the room: ‘Call on three!’
“It was Bob Friend. He’d forgotten. He remembered when he was driving home. He pulled over to call from a pay phone.
“He was embarrassed. I was grateful. I never forgot Bob Friend.”
A lot has changed a lot.