The death of a young person is always tragic, mercilessly cutting short a potentially long life. In the case of the Marlins pitcher, it was a life of fame and glory, still unrealized potential and almost fathomless fun. He brought to baseball an enthusiasm and exuberance that had not been seen since the debut of Willie Mays (in the days before the pastime was turned into big business). This is why his death hurts so much; we mourn not just for the great athlete struck down in his prime but for the uncommon joy that has been taken from the game.
Several years ago when Giancarlo Stanton became the richest player in baseball I wrote (not here) about how he was not to be envied. It seemed to me that the pressure to live up to that historically immense salary would prove insurmountable. Stanton, for all his power, had never shown great aptitude for the game's daily grind, and I wondered how sympathetic fans would be to an overpaid superstar who ended the season with a middling batting average and a clutch of meaningless if breathtaking home runs. And what, I asked, if he got injured?
Perhaps ESPN - which recently named Stanton one of baseball's most overrated players - would care to hire me as their new baseball analyst. For the third straight year, Stanton will end the regular season on the DL, after putting up mediocre stats. His popularity has not waned, owing to the fact that he seems to be an all-around nice guy (and that his season two years ago ended when he was hit in the face with a pitch), but frustration with his performance and his susceptibility to injury is, inevitably, on the rise.
I feel sorry for Stanton; baseball is an incredibly difficult and increasingly punishing game (Willie Mays never lingered on the DL), and, as noted earlier, he comes across as an upstanding young man. But I don't feel all that bad for the Marlins. Losing a clutch player who is, in reality, not all that clutch could give them the incentive they need to make the playoffs. All season they have been a team that wins just enough to give fans hope but not often enough to justify it. With a new lineup, perhaps that will change.
I arrived at Marlins Park early yesterday evening and walked up to the ticket window.
"I'd like the cheapest ticket," I said.
"The cheapest ticket tonight is $22," said the young man behind the window.
"It's usually $15," I said.
"Those tickets are unavailable tonight," the man told me.
I asked him why. He said he didn't know. I told him I was sure that the upper deck in the outfield had not sold out. He insisted that he had not been told anything; all he knew was that the entire section had been blocked for tonight's game.
I took a few seconds and approached the next window. Maybe he's got the $15 tickets, I thought. He didn't.
"This organization does everything in its power to alienate fans," I fumed. I told him I wanted to speak to his manager, and went back to the barrier to wait. He immediately started talking to the third ticket seller, surely a conversation about me which the third ticket seller found very amusing. I went up to his window and asked him if he thought it was funny how the Marlins don't play fair with their fans.
He explained to me that the upper deck was closed to ticket sales tonight because it had been reserved for people in the military. I heard this news with mixed feelings. On the one hand, I was happy to have an explanation (it was the secrecy, the withholding of information that so infuriated me) but I knew now that my battle with the manager would be a lost cause.
The manager, when he arrived, stayed behind the glass. He too told me that the seats I wanted had been blocked for the night. I asked him why. When he failed to give me an explanation I told him I knew the answer, and it had taken me three ticket sellers to learn it. He got belligerent (as I was at this point; actually, probably before) and asked me why I asked if I already knew the answer. I told him I wanted to demonstrate how the organization is not upfront with its fans.
"We're honoring the military," he said sharply, in a way that clearly suggested that, by being a pest, I was doing the opposite. I bought a $22 ticket.
During the game I checked the upper deck in the outfield periodically. At its most populous, three of the eight sections got close to half full; the other five showed small pockets of people (none of them in uniform) sprinkled around a sea of blue seats. Honoring the military, for the Marlins, means honoring the profit margin. What the organization lacks in transparency it makes up for in hypocrisy.
How beautiful that, to become the 30th player to reach 3,000 hits, Ichiro smacked - with perfect numerative symmetry - a three-bagger.
He is the bright face of globalization, as well as the hero of the little guy, and anyone who’s ever been deemed over-the-hill. A middle-aged Japanese superstar playing a young man’s game in an American city that’s predominantly Hispanic has become a beloved Everyman.
I stood in line for about 20 minutes last night to get my ticket for the Marlins game. The combination of watching Jose Fernandez pitch at home, seeing Dee Gordon return to the team, and, ideally, witnessing Ichiro Suzuki get his 3,000th hit brought out the home crowd. I was not used to waiting to get into Marlins Park but it was a good thing, I told myself, that people were coming out to support the team.
Fernandez was gone after the fifth inning (and giving up five runs). Gordon started, but went 0 for 4. Ichiro came in to pinch hit and smacked a double down the first base line, for hit 2,998, but most of his teammates couldn't get the ball out of the infield.
It occurred to me that perhaps the Marlins play better when not so many people are watching. It took me forever to exit the stadium.