On Dynasties & Three Peats

…as well as the sport that’s always worth talking about

Doesn’t it feel as though Christmas happened six months ago?

So much has happened since Ryan Seacrest talked America through another Times Square ball drop.

Tragedy and transition haven’t taken a break and the world’s collective current events phasers remain set on “STUN.”

The masses remain distracted—at least for the next week and a half—by the Super Bowl’s approach. That means about 10 more days to ponder why so many fans hate the Chiefs (they’re really, really good regardless of the officiating) and whether we Packers fans should root against KC to preserve the NFL’s only modern championship three-peat achieved by Green Bay and St. Vincent in the late 1960’s (a Chiefs match does NOT in any way diminish what the pre-merger Packers did. Greatness can happen in different eras). That said, I’m as OD’d on KC as anyone else—not because I tire of watching Mahomes and Company do the impossible on a weekly basis. Maybe it’s the State Farm ads. Or the shampoo commercials. Or “The CHEFS.”

Great googely moogely.

What never grows old is…baseball, or talk of same. Pitchers and catchers are but two weeks away from reporting to spring training, ending a winter that saw the defending champion Dodgers seemingly buy up every bit of great talent on both sides of the Pacific. The hometown Brewers made more news this off-season not for who they acquired (Nestor Cortes) but instead for who they lost (Wily Adames and Devin Williams, among others). Winter got even colder and more foreboding with the recent passing of Bob Uecker who will be celebrated and remembered throughout the upcoming campaign, but the sad fact remains that, for the first time since 1970, Brewers baseball on the diamond won’t be accompanied by a Mr. Baseball soundtrack on the radio. Games will go on, but to quote our absent friend, this one’s gonna sting a bit.

Those contests will include the pitch clock, larger bases, and a ban on the infield shift first brought to the game two Cactus League seasons ago. The winter of ‘23 was filled with the sounds of teeth gnashing over what Commissioner Rob Manfred had seemingly wrought. The game’s purists decried making a clock a part of what had been until then a timeless game. The case can be made that America’s pasttime not only survived but thrived ever since. Gone is the dead time, glove-tugging and crotch-scratching between pitches. The proceedings are crisper and far shorter. Observers quoted in a recent piece marking the 10th anniversary of Manfred’s reign say its advent may be viewed as the signature move of his tenure, liking it to the implementation of the DH in 1973 or even the turn-of-the-20th-century tweak that turned foul balls into strikes. Now that’s a debate I find far more intriguing than the one about NFL chain gangs and how they cost the Bills a shot at the Super Bowl (yawn).

But first comes Super Bowl LIX.

Soon, your platforms will fill with videos of the Chiefs and Eagles boarding their respective planes for flights to the Big Easy. You’ll see all of the ballyhooed Super Bowl commercials well before the game they “debut” in. Media Night won’t provide anything even remotely newsy. Features about the wonders of the prop bet and the dangers of gambling will abound. You might even find out about a globally famous singer and her significant other who just happens to play for one of the teams. And there will be the annual debate about moving the Super Bowl to Saturday so as to give fans a day to recover from their game day debauchery.

The NFL will surrender the center stage with the NBA, NHL, NCAA and others waiting in the wings. That includes spring training baseball, with its meaningless games and heated sports-talk debates about “who’s coming north?” as if MLB rosters are set in stone come Opening Day. We all need diversions in a world where it feels like we’re on the wrong end of the current events fire hose, its faucet left wide open. Athletics are always an option. And, an escape. There’s a reason sports are our collective toy box. Anticipation is a welcome part of all that, and awaiting baseball’s return is a part of this sporting fan’s unapologetic coping mechanism in a world where Santa’s last visit seems oh so long ago.