Valentine’s Day – Of all emotions available to us humans,
none is more vital and more invigorating than love, and
the baseball fan knows this emotion to a greater degree
than any other. True, the fan can show brief animosity to
opposing players, most commonly exhibited by booing,
but that’s a rare demonstration. Why waste precious
time on heavy-hearted heated vocal breath when cheering
feels so good? The season hasn’t started but it’s not too
early for fans to show their love in their thoughts and in
their discussions with companion fans and hosts of
sports-talk radio. We never say we hate our team; we
boast of love for those who will be wearing our colors
in the coming season.
Presidents Day – No great team reaches the apex
of achievement strictly based on its on-field performance.
A too often over-looked ingredient in the creating of a
masterpiece player’s feast is the strength and abundance
of leadership. As Washington (the general and president,
not the team) led by example in word and deed, so every
winning franchise has in its make-up leaders on the field
and in the dugout, men who combine wisdom with courage
and who control battle after battle by the standards which
they set, models followed closely by their compatriots; a
team without a solid set of leaders is rudderless and will
travel the season without direction, and such a team can
never reach its desired destination.
St. Patrick’s Day – Baseball has its pot of gold waiting for
the winners of the World Series every year (and many
players carry home their personal potent pots called annual
salaries). Also, there are saints in the Major Leagues. The
Cardinals represent Saint Louis, the Padres in San Diego,
the Giants housed in San Francisco. As for driving out the
snakes, that falls upon opponents of the Arizona diamondbacks
to defeat the slithering, slimy serpentine Southwest team
which has won the World Series once in its existence, in 2001,
against the Yankees, when they were led by Irishman
Craig Counsell, a Notre Dame alum known as The Little General.