STALIN Between the Lines

In his Nobel speech, William Faulkner proclaimed that “mankind will prevail because man can endure”. I’ve always treasured those words and many times have thought very seriously that they convey the secret of baseball’s mysterious majesty in the hearts of most Americans, boys and girls, men and women, scholars and patriots across every racial  and demographic divide.

It is America’s “pastime” because if not in play-by-play, then certainly in its essence it recapitulates in so many ways the agony of accommodating and enduring what the greatest of sportswriters, Dan Jenkins, called “Life-Its-Own-Self” !!

Over the weekend the American broadcasting Company and its vestigial product, ESPN set a course of STALINIST allegiance by attempting to rewrite history in erasing footage of Curt Schilling’s magnificent performance on October 14, 2004 from its presentation of great performances. It was the “bloody sock” victory, when Schilling was found to have pitched a stellar game whole crippled. It paved the way for Boston to the World Series.

This expunging came just days after ESPN fired Schilling as an analyst because he publicly said he preferred not to use a lady's toilet. SEE BACKGROUND HERE

The monstrous overweening self-conscious and self pomposity of the termination of employment was somehow less politically correct than it was absurd and silly. ESPN then hired an LGBT activist to rerplace hum !

But as they say in Washington DC, it’s the “second shoe” ( i.e. COVR-UP) that always worsens any situation. And so it was with the wussie-brained ESPN reverse bigots.

There’s something nasty, irreverent, and, yes, unhealthy about grown men and women scurrying around in an attempt to obliterate a shining moment in the life of a man with whom they have a petty, venereal disagreement.

ESPN, which is inextricably enmeshed in the fetid swamp of the NBA, which it worships over all other idols– is NOT the only game in town.

There is Sports Illustrated, The Sporting News and USA Today. I personally go to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram daily along with the above listed sites. Major league baseball provides a page and daily coverage for each team in both leagues. The PGA Tour has one of the best Internet sites of all, then the NFL also has a good grasp on all its teams’ news.

I don’t need Stalinism, arrogance and control freaks in my arena. 

Do you ?