a Greater Glory

Tim Lincecum delivered up his 23rd inning of scoreless pitching for the San Fransisco Giants.  The 25 year old Lincecum is pitching like the CY Young winner from last year and is 5-1 in his last 6 starts.  His ERA currently stands at a ridiculous 2.23 for the season and 2.93 overall for his still very short 2 year career.  There is a good chance that Lincecum will be starting for the NL All-Star team come July 12.

Talk about a stirring title! Now that I have your attention, we are going to take a look at James 3:5-10 to see what exactly I am talking about:

So also the tongue is a small member, yet it boasts of great things. How great a forest is set ablaze by such a small fire! And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell. For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by mankind, but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God. From the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, these things ought not to be so.

The tongue a muscle that we use for chewing and swallowing and the main organ that we use for tasting.  This muscle is one of the main reasons you are alive, without it you would be unable to process the nutrients you get from food that hasn’t been broken down yet.  While the tongue may be an important part of your body, it is also a part of your body that causes more controversy and can destroy everything that you have worked for in your life.  What will Bill Clinton be remembered for? Lying.  What will Ken Lay (Enron) be remembered for? Lying. What will Rafael Palmeiro, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens be remembered for? Lying and Baseball.

The ways in which each of these players have handled this has been different.  Sosa all of a sudden couldn’t speak English when he was asked about it.  Mark McGwire simply didn’t want to talk about the past.  Rodriguez lied about it, then kind of told the truth only once he was caught in his lie.  Palmeiro, Bonds, and Clemens well they still adamantly deny taking anything, or if they did they took it unknowingly.

In a recent ESPN interview Palmeiro still denies that he knowingly took anything and even hints at being “set-up”.  I am not saying that Palmeiro is lying or lied, but let’s use our imaginations a bit.  If I am a world class athlete and I work all year round to keep my body in peak condition and a  teammate offers me a “pill” don’t you think I might ask what it is? Second, let’s just say I don’t ask what the pill  is and just take it.  What percentage chances are there that on that specific day MLB is going to be doing drug testing?

To be quite honest and frank I beleive that Andy Pettitte handled this the best, he admitted to taking them and apologized.  What Pettitte did doesn’t make it right, but he at least handled it and spoke the right way about it.  When these players adamantly lie and say they didn’t do it, it only darkens their credibility more and more.  Eventually some new report comes out and implicates them further.  Then they have to back pedal and reword what they previously said.  It would be good if all athletes took the verses from James and memorized them or put them inside their locker.  The tongue can destroy so much of what they have created and it is a shame to see such great careers get taken through the mud.

As I was Googling on this 3rd of July, this article caught my eye.  In light of our recent discussion on happiness and sport, we cannot simply dismiss the secular person by saying, “They just don’t get it.”  As I read this article by the blogger, I came to realize that we both want the same things in life.  Admittedly we love the same sport.  In the article, the blogger explains baseball as a sort of “mystique” and gives the movie Field of Dreams as an example.  The qualities of sacrifice, redemption, and reconciliation ring free in this drama.

Again, our hearts and souls were created in a way that can connect with these types of stories.  We find a passion inside that desires the same experiences.  I’d argue that the secular mind and Christian mind line up precisely when it comes to these issues.  We both want to find a worth in something greater.  It’s the answer we disagree on.

Take this quote from James Earl Jones’ character in Field of Dreams (which is also quoted in the article):

The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball.  America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers.  It’s been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt, and erased again.  But baseball has marked the time.  This field, this game, is a part of our past, Ray.  It reminds us of all that once was good, and that could be again.

No one can deter from the fact that this is a great Hollywood quote – maybe the best sports’ quote in movie history (which is another argument).  However, is it entirely true?  Has baseball been a constant throughout the years?  One could argue it has not been.  Take for example the strike in 1994.  I know how disappointed Montreal Expos fans were that year.  What about the average baseball fan?  We were devastated.  I remember my dad stating that things would never be the same again.  Baseball had failed us.

The article goes on to say that, “The only church that truly feeds the soul day in and day out is the Church of Baseball.”  Another question follows.  Do we really want to put our faith in something that will continue to disappoint us?  Can the game ever fully return the love that we put into it?

We can take Jeremiah 31:3 to heart when the Lord says, “I have loved you with an everlasting love, I have drawn you with loving-kindness.”  Baseball, although a great game, can never provide us the satisfaction that we want from it.  I remember celebrating the Phillies World Series victory last year with my roommates.  It had been 25 years since the last Philadelphia championship in any major sport.  Were we elated?  Sure.  We went crazy.  But even that didn’t last more than a couple days.  We continued in our lives, still knowing that our souls craved something far more valuable.

Being an athlete who excels in professional sports is tough, maybe one of the most difficult things in the world.  That is why there are so few of them.  But something that may be even more difficult than being a professional athlete, is being the coach of those professional athletes.  In no other job are you criticized for the failure of your team and then forgotten about when your team does well.  Being the coach of a professional team is a job that requires you to shoulder the blame when things aren’t going well and then step into the background when your team is doing well. Coaches must love to coach and must be willing to do just that, coach.

While coaching is important, it seems that we have now entered a time in professional sports where a coach can no longer coach or attempt to bring about change on a team.  Typically when a coaching change is made it is a chance for players to hear another person’s voice and allow for the new coach to do some things differently, but how often is to often to change? A New York Times article highlighted the short leash that NBA coaches are on, that article can be read here.

Since when did coaching in any major sport become something that changes when the weather patterns do?  An interesting study although extremely time consuming would be to look at the number of coaching changes that have occurred in the major sports (football, baseball, basketball, and hockey) over the past five years. For basketball Jerry Sloan has been coaching since 1988. During that time there have been over 225 coaching changes.  Did you read that number??? That means that there is on average 11 job changes every season.  Remember, there are only 30 teams in the NBA so that is a little over a 1/3 of the teams every season.

By no way am I saying that every coach should be kept, but the firing of Michael Curry that occurred yesterday is a bit frustrating. Curry wasn’t a great coach after only getting the team to a 39-43 record, but look at what he was given.  He had to deal with Allen Iverson in a mid-season trade that was anything but beneficial to the Pistons. Joe Dumars is quickly becoming the Matt Millen of the NBA with 5 coaches now in 9 years.  Dumars needs to make sure he gets it right with this next coach.  Typically, the most successful franchises are the ones who “stay the course”.  In the NFL you have the Pittsburgh Steelers, MLB you have the NY Yankees, in the NBA you have the Utah Jazz.  Does consistency mean you will win and make the playoffs every year?  Of course not, but there is something to be said about consistency.  All I am asking is that given the current state of our country, economy, and speed of life, one would think that consistency and staying the course would be appropriate and important.

My bias yet poureth over.  Chris Heisey, a former teammate of mine at Messiah, was just promoted to Triple-A Louisville this past weekend.  Heisey, who hit .347 at Double-A Carolina, is quickly moving through the ranks of Cincinnati’s farm system.  Not only is this guy a five-tool player, he is a devoted Christian and husband.  Catch him today, Tuesday, on MLB Network as the Louisville Bats take on the Gwinnett Braves.  Game time is set for 2:00 p.m.

It’s hard to believe that over 13 years have passed since Mariano Rivera recorded his first save of his career.  How long ago was this?  Well for starters, Braveheart had just won the Academy Award for best picture, Bob Dole had yet to pick Jack Kemp as his running mate, and I was in Mrs. Hampton’s third-grade class, banging out state capitals like it was my job.  Maybe the most impressive stat of that time was the attendance at Yankee stadium the night of Rivera’s first save:  19,087.  To put that number in perspective, the Washington Nationals are currently averaging 23,030 this year alone.

Anyway, back to Rivera.  It’s difficult to measure his worth to the Yankees over the last decade and a half.  Granted, the save has been a watered down statistic for the past 20 years or so and the modern era has been very lenient on pitching statistics general.  But still, there are several reasons why Rivera has been the MVP for the Yankees (yes, I said it) during their dynasty reign.

Reason #1:  Being the man during the steroid era while pitching in a bandbox

Maybe the main reason why we can say he has ice in his veins.  Rivera broke into the league amidst the pruning of baseball’s biggest juicers.  No names will be mentioned (thanks Raul Ibanez) although we can assume that Rivera pitched against some of the biggest juicers in the American league at that time.  Just in case that wasn’t enough, this guy had to pitch in little-league field they called Yankee Stadium – 315 ft. down the lines and 380 in the gaps.  You wouldn’t be able to tell from the results because he posted a lower than 2.00 ERA in each of his first three seasons as the closer.

Reason #2:  Being the man when it counts:  October

Most people have heard how money Rivera has been in the postseason, but the numbers say it all:  8-1, 0.77 ERA, 117.1 IP, 0.750 WHIP (which is ridiculous by the way).  Again the result is four World Series rings.

Reason #3:  The Cutter

Maybe the most devastating pitch in baseball.  Experts like to talk about Joel Zumaya’s fastball, or Brad Lidge’s slider, Francisco Rodriguez’s curve, or Trevor Hoffman’s changeup.  The difference between these closer’s and Rivera?  He has ONLY thrown one pitch his entire career.  It hasn’t mattered how much film a hitter can possibly watch, he has no chance.  Yankees reliever Brian Bruney sums it up:  “Let’s say you get a guy who comes into the league today, let’s say he throws 110 miles an hour, he will not be as good as Mo because his pitch is better than anything you could ever imagine.”

It’s almost as if this guy was born to pitch.  When asked if he ever feels threatened on the mound, Rivera responded “Never.  I’ve always loved the competition. I’m not afraid of it.”  That’s why we’ve loved to watch you pitch Mo.

Congratulations to Mariano Rivera on his 500th save.  Mariano from all accounts is a committed Christian who is playing in the biggest baseball market in the world. For him to achieve this is monumental and amazing, congratulations to Mariano.

Yes, the title is bold and yes, I am a fan of soccer.  So before you get all huffy puffy at least hear me out my reasons as to why soccer will never matter in the U.S.  Soccer as everyone knows is a global phenomenon.  In a typical World Cup year viewing records are set boy those who watch the final.  For the 2006 World cup ti is estimated that 26 billion individuals watched the World Cup at some point during the tournament.  Of those 26 Billion the estimate is that 829 million were from North America and the Caribbean.  This was with every game being broadcast on ESPN or ESPN2.  That number compared with every other continent is so small that it is almost laughable.  Europe brought in 5 billion, Asia had 8 billion, Central and South America had just under 4 billion, Africa had just under 5 billion, and the Middle East which isn’t even a continent but is broken out for statistic purposes had 847 million.  The numbers themselves show how little attention is truly paid to soccer in the U.S.

Many will argue that soccer is growing and that bringing over big named players and allowing people a chance to watch will increase viewership and this may be true to a point.  But whether soccer lovers want to admit it or not, soccer is not fast enough for American viewers, the stretches of play are too long without a stoppage, and the sport suffers from an identity problem.

The speed of play in soccer is actually quite amazing.  When watching a fast paced soccer game there are few sports in the world that rival it (possibly only ice hockey or badminton). The problem for America isn’t necessarily how fast the players are with the ball, it’s the fact that the scoring and scoring chances aren’t frenzied enough and defensive games are normally not played in front of one team’s goal.  In any of America’s favorite sports scoring can and does typically come in bunches. That’s the first reason why Americans don’t enjoy soccer.

Along with there not being enough scoring or the speed of play not being fast enough is the fact that halves are too long for most American viewers.  Every major sport that we have has commercial breaks built into it.  You can get up and go to the bathroom, grab a drink, look outside and still only have missed a Viagra commercial, a truck commercial, and a trailer for a movie.  Soccer isn’t like that.  You are sitting for 45 minutes without a break.  Could you imagine if an inning of baseball lasted 45 minutes straight.  Baseball, Football, Basketball, Ice Hockey all have natural built in breaks and commercial breaks so they are easier for people to watch.

The last reason and maybe one of the best reasons that soccer will not matter in the U.S. is because it suffers from an identity problem.  Most soccer fans are the guys who didn’t play American football.  In our macho man America those Football players woud never be caught dead watching a soccer game, it’s just “not manly enough”.  The reason it isn’t manly enough is because every little kid plays soccer.  So it’s a little kids game, not a game played by men.  While David Beckham brought lots of little girls out to games, he didn’t fit the image of a guy you want to follow or a guy you would necessarily want to hang out with.  Imagine if Tom Brady played soccer.  If he played soccer and were marketed the way he is with football, that would bring in more men to the sport and would also get it covered a bit more.  Until soccer is seen as a sport that men play, it will continue to not matter, at least in America.