The Snowball

There are three days next year that I am looking very forward to. February 25th, March 31st and October 1st.

February 25th is the Matchbox 20 concert in Kansas City.

October 1st will be the start of the Major League Baseball playoffs and hopefully another step towards the 11th World Series championship for my redbirds.



When I was 19 years old I was sitting in my uncle’s driveway at a family gathering of some sorts. My Uncle Bryce and I were discussing the upcoming baseball season and wondering how our beloved Cardinals would fare. He told me that, as always, he was going to Opening Day and asked if I was going. I had not really thought about it. When I realized that I was off work that Monday I decided to go. I bought a ticket from a dirty scalper and the rest as they say………..

On that Monday not only did I see what Uncle Bryce was telling me about, but I fell in love.

You see for a true baseball fan the last game of the World Series has two parts. First you crown a new champion and then the “next year”, that Cub fans have been talking about since May, begins.

It begins like a snowball; teams can start talking to their free agents. Then they can talking to other team’s free agents. Some players sign with new teams (i.e. Edgar Renteria and Torii Hunter). Others sign with their same club (i.e. Jorge Posada) and some players say they will not sign with their old team then realize no one else will pay them $27.5 million per year for ten years and end up signing with their old team (i.e. Alex Rodriguez). Some big trades are talked and talked and talked about (i.e. Johan Santana and Miguel Cabrera). Then there are the GM winter meetings where big deals can get done everyday of the week. Free agent signings, trades, and looking for prospects continues for months until all 30 teams feel as if they have the best team to put on the field.

Soon February begins and it’s time for spring training. While wins and loses in the spring may not mean a whole lot, there is plenty to play for. This is when players get there timing down, see how they are improving after last year’s injuries, and for some it is a time used to prove they are worthy of playing in “the show”. A couple weeks into spring training and every fan’s snowball of anticipation is growing to be about the same size as their lofty hopes that the new season has brought.

As a fan my season starts when Jason and I camp, often in the snow, in a Schnucks parking lot all night to get a ticket for the experience that is Opening Day. (I could tell you which Schnucks we camp at, but then I’d have to kill you.)


Opening Day is the one day a year when nothing else matters. A concert will come and go. The October baseball you hope and pray will come has no guarantee. But Opening Day comes every year and on that day time stands still. It doesn’t matter who the president is, what a barrel of oil cost, or who will win American Idol. Baseball is all that matters on that day.


All of the sudden a ball of snow that has been building for five long months melts away in the springtime sun with the simple words…………..Play Ball!