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player ready...With proper respect for baseball Commissioner Bud Selig and his revenue-sharing plan, there is room for improvement. Some problems have been rectified by rich teams giving money to poor teams, but not all.
Take the National League Central, please. The St. Louis Cardinals might clinch by Labor Day.
So here’s how to fix competitive imbalance: Make the Cardinals fly commercial until season’s end. No more charter planes that actually leave when they’re supposed to leave and arrive when they’re supposed to arrive.
And if the Cardinals’ division lead reaches 20 games between now and the close of the regular schedule on the first Sunday of October, they must not only fly commercial like us mopes, they must do it through O’Hare Airport.
How and where did I come up with this crazy idea? Well, I did it at O’Hare Airport recently, while waiting out another delay. Apparently I’m not alone. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, more than 58,600 flights have been delayed there this year, surpassing the total for any other year at O’Hare since the FAA began monitoring ignominious performances by the major carriers.
The record is so awful, in fact, that the FAA will meet with airline officials on Wednesday. We can only hope the meeting isn’t scheduled for Chicago, because it probably will be delayed. Or canceled. Or diverted to another city.
If Selig rules the way he should and declares that the Cardinals must begin moving from city to city like sheep, it would not only restore some suspense to the NL Central, it also would benefit the Cubs, who languish in second place without being able to exploit their home airport advantage.
Remember, professional athletes don’t schlep around ticket counters and luggage checkpoints. These guys travel like kings. There’s the old story about how Michael Jordan arrived at O’Hare fresh out of North Carolina and didn’t even have a ride to the Bulls’ rookie camp. The rest of the story is that he probably hasn’t seen the inside of an airport since.
If the Cardinals can be introduced to O’Hare, they soon will return to the ranks of the mortal. According to the FAA, many of the O’Hare snafus are because of bad weather. But the other day, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky when I had a flight delayed, I presume because it was too bright out.
The Cardinals, deprived of their cushy private charter jets, couldn’t handle the succession of lies and excuses dished out by the airlines. Eventually the Cardinals would wear down and lose their double-digit lead, if not their minds altogether. They’re only human. Happens to all of us.
Let’s try this itinerary. The Cardinals play in Los Angeles on Sept. 12, and return home for a game against Houston on Sept. 14. I say if they fly commercial through O’Hare, it’s even money they have to forfeit while they’re stuck on the tarmac here, 68th in line to be cleared for takeoff.
Occasionally, when teams are closing out a road trip, they send their next day’s pitcher ahead so he can be rested. Hah. Let the Cardinals try that using O’Hare. Their starters have been surprisingly efficient this season. Insert O’Hare into the equation and their rotation will become cranky, disabled or invisible. Give Jason Marquis a middle seat, throw him a bag of peanuts while a thunderstorm blows over and let’s see how that affects his curveball.
Because the Cubs and White Sox have been brutal for decades, one can’t say that if you want to win the World Series, you have to go through O’Hare. But that’s the route to take if you want to lose a World Series, or miss it altogether because you missed your connecting flight.