Marketing, CVS, and the NBA

I'm in Florida right now at my company's annual meeting. I'm staying at the Marriot World Center Hotel, which is, according to its website, that largest Marriot in the world. Oh, and each room has its own balcony. Mine overlooks one of the parking lots.

Still, it must be a pretty nice hotel because there's some kind of a big NBA Pre-Draft meeting going on, and I wouldn't imagine that the NBA would scrimp on the accommodations when it comes to something like this, whatever it is. I don't know what it's about exactly, but I do know that there are a lot of fit-looking coach types walking around in expensive basketball shoes and wearing the logos of various college and NBA teams. A surprising number of them are bald, for some reason, and this morning they made me feel self-conscious at the fitness center.

I mention all of this within the context of this blog as an example of how sportsified we've become as a culture. I used to work at Springfield College, the Birthplace of Basketball, where James Naismith first hung up the peach baskets and invented an industry. The first basketball hall of fame was located right on Springfield College's Campus, until college officials agreed to sell or give (I'm not clear on the details) all of their memorabilia to the Basketball Hall of Fame—capital letters—in downtown Springfield. This was before Magic and Larry and Michael and the NBA and ESPN and the NCAA helped make basketball into a global, multi-billion-dollar business where a bunch of bald men in basketball shorts can sit around in a posh hotel and talk about a two-round draft.

And the kids sense all of this. The sportification reaches all the way down to the pre-school set. Last night I called home and Owen insisted upon giving me the baseball game update: Big Papi was up and the Red Sox were winning. Now, for Owen, and his older brother, Sam, the joy of baseball comes from the physical activity and the fun of mimicry and pretending to be Big Papi or Manny. But it's also becoming commercial, as happened over the weekend when we made a trip to CVS to print out a couple of pictures and I ended up buying each of them a ball with a big Gothic 'B' on it. (I know, I know, it's my fault for enabling them, but I've kept the receipt and I'm hoping that I'll be able to write off the expense once I get a book deal.) And, of course, the teams know this, too, and they've have spent and continue to spend enormous amounts of money on marketing to ensure that a trip to CVS, for instance, can't just be a quick trip but instead must be a battle between too-permissive parents and spoiled children over what extras need to be bought.

Sorry, I guess that wound's still a little raw.

Calling Dustin Pedroia

The other day, as I dropped the kids off at school, I was walking down the hallway when I heard one second grader say to another second grader, "Did you know that there's an actual GUY named Ripken?"

I knew exactly what they were talking about. Here in Northampton, we have Little League and Cal Ripken League when it comes to baseball. And now, as the flowers are in bloom and the weather has finally become seasonable, all of the leagues are in full swing, pun fully intended. For the younger kids, baseball means t-ball. Owen had his first game a few weeks ago, and on the way to the game, he and his brother had a philosophical debate in the backseat about whether T-Ball is, in fact, baseball. His older brother, full of Farm League hubris, insisted that T-Ball is not baseball, mainly because there is no pitching and no catcher sitting behind the plate. Owen, not entirely sure since he was on his way to his first game, gamely and loudly disagreed, just to be disagreeable.

In the middle of Owen's first game, as he stood on third base, he turned to me and his brother and declared loudly enough for every parent in attendance to hear: "Dad! T-Ball IS baseball!"

Cross that philosophcial conundrum off the list; the question has been answered.

While the organized baseball leagues are great, as is true with many things when the kids are seven and four, the vast majority of baseball in my family happens in the back yard. We have one of those Pitchback nets, a dozen or more safety baseballs, a couple of plastic balls of various sizes and shapes, and numerous bats. We also have landmarks, like an old stump and a sandbox, and backyard detritus, like empty flower pots, that act as bases. The organization is admittedly pretty loose, just as is the line between a "practice" hit, i.e. a weak grounder back to the pither, and a "real" hit, i.e., one that flies over the pitcher's head.

One thing that doesn't vary much is who Sam and Owen choose to be when they're batting: Big Papi, Daiske, and "Tek," Jason Varitek.

The Red Sox have invaded my back yard.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, I tried to prepare myself--on an intellectual level, anyway--for the various ways my attempt to root for the Red Sox would move me from my comfort zone, which is going through life comfortable in my hatred for the Red Sox. As I dreamed up this experiment, I was okay with the idea of my children rooting for the Red Sox as a team. I didn't anticipate their rooting interest taking such a personal turn. Now, looking back on it, I should have known that this would happen. But when I was a kid, I didn't spend a lot of time pretending to be the popular athletes of my day. Sure, I may have pumped my arm like Joe Morgan, he of the Big Red Machine (I know you know what the Big Red Machine is, and that I didn't really have to say that Joe Morgan was on the Big Red Machine, but I just felt like writing, the Big Red Machine) but that was about it. I was more interested in playing the game than I was in pretending to be someone else while I played.

Yes, I know: times have changed.

And with this increased awareness of the Red Sox players, I've had to become more aware as well, so that I can answer all of the questions. It wasn't until the other day, when Sam asked me who plays second base for the Red Sox, and I dutifully answered "Dustin Pedroia" within earshot of my Yankee-fan wife, that I realized that I'm being sucked in deeper myself. "Wow," she said. "I would never have been able to answer that question."

There's just something in the New England psyche that makes it almost impossible to not know at least a few Red Sox players. Even Owen, at four, knows enough to pretend to be Big Papi when he bats. And I have to admit that I like the inherent innocence and optimism that comes along with this awareness when it's in children. It's hero worship in a pure form, totally free cynicism or suspicion. I lost that a long time ago, and that's why the challenge I've laid out for myself is so difficult: I can't just root for a player or a team without considering all of the baggage--my baggage, too--that goes along with that choice. I mean, I understand that I'll have to watch Fever Pitch at some point, for instance, and I am NOT looking forward to that. Let's face it: I'm forty years old, and I've lost my sense of wonder.

And it's that wonder that I heard when I heard that second grader exclaim to his friend that there actually used to be a Cal Ripken.