Fandango’s Provocative Question #79

Mookie Betts signed a $390 million contract with the Dodgers today. This ups the ante from $360 million and extends the contract to 12-years. I’m sure he’s explaining that it isn’t about the money. It’s about pride and honor. Personally, I think anyone who is earning $32,500,000 every year for the next 12-years will probably be able to put food on the table. It really is about the money. I don’t mind it being about the money because how many people are so good at anything that they would possibly be offered that kind of money? I’m just pissed that the Red Sox didn’t come up with the bucks and keep him here. We always come up short and then we have these terrible years with no pitchers, no fielding, no nothing.

The reason we have YouTubeTV which is the most expensive (but not by much) of all the streaming packages is that they have all sports — including the entire MLB baseball package. football, basketball, hockey, and who knows what else. It’s very heavy on sports. Garry is insane about baseball ⚾ beyond mere fandom. Even when the Sox are doing really badly as they surely will this year — we’re expecting them to be the bottom or next to the bottom of the Eastern Division — he will still watch at least one and often two or three games through the summer. So yeah, we missed sports.

I like baseball, too, though I’m not quite as fanatical as Garry, but I enjoy it. It’s a relatively peaceful game especially compared to football and hockey. And unlike football where I never can figure out what that calls mean, I actually know where the strike zone is and can call the pitch and know who is safe or out. I have a pretty good selection of Sox-wear.

Baseball is summertime for us. It’s what we watch through the warm, humid days and into the snappy days of Autumn. On a great year, it might be the only thing we watch from spring to fall. We also watch football, but now that Brady has moved on, I’m not sure we’ll be quite as jazzed as we were. We watched Brady from when they called him up from the bench until he moved out of town. I don’t even know why he’s still playing. He’s good-looking, well spoken, and I’m sure he could get any contract he wanted from ESPN. I thought he should have quit a couple of years ago so he could go be a broadcaster without waiting to get seriously broken. I still think he should retire while he’s healthy.

Especially during this incredibly intense and painful year, sports would have been a nice release from the pressure. But of course, when everything went to hell in a handbasket, why not sports too?

This isn’t going to be a “real” season. Just as well because we don’t have a single functional pitcher and our glorious outfield was bought by other teams who were willing to pay the big bucks which we should have paid. Never mind. We’ll bottom out this year and be much better next year and with a little luck, in one more year we’ll be heading for the playoffs.

Meanwhile, “opening day” is Friday for the Sox and Thursday for everyone else. Even with empty stands, it’s better than nothing.

Categories: #FPQ, Baseball, Boston Red Sox, Fenway Park, Provocative Questions, Sports

Tags: baseball, how much is $390000000 divided by 12, Marilyn Armstrong