Value In Eye of Beholder

It was several weeks ago while driving alone and listening to a radio talk show where the topic was America's waste and excessiveness when a caller suggested that a "mild depression might cause Americans to be less wasteful." I thought I'd rather not have a economic depression to teach any lessons. That said, I was reminded of that radio moment just recently when a baseball broadcaster stated that today in a Major League Baseball game "a baseball lasts two pitches before it is thrown out of play usually because the ball bounced in the dirt."

I recalled my East St. Louis youth when as sandlot baseball junkies, my friends and I would hang around the Sunday morning Fountain of Youth Men's baseball games hoping that we might be given a  broken bat that we could take home and put a screw in the cracked area and then tape the handle. And if we could talk some player out of an old baseball, we'd use that ball well after it needed taping. I remember back in 1949, my first so-called spike baseball shoes were old street shoes that I screwed cleats onto.

In the early 1950's the 'Browns' American League baseball franchise was still playing at Sportsman's Park in St. Louis. The Brownies fell on hard times financially. So bad was the Browns' money problem they tried to attract fans by letting them use 'yes' and 'no' voting placards to raise when the  PA guy asked what game strategy to use in a situation. As a kid, me and my friends would attend Browns' home games for just the tax on a ticket because we belonged to The Knothole Gang. We had to sit in a specific section down the left field line. That section was cordoned off so we could not move to better seats. Oh, another thing: If a foul ball came into the knothole section the Andy Frain ushers told a kid that they had to give the ball back to management or leave the park. Well, you know we left the game. Needless to say, back in the 1950's a baseball lasted more than two pitches at a St. Louis Browns' game.

Excessiveness ? A dozen baseball in the 1950's cost perhaps $15.00-to-$17.00.
                          Today a dozen baseballs cost $68.00-to-$72.00.

Major League Baseball estimates that it spends $5.5 million dollars annually on baseballs. Does that figure out to be about 900,000 baseballs?

As a 10-year old kid, I never minded using a taped broken bat but I hated using a taped baseball...time to head to head out to the Sunday morning Fountain of Youth game at Jones Park (East St. Louis) or grab your Knothole Membership Card and catch the Grand Avenue streetcar headed to a  Brownies' game. Let's face it, a new Baseball to a kid in 1950 was like 'gold.'