Baseball may not be America's pastime anymore — the NFL ripped that mantle away decades ago — but it's still uniquely positioned to help the nation heal.
Provided the players and owners don't screw it up.
As Americans desperate for a sense of normalcy look for any reason to feel hope, the return of sports could provide it. The first league to make it back will take its place in the history books as a key marker in our response to the coronavirus outbreak, and as the past has taught us, that sport is often baseball.
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When the U.S. joined World War I in 1917, baseball began the tradition of playing the Star Spangled Banner before games. When World War II threatened the 1942 season, president Franklin Delano Roosevelt famously penned his "Green Light Letter" to commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis, urging the games to continue because the men and women of the war effort, "ought to have a chance for recreation and for taking their minds off their work even more than before."
One of the seminal moments of the response to 9/11 came when president George W. Bush threw out the first pitch before Game 3 of the World Series in New York, a perfect strike that exemplified American resolve in the face of tragedy.
And Red Sox fans need no reminder the franchise's role in the wake of the 2013 Marathon bombings, from Boston Strong to the 617 jersey to David Ortiz's exhortation that, "this is our (bleeping) city." When the Red Sox won it all five months later, their most emotional stop on the victory parade came at the finish line, where they placed the World Series trophy.
The opportunity exists for baseball once again to give us hope that everything will eventually be OK. But that requires cooperation on the part of the league and the MLB Players Association, and the two sides have been disinclined to work together as the expiration of the current collective bargaining agreement looms in December of 2021.
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This is an opportunity baseball simply can't afford to botch.
The postponement of the NBA season after Utah's Rudy Gobert tested positive is what made the looming pandemic real for millions of Americans in March. The return of baseball would be a significant driver of hope.
The sport could use some positive publicity after an offseason marked by dual cheating scandals in Houston and Boston. It could also benefit from having the stage to itself, since no sport has faced a longer layoff. Whereas the NBA and NHL played most of their regular seasons, and the NFL has been able to dominate the news cycle during free agency and the draft, baseball hasn't seen a pitch thrown for real since the Nationals stunned the Astros last October.
Baseball has inherent advantages to returning that it should maximize.
For one, unlike the NBA and NHL, it can be played outdoors, where the virus seems to have a harder time spreading. For another, it's the game that most easily lends itself to social distancing, since it lacks the constant contact of the other three major sports. And finally, it's the game we most associate with summer, making its return feel the most natural. Basketball and hockey aren't meant to be played in July, but baseball is.
Unfortunately, the game has shown an obstinate refusal over the last decade to act in its best interests, from its periodic steroid scandals to its stubbornly glacial pace of play. It employs the strongest union in sports, which means the MLBPA will fight when and if owners try to decrease salaries on account of the stands almost assuredly being empty.
Such skirmishes could keep the game on the sidelines, depriving it of a golden opportunity not only to be the only show in town, but to play a meaningful role in restoring our sense of shared experience and community.
And missing that window, sadly, would be a very baseball thing to do.