Bye, bye baby
Write if you think of it maybe
Know I love you
Go if it means that much to you
--Crosby, Stills and Nash
I’ll never forget the melancholy tones of this song coming over the TV with scenes of an empty RFK Stadium the day after the Washington Senators played their last game. I was a teenager and I thought it was the end of the world. I don’t think I cried, but for sure I was stunned that baseball would allow the team to move and confident that they would soon rectify their mistake.
I guess that in on the grand cosmic scale of time, 34 years qualifies as “soon”, but it seems like it’s been forever.
Baseball is back in DC. It’s officially official.
Mayor Anthony Williams signed the stadium financing bill into law today thus removing the final obstacle in the way of the Montreal Expos becoming the Washington Nationals.
I should probably have been truly delighted at the news, but in fact it wasn’t even a relief. It’s difficult to get very emotional about common sense prevailing. If common sense had prevailed all along, the Senators never would have left, the Padres would have moved here, an expansion team would have been placed here, the Expos would have moved here 10 years ago.
But what happened happened. With baseball being gone for 34 years, we missed a lot, including the labor disputes, one of which cancelled the World Series. I suppose that not being attached to a particular team during that time period had its advantages. Still, it would have been nice to have experienced it and have the opportunity to figure it out for myself.
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