Quote Originally Posted by gnome View Post
Thoughtful post RickBak.

Your point about mercenaries is true but not exclusive to players. Ask Cleveland or St. Louis or any other city that had their team pull up stakes and move.

It is a business and the owners know it too. They’ll hold a city hostage for a new stadium without batting an eye.

We see that with Ilitch and Co. Their promises for this or that are like ashes in our collective mouths. We paid for the arena, zero hope of ever seeing a dime in return; yet, taxpayers line up to gobble their swill.

The Fords are better but not by much.

For the last year or so I've been researching a book about baseball in Detroit in the 1890s, just as the Tigers were making the transition from a minor-league to a major-league club. Actually, I'm ending the narrative in 1912, just as the team has abandoned Bennett Park for brand-new Navin Field. Everything was on a much smaller scale then, but in many ways not a helluva lot has changed in 100+ years. Greedy owners, fawning fans, celebrity athletes, even constant bitching about overpriced beer and lack of parking. Still, lotsa fun revisiting 1895 and 1907 and hanging out with the likes of George Vanderbeck, Germany Schaefer, and a bunch of other guys lost to time.