Baseball pops up again

The long, cold winter is over and baseball is here. I can't tell you how thrilling this is for me. I adore baseball. When baseball is in season, I don't have to have a life -- which is such a relief. I can just sit in front of the TV and watch games. What a benefit!

Even though the season is young, I've already heard odd things from the sportscasters. Now you get to hear about them too.

Let's start with things that confused me.

I asked this last year and got no answer. I'm still waiting, so here it is again: What the hell is a "seeing-eye single"? I heard it again this year and I have no clue what it means.

Keith Hernandez said something that went right over my head. He said, "But if you get a hammy or a calf injury, that's trouble up river city". River city?

Another one that confused me, at least at first, was that after a guy hit a line drive into left field, Keith (why is it always Keith?) said "You could hang laundry on that long drive. Look at that clothesline!" I thought about this and was initially stumped. In the end, I decided that he was talking about the height of the drive. It was literally at clothesline level. You wouldn't think something like that would become a thing.

And finally (in the "I didn't understand it" category), I've been stumped by something that I never heard before. The announcers keep talking about who won a platinum glove last year. Platinum? I seem to have missed a memo.

Here's a fun, odd thing: I think it was Gary Cohen (a Mets announcer) who told a story that involves the way New Yorkers speak. He said a long time ago, a Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher named Hoyt was hit by a ball. In response, the fans yelled "Hoyt's hurt!" But in typical New York accents, it came out "Hurts hoyt".

UPDATE: It occurs to me that this might not be clear to those outside NY. In the old days, New Yorkers said "erl" for "oil". And yes, they said "oil" for "earl". They were very consistent about their mispronunciations. So Hoyt's hurt came out Hurt's hoyt. See? This is about men my father's age (he's dead now; we're talking long ago). They spoke in a weird neighborhood way. I was amused when they would try to say "iodine". It came out "ee-oh-deen". As I say, they were consistent. I wonder how all that began. End of Update.

Baseball's back and I'm lovin' it. Hopefully you've got something in your life that provides this much fun for you. Okay, I'm gonna go watch another game. Later.

Steroids, baseball and players who can't hit

During a Mets telecast last week, Keith Hernandez brought something up. The strike-out rate for baseball players in the last nine months of play has been higher than at any time in baseball's history. Not in the last five or ten years -- in the entire history of Major League Baseball. This is a stark statistic.

A more basic way of putting it is that no professional baseball player can hit a baseball these days. That's the thing everyone's been noticing. You see guys this season who have incredibly low hitting averages. And these aren't minor players; many are traditionally good hitters. Yet this year, they can't get above the "Mendoza Line", which is .200. If you're not a fan and don't understand hitting averages, a .200 batting average means you hit the ball safely once in every five at-bats. That's not good -- and guys are hitting below that.

Hernandez rightly attributes this to steroids, or rather the current lack of steroids in baseball. He said it was highly suspicious that everyone's batting average dropped right after baseball honed in on steroid use among players. But there's more to the story.

I suspect Keith hasn't done steroids himself, so his knowledge of their use is superficial. I took tons of steroids when I was a bodybuilder, so I know all about this stuff. The thing people don't grasp is that there's more to steroids than a bigger, more muscular body. There are after-effects.

Once you stop using steroids -- as the MLB players are now finding out -- you're much weaker than you were before using them. I don't know why this isn't talked about. It's true, take it from me. I went from super-powerful on steroids to very, very weak when I got off them. And this post-steroid weakness lasts. My strength never recovered, no matter how much I worked out. My strong days were over.

So to me, it's understandable that no one can hit now. Without the additional punch that steroids provide, the players can't even muster the strength they had before they used steroids. And as a result of this catastrophic loss of strength, some can't even make it to the Mendoza line.

It's the lack of steroids and the lasting effect of having been on them that is plaguing baseball players now. And I've got news for these downtrodden players: it won't get better. The effect is permanent. Teams will have to be replace these guys with players who are steroid virgins. Mark my words.