As if it wasn't obvious, I am a Colorado Rockies fan. Been there since the beginning. Purple is my color through and through. Living in Denver, it is hard not to be overwhelmed with Bronco talk 24/7 365 days a year. Not that it is a rare thing as every sports talk radio station in the country is NFL talk all the time. Hard to say that ESPN hasn't just become the voice box for football in our nation.
With Spring in the air and Rox opener almost 2 weeks away you would think that maybe we would get some love? Maybe? But no the Broncos stole at least a week's worth of news with the signing of future Hall of Famer and 4 time MVP Peyton Manning. Fantastic, great for the Broncos and the orange and blue faithful. I have to admit that Fall in the Rockies is a little bit brighter when the Broncos win. Anyway as a general sports fan, the signing of Manning struck me as so unlike the world of the MLB and Colorado Rockies. Manning's signing would be on par with the Rox signing Albert Pujols this winter. Think about that for a moment...
Baseball is America's pastime but football is it's getaway. Baseball is so American that teams are even considered low, middle, and high income potential teams. With Pujols on the market this winter, Rox probably didn't even pick up the phone. Bottom line there was only one to four teams even able to consider giving out the coin he got. Yet in the NFL almost any team probably could have signed Manning. There was no discussion of the have or have nots. With the money machine that is the NFL all teams work generally from the same spreadsheet. Kind of funny how un-American the NFL truly is. It is the socialism of sports. Too bad New York and Dallas, that you make so much more money, and have to pass it along to the have nots in Green Bay and Jacksonville. Most pundits say this is what makes the NFL work and that every team has a chance on opening weekend. This is not so true in baseball as Opening Day usually means half of the baseball teams can be written off and won't be within 20 games of playing in October.
So in the end would I like to live in a world where every team in the MLB had a chance on Opening Day? That I could actually believe we could sign Albert Pujols? That is hard question because my love for baseball is based in America itself. The ebbs and flows of our nation just like dynasties on the diamond are what makes America and Baseball great. What makes baseball sort of fun is the fact there exists a team like the Yankees. A $200 million dollar behomoth that can be loved or despised. If all was equal who would we root against? Baseball like America is richer with diversity. Sometimes with the right mix of individuals, a baseball team can come together and win it all regardless of their team income just like each of us can do our thing and perhaps build something greater than the sum. Each of us, as American's, can still theoretically strike it rich.
In the end I'm glad for the Broncos and just as happy to see Todd Helton play out his career in Denver with Pujols paying for the West Coast Yankees.
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