Evaluating Cleveland as a Baseball Town: Part I.

The most important topic addressed by this blog has always been Cleveland as a baseball town. What makes a city a great baseball town; how to understand what that means; how to make our city an even better town for baseball. Along with this my interests focus on the culture of baseball, the role of media and the changes that happen as social media increasingly transforms how we encounter the game, and, ultimately, how we approach and understand the game of baseball.

So I began this afternoon sitting inside on a hot day, listening the the Indians play the Cardinals, and intending to write about the topic of what makes a great baseball town as a response to the interesting interview with Indians President Mark Shapiro published Saturday by the Plain Dealer.  The overwhelming reason I was intending to write about this is because the other post I'm working on focuses on inter-League play, and inevitably that turns into an apocalyptic rant about the irreversible decline of American culture and the inevitable end of our way of life. (I get irrationally negative over the abhorrent abberation of baseball often called inter-League play.)

What attracted me to write about this interview was Shapiro addressing the concept of Cleveland as a baseball town. But I made an all too frequent error as I sat down to write. I scrolled down and read the comments. And now whether I talk about Shapiro and evaluation Cleveland as a baseball town, or the current inter-league nonsense, it's going to go poorly.

So let's hope that the Tribe pulls off a good win as I'm writing in order to lift my spirits.

Reviewing the interview and, unfortunately, looking at the comments, leaves me in a place where I have to admit that right now the front office is stuck doing three things: 1) Deflecting the same idiotic comments time and again (re: ownership, payroll, spending, revenue); 2) Answering inquiries on "evaluating" trades past or present (ranging from Ubaldo way back to the long dead horses of the C.C. / Cliff Lee trades); 3) Expressing some kind of confidence in Cleveland as a team and a worthwhile city for baseball.

Quite frankly, #3 is going to be the only one that matters in the long run; and my unfortunate reading of the comments reinforces that. (I need to block all of the cleveland.com site from my computer and only read it on my phone. The mobile site doesn't display comments.)

These points are really tied into my own central concerns of the cultures of baseball fans, changing roles of media, and what it means to be a baseball town. Why?

The comments following the article were, sadly, what they always are, a random combination of:

• Unfounded statements relying on totalizing language ("we never...",  "This team always...", "No one thinks...", etc.)
• Absolutist statements and ad hominim attacks, frequently amplified by the CAPS LOCK OF RAGE.  (e.g., "Shapiro is a LIAR", "The Dolans make huge profits", and various insults to the intelligence of all parties involved). 
• Direct attacks as rebuttals. (in the vein of "if you disagree, you're an idiot / on drugs / paid by the Dolans to write that")
• And, occasionally, brave souls who challenge the faulty logic, lack of evidence, or sheer idiocy of other commentators. 

Now, I know and hope that anyone reading this knows that comments on a news site do not reflect the general level of discourse. There is a strong inclination toward aggressive trolling and generally hostile interaction that comes from a combination of the security of anonymity and simply the demographics involved. And as I keep discovering, to my constant delight, for all the idiots making these kinds of posts and comments, there are many more who have no part in that discourse and just enjoy the game. I usually meet them on the RTA Red Line going to ballgames. I find them in the stands watching the game. 

Increasingly, and this is a very important point, I'm finding the better fans of the game claiming social media. Even as I write this I'm sending and receiving messages on Twitter from Cleveland fans delighted with a close, tight 1-1 game in the top of the 9th. 

This is why I say that the most important recurring motif I'm seeing in communication by Shapiro and the rest of the Indians Organization is expressing confidence in the fans and in Cleveland as a great city for baseball. Because this speaks directly to people like the fans I talk to on the train and the fans I follow on Twitter. This helps encourage us. 

The reality of the situation is that since the front office, especially Shapiro, are immediately put on the defensive, they've already lost. No amount of fact, no disclosure of information, no dose of reality matters. There is an established narrative that determines and decides what most people think, however idiotic. When you have to react to that, you've already given that narrative control. 

It really remains up to us to reclaim the narrative and redirect it. 

#GoTribe