I tell you, baseball is all about attitude.
Every pitch can't be a home run; you gotta reserve your power, play it safe. But sometimes, when the bases are loaded and it's all on the line, you gotta put your heart in the game.
You gotta swing for the fences. You gotta give it your all. You gotta slap a big sloppy turd straight into second base and get called out immediately, and the game's over and your team loses and everyone is booing you as you stumble back to your '03 Honda Accord in the parking lot, and you go home to your wife -- your beautiful wife, your powerful wife, so much taller than you, love of your life, joy of your days -- and she tells you she's leaving you for some guy named Derek Broderick, who was starting QB on his high school football team, whose dad owns a Buffalo Wild Wings and lets him manage it, whose friends all call him "Steak" because he ate three steaks at once one time. She's leaving you and the big sloppy turd to second base was the final straw.
So you listen to the radio, and that one song with the really mournful sax solo about living in the city or whatever it's about comes on, and you think about your life and your choices, and you know in your heart what men learn who voyage long at sea. You cry, of course; of course you cry. And you sleep, and you do not dream; but you wake up, and -- you know what the first thing you say to yourself, hoarse-voiced, gentle as a whisper, firm as a promise -- you know what that winds up being?
"Baseball."