Play Ball! You’ve heard that before. It’s all about Baseball, the game that brings tons of people to the Valley for spring training. The game that gave us Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, and Yogi Berra, to name a few historical players who helped Baseball be America’s favorite pastime.

As a very small child, I remember a baseball game always being heard in our house, in our car, at a picnic . . . no matter where I was, my family was listening to a Dodger or Yankee game, of course, since we lived in the New York area. And, additionally, we acquired box seats at Yankee stadium right behind the home dugout when I was a teenager. Here’s a little trivia: Mickey Mantle’s house was right behind our house, so our backyards were back-to-back, and in those days there were no fences.

Surprise, I am not a baseball fan, nor was I ever. The game, in my opinion, is way too long and boring. The average game takes more than 3 hours to play. Sitting in the hot sun while people are gulping down beers and eating hot dogs covered with everything you can imagine is not my idea of quality time.

I recently when to an event where Joe Garagiola, Jr. mentioned that there was going to be a few changes to the game because it’s the only sport that didn’t use a time clock. Well, finally, but it will probably take forever to finalize the new rules because the decision makers probably move as slow as their game.

My suggestion is to shorten the game to one inning, and use a second inning only as a tie-breaker. The disputes between the players and the umpires, the umpires and the managers, and the two teams playing can be eliminated. No time for fighting, just play the damn game and get it over with.

Oh, and if you go to the games just to eat, ballpark franks and beer are available in every sports bar where you can yell for your team, not have to wait for your food, and have no chance of getting hit in the head with a wild ball.