Children's Letters to Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig
by Enis Esmer
It's no fun being a kid anymore. Smothered by overly protective parents and living in an increasingly cynical world, children are forced to hastily abandon the cherished illusions of their youth. Gone are the days when kids could set up a lemonade stand, or play dodgeball at recess, or smoke a cigarette they found in a dead hobo's pocket. What's worse, the last of childhood's institutions are being revealed as frauds.
Even major league baseball, haven of juvenile wonder and family tradition, seems doomed. What used to be a simple game, a bond between a boy and his father, or a girl and her lesbian moms, has exposed itself as a filthy, money-grubbing machine on wheels with dollar-sign hubcaps. If ball players go on strike this season, it will be one more undeserved spanking on the collective bottom of children everywhere. With that in mind, here are some "imagineered" letters from kids around the world to Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig.
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Dear Mr. Selig,
Please don't have a strike. I love baseball. Last time I was at a game with my dad I had the BEST TIME! I saw a home run, and a double play, and my dad got me a hot dog, and pizza, and mini donuts, and a kiddie nugget meal, and two ice cream sandwiches, and a jumbo pretzel, and garlic fries, and a grilled steak wrap. It was great. A guy told my dad if I kept eating like that, I could be a baseball player one day. My dad laughed so hard at that.
Philip Beatty, 9
Amherst, Massachusetts
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Dear Commissioner Selig,
Please don't let there be a strike! It would make my dad so sad. He's been playing baseball all his life, and every time he hears about the strike, he starts to cry. And sometimes he throws things. One time I forgot to tape American Idol, and he cried so much he started trembling, and he got all these weird pimples on his face. He says baseball shrank his testicles. Is that possible?
Laura Canseco, 12
Hanford, California
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Dear Bud Selig,
I don't know much about the strike, but I do know baseball needs to reinstate Pete Rose. Now there was a ballplayer. I mean, I'm just a little kid, but if the all-time hits leader can't be in the Hall of Fame, that's a goddamned travesty. It's not like he killed a guy.
Timmy Smith, 5
pete_rose@hotmail.com
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Dear Captain Selig,
Strike? No way jose! Baseball rules forever, slugger! 2000 to the max! Thanks to make Ichiro so success. One best wish of me - no more blow saves AHAHAHAHA!
Tomatsu Hirogoshi, 14
Osaka, Japan
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Dear Mr. Selig,
Seriously, how come you don't like Pete Rose? I heard you won't return his calls. What did he ever do to you? You weren't even in baseball when he beat the hits record. And he didn't just beat it by a little bit. He smashed it. So what if he made a few bets? Ty Cobb is in the Hall of Fame, and he's a known racist. What kind of twisted morality bullshit is that?
Tommy Smith, 11
peterose@peterose.com
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Attn: Mr. Selig
Re: Looming MLB Strike
I have never seen a baseball game in my life. However, my older brother often steals USA Today from the men who oversee the diamond mines in my village. I taught myself to read English using the articles on the baseball strike. I am writing to say it is quite sad to see a man of your supposed power reduced to a puppet, controlled by the board of franchise owners. And how can a league's commissioner also own one of the teams in that league? The immensity of that conflict of interest is staggering, and the fact it was allowed to happen makes a laughing stock out of a) professional sports in America, and b) the culture that supports them. Hopefully your authority will soon be usurped in a coup of some sort.
Ayodele Nangila, 7
Kolmanskop, Namibia
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Dear Bud,
Thanks for fucking up baseball. None of the kids at school will be my friend. If I turn gay, blame yourself. Mom says stop calling the house.
Matty Selig, 6
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
