The Michigan Daily
Edited and managed by Students at the
University of Michigan
Friday, June 18, 1976
News Phone: 764-0552
Basebdll's debauchement
THE ACTIONS this past week involving the Oakland
Athletics, Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees base-
ball teams underscores the absurd monetary shenani-
gans which threaten to make a shambles of a sport whose
charm and lore have found a niche in the hearts of
Americans for over one hundred years.
If the signing two years ago of star aitcher Catfish
Hunter by the New York Yankees for $3.75 million wasn't
enough, the Oakland Athletic's eccentric owner, Charles
Finley, staged one of the gaudier clearance sales of the
century early this week when he sold two of his star
players to Boston for $1 million a piece and another lu-
minary to the Yankees for $1.5 million.
However, Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn
Wednesday held up the transaction until he could in-
vestigate this latest manifestation of big money taking
over the sport.
We hope the commissioner looks seriously into the FOR RHODESIA PANAMA CANAL/UB
latest of the sport's sweepstakes. The bartering of name
players for lofty sums has become rampant, and usually
involves only teams whose coffers can accommodate the
athletes' high price tags. Clearly, New York and Boston
are two of the wealthier teams in their league, and, espe- -
cially in the Yankees' case, fast becoming the only teams
able to afford the cliched 'superstar". MIU JR
The classic institution of baseball has held strong
through the years. To see it degenerate into a battle of
owners and bankbooks would be a national tragedy.
Innocence lost at Loch Ness
...
By JIM '[OBIN
HAD TO WRITE this before
they find the loch Ness
Monster.
A bunch of men with cameras
are poking around that twisting
tech in Scotland, and some
morning this summer the New
York Times, sponsor of the
praject, will tell the world in
held hetidlines that it can for-
get one of its only remaining
legends. the M onster wil be
a \Monster n lintter, but just
a damned ''amtphiittes reptile''
nr sanmething like that, a mere
atnittii rather thian ppari'
tion. They'll catch it nd dis-
plas it and tie it down with
soae L tin cluifi'atan, shun
it in a tank at Sea Wtirld se
middle-aged ladies in stunglasses
and h'iir-nets can Itinch their
hushands and say, "Rex, get
ever here and look at this
thing"
131aspheity'm llo% dare the New
York Times- assault the mystic
underwater castles of magina-
tine where The Mtonster slinks
and slithers! Don't they under-
stand the delicious fear of a
twelve-year-old first contemplat-
ing Loch Ness and its -hideous
reptilian treasure?
Loch Ness -- the very sound
of it is fog and darkness and
mysterious, unseen presences.
And new they mean to rob the
senses of that shiver felt at
night under flimsy sheets when
thoughts of The Monster creep
Upon the restless sleeper.
Not that the adventure itself
is without appeal. Far from it
There is little I would like so
much as to jettison this drowsy
Ann Arbor summer in favor of
the storied mOuntains and mists
of Drumnadrochit, -Scotland,
where the Times/Academy of
Applied Science expedition is
pursuing its quest. There's an-
other word long departed from
the popular tongue - expedi-
tion. They used to careen off
into jungles and canyons and
up mountains all over the
world; now adventure is passe.
'Told to find Dr. Livingstone,
a modern day Ienry Stanley
would probably beg off, claim-
ing lost Traveler's Checks and
an expired Diner's Club card.
Ah, adventure. There is little
left. A hardy adventurer of to-
day named Robert Marx, a
treasure hunter, recently de-
clared to an Esquire writer,
"Adventure is a full time thing
with me, always was, always
will be. I'm building this ship and that is what these con-
now, you see, an authentic rep- funded scientists in Scotland
lica of a four-thousand-year-old are intent upon. The conquest
Phoenician sailing boat. I'm gon- of a myth, and a myth is no
na sail the fucker from Israel more if smote with fact and
to Yucatan, partly to prove that analysis and the light of sci-
the Phoenicians got here first, ence.
but mostly for the adventure of And so I take up the cause
it man, for the adventure of it." of The Monster, and I weep
But adventure is not conquest, for its approaching exposure.
But more than for The Mon-
ster, I weep for ourselves. If
they find Loch Ness's legend,
as they have climbed MutmiI
Olympus to debunk the Greek
uds life will lose one more
seet piece of the thrilling, and
the world will descend one step
further toward that Doomsday
of McDonald's and soap operas
that beckons to man's blandness
and cowardice.
Not that The Monster can
only be known through courage.
Indeed, it is hardly as excitin"
when confronted with anythint
other than terror, or at least,
- the sort of vicarious terror ex-
perienced from across an ocean,
through imagination alone. Im-
agination is what is at stake;
the loch is huge, wandering,
shrouded in mist, cloaked in
sober forests that warn off visi-
tors - the perfect homeland
for imagination. Here it can
k run free. If they capture The
y[ Monster, they'll capture the im-
agination as well. The Monster
will be but a "species," and
Loch Ness will be only a "habi-
Shfpa .:,tat."
Some fool with a Polaroid SX-
t l 1 70, the official camera of the
s ; expedition, will put the mystery
' u of Loch Ness to rest this sum-
mer, perhaps is doing it right
now. Let us pray that a new
one swims in from the sea.
Jim Tobin is co-director of
AP Photo the -summer editorial page.