-Nothing is going on! -yelled my Spanish friend with frustration. It was a cool summer day, and we were sitting near first base in Shea Stadium, as Pedro Martinez prepared to take the mound.
Baseball is a game of absences, where the “action” is what happens between plays. It’s like Jacques Derrida’s (kooky) approach to language, where he famously stated meaning was held in the blank space between words, not in the words themselves. Some sports (albeit very few of them) work as perennial tension-builders where the most interesting things happen away from the action.
Baseball (and golf, and chess) can be a nerve-racking affair for passionate fans. I know people in Europe don’t understand the sport -and I don’t judge them-, but if you’ve ever played baseball, you’ve probably experienced a lot of waiting, sitting about and tobacco-chewing. No, baseball players aren’t sleek gazelles that can gobble up the field in seconds like Mbappé: their strength lies in the mental discipline needed to be able to perform for a few minutes in a game that can last between 2 and 4 hours. You’ll only get 3 or 4 at-bats, and each at-bat only tolerates 3 misses (strikes): so for players, the level of mental discipline and commitment needed to go out there and hit the ball once every half an hour is outstanding. It’s a mental game.
For fans, the game is completely open before the ball is in play. In this space of nothingness, strategies are crafted and possibilities are carefully weighed one against the other. It’s nothing short of Schrödinger’s cat: the mental experiment in which the cat is both dead and alive as long as the box is sealed.
Before Pedro Martinez throws the ball, everything is possible: will he throw a strike? Will the batter connect? Will the runner on base go for a steal? A plethora of options open up in the fan’s mind as he ponders and discusses with his friends what the best strategy would be.
That’s when everything happens in baseball. Once the pitch is thrown, the spell is broken: we follow the play for a couple of seconds, gasp, cheer or fume, and then retreat into nothingness, waiting for the next play, debating heatedly the new collection of possibilities that lie before us.
Baseball is a very different experience from the emotional roller-coaster football and basketball can be. when the ball is always in play, you can follow the action glued to your TV, in perpetual fascination. Baseball, on the other hand, is a cerebral game, like chess. You have to wait. You have to think. You have to understand how to see all that’s going on in those moments of nothingness.
Ultimately, you either get it, or you don’t. I couldn’t explain to my Spanish friend the importance of bringing Pedro Martinez in at that moment, or how the game could change at that point. He just looked at me blankly and nodded, before going to get more beer.
This reminded me of my trip to Egypt, when I had the incredible opportunity of going inside the pyramid of Kheops. We were travelling on a tour bus and after walking down the claustrophobic little corridor that takes you inside, we reached the Pharaoh’s chamber (or what is said to be his chamber). I was fascinated. However, once back on the bus, one of the other tourists said:
-What a ripoff! There’s nothing there.
This made my blood boil and I couldn’t help but answer:
-Nothing there? What do you mean, “nothing there”? You just visited the world’s most incredible stargate, you walked on stones over 4,500 years old, you descended deep into the ground and then emerged *exactly* under the zenith of this amazing structure, and that’s “nothing” to you? What were you expecting, a golden statue? A sack of diamonds? Did you look inside yourself? Did you not feel the cosmic call?
He gave me a strange look, raised an eyebrow and went back to his seat, to fiddle with his silly cell phone.
“Things” are there, they’re everywhere. We just have to employ “correct looking”, as the Buddha said! Personally, I’ve never understood people who claim they’re bored with life, saying they can’t find anything interesting. Oh, really? How about you just look up? There’s a giant fireball burning in the middle of our solar system, stars and meteorites are bursting through the night, clouds create magnificent colors that adorn our blue planet as we hurtle through space… And you can’t find anything interesting to think about? Really?
Enjoy your life, guys. It’ll all be gone in a second. While we’re here, “I vow to live deeply in the present”, as Thích Nhất Hạnh said, because the rest of it, society, work, roles and responsibilities… are just an elaborate farce, something you understand when you meditate.