Professional baseball would do well to avoid politics, assessed Ron Swoboda, author of Here’s the Catch: A Memoir of the Miracle Mets and More, offering his remarks on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Sunday with host Joel Pollak.
Ron “Rocky” Swoboda is best known for his ninth-inning diving catch to help preserve the New York Mets’ 1969 World Series Game 4 victory. He also drove in the clinching run in Game 5 as a highlight of his nine-year MLB career, six with the Mets and some time with the New York Yankees.
Pollak asked about recent political expressions in professional basketball and football leagues, including former San Francisco 49ers quarterback and Nike-sponsored athlete Colin Kaepernick’s kneeling during the national anthem.
“I’d love for baseball to be one other few things in our culture these days that avoids politics, because it seems like everything else has been affected by it,” Swoboda said. “We have managed, somehow, as Americans to separate ourselves pretty far politically from the ends of our political spectrum, which I don’t think is good for anybody.”
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Minor league baseball players aspiring to play in the major leagues are the hardest hit by shutdowns of professional baseball, assessed Swoboda.
“Besides the fans and people that care about the game — and I include myself in that number — the real losers are the minor leaguers, because they’ve got nothing,” Swoboda stated. “The owners of my team from New Orleans went to Wichita to build a brand new stadium for a AAA ball club, and they’re not playing any games and they’re firing and laying people off.”
Swoboda will be joining 1969 Mets World Series champions Ed Kranepool and Art Shamsky in a pair of free live moderated video question and answer sessions on Thursday at 4:00 p.m. Eastern. The events will be streamed live on Facebook, Twitch, and YouTube.
Breitbart News Sunday broadcasts live on SiriusXM Patriot 125 from 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. Eastern.
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