The Bench-Clearing Brawl, the Latest in Team-Building
Even the casual student of the game of baseball has to admire the many gifts it has brought to the culture.
You may watch the teams run out onto the green fields of play and think to yourself: ‘I see now, there is a spread-out part to this game, there is a close-in part. There is occasional teamwork, occasional grandstanding, many successes, but more failures. Even the mightiest hitters never get on more than one time out of three. For the longest amount of time hardly anything happens at all and then of a sudden an extraordinary number of things happen. Somewhat remindful of life, this whole thing.’
The home run king taking his practice swipes in the batter’s box; the relief pitcher brushing back the batter who has been mocking him; the secret signals between pitcher and catcher. There is material enough and metaphor enough here for any number of stories and poems and in fact, for practice in real life.
Who hasn’t seen in conversation between, say, one of those aging-lion types of CEOs and a young hotshot who has overstepped his bounds, a quick verbal brushback that puts the cocky youngster in his place?
Who doesn’t, walking into a crowded reception, exchange signals with a friend on the other side of the room using nothing but his eyes, his eyebrows, an occasional gesture of the head one way or the other? Should he head to the open bar? Should he tell a few jokes? Should he stay quietly on the sidelines to see what develops? The fellow at the other end shakes his head politely at the first two, then nods briskly at the last one, the two of them just like a pitcher and catcher who roll through the options and decide on the next pitch.
This is adequate for the finer points of the game but one scene of real drama hasn’t yet made the transition to daily social life: the bench-clearing brawl.
On these occasions, provoked beyond human endurance by a bad call, a hit batter, a cleats-first slide into one of the bases, first the two immediate antagonists make ready to trade blows while those around them try to hold them back, and then, in a swarming motion, the rest of the players – and I mean all the rest of the players, down to the bat boys and the guy who sluices out the floor of the dugout – rush out onto the field, find someone to tackle or punch, and then go at it for as long as they can get away with.
It is a bit like a sudden war when one country bursts out of its bounds and lays claim to another, while only realizing too late that the other country’s army lies in its way.
There is a particular look on the faces of the participants in the throes of these bedlams and at the end as they reluctantly walk back to their dugout. That look is happiness. Or joy. Or satisfaction. Something like that. A certain pleasure in being alive and having gotten some things straightened out.
There is just something about these brawls that clears the air, gives use to a lot of pent-up energy, and builds bonds between teammates…and even a new respect for their opponents.
The aggression doesn’t seem to last beyond the inning and it is hard to imagine that any of the participants, particularly on the periphery, bear any ill will to the other team. It was, you know, merely a way of getting your opinion out there for discussion.
It is a spectacle that just doesn’t exist otherwise in society, this unleashment of aggression in the name of team spirit, followed of course by the subsequent satisfaction.
This is what is due for a change, this business of it otherwise not really being out there in ordinary life.
It is often observed that we are a people under stress. There is much on our minds, many things to thrash out, and little in the way of the activities of our forebears — such as chasing down wildebeests for dinner or sprinting in the opposite direction from a sabertooth tiger to avoid becoming his — to work off steam or otherwise to put our energies to good use.
It accounts for many a dark mood and a gruff response to loved ones at the end of the day. The question is often asked: is there no common activity that we can all get involved in?
Why not the bench-clearing brawl?
Start right there at the stadium. No need to limit the brawl to the players. Fans in the stands have just as much passion at stake.
Open the gates I say, and let them file safely down to the field and then rush over to the center of the action and start landing blows. The women could swing their purses, the children could bite their opponents on the calf.
The hot dog men and the cotton candy vendors, weary of trudging the same steep stairs inning after inning, would no doubt relish a quick sprint down to field level where they might practice the judo and karate moves they perfect in their free time.
The fine people who call the games for the networks along with their camera crews can use a break themselves – and seldom get it in the long course of a continuous nine innings – and sign off long enough to throw a few punches.
Nearly all of these baseball fields are located within areas of dense urban development.
Office buildings, hotel complexes, and strip malls alike are full of people devoted to the sport, or at least devoted to conflict. I say cut them loose from the routine of the day and bus them over to the stadium where they can enter in an orderly manner and fling themselves into what now is a swirling stew of humanity, similar in perspective to one of those views of a hurricane shot from above.
Now this is team spirit! This is the sporting instinct! Brought to the people, by the people, for the people.
But my thinking, always subtle and often far-sighted, sees no reason to stop there.
There are many occasions in the ordinary course of life when a good bench-clearing brawl would clear the air and let proceedings move forward with no one wondering anymore where anyone else stood on the matter.
There are weddings where there is a certain spirit in the air perceptible to even the most casual observer.
What to call this emotion that runs so thick between the two sides of the church? Hate, I suppose.
It seems as if a Hatfield is marrying a McCoy or a Capulet a Montague. While the two main participants have found a way around the antagonism between the two families, absolutely no one else has.
When further into the ceremony the preacher asks if there is any reason why these two lovebirds should not marry, there is a show of hands, and as attendees instead recite the reasons why they can’t imagine why the couple should be married, this takes time and is hard to sort out.
How much more direct an approach to simply cross the aisle, rush the opposing pitcher, I mean, opposing family member, and just start swinging?
Soon enough the entire congregation is engaged in this beneficial aerobic activity, with bridesmaids whacking opposing groomsmen with their bouquets, and elderly matrons bringing their umbrellas into play.
This sets the tone for the coming years between the families.
In other circumstances entirely, let us let a Battle of the Bands be an honest Battle of the Bands.
Cheering madly for your band and holding lighters solemnly aloft during the ballads seem mild compared to a real show of loyalty…yes, a bench-clearing brawl. Not only is this good physical exercise, it gives the participant occasion to form his or her thoughts on the matter, and exchange views with the loyal fan of another band, however misguided those views may be.
Corporate America, by the light of some observers, is enmeshed in a series of ritualistic behaviors that don’t cease to exist just because no one spells them out for you.
You know at the corporate retreat that you are expected to smile and congratulate your rival in the Upper South Midwest North Region, who has, through some piece of larceny, scored the McGregor account when it was rightfully yours and will no doubt mess it up badly.
Instead of approaching him with outstretched hand, why not lead with your fists? There is a lot of tension between the regions in any event, everybody know it. Why not simply let nature take its course and stage a bench-clearing brawl?
Almost any public occasion has its sides, its proponents and opponents, its advocates and naysayers, however submerged they are by social niceties.
Why let the next poetry reading, art opening, ballet performance, or opera premier labor under a blanket of bland head-nodding or mild frowns? Wade in there, my friend, and throw a few punches, and let your critical voice be heard! You’ll find many others eager to participate, I assure you.
This gets a lot of issues out in the open, promote honest dialogue, and establishes a rapport between people who prior to this didn’t really have that much in common. Now they have the experience of the brawl itself, and will look back on it fondly in the coming years as the time people really came together as one.
We can all learn from sports; you just have to know where to look for the lessons.
