I suspect that, statistically speaking, grading down from total baseball nuts to those who can't imagine liking a "slow" game, I would be in about the 80% percentile... not a obsessed nut, but definitely a baseball fan. Other fans will understand what I mean when I say that I was fathered by a Cubs fan, so an appreciation for the game itself has to mean a lot more than winning pennants.

I like to think of a baseball game as being like a new day. Chances are good that it will be like yesterday, rather uneventful, filled with routine happenings... stuff that you expected. That doesn't mean it was a bad day, just a normal day. Most baseball games are like that... a few bright spots, a few downers, and a lot of what you've seen many times. Like days, though, a baseball game can have a momentary thrill that you won't forget for a long time... IF you were watching and if you understand the game well enough to appreciate what happened.

Sometimes a team makes brilliant plays and still loses (recently true of the Twins). I'll watch games like that any day of the week and be satisfied. Sure, a win would have been nice, but the PLAY is the reason to be a baseball fan. Watching Juan Castro play some of the best infield I've ever seen has been awesome. Watching the Twins infield deke an opposing runner into running when he should have tagged up, was a thing of beauty... a masterpiece of cunning, practice, and acting that STILL required a great throw in from Torii Hunter to be successful... but ALL of that happened, in a matter of seconds, and it worked... a routine outfield fly ball turned into a double play. Stunning... worth watching a couple of "routine" games just to catch a play like that.

I'd love to talk more baseball... outfield play, pitching, and managerial cunning, but my purpose is to convince you that I LOVE baseball, and that I'm not a fair-weather fan. It's easy to be a Twins fan now that they're one of the really professional and winning teams in baseball, but I was a fan when they were an also-ran.

Despite my love of the game, I do NOT want those of you who can't appreciate it to have to subsidize what I enjoy. I enjoy having a major-league team here, and being able to watch the very best players regularly, but a simple fact remains: Polls have consistently, for many years, shown that a large majority of Minnesotans do NOT want to pay anything for a stadium, even if it means losing the Twins. They have felt the threat of loss of the Twins many times, and watched the North Stars leave the area, so they KNOW what NOT supporting a stadium can mean. It's sad but apparently true that there just are not enough baseball fans here to support a major-league team in the style to which such teams have become accustomed.

Other cities have taxed, and tricked, their citizenry into supporting stadiums, to benefit the special interests who will actually profit from having major-league baseball played here... the downtown business interests, construction unions, and politicians wanting a star on their record. Such cities have ripped off their own citizens and raised the stakes, giving MLB and team owners the leverage to demand tax support.

The latest proposal (of many) is from Hennepin County, to help fund a stadium by raising the local sales tax by .15%. A $360 million open stadium, with another $90 million for land and infrastructure improvements, on the north side of downtown Minneapolis would be built with $125 million from the Twins, leaving $325 million to be financed with tax-exempt bonds covered by the sales tax increase. Those costs don't include a roof, which the state would have to pay for, if added.

Speaking of a roof... think back... wasn't the weather a whole lot worse when the Twins and Vikings played outdoors? I think Gawd Murphy decreed that as long as they played in the dome, the weather would be great OUTside. Note that the Twins were snowed out in Detroit's snazzy outdoor Comerica Park on Saturday and Sunday. I figure that the slightly warmer temps over the past 20 years are not from global warming, but because of the increase in domed stadiums. Murphy IS a contrarian, you know.

No, it's not much of a sales tax increase. As they're touting it... 3 cents on a $20 purchase. Of all the stadium deals proposed in recent years, it sounds like the least painful for the taxpayers. But... do the taxpayers WANT the bump in sales tax? Those proposing the deal seem to agree that this is something the taxpayers would NOT support, so they don't intend to ask:

Any attempts by lawmakers to require a county referendum on the ballpark tax will be fought by team and county officials, said Finstad (state Rep. Brad Finstad, R-New Ulm) and the other sources, who asked for anonymity until Monday's expected news conference. A "no'' vote in a referendum would kill the Twins project, as it did in St. Paul in 1999.

So... our civic leaders are willing to push this through in spite of believing that residents won't approve it? Is it really any wonder that citizens have come to view elected officials as opponents rather than public servants?

Unless you're a fan who wants a subsidized stadium, you've come to understand that this stadium plan, like all other government plans, will not happen the way it's being described now. The total cost will inexplicably rise, and other downsides will occur, and we'll listen to excuses similar to those explaining why the great Metrodome is no longer acceptable. It was another grand scheme when proposed; somehow it no longer is.

Enjoyment of baseball does not require a grand setting. Remember, it's a sport... it's entertainment. If you really want to enjoy the game in person, hit Midway Stadium for the St. Paul Saints. It's the way baseball used to be, before major-league baseball grew into a massive corporate conglomerate with the power to corrupt cities into subsidizing ever-more-luxurious stadiums.

Baseball (and football, etc.), like any other business, must carry it's own load. There is a level at which a team can be profitable, including the construction and maintenance of the venue in which they play. Just like all the rest of us, they have to learn to spend less than they make. There is no reason why sports teams should be treated to subsidies at the expense of taxpayers who don't share a love of the game, or who can't afford to include baseball tickets in their budget. Judging from ticket sales for a subsidized team, that's a very big majority of us.

Baseball is a business, and we have thousands of businesses that don't receive subsidies... if fact, most of them get pushed around by grand schemes such as a new ballpark. If a business requires a subsidy, it isn't a viable business. I have no desire for Minneapolis to be a "major-league" city, as stadium proponents like to put it, if it means forcing everyone to pay for it to happen. If a stadium can't be financed by those who would profit from it, then let it remain unbuilt.