The Importance of Spring Training

Baseball, and specifically the Red Sox, are an all out obsession of mine for two hundred and ten or so days of the year, starting with the first pitch around April 1st and ending, with any luck, as I carve pumpkins in October.
Stepping out of my own skin for a second and looking critically at myself, it might cause me to take pause and wonder how healthy that obsession is. Behind Family, Work (to bring in money to support said family) and Friends, the Red Sox take a back seat to nothing. If I am completely honest, they definitely take disproportionate share of my attention away from the other two higher priorities in my life during pivotal points in a season (i.e. the nineteen times per season the opposing lineup card leads off with Johnny Damon), and the pennant race and post-season…forget about it.
So where am I going with all this? Spring Training.
Full disclosure; I sit overlooking the beaches of Fort Myers, Florida right now. My family has been coming to Fort Myers since the late 1960’s where my grandparents have a place down on the end of the beach. My Fort Myers vacationing predates the Red Sox by at least two Major League franchises. I grew up going to the occasional Kansas City Royals Spring Training games seeing George Brett and Willie Wilson, the toothpicked wonder.
I sit here in Fort Myers like many other Red Sox and Twins fans who have made the mecca to see an advanced screening of their team this Spring; except I am not here for baseball. To be honest, Spring Training is as needed as a warm up for the regular season for the fan in me as it is for the players.
Every spring, I get excited as the build up to pitchers and catchers reporting fills the chill New England air with a familiar buzz. The baseball fan in me begins to wake up from the surreal dream world of the Hot Stove. As I come to, I need Spring Training to get myself grounded with the fact that baseball is back. Unlike some of the cars that roll into the Fort Myers Training facility, I can’t go from zero to sixty with my obsession the second the gates are opened. I need to ease my way back into the grind of the season ahead.
I start by ordering my pre-season annuals from the Hardball Times and the Red Sox Annual (in conjunction with SOSH). I slowly obsess over my fantasy baseball draft big boards. I lament the dead period of sports between the Super Bowl and March Madness.
It’s almost as if the Sporting Gods deemed mid February to mid March as time for husbands to pay their dues with their wives and fathers to spend just a little more time with their kids; baseball season is coming.
As Spring Training reports begin to fly and the first games are played, I can’t bring myself to watch a full nine innings or obsess over outcomes. I am just not ready for that level of full out sprint yet. I haven’t done the requisite stretching and training regimen that Spring Training requires.
But each day, as we creep ever so closer to Opening Day, I feel stronger and stronger. I feel more and more ready to fully embrace baseball back into my daily, if not hourly, routine.
So as I sit here lamenting that I’ll still be in Fort Myers this week, while Doug Mirabelli will not, I understand the importance of Spring Training for the fan. Instead of stalking players outside the baseball complex, I will be taking my daughter in the ocean for the first time. Instead of spending three hours each night in a virtual conversation with Jerry Remy and Don Orsillo, I’ll have a real conversation with my wife. And while I enjoy every second of it, I’ll also enjoy knowing that when I return home from the Fort, real baseball (albeit in Japan) will only be one week away and I’ll be mentally prepared to tackle a new season at the levels of obsession that has come to be expected from me.