◆The Barbaric Yawp Project

You know what's wrong with America? Nobody goes there anymore. It's too crowded. I've been watching what's going on and I want to say something about it. When you come to a fork in the road America took it. Both of them. At the same time. In opposite directions. That's not easy to do. But America's always been talented that way. The future ain't what it used to be. I remember when the future was something you looked forward to. Now everybody's looking backward at it and saying that's the future we want. You can't look backward into the future. I tried that once. I walked into a wall. The wall didn't apologize. I played for Casey Stengel. Casey used to say things that made no sense until they made all the sense. Turns out everybody does it now. Especially the people who are supposed to make sense. The difference is when Casey said something that made no sense it turned out to be true. When these fellas say something that makes no sense it turns out to be something they just made up. There's a big difference between profound and made up. I know which one I was. I'm not so sure about them. Baseball teaches you things. It teaches you that 90% of the game is half mental. The mental half is the part where you think about what's actually happening. A lotta people have stopped doing that half. The other half is easier. The other half is just believing what the manager tells you and not looking at the field. A manager who tells you not to look at the field is not a good manager. A good manager lets you see the field. Even when what's on the field is not what you wanted. Especially then. It ain't over till it's over. People forget the second part of that. The second part is: it's over when it's over. You can stand at the plate and say it ain't over all you want. If the game is over the game is over. What you can't do — what nobody can do — is make the game go on by refusing to leave the field. I was never sure what to call that but I know it when I see it. A team that plays for one man instead of for each other doesn't win. It might win games. It won't win seasons. Because the season is long and one man gets tired and one man makes mistakes and one man eventually thinks he's bigger than the game. Nobody's bigger than the game. The problem is some people stop playing the game and start playing a different game where they make the rules up as they go. That game doesn't have a World Series at the end. It just keeps going until somebody calls it. So here's what I want to say to America. You've made the wrong mistake. The wrong mistake is the kind where you know it was wrong while you were making it and you made it anyway because it felt like the right wrong thing to do. I've made wrong mistakes. Ask my wife Carmen. The difference is I knew they were wrong mistakes and I didn't pretend they were right. You can fix a wrong mistake. You can't fix a wrong mistake you're still calling right. It gets late early out there. I said that about left field in Yankee Stadium when the shadows came in in October. You had to be ready for the ball earlier than you thought. The light changed and if you weren't paying attention you lost the ball in the shadows and what was coming at you looked like nothing until it hit you. It gets late early out there, America. The shadows are already here. Pay attention. The ball is in the air. It ain't over. But it gets over faster than you think if you lose it in the shadows. Keep your eye on the ball. That's the whole thing. Keep your eye on the ball.