The Globalization of Baseball

No sport provokes as much hackneyed philosophy as baseball. Today is Opening Day in North America, and as we celebrate the return of the National Pastime from its four-month hibernation, the game's romantics are busy again, telling us how the sport is a parable for life in too many ways to count. Baseball is also supposed to be something uniquely American, right up there with apple pie in the pantheon of the national iconography. Stadiums will be draped with patriotic red, white and blue bunting today; state leaders and mayors will throw out the first pitch; country music stars will sing the national anthem.

This year, though, there is something ominous about the saccharine haze surrounding Opening Day. The season actually started last week with a two-game series between the Chicago Cubs and New York Mets in Japan, where there was presumably no red, white and blue bunting in the grandstands. The move has provoked angry reactions from many fans who believe that Major League Baseball, especially Opening Day, should stay in America. Among players, St. Louis Cardinals slugger Mark McGwire, the home run king, has been the most vocal critic of the series in Japan: "People come to America, they come here to watch our game. I think it's the bottom line," he said. "They [Major League Baseball] want to copy what the N.F.L. and the N.B.A. are doing. What's different? The N.F.L. and the N.B.A. are not the American pastime."

Though McGwire's fears are understandable, surely baseball can grow into an international sport without losing its historical place in American culture. Already baseball is played across the Caribbean and South America and in parts of Asia; even a few European countries, including Italy and Germany, have fledgling leagues. Growth is good for the game; the talent pool today is getting deeper, and more people across the world are following the major leagues that ever before. And through it all, there's no evidence that the sport's "American-ness" has suffered. America has invented a great game, a national treasure. Bringing it to the rest of the world isn't going to take away from its popularity at home.

The globalization of baseball is a blessing, not a threat, to America's national pastime. Players from dozens of nations will take the field today in major league cities across America, and the sport is better for it.