Griping about baseball's drift

   If I sound a little befuddled it's because I am trying to stay up late to watch the baseball playoffs.
   If God wanted baseball games to run four hours plus, He would have called it golf.
   Four minutes for commercials and network hype between every half inning adds up to the average length of a baseball game in the 1950s, the last time the game was true blue.
   I like watching baseball, but there is no way I could sit in a ballpark seat for four hours. And no way I could stand in line to use the bathrooms every two innings.
   At home, I can nap during the 45 pitches that get fouled off on a 3-2 count, get a snack up in the kitchen, make a soda pop run to the fridge in the garage, make a potty break and if I miss anything, I can catch the play on one of the 23 replays they will run over the next five minutes (except during commercials; they never run replays during commercials).
   While I'm grumping, can I just say the game would also be faster if players were not allowed to wear batting gloves and various forms of body armor at the plate? It wouldn't be so bad if they'd just show up with the batting gloves, but they have to adjust the gloves, both of them, after every pitch, which requires that they step out of the batting box, look around, fidget, and do it all over again.
   Then they also have to adjust their shin protector, elbow or bicep protector, and whatever other protector that they deem out of place before the pitcher gets the sign for the next pitch. By that time, I'm thinking about getting into my Doctor Dentons.
   I'm not finished: Can we leave our jewelry collection at home, please? If you wear the good stuff on the ball field, what do you have left for the Grand Ball?
   And it's not Halloween all year, so get rid of the lumberjack beards, buccaneer moustaches and  pirate tattoos.
   It's a ball game, not a costume party.