To Demote or Promote?
There are plenty of words in the English language that rankle my sensibilities, but few of them so consistently annoy me as “always”. It seems like such an innocent word, but how many times is the word “always” used correctly? It’s a sloppy word, used when someone is putting together a hasty argument and doesn’t have the time to merit defenses or facts to support them. “The Yankees always field a good team.” “Steroid use is always immoral.” “The better team always wins.” As much as we may want arguments (and life) to be black and white, cut and dried, very rarely is this the case. Life is full of contradictions, nuances, and shades of gray.
There are many baseball debates that tend to get polarized, but one common one during Spring Training is the debate over what to do with top prospects. If a team starts a top rated prospect in the minor leagues, there’s a public outcry about how the team is manipulating that player’s service time to serve their own best interest, keeping the player for an extra season and keeping the player’s salary lower for a longer period of time. The demotion has nothing to do with talent, but everything to do with money.
In most instances, though, the debate is far from this simple.
