The Offseason
VIEWPOINT
By RALPH HARDIN
Evening Times Editor
I’m a big baseball fan, so even though I’m pretty bummed my Atlanta Braves got bumped from the playoffs pretty early, the Dodgers are a great team (the best team money can buy apparently — Ha!), so kudos to them.
I am, however, a little miffed I won’t get anymore baseball until the Spring of 2025. Until then, I’ll have to get by on football and pro wrestling — oh, and playing “MLB: The Show,” a pretty sweet video game that even I can figure out the controls for, even though my video gaming these days is limited to Candt Crush and Wordle-type games.
Yes, baseball is in what’s called The Offseason. Most major sports have them. It’s that period between the end of one season and the beginning of the next one. For football, it’s basically February to August. For the NBA, it’s July to October. It
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varies from sport to sport and league to league, and it happens from little league ball to the pros.
And you know what? It only makes sense. These athletes perform at the highest level on the biggest stage, so why not have a long break, to heal up, relax, unwind and get refreshed for the start of the next season?
You know what else makes sense? Giving everyone an offseason. No, I’m serious. I used to teach school, and one of the big perks (because it sure ain’t the money) was the extended breaks… a week in the spring, two weeks at Christmas, a couple of months in the summer. It’s a shame that we don’t have something like that for all workers. At best, most can expect a couple of weeks a year or a two-orthree- day mini vacation.
Some don’t even get that.
There’s got to be a way, whether it’s through crosstraining or overlapping redundancies or something where the average full-time worker gets to take a break from the stresses of their daily grind and enjoy some time away from work. Other countries do it and they seem pretty functional. Of course, they’ve also made universal health care work, so…
I’ve seen some companies are going to a four-day work week . That’s a good start. But it would be nice for all of us to have ourselves a bit of an offseason.
