July 13, 2007 was a long time ago. Kids born then can get their driver’s license today. We used the phrase “avoid it like the plague” without any sort of real-life context. Tobey McGwire was still Spider-Man. Only five Harry Potter movies existed. The Clone Wars was still a year away from hitting TV screens.
Baseball coverage was a lot different then as well. You could read the Post-Dispatch online without a subscription, though it wasn’t as fancy as it is now. Twitter was about a year and a half old and still a very niche thing, not the driver of daily conversations. Podcasts were still in their infancy. If you had some opinions about the baseball team, you pretty much started up a blog and put them out there to see if anyone wanted to hear them.
Sixteen years ago, I started up this blog. It’s had a couple of different physical addresses, but the general content has been the same. Looking at each game, talking about what the Cardinals did, picking a Hero and a Goat. Lots of different thoughts, lots of different takes, but one thing that I prided myself on was at least some consistency.
Last year, it started slipping. Recaps came once a week or once every two weeks. Less and less made it to the page and more and more was just trying to cover ground that nobody really cared about any more. There was still some general thoughts but the posts got unwieldy as we looked at more and more games.
That was amazingly regular compared to this year.
I’ve not written over here since May 6th. Whether it’s because I’m not watching the games–as most of you know from various spots, I let my DirecTV Stream go due to costs this year–or because I’m now just shy of three weeks away from turning 48, the motivation to get up before work and write just hasn’t been there. It’s harder to feel passionate about this play or that move when you are watching it on a little GameDay animation.
It’s also not like I’ve not stayed informed or opinionated (you can argue the first category, I guess) and there’s no shortage of places you can hear from me. The pun-filled Twitter account is still very active. Pretty much every week you can hear me on Meet Me at Musial and Gateway to Baseball Heaven. I get invited onto other shows from time to time as well, either Cardinal ones or those from the opposition. It’s not like I’ve shrank away into some sort of pocket universe or anything.
I even still write, though it’s usually now at the Substack site. I don’t know why I find it easier to write over there than here. You’d think it would be about the same–it’s difficult to share Twitter links in both places, both have writing options. Heck, over here I can do tables, something I haven’t quite figured out at the other spot. I don’t know if it’s because it doesn’t have all the history and weight of this site, if it’s just the interface is a little more appealing, or I feel like if I write here I should be doing the recaps. I couldn’t tell you but I have found it more interesting to write items over there lately.
I know he’s not someone that many of you may read or agree with, but conservative writer Jonah Goldberg recently put something in his newsletter than I thought was relevant for what’s going on here:
There’s another concept from finance that’s of use here: buy and hold. Again, it’s just a metaphor. But old institutions and relationships are usually more valuable than new ones. That’s because as institutions age, they sink roots. They become habitats. They store knowledge and memory and provide continuity and context. They shape identities intergenerationally. Just as old friendships ground us individually, old institutions give us our bearings and connect us to enduring values and customs collectively. They also elicit greater commitments from leaders and members alike because their age creates a sense of gratitude and obligation to pass on to the next generation. No leader wants to be the one to close the doors on an old institution, they want to be remembered as a vital steward who left the institution stronger than they found it.
I don’t want to shut the doors to this place, though symbolically doing it on the same calendar day that I opened it does have some appeal. I probably will throw things up here every once in a while. If nothing else, series like the Exit Interviews and the always-popular Top Cards on Twitter will work much better here than at Substack. Assuming that Nick still wants to foot the bill for the site, we’ll leave the lights on. And hey, you never know when Josh or Rusty might at least give you some Conclave content.
That said, if you are actually one of those that like what I write, you might go ahead and subscribe at Substack so you can make sure to get whatever I ramble about delivered to your inbox. After all, the Ahsoka series is coming and I’m sure I’ll have thoughts on that!
Thanks for sticking with me for 16 years. Maybe I’ll get a second wind and this will look like some navel-gazing post that didn’t age well, unlike what it looks like now, which is just some navel-gazing post. Appreciate all those that have been along for the ride and we’ll see what other roads we can go down in the years to come.
