There's just something about the smell of the grass, the blinding hue of your team's home whites, the wonderful sound when your favorite player really connects on a swing, and you just know that ball is going to leave the yard...
Baseball is beautiful, but random. Every time you tune in for a game, you might get to see something that's never happened before.
Maybe you'll see a pitcher's duel, a no-hitter, a perfect game.
Perhaps you'll be treated to a slugfest, in which prodigious hitters wallop towering home runs, and the final score would look more appropriate following a football game.
But even if that particular game doesn't make history, when you watch a Major League Baseball game you'll watch some of the most talented athletes in the world display their skills on the hunt for victory. Young phenoms and aging legends taking the field together in pursuit of a common goal.
Anything can happen when you watch a baseball game; the possibilities are truly endless, as unpredictable as the trajectory of a knuckleball.
And here we are, together on Opening Day: the cleanest of slates, with the summer months looming tantalizingly in front of us. Will your team make a run for the pennant? Will that promising rookie fulfill his potential? Will your favorite player be the MVP or Cy Young winner?
Or will things turn sour? Perhaps untimely injuries, ill-timed bullpen implosions, or clubhouse drama might derail your baseball hopes and dreams?
One lucky club might float through 2018 without issue, staking out first place on Opening Day and never relinquishing it. Some might lose five straight out of the gate, then stay in the cellar before selling off any useful pieces by July.
Most teams will spend the season in between, fighting it out over 162 game for a single coveted playoff spot.
I hope your team is successful this season (unless they're playing against mine). But even if your team is terrible, mired in a "rebuild," or taken down by injuries, I hope you find the wonder in baseball's small moments, in fan interactions and incredible defensive plays.
No matter the trajectory of your team in 2018, I hope you find time to step back during the long season and reflect on the beauty of baseball.
How lucky we are that we get to watch it, and debate it, and whine about it.
How lucky we are to have our hopes built up every year on Opening Day, even if the odds of coming out on top by October might be slim.
How lucky we are to have baseball.
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