FLANNERY TAKES CUT
AT GAME'S PROBLEMS

February 3, 2002 -- There's a remarkable new song and video out that tells us what's wrong with major league baseball and, sadly, what used to be so right about the game.

"The Baseball Song" is music for our time, if not the commissioner's ears, considering BudBall's contraction mess, ever skyrocketing ticket prices, ridiculous salaries, labor wars and the game's overall loss of innocence.

What makes this song so fascinating is that it was written and performed by one of baseball's own, former infielder Tim Flannery, who spent 10 blue-collar years in the majors and is currently the third-base coach of the Padres.

The musical side of Flannery has had it up to here with baseball greed after 23 years in the game. Proceeds from the sale of his CDs buy Padres tickets for San Diego youngsters and "The Baseball Song" will be on Flannery's fifth CD, "Highway Song" which will be released this week on the PSB label.

The song comes from Flannery's baseball heart and begins: "The trade's been made, the game's been played for dollars without sense."

"The song is just blowing people away," Flannery says. "It's something I needed to say. I wanted to thank the players who taught me the right way to play the game. That's why I wrote the song."

"The Baseball Song" and video touches the heart in many ways, from Flannery's own backyard home movies while growing up in Kentucky to classic baseball footage. The last verse is a tribute to many of the players who shaped Flannery the ballplayer, everyone from Jackie Robinson to John Kruk. The video ends beautifully with a father and son heading into a ballpark.

"I take music just as seriously as I do baseball and I think in some ways being a baseball player has held me back as a musician," says Flannery, whose storyteller style is somewhere between Jim Croce and Celtic bluegrass.

Flannery has performed with an All-Star musical lineup that includes Jimmy Buffett, Jackson Browne, Willie Nelson, Judy Collins, Bruce Hornsby, Linda Ronstadt and Bonnie Raitt. Flannery has played concerts around the country and in Ireland, where he was once introduced as a former "basketball" player.

Flannery is a prophet in "The Baseball Song," which was written almost two years ago and features Cal Ripken, Tony Gwynn and Mark McGwire, who have all retired, and gives Diamondbacks first baseman Mark Grace his due for playing the game right.

There's a New York connection too, as the refrain highlights Roger Maris, Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays.

"Most players today just don't understand that the game ain't about them," Flannery says. "The game is bigger than you and that's what I'm trying to get across."

Flannery, 44, takes his best shot at the modern game, the cheap home runs and the obscene greed. The video is shot in a number of ballparks. Flannery tried to shoot inside Yankee Stadium, but was told by an official that he couldn't enter the Stadium unless the "club's lawyers" said it was OK.

"That was just perfect," says Flannery, whose quick-thinking producer instead got a vantage point from across the river, looking down on Yankee Stadium as Flannery walked along and sang.

The inspiration for the song came when Flannery was talking to an average ballplayer, and that player, whom Flannery will not name, told him he would sign with the Padres the next season, "if you give me $8 million."

That same weekend Flannery had a few beers with the 1960 Pirates. His uncle, catcher Hal Smith, played for those Pirates, a team that shocked the Yankees in the World Series. Smith hit a three-run homer in Game 7, which is all but forgotten because of Bill Mazeroski's Series-winning blast.

"Those players, their love of the game is overwhelming," Flannery says of that team, that era of ballplayer.

When Flannery walked into a major-league clubhouse in 1979, he came with a guitar slung over his back and was told by his manager Roger Craig "to make sure you keep your guitar out of the cocktail lounge."

Flannery played the game with a head-first style, that's part of the reason he sings in the chorus: "Let's all forgive Pete Rose."

"I think this song will bring a tear or two to the eyes of traditionalists who long for the days before corporate domination took over the game," Flannery says.

Those days are going, going gone, but "The Baseball Song" remembers when the great game was more than just greed and highlight-show home runs.