The kids don't come to Spring Training any more

Wallowing in Spring Training nostalgia the other day, I came across a Cleveland Press photo of Rocky Colavito arriving for Spring Training in Tucson with his two kids, probably that fateful spring of 1960. The tykes were three years old and a year and a half. Cute kids, too. (Jeez, they'd be in their 50s now!) (So are some of us!) The player and his family arriving in camp used to be a stock photo. That was before the players were all millionaires, and their families had to be carefully hidden from view. I'm glad the players get paid well; they are the ones that generate all that cash. But those Spring Training photos of families arriving with our heroes were something the working stiff could identify with. Each time one of those touchstones disappeared, the gap between player and fan widened. Is it any wonder it's reached the point where the "stars" are shooting up illegal drugs intravenously, then lying about it in the largest public arena in the land?