Civil_War_Movie

Take Me Out to The Ball Game' “Let me root, root, root for the home team, If they don't win, it's a shame. For its one, two, three strikes, you're out, at the old ball game” (Tim Pan Alley). These famous lyrics taken from the chorus of a song by Tim Pan Alley serve as the unofficial anthem of baseball that I can guarantee is embedded into almost every American.  Sadly, according to Rob Herbert, if the prices of professional baseball tickets continue to increase, this song may slowly fade away.  American children experiencing a night under the lights, devouring a hotdog while cheering on their home team as they score a home run is slowly becoming obsolete as ticket prices rise.  Rob Herbert’s article, “Pricing the Kids Out,” makes a good point that ticket prices are becoming too expensive, but is deficient in sporting evidence to prove that the younger generation is missing out on experiencing an important aspect of American culture.             In his article, Herbert makes a poorly supported argument that the younger generation is being priced out of going to baseball games and experiencing an important aspect of the American culture due to the fact that going to a game is becoming a luxury that ordinary citizens can’t afford for their family.  Herbert explains that “Baseball was called the national pastime not only because it’s a great sport but because it was a sport that was affordable for nearly all American families” (Herbert).  Further into the article,  Herbert misleadingly states money that could be spent improving the auto industry, schools, and hospitals is being wasted on enormous video screens, chic restaurants, and classy boxes in multi-million dollar stadiums.  According to Herbert, these luxuries are highly unnecessary and take America’s pastime away, deny the younger generation of important childhood memories and from experiencing a vital part of the American culture.   Herbert makes the excellent point in his article that the rise of ticket prices are turning baseball games into an event for the wealthy instead of a fun night under the lights for the average American and their family.  Joel Sherman, from the New York Times, wrote an article about the new multi-million dollar stadium built for the New York Yankees supporting Herbert’s view, “They will tell you they built this stadium for the everyman, stressing what they consider still affordable pricing and amenities. But this stadium, in actuality, was built for a moneyed class that in many respects does not even exist in this city any longer” (New York Times).  If Herbert included supporting evidence in his own article to strengthen his points, he could have had a stronger argument.  By comparing statistics from twenty years ago and now about how far the prices have been raised and how they affected the attendance at games could have made Herbert’s argument much stronger.  Since he did not have strong supporting evidence, Herbert tried to redirect his readers from his argument when he stated that instead of putting millions of dollars into a stadium that money should be going towards the auto industry, school buildings or hospitals that could use the help instead.  This is a weak point since these are government funded institutions and have nothing to do with the profit earned in the baseball industry.