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- Jacob Rhee

I think that if I conducted a Family Feud survey regarding the coolest baseball moment of the 21st century, around 40 of the 100 respondents would point to the iconic Shohei Ohtani vs. Mike Trout sequence at the end of the 2023 World Baseball Classic.

If you’re not a baseball person, allow me to explain. That’s the two best players of this generation going one-on-one in the final moments of a massive winner-take-all championship game. I can’t remember a situation like that unfolding in any other sport… ever? Bird and Magic dueled in Game 7 of the 1984 NBA Finals, but those guys didn’t really guard each other. LeBron and Steph went head-to-head in 2016, but they weren’t exactly calling ISOs on each other down the stretch either. The closest thing I can think of is Messi and Mbappe trading goals in the World Cup final a couple of years ago; even that could’ve been more dramatic if we swapped Kylian for Ronaldo.

The only bad part about the showdown between Angels teammates? No one outside of the baseball world watched it. Like, no one. 5.2 million people tuned in that night, which is the exact same amount of viewers that the NFL Hall of Fame Game drew last week. I’m serious. That unprecedented, legendary sports moment had the exact same viewership as a preseason football game. It’s no secret that the NFL destroys everything in the TV ratings, but that is a truly embarrassing statistic for baseball.

Look, I understand; growing this sport is easier said than done. Getting young people with short attention spans to commit to watching a relatively slow-paced, 150-minute sporting event is a tall task. But I really think that we could take a huge step in solving this issue by making baseball a permanent Olympic sport.

At the moment, baseball only pops up at the Olympics if the host country happens to have an interest in it. When the sport does appear, the absence of MLB players ruins the product. I know that I’ve certainly never sat down and watched an Olympic baseball game. So, the course of action is pretty clear. Are you listening, Rob Manfred? Just carve out a month-long hiatus every four seasons, so the league’s stars can participate. The WNBA does it. Soccer leagues overseas have international breaks. Why not baseball? In 2028, start the MLB season 15 days earlier and end it 15 days later so the players can go represent their countries in the summer. This isn’t that hard to figure out.

If you don’t think the Olympics would make a significant difference in the general public’s interest level in baseball, I would disagree. Didn’t we just witness Formula One blow up on the strength of a Netflix show? I would venture to guess that seeing the best baseball players on the planet clash with a gold medal hanging in the balance would at least hush some folks that claim that the sport is boring.

A massive opportunity to change the narrative surrounding baseball itself is sitting in front of us. The next Olympics are right here in America, and MLB players have already said that they want in. If the people in charge care - and if this game really is America’s pastime - the summer of 2028 will be a transformative one for the sport I love so dearly.

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