Since this is the first week of classes, I contemplated writing this column about the… Since this is the first week of classes, I contemplated writing this column about the wonderful things I did on my summer vacation.

But since my summer was as boring as an astronomy lecture, I decided I would write about something a little more important: baseball and the chance that it may not exist after Friday or, at least, not in the same way we are all used to.

I am sure there are plenty of people who won’t care if major league baseball goes on strike and never comes back. But there are just as many people who are hoping there is some way that Friday will come and go and baseball won’t.

I am a part of that second group.

But not because I enjoy watching a utility infielder, who makes more money in one year than I will in one lifetime, strike out twice, make three errors and cost his team the game.

I care because baseball has been a large part of my life for as long as I can remember. As a child, baseball was the first sport taught to me, the first sport in which I actually understood the rules, and the first sport I ever participated in on a team.

My father grew up the same way, and I’m willing to bet my grandfather did as well, just like millions of others in this country have.

While I would enjoy watching players like Alex Rodriguez and Jason Giambi play baseball, that’s not why I go.

I go simply for the game.

The game is the reason why, at 10 years of age, I would get up at 8 a.m. on a Saturday and head to the school playground.

Or why I would stay up until after midnight the summer before my sophomore year of high school, not because I liked to watch some overpaid bum pumped full of steroids, but because I liked to watch baseball.

My love of the game is why, even though I know I shouldn’t, I will pay a ridiculous amount of money for tickets just to watch a team that hasn’t had a winning season since I was in sixth grade.

I am sure there must be other people out there that feel the same way I do. Their love of baseball wasn’t built by Rodriguez, Giambi or some other multi-millionaire.

They love baseball because it is baseball.

With that said, rather than letting the season go to waste when the players strike on Friday, it would be in baseball’s best interest for the owners to bring in replacement players.

I realize baseball’s owners are as much to blame for this as the players, but to end the season now just might kill the sport.

Bringing in replacement players will make some people stay at home but there are two reasons why it would be better than a strike.

First, the teams would still be making money from the fans that do attend games, although they would lose the people who go just to see the stars.

Second, the owners would be saving money by paying the salaries of minor league players, instead of the major leaguers.

Plus, baseball has a better chance of surviving, and maybe even flourishing, with cheap minor league players rather than no players at all.

PNC Park will still be the same wonderful stadium that it is whether it is Brian Giles or Adam Hyzdu patrolling left field.

The history that comes along with a trip to Fenway Park, Wrigley Field and Yankee Stadium will still be there whether the Red Sox, Cubs and Yankees are a bunch of major league players or a slow-pitch softball team from the local over-40 league.

The thrill of going to a baseball game is not to watch the individual. The thrill of baseball is the game.

Joe Marchilena is the assistant sports editor of The Pitt News and still dreams about playing center field and leading off for the Pirates someday.