Published: July 15, 2007 11:51 pm      

BASEPATHS: Blogs blast Power’s fellowship sponsor

NIAGARA FALLS — The Niagara Power, who lead their league in being hit by pitch, took one right in the blogs last week.

The Ultimate Baseball Roadtrip (www.thesportsroadtrip.wnymedia.net), by ArtVoice sports columnists Peter Farrell and Andrew Kulyk, logged in at Sal Maglie Stadium for Tuesday’s game versus the Bolivar A’s. UBT seemed to have a good time, but was put off by evidence of the Power’s Fellowship of Christian Athletes sponsorship.

In a sharp posting titled, “The Niagara Power and the Glory,” Farrell said he knew he was in for a different experience when he saw the Family Life Network banner at the gate.

“We came to enjoy a ball game,” he posted, and wound up in “a crusade for our souls.” He quoted Christian testimony in the program by players and coaches and cautioned that if Power President Cal Kern does not “reach out to the entire community,” his venture is doomed to failure.

Full disclosure — Base Paths contributes money to the Power and volunteers as its public address announcer. While he attends a Methodist church with some regularity, he is also counseled by a Franciscan Brother, a cloister of nuns and two Jewish scholars. A card-carrying skeptic, he believes in Cal Kern. He also believes in Farrell and Kulyk, his good friends and honest colleagues.

His take on the Ultimate Baseball Roadtrip posting: “Doomed to failure?” Don’t hold your breath. Fellowship of Christian Athletes has been around since 1954. Christianity has survived 2000 years.

Base Paths has never attended a Cardinals game in St. Louis, but would expect that he would see banners boosting Busch beer products. He does not foresee the Cards sponsoring “Prohibition Night,” nor would he recommend it.

He is appalled that professional baseball teams accept ads from the New York State Lottery. Baseball bans players for gambling. The Lottery levies a 51 percent tax on people who can least afford it and promotes the notion that you can achieve wealth by means other than personal initiative. But when the Bisons run their Lottery Toss, Base Paths just goes out and orders a beer.

In published interviews with ballplayers, he has read of preferences in entertainment and social interchange that nudge him toward nausea. A profession of faith and confidence in a religious figure or icon seems innocuous by comparison.

Base Paths is fascinated by faith, even Kevin Costner’s copulative catechism in “Bull Durham.” He endorses almost any belief which provides sustenance and joy. Sometimes, though, it doesn’t. Bolivar, sponsored by faith-based Athletes in Action (founded 1966), has the crabbiest fans in the league.

Tuesday’s game involved the only two faith-based teams among the league’s 14, undoubtedly raising the level of religious content. It included only the second prayer Base Paths has heard in 22 games. The visiting A’s took it upon themselves to distribute literature in the stands. Farrell wisely cautions the Power against letting evenings evolve into prayer meetings with pitchers mounds, but one visitor to the UBT site said that an earlier game he had attended, versus Geneva, had a much different atmosphere.

Paranoia prevails in Peter’s post. He seems terrorized by faith, shocked that a faith-based sponsor would market its “product,” even as Dunn markets tires and the Senecas market casinos. Yes, they care about your soul, but they’re not going to wrestle you for it.

Take it or leave it. Play ball.