Posted on: Wednesday, July 28, 2004

By Ferd Lewis
Advertiser Columnist

Here it is early in the presidential campaign and Sen. John Kerry may have taken an early edge on an issue of some importance.

On Iraq?

On healthcare?

The economy?

No, on baseball, of course.

If you think baseball isn't important — and didn't ESPN's Jon Miller tell us Sunday while interviewing Kerry that, "conventional wisdom is that baseball is the national sport, not politics."? — then you missed the lead up to a Democratic National Convention, which hasn't lacked for baseball references or tie-ins.

Indeed, amid the references to "hitting a home run" or "striking out George Bush," the Boston Globe declared the other day that, with the opening of the convention, "spring training" was over for the home state presidential candidate.

Kerry apparently realized as much, ordering his campaign plane diverted to Boston Sunday just so he could sneak in and catch the final game of the weekend's Red Sox-Yankees series at Fenway Park.

And, of course, throw out the first pitch on national television.

"Couldn't miss it," he said.

Whether the shot of him bouncing one in the dirt out in front of home plate — drawing a mix of cheers and boos — will help or hurt remains to be seen. But he succeeded in getting more face time than Johnny Damon and Alex Rodriguez combined. There he was charging out of the Red Sox dugout. There he was sitting in the owner's box and being interviewed on ESPN.

Beyond his considerable network exposure, Kerry may have also put his opponent, George W. Bush, in something of an early pickle. That's because the Republican National Convention is in New York and when it begins its Aug. 30 to Sept. 2 run the Yankees and Mets will have simultaneous homestands.

If you're President Bush, this poses some questions. Can you afford to show up at just one of them? Or, if you somehow manage to work in both, do you come off looking as insincere as the time Hillary Rodham Clinton sported a Yankees cap for the first time in her senatorial campaign? Would the Kerry campaign turn the tables and claim the president was waffling?

These are questions on which campaigns can turn.

For the moment, it would be no small victory for Kerry, whose athletic claims to fame lean more toward hockey and lacrosse, to take some of the baseball spotlight away from Bush, a former owner of the Texas Rangers who has tried to cast himself as the "baseball president" and "first fan."

Indeed, on his official Web site Bush has declared, "I never dreamed about being president. When I was growing up, I wanted to be Willie Mays."

And, the president has gotten a lot of mileage, especially when pressed by probing reporters about perceived mistakes, by declaring the error he most regrets was "trading Sammy Sosa."

A lot of voters might not have a clue on nuclear non-proliferation, but baseball is something close to the heart.

And, it will be a wise candidate who manages to capitalize on it.

Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8044.