Columnist Dean Juipe: Camps run too long to work here

Dean Juipe

Friday, March 24, 2000 | 10:49 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at juipe@vegas.com or 259-4084.

Spring training wouldn't be so bad and might actually work in Las Vegas if the ritual was shortened from two months to two or three weeks.

Pared to a tolerable length, spring training would be more of a natural fit in a city that's big on short-term gratification but isn't much for long-term commitment.

Look at Las Vegas: It's drinking, gambling, strip shows and Strip shows. It's an energetic city obsessed with quick fixes.

It is nothing at all like the cities that currently serve baseball as springtime training hubs. In Florida and Arizona, retirees lounge through a succession of sunny afternoons and spring games with players who may never see the major leagues.

In Las Vegas, retirees are buying rolls of coins and guzzling free drinks.

They will never care enough to frequent and support spring training in Las Vegas, a subject which, once again, is back on the front burner as the city finds itself being used as a pawn by an assortment of teams looking for leverage and intent on improving their Florida and Arizona situations.

Las Vegas should say it isn't interested unless baseball compacts spring training to a manageable number of days. As it is, players are bored by the endless exhibition games and might readily agree to an extra month off in exchange for a more serious training period.

With all the injuries that have occurred this spring, baseball ought to give the idea some thought.

"It's a challenge just getting all your pitchers through spring training," San Francisco manager Dusty Baker has said, as if spring training runs the risk of being counterproductive.

It certainly has been for the 11 teams that have had pitchers go down with injuries this spring. The list of those out of service includes Atlanta's John Smoltz and Milwaukee's Rocky Coppinger, both of whom will miss the entire season. Also down: Baltimore's Scott Erickson; Tampa Bay's Wilson Alvarez; Milwaukee's Jamey Wright; the Chicago Cubs' Ismael Valdes; Arizona's Matt Mantei; Anaheim's Ramon Ortiz; Florida's A.J. Burnett; Colorado's Jerry Dipoto; Texas' John Wetteland; and San Francisco's Shawn Estes, a product of Northern Nevada and a former 19-game winner.

Granted, pitchers' arms need to be nurtured and the occasional injury may be inevitable. But losing guys in meaningless games makes no sense at all.

Centuries ago, or so it seems, baseball devised the two-month spring camp as a way of ensuring its players wouldn't drink all winter and turn into sloths. But those days passed when huge salaries provided the players with their own incentive for maintaining some semblance of year-round playing shape.

The modern player lifts weights and works out all winter and doesn't need to be coddled, or even forced, into condition. They're doing it on their own because the money makes it more than worthwhile.

They don't need eight weeks of batting practice and fielding drills.

If baseball ever comes to this realization and makes the economic sacrifices it would take to trim spring training to a more tolerable length, then and only then should Las Vegas say it's interested.

Otherwise, spring training's inert pace just doesn't fit with how we like to do things here.