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TOMORROW IS Black Monday.
If you're not a baseball fan, this designation will mean nothing to you.
To those of us who faithfully follow each pitch, however, tomorrow is the one day each summer when there is no hope of either seeing or hearing a Major League Baseball game.
After today's contests, the All-Star Game break begins and that means there absolutely will be no games tomorrow. Except in Houston, where the All-Star Game will be played Tuesday, every major-league park in America will be dark, hence Black Monday.
True, Wednesday is also scheduled to be an off-day, but occasionally some rained-out games are played on the day after the All-Star Game. There is always hope for Wednesday.
Tomorrow, however, there is no hope.
Oh, yes, there is the home-run-hitting contest tomorrow night, but that's just a show. There will be no real baseball again until Thursday.
The big All-Star Game slogan this year is "This Time It Counts."
For what?
American League teams used to hate National League teams, and the All-Star Game was played for blood and bragging rights.
Now, with interleague play and free agents bouncing from league to league like hailstones in a Kansas twister, everybody knows everybody else and this once ferocious rivalry has taken on a kissy-kissy persona.
The game is just not the same as in the past.
The big moment fans in our area are waiting for is not Monday night's home-run derby or Tuesday night's first pitch. It's the long-awaited announcement that the Montreal Expos are moving to Northern Virginia.
This could make Black Monday the brightest of days for us.
For years now (it seems decades), Commissioner Bud Selig has promised us a decision by the All-Star break on where the Expos will play "next" year.
Is this the year it actually happens? It may well be, although some baseball insiders say the decision may be delayed yet again.
Almost everyone in the civilized world seems to agree that Northern Virginia is the only feasible place to move the Canadian team. So, what's holding up the works?
Potential customers can't be a problem. There are several million people in the area just dying to get a team, especially a National League franchise. I've had my season-ticket money in escrow for two years.
RFK Stadium is just sitting there waiting to become the Expos' temporary home until a stadium in built in the Dulles area.
The Dulles-area stadium might well be the problem. Major League Baseball saw how in 1994 Northern Virginia special-interest groups fought a Disney theme park--and won.
Not even baseball is more wholesome than Disney.
If Selig announces the Expos are coming, I'll bet anyone dollars to doughnuts that the group of investors hoping to buy the team finds itself in court within days after the first stadium site plan is filed.
Some bunch of conservationists will probably argue that the stadium site is the nesting area for the dipsy-doodle crowned duck or the rare black bandanna-faced raccoon.
And some idiot federal judge will issue an injunction in favor of the dipsy-doodles and the bandanna-faces.
Still, I'm guessing that the Expos are coming and that an announcement to that effect will be made this summer.
Despite potential problems with Northern Virginia, no other area can support the team. We have the affluence and the fan base to make the Expos a contender.
None of the other possible areas mentioned do, certainly not Monterrey (Mexico) or San Juan (Puerto Rico). The wealth is not there, and it takes money to keep coming back to the ballpark at $100 a night (tickets, gas, parking, hot dogs, drinks, etc.).
Portland is too small, Norfolk is too spread out and Washington is too close to the Baltimore Orioles.
That leaves Northern Virginia, which has both the people and the money.
This is not the same Northern Virginia that didn't support two Washington American League franchises. The area is as different now as night is from day. Thirty-five years ago those who lived here were mostly middle-class working people. Now they are upper-middle-class folks who, even in the worst of times, have money to burn.
This year Selig's back is up against the wall. The Puerto Rico experiment hasn't worked, and empty seats continue to show up at Expo Stadium in Montreal by the tens of thousand.
With one swipe of the pen, the Expos could go from a drag on Major League Baseball's pocketbook to a financially healthy franchise.
Even if Selig has to fight the special-interest groups, the commissioner has to take the Northern Virginia gamble.
As for those special-interest groups, well, they might want to consider which bird they want to protect.
The dipsy-doodle crowned duck may be rare, but the Expos just might be the goose that will lay a golden egg.
At least this baseball fan thinks so.
To reach DONNIE JOHNSTON: DJohn40330@aol.com