If Huckabee had Brett as running mate

For those who think there is no connection between sports and politics, take Mike Huckabee. Please.

Earlier this month, the former Arkansas governor dropped out of the race for the Republican presidential nomination when John McCain accumulated enough delegates to ensure the nomination. In Huckabee's concession speech, he not only invoked the name of former Kansas City Royals third baseman George Brett, he used the first 168 words of his loser's farewell address in a screwball attempt to create a link between his own competitive grit and that of the baseball Hall of Famer; between Brett, who had more than 3,000 hits and batted .390 one season, and a guy who won the Iowa Caucuses.

Huckabee said that when Brett was nearing the end of his playing days, he was asked how he wanted to leave the game. And Huckabee said that Brett, instead of dreaming of a game-winning home run to end his career, had said he wanted to get thrown out on a routine grounder, but that he would run, as always, as hard as he could, so that people could say "he gave it his best, all the way to the very end."

Huckabee then abruptly abandoned the Brett comparison, not because it was ludicrous but because he had other bizarre claims to make, like how he's a voice for unborn children, but with no mention of the tens of thousands of real children killed and maimed and orphaned in an unprovoked war he supports.

Ludicrous or not, the failure to develop additional Brett material was a glaring error, like letting a slow roller go under your glove.

Huckabee had a lot more to say, so keeping the Brett allusion around for the whole speech couldn't have made it any wackier or more awkward than it turned out to be.

Instead of rambling on as he did, speaking in the vague platitudes of family, religion and flag waving with which politicians (and many athletes) are so mindlessly comfortable, thanking his family for "giving 110 percent of themselves" to his campaign, and then referring not only to both the Old and New Testament but to the Alamo, too, Huckabee could have used Brett as a much stronger DH -- designated homily.

At least Brett has a World Series winner's ring, which is one more than Davy Crockett had.

Huckabee could have said that he hopes a united Republican Party has the same whatever-it-takes commitment to winning the election as Brett had for winning a ballgame on July 24, 1983, when he used an illegally pine-tarred bat to hit a potential game-winning home run against the Yankees.

Hey, that would have gotten fewer snores than his Sunday school reference to the prophet Isaiah.

Huckabee could have continued, saying he has tried to model his feverish passions for illegal war, military occupation of a foreign country and a 2,000-mile U.S. border fence on Brett's psycho reaction when the pine tar-aided home run was disallowed. Huckabee could have described how he identifies with Brett's emotions when Brett had to be restrained from attacking umpire Tim McClelland because that's how he feels when he hears progressives talk of peace and inclusion.

At least that would have gotten livelier feedback than Huckabee's cliche reference to the Apostle Paul fighting the good fight.

Huckabee could have gone on to say how he dreams of the day Roe vs. Wade will be overturned, just as the ruling on Brett's pine-tarred bat was overturned.

Huckabee could have gone on to say how he also admired Brett's courage during the 1980 World Series against the Philadelphia Phillies, when he had to leave Game 2 in the sixth inning because of the pain from hemorrhoids and had to have the hemorrhoids surgically removed the next day but still came back to hit a home run in Game 3.

He could have concluded by saying McCain had been like Brett's hemorrhoids, a real pain in the rear, but now it's the Democrats who are like Brett's hemorrhoids.

It would have made as much sense as the real conclusion to Huckabee's concession speech, about the importance of "maintaining liberty and freedom when we get elected and when our country's flag still waves proudly on the wall."

Robert Rubino can be reached at robert.rubino@pressdemocrat.com or 521-5261.