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[This is part of a series exploring the Baseball Tarot. If you would like to prompt for a part of the game or a card from the deck, there's very little space left. Leave a comment with a prompt if you want in. All other comments are still welcome, of course.]
Sports games can sometimes get chippy. They start with the smallest things - a fielder believes a runner gave him a spikes-up slide, the pitcher is throwing balls just a little too far inside to be innocent, instead of trying to slide under the tag, a runner charges the catcher and tries to bowl him over and knock the ball loose. A manager is still playing aggressive baseball with steals despite being ahead by ten in the bottom of the eighth inning. Some young player is showboating and taunting from their home run. (Don't do it, kids. If you're lucky, the worst that will happen is the umpire or your coach will pull you aside and give you a stern talking-to.)
So one of the other team's players expresses their opinion about the matter. Perhaps with civil words, perhaps with uncivil words, perhaps with an easily disguisable retaliation for a perceived or actual wrong. Now, at this point, the impending problem is sure to attract the attention of the umpires. One of those sayings of the sport world (and of life in general) is that the original foul is not always going to get caught, but the retaliation most certainly will. So any players goaded into obvious retaliation are likely going to end up penalized. In baseball, though, it's not going to be yardage or time or free throws our bases awarded for that kind of thing - the penalty is likely going to be a one-way ticket to the clubhouse. So there is a definite impulse to keep things calm enough so that the umpires don't act on their suspicions.
That said, once the retaliation begins, it's very hard to stop from escalating. And as things escalate, they slowly lose their ability to stay hidden from others and the umpires. And then the words are almost always unkind, the actions intended to hurt, and it usually culminates in a headhunter from the pitcher that nobody can explain away as any other possible thing. Then there is staring, and walking, and even though the umpire is already starting the ejection process, there will be what is euphemistically referred to as "rhubarb".
More commonly, we call it a bench-clearing brawl. As with any large melee, most of the participants in the conflict will be people grabbing on to other people to prevent them from joining in or from sneak-attacking their person, and will let go as soon as the energy has dissipated. Those players will likely not face individual discipline from the office of the commissioner, but if there's is any team punishment handed down, they will participate in that exercise. There will also be many people who are holding on to their own people to prevent their participation as well.
At the central point of the conflict will be the people who are actively engaged in fisticuffs or otherwise, with a small nebula around them of people pushing and shoving each other, which could ignite into a new fistfight if the conditions are right. The dialogue in the middle of such a storm would have to be continuously censored were it to be appearing in the television broadcast, and unlike professional pugilists, rhubarb continues until everyone is satisfied.
Unlike other sports where player-to-player violence is an expected part of the game and penalties exist for excess of that violence or play that is dangerous to the health and well-being of players (ice hockey had the clearest examples here, with penalties for using the stick to hit, trip, or strike people outside of narrowly-defined zones as well as penalties for hitting people while they are unable to defend themselves or when doing so presents a serious risk of injury), baseball is expected to play as a game without much direct interaction between the opposing sides outside of plays at bases and the pitching. In fact, there are penalties for interfering with the opposition's rights to field or to run the basepaths outside of specific situations, usually involving application of tags (which only come into play if the defensive fielder possesses the baseball - otherwise, interference will be called). Compounding matters, the umpires have a limited set of tools for discipline at their disposal for bad behavior. They can't award penalty strikes, balls, outs, bases, or runs based on behavior. They can warn and they can eject. So if you're going to do something that will get you kicked out, you may as well make it worth your while. This probably contributes to things being larger and more vicious than they otherwise would be when everything finally boils over.
After the dust settles from the fight, the will be the ejections from the game, handed out like analgesics for the bruises and headaches, and the whole incident will be sent to the Office of the Commissioner to see if there will be extra punishment handed down outside of the game. Fines and multiple-game suspensions are fairly standard affairs from something like this. The footage available from the television cameras will also be packaged into training material for the umpires on how to recognize a situation that threatens to get out of control, and as practice in figuring out who gets the hook in situations like these when they develop. From bad behavior comes training on how to avoid bad behavior in the future.
This card appearing in a reading is a nearly-universal negative - a fight like this produces a lot of heat, injury, and bad blood, but it doesn't illuminate or resolve anything, really. At best, it could represent a fight that was necessary to expose things that need to be worked on, but that's generally an outside chance. If you're in the rhubarb, your job is to get out. Which will likely mean having to abandon your quest for satisfaction for all the wrongs committed against you, real or perceived. You don't necessarily have to forgive yet (although being able to forgive makes it more likely you won't backslide), but you have to be willing to let it go and walk away. Even if the other side isn't yet. Stop feeding the conflict energy. Without you, it may rage on, but getting out while you can will put you in a better position when the umpires arrive and when the Commissioner is considering punishment. If you started the rhubarb, shame on you and everything in this paragraph goes double, plus be willing to accept that your punishment will be harsher so as to discourage other people from doing the same.
If you can see the rhubarb, but you're not in it, run away. Stay well wide of the conflict if you can. There's nearly zero reason to think that something good will happen if you join in, and third parties have a history of escalating when they get involved. If you think you can profit of a rhubarb by playing both sides and/or selling weaponry to both sides, shame on you even more than those who started it, because you are causing both sides injury for your own gain. If someone finds out, the destruction of your reputation is the least of your worries.
If you're the umpire in this conflict, be fair. Punish everyone who's involved based on the degree of their participation, and try to find ways of doing so that don't give anyone a reason to restart the conflict. This is difficult, but it is part of your job, so don't shy away from it or half-ass it. No matter what you do, the players involved think you're being too harsh on them and too lenient on the other team, so you may as well go forward with the most effective plan of your options. If the punishment is fair, the resentment will recede fairly quickly, and hopefully the rhubarb won't happen again.
This card represents poor judgment and an inability to keep things contained. Furthermore, this card indicates that the issue is also dragging teammates into the conflict, whether by retaliation for something else that ends up in their lap, or by feeling like they have to protect their teammate from the insults delivered to them. A system of alliances like this only took one assassination event to spark off what was supposed to be the "War to End All Wars", and everyone got pulled in. At the end of it all, though, the retaliation from the winning side planted the seeds for the losers to build resentment and frustration to the point where they decided to have another go at it a generation later, which resulted in the user of nuclear weapons, the fallout of which we are still dealing with today. From thence came the Cold War, and from the Cold War came the seeds of the current conflict in the Middle East, the whirlwind of which we are now reaping, and most likely will eventually lead to another major incident after this one is resolved. Every time rhubarb breaks out, everyone loses, because revenge is the first thing in mind. Once there has been one bench-clearing brawl, the next one is much more likely to happen.
Sports games can sometimes get chippy. They start with the smallest things - a fielder believes a runner gave him a spikes-up slide, the pitcher is throwing balls just a little too far inside to be innocent, instead of trying to slide under the tag, a runner charges the catcher and tries to bowl him over and knock the ball loose. A manager is still playing aggressive baseball with steals despite being ahead by ten in the bottom of the eighth inning. Some young player is showboating and taunting from their home run. (Don't do it, kids. If you're lucky, the worst that will happen is the umpire or your coach will pull you aside and give you a stern talking-to.)
So one of the other team's players expresses their opinion about the matter. Perhaps with civil words, perhaps with uncivil words, perhaps with an easily disguisable retaliation for a perceived or actual wrong. Now, at this point, the impending problem is sure to attract the attention of the umpires. One of those sayings of the sport world (and of life in general) is that the original foul is not always going to get caught, but the retaliation most certainly will. So any players goaded into obvious retaliation are likely going to end up penalized. In baseball, though, it's not going to be yardage or time or free throws our bases awarded for that kind of thing - the penalty is likely going to be a one-way ticket to the clubhouse. So there is a definite impulse to keep things calm enough so that the umpires don't act on their suspicions.
That said, once the retaliation begins, it's very hard to stop from escalating. And as things escalate, they slowly lose their ability to stay hidden from others and the umpires. And then the words are almost always unkind, the actions intended to hurt, and it usually culminates in a headhunter from the pitcher that nobody can explain away as any other possible thing. Then there is staring, and walking, and even though the umpire is already starting the ejection process, there will be what is euphemistically referred to as "rhubarb".
More commonly, we call it a bench-clearing brawl. As with any large melee, most of the participants in the conflict will be people grabbing on to other people to prevent them from joining in or from sneak-attacking their person, and will let go as soon as the energy has dissipated. Those players will likely not face individual discipline from the office of the commissioner, but if there's is any team punishment handed down, they will participate in that exercise. There will also be many people who are holding on to their own people to prevent their participation as well.
At the central point of the conflict will be the people who are actively engaged in fisticuffs or otherwise, with a small nebula around them of people pushing and shoving each other, which could ignite into a new fistfight if the conditions are right. The dialogue in the middle of such a storm would have to be continuously censored were it to be appearing in the television broadcast, and unlike professional pugilists, rhubarb continues until everyone is satisfied.
Unlike other sports where player-to-player violence is an expected part of the game and penalties exist for excess of that violence or play that is dangerous to the health and well-being of players (ice hockey had the clearest examples here, with penalties for using the stick to hit, trip, or strike people outside of narrowly-defined zones as well as penalties for hitting people while they are unable to defend themselves or when doing so presents a serious risk of injury), baseball is expected to play as a game without much direct interaction between the opposing sides outside of plays at bases and the pitching. In fact, there are penalties for interfering with the opposition's rights to field or to run the basepaths outside of specific situations, usually involving application of tags (which only come into play if the defensive fielder possesses the baseball - otherwise, interference will be called). Compounding matters, the umpires have a limited set of tools for discipline at their disposal for bad behavior. They can't award penalty strikes, balls, outs, bases, or runs based on behavior. They can warn and they can eject. So if you're going to do something that will get you kicked out, you may as well make it worth your while. This probably contributes to things being larger and more vicious than they otherwise would be when everything finally boils over.
After the dust settles from the fight, the will be the ejections from the game, handed out like analgesics for the bruises and headaches, and the whole incident will be sent to the Office of the Commissioner to see if there will be extra punishment handed down outside of the game. Fines and multiple-game suspensions are fairly standard affairs from something like this. The footage available from the television cameras will also be packaged into training material for the umpires on how to recognize a situation that threatens to get out of control, and as practice in figuring out who gets the hook in situations like these when they develop. From bad behavior comes training on how to avoid bad behavior in the future.
This card appearing in a reading is a nearly-universal negative - a fight like this produces a lot of heat, injury, and bad blood, but it doesn't illuminate or resolve anything, really. At best, it could represent a fight that was necessary to expose things that need to be worked on, but that's generally an outside chance. If you're in the rhubarb, your job is to get out. Which will likely mean having to abandon your quest for satisfaction for all the wrongs committed against you, real or perceived. You don't necessarily have to forgive yet (although being able to forgive makes it more likely you won't backslide), but you have to be willing to let it go and walk away. Even if the other side isn't yet. Stop feeding the conflict energy. Without you, it may rage on, but getting out while you can will put you in a better position when the umpires arrive and when the Commissioner is considering punishment. If you started the rhubarb, shame on you and everything in this paragraph goes double, plus be willing to accept that your punishment will be harsher so as to discourage other people from doing the same.
If you can see the rhubarb, but you're not in it, run away. Stay well wide of the conflict if you can. There's nearly zero reason to think that something good will happen if you join in, and third parties have a history of escalating when they get involved. If you think you can profit of a rhubarb by playing both sides and/or selling weaponry to both sides, shame on you even more than those who started it, because you are causing both sides injury for your own gain. If someone finds out, the destruction of your reputation is the least of your worries.
If you're the umpire in this conflict, be fair. Punish everyone who's involved based on the degree of their participation, and try to find ways of doing so that don't give anyone a reason to restart the conflict. This is difficult, but it is part of your job, so don't shy away from it or half-ass it. No matter what you do, the players involved think you're being too harsh on them and too lenient on the other team, so you may as well go forward with the most effective plan of your options. If the punishment is fair, the resentment will recede fairly quickly, and hopefully the rhubarb won't happen again.
This card represents poor judgment and an inability to keep things contained. Furthermore, this card indicates that the issue is also dragging teammates into the conflict, whether by retaliation for something else that ends up in their lap, or by feeling like they have to protect their teammate from the insults delivered to them. A system of alliances like this only took one assassination event to spark off what was supposed to be the "War to End All Wars", and everyone got pulled in. At the end of it all, though, the retaliation from the winning side planted the seeds for the losers to build resentment and frustration to the point where they decided to have another go at it a generation later, which resulted in the user of nuclear weapons, the fallout of which we are still dealing with today. From thence came the Cold War, and from the Cold War came the seeds of the current conflict in the Middle East, the whirlwind of which we are now reaping, and most likely will eventually lead to another major incident after this one is resolved. Every time rhubarb breaks out, everyone loses, because revenge is the first thing in mind. Once there has been one bench-clearing brawl, the next one is much more likely to happen.
