Should we be...

[nickrego]

rubbing up baseballs using Spit/Saliva ?

When I first started umpiring, I was taught to put a little spit in my hand to rub up balls before a game. I've been doing that for years now. Sometimes, if my mouth is dry, I'll use some sweat off the top of my head. Yeah, all this is gross, but it's what goes on on baseball fields every day.

So one game a couple of weeks ago, I'm standing there during a time out rubbing up a new ball that was given to me. The reason for the timeout, was we had to decide that a player had to change his pants due to blood stains from a slide.

So as I'm putting my spit all over this ball, I start to think, "what's the difference between him having blood on his pants, and me coating this ball with my spit ?" I know different body fluids carry different elements, but body fluids are body fluids, and our nasty stuff is in them.

I guess I need to start carrying sterile water, maybe even holy water, for rubbing up balls ?