CHEWING ON TOBACCO

Baseball players take on tobacco following MLB players

A+baseball+player+is+preparing+himself+for+the+%E2%80%9Csensational+feeling%E2%80%9D+of+the+tobacco+in+his+mouth+on+a+Friday+afternoon.+The+players+consider+this+a+pregame+ritual.

Stephanie Jimenez

A baseball player is preparing himself for the “sensational feeling” of the tobacco in his mouth on a Friday afternoon. The players consider this a pregame ritual.

The unforgettable candy like taste, as they describe it, leaves them feeling like they have no care in the world.

Chewing tobacco, they say, makes them lightheaded by day to where they can’t think straight and have no care, but active by evening just in time to get pumped up for practices and games.

Idolizing the big league, several players from the baseball team chew tobacco, which is also known as “dipping.”

These baseball players are aware of the risks tobacco leaves on the human body, but they continue to chew because it’s “cool,” they say, and it makes their mouth feel moist.

For those who would think it would be hard to get such a substance, because they are underage, they find ways to get it from the liquor store, even though it is illegal to supply to a minor.

Chewing tobacco— it’s become a Friday thing.

On those Fridays during lunch they gather at “the spitting tree.” They say when they spit it out it just evaporates into the air.

Sometimes the players take it farther than just a lunch thing and do it during games.

But where can they spit it, with there not being a tree on the baseball field? Also they can’t throw it on the field, which would be damaged, so where does it go? They throw it alongside the wall near the baseball field.

Beginning with the two finger swoop, they scoop the tobacco from the container into their mouth continuously until they have a bulging lip. The different flavors swirling through their taste buds give them a sensational feeling.

This feeling may be blocking them from realizing what it’s really doing to their bodies.

And because they are too busy chewing they miss out on what tobacco can really cause such as blood clots which could lead to strokes.

What they also should be worried about is not being able to even run long enough to get to third base, because when chewing tobacco, low blood supply flows through the legs.

Tobacco is just a leaf, but a leaf that could cause these players to develop diseases whether they are aware of it or not.

Certain diseases that tobacco can cause are things such as Leukoplakia, which is where a small gray-white patch that will form in the gums of their mouth and later to become cancer.

Most baseball players end up getting lung cancer that don’t ever develop that well.

Even worse some may become addicted to chewing or swallowing tobacco, and according to Erick Brigham, Channel Medical, said that chewing tobacco is “nothing bad but in reality because of the addiction they can’t quite.”

Brigham said that even though people take tobacco “tobacco is tobacco” and it’s not healthy for the human body. Especially because “over periods of time we can become chemically unbalanced,” he said.

“But American tobacco is different from Turkish and Turkish is different from Israel,” Brigham said, meaning that different tobacco can have different effects.

“We’re just teenagers,” said one sophomore on the JV team. “We don’t know right from wrong.”

Although they say they are aware of the medical consequences of using tobacco, their main concern is being kicked off the team. Knowing that baseball isn’t everyone’s go to sport, when asked why they do such a thing the players replied with “to make baseball more interesting.”

They see the MLB players do it so they just think, “What’s wrong if I do it?”

“The little things have long term effects, but when you’re in the moment the feeling is worth it,” said a junior on the varsity baseball team.