People are giving Mets announcer Keith Hernandez a hard time for telling it like it is about a supposedly sensitive issue. Earlier this week, Keith spoke up about what he saw as a wrong thing. During a game against the Padres, Keith noticed a woman in a Padres uniform giving Mike Piazza a high-five. “Who is the girl in the dugout, with the long hair?” he said during the broadcast. He found out later on that she was a member of the Padres training staff. After learning that, he said, “I won’t say women belong in the kitchen. But they don’t belong in the dugout.” And now Keith has to apologize for his “offensive” comments, which is garbage for lots of reasons.

First of all, I don’t see anything wrong with speaking your mind. Keith is a color commentator for the Mets, and I’m sure he’s doing a great job for them. He gets paid to offer his observations on what happens during a game, which is what he did in this case. Just because folks don’t agree with him doesn’t mean that he’s wrong, or that he should apologize. If commentators were forced to apologize after every single thing they said that someone didn’t agree with, no one would ever get to say anything. If folks only want to hear someone they agree with say anything, they should just lock themselves in their closet and talk to themselves.

Censorship is wrong in any area, especially in public. To tell Keith what he can or can’t think is something George Orwell called thought-crime. And Orwell, in his book 1984, wrote about an oppressive future where people did nothing but work all day and live in fear of being killed. And it’s situations like this where a destructive future is born. Right now, it’s folks telling Keith to apologize for speaking his mind. Tomorrow, it’s someone telling you or me that we can’t tell dirty jokes any more. Next year, we’re all wearing tracking collars and working on chain gangs. And who wants to live like that?

For the record, I agree with Keith. Baseball is a man’s game. That’s why there’s softball. You don’t see men playing women’s softball (unlike men’s softball, of course), so why should there be women in men’s baseball? There are just certain places were women shouldn’t be allowed, and a baseball dugout is one of them. In order for these players to do what they’re paid to do, they have to be totally comfortable at all times. That means they shouldn’t have to worry about hiding their junk every time a woman bounces by in the locker room, or have some pretty tush in tight baseball pants staring right at them in the dugout. Temptation is everywhere, and it’s hard enough to not give in already. There are enough of these distractions in the stands that having them on the playing field as well is just overkill. (And don’t get me started on ballgirls.) Hell, just knowing some hottie like Kris Benson’s wife or Aaron Boone’s girl (or Trinka Lowe!) could be watching me bring the heat turns me into a walking tripod.

What it boils down to: people are very protective of their personal space. Hitters want every inch of that batters box, just like pitchers want every inch of the strike zone. Women are very protective of their kitchens and china cabinets and their man’s children. And all baseball players want every inch of the clubhouse and dugout to be their own personal sanctuary. Which means no women. It’s a fact of life. Guys need their space, too. Remember all that guff about women wanting equal rights and equal pay a while ago? Well, here’s the payback. As soon as guys clamor to spend time with female soccer and tennis pros, then maybe this will change. But after all we’ve given up already, don’t expect it to happen from our end. We see what’s happened to the NBA. It’s not gonna happen in America’s pasttime. And don’t expect any apologies from me. Baseball is a man’s man’s man’s world, baby. Deal with it.

Todd Jones is a relief pitcher for the Detroit Tigers, and a contributor to SportingNews.com.