Baseball has survived the Black Sox World Series fix. It has survived Pete Rose and the Pittsburgh drug trials. It has survived eight work stoppages since 1972, including the most recent in 1994, which, unconscionably, wiped out the postseason. It even has survived its brazen, self-created economic chaos, somehow managing to get away with asking a dad, who maybe makes $10 an hour, to shell out $150 or $200 to take his family to a ballgame to watch Alex Rodriguez earn approximately $154,321 for his night's work as part of his quarter-billion-dollar contract.

Surely baseball will survive this latest, greatest scandal.

The Kris and Anna Benson breakup.

Just kidding.

Baseball returns to ballparks across America today and in none of 'em but San Diego's, where the San Francisco Giants start the season, will anyone think about Barry Bonds or care the slightest about what performance-enhancing drugs he might be using this month. It will be just nice to be at a ballgame again after the long, cold winter. It's opening day. This is the one day of the year when you're allowed to think your team has every bit as much chance of winning the pennant as A-Rod and the Yankees.

It won't happen, of course, not this year or perhaps any year for your Pirates. But so what? Isn't the game itself enough of an attraction? It's the best game going. It's not like pro football, where there are only eight regular-season home games and the survival of the free world seems to be riding on each one. It's not like hockey, either. You can't exactly sit back and enjoy the warm sunshine and soft breezes in Mellon Arena.

There's nothing better than being at a ballpark on a pretty day or night. Forget the smell of fresh-cut grass. The smells of spilled beer and grilled kielbasa are even better. The ticket prices might not be completely right -- what is these days? -- but they're easier to swallow than what the other sports command. The kids understand the game. They've played it. They probably have dreamed of playing it at PNC Park. They have Jason Bay's picture on their bedroom wall, just as their dads once had Roberto Clemente's on theirs.

That's the beauty of baseball.

There's so much good about the game that it makes you forget all that's wrong with it.

A year ago, the BALCO steroids story was front-page news. Two of baseball's biggest stars -- Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa -- made fools of themselves at a Congressional hearing into steroids, leaving no doubt they have something to hide. Another player -- Rafael Palmeiro -- wagged his finger at his interrogators and said, infamously, "I never used steroids. Period." It was a Capitol Hill pronouncement that rivaled "I didn't have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky" for drama and, sadly, untruthfulness.

Talk about turnoffs.

Baseball still set an attendance record last season.

The Pirates helped. Their attendance jumped from 1.58 million to 1.8 million despite a 13th consecutive losing season. How marketing director Tim Schuldt didn't win baseball's executive of the year award is a mystery.

The Pirates' attendance will increase dramatically again this season even though another sub-.500 year seems likely. It can't all be the All-Star Game. Maybe every sports team should contact Schuldt for advice.

Baseball will break its attendance record again.

Fans just can't seem to stay away no matter how disgusted they say they are with the steroids and the high salaries and, in the Pirates' case, the endless losing.

The Bonds controversy won't keep them away.

Bud Selig and George Mitchell won't keep them away with their farcical investigation into Bonds and the other steroids druggies.

The game will survive.

It's so good it always will survive.

Next Monday can't get here soon enough. That's the day the Pirates will play the Los Angeles Dodgers in their home opener. It's the perfect day to call in sick to work or to convince mom and dad that playing hooky for one afternoon won't be a problem. It's hard to imagine a better place to be than PNC Park. It's nice to think it will be a warm, sunny day. It will be great if Zach Duke throws seven shutout innings at the Dodgers. But you know what? It will be great even if he gives up five runs in the second.

It really will be just nice to be at a ballgame again.

If nothing else, it will take our minds off the Bensons' breakup for a few hours.