Death to the Opposition: Joy, Loss, and Baseball inDeep Space Nine‘s Most Endearing Episode

Twenty - twoyears ago today , Deep Space Nine — at the altitude of itsdark , complex , morally nuanceddepiction of state of war , and the impingement it has on Zion — render a affecting message about the concept of accepting loss . It did so in acomedy holodeck baseball game plot , and the outcome cement itself as one of theall - time greatestStar Trek episodes there ever was .

Season seven ’s “ Take Me Out to the Holosuite ” reads , at first , like a soundly absurd , almost un - Trek - like escapade , especially to a series like Deep Space Nine ( the Dominion War is exalted as the franchise navigating itsethically darkest hourswith a light that is daring to flicker out ) . Captain Sisko calls his faculty to a dire - sound meeting , only to reveal that the reason for his graveness is that the chaffer captain of the T’Kumbra , Solok — the vampiest Vulcan to have ever vamped in a Star Trek show — has challenged the staff to a team exercise with his own all - Vulcan bridge crew . But it ’s not just any match : it ’s baseball game .

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Worf needs to recalibrate his level of heckling.

Worf needs to recalibrate his level of heckling.Gif: CBS

Baseball is a running theme throughout Deep Space Nine . In Trek ’s fabrication , baseball is a dead play by the late 23rd - century — but Sisko is obsess with it , both as a historical artefact and a unpaid pastime . It helps him tie with his Logos , Jake , and provides a respite from the politics of managing a society like the odds and ends of factions and diasporas that call Deep Space Nine home . The baseball that Sisko keeps on his authority table is one of the show ’s most deeply authoritative pieces of iconography ; used when Sisko first explains linear time to the Nebiim when he bump them in the show ’s opening episodes , it comes to map the world himself when Deep Space Nine is forcefully abandon to Dominion occupancy in the war ’s darkest hours . Baseball is n’t just a mutation : it is Benjamin Sisko ’s .

Solok ’s challenge — born out of a decidedly - un - Vulcan , but actually extremely Vulcan grievance he and Sisko developed in the academy over his airless superiority when it comes to managing emotion — is a deeply personal one to the sea captain . Being Sisko , Man ofa Million Grudges , he rent it to heart . It ’s beautiful that something as silly as a purportedly friendly ballgame ( which Sisko has to indiscriminately teach to his multicolored crew in sentence to face Solok ’s team ) so utterly expose the human imperfectness that make Sisko such a compelling character in the first place . In a stark world , this would be a well-disposed meeting between fellow officer of the Federation , a social experimentation , a chance to see how history regard such a pastime that no longer exists in this advanced civilisation .

But Star Trek is made up of people , deep imperfect thing , and Deep Space Nine is a glitter example of this . So Sisko — in an absurdist parallel to paths he went down dealing with everything from the Cardassians and the rise of the Maquis guerrilla group to the Dominion itself — take this blithe game and turn it into an obsession where he must n’t just crush Solok , but prove once and for all that he was always right about snotty Vulcans . After hastily getting the bridge crew ( and a few friend , most notably Rom and Leeta ) forge into the Niners , a bunch of loveably clueless go - getters who have no idea how to play baseball game in the slightest , Sisko ’s involuntariness to not just not lose , but countenance Solok come through , is a tragedy waiting to happen .

Image: CBS

Image: CBS

The team ’s first practice end with most of them in Bashir ’s sick berth , head to Sisko making some morally questionable uses of his control prerogative to get some expert ( mostly his girlfriend Kassidy ) to fill up the gaps in his armoury . But repeated drill with his team see Sisko grow increasingly infuriated with misfortunate Rom , who ca n’t sweep a bat to deliver his life . at last , Sisko ca n’t take it anymore , even if Rom is adjudicate ; he boils over and lash out at the Ferengi in front of his fellow niner , motivate them to quit until Sisko just have Rom have fun with the eternal rest of them . But Sisko is retiring cause fun with the sport he in earnest , in truth loves : he just wants to win , whatever it takes . Even if whatever it takes peril compromise the friendships he has built with his crew .

Deep Space Nine is a series filled withsubverting expectations , so it ’s perhaps not too surprising that “ Take Me Out to the Holosuite , ” a story almost ache for an underdog story of victory , conclude with our Niners getting utterly steamrolled by Solok ’s squad . At that point , we ’d total to love these characters over six time of year of TV , and seen them , at the acme of the show ’s grim chapters , come together and have playfulness in a way they rarely have . Despite the fact that the episode makes it very clear they do n’t have a fortune in hell at winning , we so desperately want them to eke out that victory . They ’re dependable people , just having fun . Give them the win !

But that ’s the dot , and it ’s the point Sisko has to learn over the course of the instalment . As their cream to Solok ’s Logicians continue , his emotion boil over again , leading to his riddance to the holographic stands , alongside Rom — who still record up to urge on his friends along even after Sisko shorten him . It ’s there that the captain is given the literal and metaphoric distance to re - realize just why he loves baseball so much , the poesy of its chaotic randomness reflecting in a cockamamie misplay by Nog that somehow end with the Niners getting the third out they needed to shift play against the Logicians . In finally accepting that he was n’t live on to win his X - farseeing grudge against Solok , Sisko not only has to ascertain to permit go and confront the idea of loss but to re - embrace the multitude he ’s lose with .

Image: CBS

Image: CBS

in conclusion learn to incline into the playfulness and arrange Rom on as an impromptu batter , the Niners score their first running play of the entire match after the hapless Ferengi inadvertently bunts , while absolutely failing to realize that ’s what he was meant to do . The Niners are so overjoyed that they terminate the match then and there , much to Solok ’s furious confusion — a fury that continues on into the post - gimpy celebrations in Quark ’s saloon , where the Vulcan is denied the luck to rub his win in against Sisko . He and the rest of the Niners are too busy happily fete their one picayune moment of halo like there ’s no tomorrow .

Beyond deny Solok his niggling preening , the Deep Space Nine crew has learned that sometimes expiration is inevitable — but they ’ve also learned to take a win where you’re able to , no matter how small in the face of that going , and that sometimes there are no better people to lose alongside than those closest to you .

They just did n’t happen to learn it in the field of battle , in a war that threatens to enfold the Federation that they all bear for . They teach it in a holographic plot of baseball game from a Ferengi who does n’t bang how to bunt . Twenty - two years subsequently that still remains a beautiful , wonderful affair .

Image: CBS