There is nothing more American than spring baseball — dollar hot dogs, homeruns and bleacher seats.

Baseball fans are willing to keep up with 162 games a season and purchase pricey tickets.

Baseball has a wide appeal.

It is the only sport in the United States that can make grown men tune into the Little League World Series, a sporting event for early teenagers.

As SMU moves to the Big East, it is time to start our baseball program back up. Title IX programs and resulting budget shortfalls caused the team to become defunct in 1980 and with it, the history of a storied program has been lost to most SMU students.

SMU shared the Southwest Conference championship with the Texas Longhorns in 1953. The team won 25 games in 1978.

Jerry Kovar, Fla Strawn and members of the Pony Express including Craig James played baseball.

Even in its prime, the team was under funded. The team’s last coach, Steve Adair, only made $15,000.

The university only gave him money for six scholarships a year.

During the same time period, schools like the University of Texas for giving out as many as thirteen scholarships a year.

And yet, the team stayed competitive.

SMU still has a successful club team and for years, boosters and alumni alike have wanted the return of a Division I program.

No offense to spring sports like track and field but baseball sells tickets and brings students to the stands.

The Big East is set to expand in the next few years with big additions to the conference.

This is a chance for SMU to expand athletic recruitment and increase enrollment competition.

Butler University, after its miraculous March Madness run, saw a rise in applications. But, even more importantly, it saw increased national visibility ­— something necessary for a university wanted to expand its brand into the domestic and foreign arena.

It will not be easy to start a team back up. Financial costs and athletic bureaucracy will be tough to overcome.

But, if SMU athletics in recent years provide any indication on how the baseball team will do in the next decade, the Mustangs will be just fine.