Orlando, Fla. ? As another yahoo was handcuffed and dragged away Tuesday night, two things became obvious: Baseball has a problem, and baseball has been very lucky.

Last time Kansas City’s first base coach was attacked in Chicago. This time it was an umpire. Next time . . .?

There must be a lesson in here, something to prevent the next time. As the Royals threatened not to play Wednesday night, baseball’s homeland-security people went into red alert. They pondered security measures and tried to get to the root of the problem.

It’s really pretty simple.

“Some people, when you mix alcohol with bad genes, this is what happens,” Britt Gaston said.

If you want answers, you go to the experts. Except for Morganna the Kissing Bandit, Gaston may be the most famous person to run uninvited onto a baseball field.

Remember Henry Aaron’s 715th home run? Gaston was one of the two guys in bellbottoms who appeared out of nowhere as Aaron rounded second base.

Gaston and Cliff Courtney patted Aaron on the back, then fled into the stands. They ended up paying $100 in fines and were given suspended sentences, partly because Aaron didn’t push the case.

He realized they were just two 17-year-olds who meant no harm. That doesn’t excuse what they did, but it sure makes it different than today.

“What they’re doing now is stupid,” Gaston said. “There is no point to it.”

It’s one thing to run around the field seeking attention. You make a spectacle/fool of yourself, get arrested and life goes on. But what was that idiot thinking when he jumped first base umpire Laz Diaz?

“I know! I’ll tackle the guy, tell him he blew that call in the third inning, evade a couple dozen players and scores of cops, then hop the train back to Moline.”

It was almost as inexplicable as last year’s episode in Chicago when William Ligue and his 15-year-old son stole the show at Dysfunctional Family Night when they attacked Kansas City Royals first base coach Tom Gamboa.

The White Sox stress that Ligue and the others aren’t typical fans. With a full moon out, three other guys also barged onto the field Tuesday night. None turned out to be rabid, but you sure hope the security chief at U.S. Cellular Field never gets a job with the president’s Secret Service detail.

It makes you long for football, where idiots enter at their own risk. That guy Baltimore’s Mike Curtis waylaid 32 years ago probably still is seeing tweety-birds. Short of digging moats, a la Euro soccer, what can baseball do?

“We did it in fun,” said Gaston, now a businessman in Isle of Palm, S.C. “The other big thing was we were sober.”

Getting rid of beer sales is an easy lesson to take from Tuesday night, but Mo Vaughn will lead the league in stolen bases before that happens. Even if the stands were full of devout Mormons and every crasher was thrown in jail for a year, it only takes one nutcase to do the unthinkable.

Not to put too dour a point on it, but America’s pastime truly reflects America. It’s an open society full of easy targets if a case of bad genes doesn’t mind getting caught.

Gaston has two young sons now. Given his background, what could he tell them if they felt like running onto the field when somebody breaks Aaron’s record?

“I’ve been asked that hundreds of times,” he said. “If they wanted to, really, there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Coming from a guy who ought to know, that’s the scariest lesson of all.