Instant Play Review in Baseball? No Way!

I went to a AAA baseball game last night and enjoyed a close 1-0 victory for the

Durham Bulls. They are doing well again this year, and all Durhamites have hopes for another "World Series" victory. But as I was enjoying the atmosphere of classic baseball and watching these excellent players apply their skills, I couldn't but think about the tempo of the game and its accurate reflection of what all of us experience every day in our lives. The tempo of life.

You see, baseball has a unique tempo, that no other sport has,  that reflects everyday living. I'm convinced that this is one reason that it is the National Pastime because we sense this familiar rhythm when we attend a game  During a basketball game, we have to keep our eyes glued to the court, otherwise we might miss a critical moment of the action. Basketball is  almost ALL action, but life isn't, and either is baseball.

Baseball is a slow, and sometimes routine, and one might even say boring for some. Pitch the ball, catch the ball, throw the ball back. Pitch the ball, catch the ball, throw the ball back. Pitch the ball, catch the ball, pitch the ball, hit the ball to the second baseman, and throw him out. Pitch the ball, etc. It goes on. Get up, go to work, come home, watch the news, and go to bed. Get up, go to work, come home, watch the news, and go to bed. Get up, need I belabor the point? I don't think so.

In life as in baseball, every once in a while something happens, and all hell breaks loose. Can I mention 911, Pearl Harbor, 1929 crash? I could go on. In baseball it's the line drive over the shortstop's head with a man on second. When this happens everyone on the field must react to the incident, and figure out how to get out of it. Baseball is a slow, relentless unfolding of events marked by "short" bursts of real "action." When I played high school baseball, I started out in left field, but  was so bored, I moved to first base. Just the right amount of action.

You can sit with a friend at a baseball game, and, during the game,  have a nice in-depth conversation  about multiple topics, but you can't to that at a basketball game, or a soccer match, because there is too much "action." In this sense, compared to life, all this action is artificial. If life had this much action, we would end up in the hospital.

This tempo I am talking about is something that we should not tamper with. If we do,  it will take away one of baseball's treasures: a familiar tempo we can all "dance to" as we sit and feel a baseball story develop during an afternoon's game.

One clearly developing threat to this tempo and this national game is the instant replay of questionable calls by the referee. It is going on in most sports now, and has begun to creep into baseball with the review of questionable home runs. That's enough, and let's not go any further with this in baseball. Imagine the first base calls, or the slides into home, or even the individual pitch that isn't certain, should we stop the game and review that "call"? What will "instant replay"  do the rhythm of the game but ruin it.

Life isn't certain, and, the vast majority of the times,  we don't get to review or  change  decisions  we make in life either. Uncertainty is something we live with every day, and trying to eliminate it from baseball will surely cripple one of it's major appeals: that touch of uncertainty that adds the spice of surprise to the play.

This drive to "review" calls is another example of questioning of authority, isn't it?  Unfortunately, with the exposed nature of many of our authority figures today, I guess we should question it. But with baseball, leaving that element of uncertainty there adds that dollop of the unknown that pervades all of our earthly travels: some good, some not so good. It just makes the experience of the game more real.

I guess there are some who want to know the "truth" of each encounter on the ball field. I think the enjoyment of the game is more important, and stopping the game to review a questionable call will remove one of baseball's appeal to all of us: a familiar tempo we can dance to. Finally, is it THAT important anyway? To most of us it really isn't, and if it is I suggest you "get a life."

Take Me Out to the Ballgame

OK folks, yesterday was opening day for the major league baseball season. I know that means winter is almost over--the season starts too early doesn't it-- and spring cannot be far behind. The scores from the six recorded major league games yesterday were: six to three, four to two, two to zero, seven to six, two to one, and five to three(eleven innings). I know that's silly, but I've always wanted to report the scores that way because a radio announcer in Chicago used to do that when I was a teenager. I've always thought it was hilarious.

But on a serious side, there is something nostalgic about the beginning of the season. It represents many things: hope for the new players and their game; a new beginning for those teams that didn't get into the World Series last year; new thrills in sport; new controversy on close calls with a lot of kicking of dirt, much spitting in the dirt and scratching of a certain spot on one's body (why does it itch so much?). It's relaxing to go to a game, have a few beers and a hot dog--a baseball game is not a baseball game without a hot dog and mustard (sorry you vegetarians)--and anticipate the thrills of the incipient season. I guess it just represents renewed hope.

I can still remember playing high school baseball in Chicago when the season opened in April. Damn, was it cold. If you actually hit the ball with one of those  old wooden bats, you hands almost fell off. It would really hurt you ability to play the piano.  I just couldn't hit that thing. It came in so fast that it sizzled, and if it hit you, you feared injury of even death. I used to look "about" where I thought it was going, and swing in that area.  Unfortunately, it was rarely there, so you can guess I was a terrible hitter.

I remember one time--I still feel guilty about it-- while playing first base, I got a hard throw from the shortstop. It was in the dirt, and a lot of dust--they didn't take good care of the field-- flew up in the air as the runner arrived. The base lifted up off the ground, and the ball went under the base. The umpire couldn't see the ball, but to him it  looked like it "arrived in the vicinity" of the first baseman (me) before the runner got there so he called him out.  The other team went nuts, and while they were verbally attacking the ump, I reached under the base and retrieved the ball. It was too late for him as the ump didn't see me do it, and I didn't offer the truth (I confessed in church the following Sunday).  If that runner sees this article, I apologize for that moral lapse. But that's baseball isn't it? I think we were playing Parker High that day.

There is something about baseball, which makes it unique among all sports, and I  think this contributes to making it America's Pastime. (Please follow my argument here, it's complex.) This sport is the only sport which has a rhythm which is very much like the rhythm of life. Yes, believe it, the rhythm of life!  Ninety-eight percent of it is routine and boring-- throw the ball catch the ball, throw the ball catch the ball--but every once in while all hell breaks lose, and everyone tries to get out of a "fix." If this doesn't describe  the rhythm of life, I don't know what does. Get up early, go to work, come home, go to bed, etc., etc.,etc.. Another similarity is the fact that the more you know about the details, and I mean a lot of details of the participants, the more you can understand what is going on. I don't know another sport where that is so true.

Because of this "rhythm" I am talking about, I think most of us can sit back, watch a game, and experience a "feeling of life" that we are very familiar with, and that we experience every day. The biggest difference with that "feeling" during a game,  is that it really doesn't matter very much what happens--at least until the playoffs arrive.

My favorite play in baseball is the steal. Once a man (I was going to say "person," but it's not that way yet) gets on first, it's exciting to watch the possible confrontation. How fast is the base-runner? How fast is the pitchers delivery? How strong is the catcher's arm? How good is the shortstop or the second base-person (OK)? It's always an exciting play.

It's amazing to me that Abner Doubleday got it so right with all the measurements. Ninety feet between bases makes it just about right for close plays if someone hits it to the shortstop or the second baseman, and tries to make it to first. Again, with the steal, there is that rifled throw to second (quite a long distance) that has to be right on to get the runner.  Those plays are always close. I don't think Abner experimented with the distances between bases, but it wouldn't surprise me if someone found some old charts one day that he used to work out these "oh so perfect" distances.

Finally, there are a lot of problems in the world today-- political unrest, war, nuclear catastrophe in Japan, monetary crisis and debt, viral plagues-- and there is no better remedy than going out to the ball park, and filling your stomach with goodies while you watch the summer game that is full of hope, youth, and a modicum of excitement. Take yourself out to a ball game this summer and see what I mean.