Apr

14

The 2015 baseball season is now into its second week, and some interesting patterns are appearing. For instance:

1. The Orioles may have some weaknesses in pitching. It's still way too early to hit the panic button, and Jimenez is doing so much better than last year that memories of Steve Stone's 1979/1980 performance come to mind. Base stealing has not been an Orioles strength, and there's either a more aggressive view to the base paths than in the past or some blown hit and runs. On the other hand, Jonathan Schoop gave a nice clinic on Sunday on sliding into second base and avoiding the tag.

2. The Cubbies may have a pitching problem with Mr Lester, who is having some trouble connecting with his first baseman. Hard to get a pick-off if you can't throw to the first baseman. And that hasn't prevented the Cubs from a strong opening to the season in 1st place.

3. The Astros are performing better than I had expected, even if it is early in the season.

4. On the other hand, the Padres are not. Again, though, still early in the season.

5. And the Braves, signer of former Oriole Nick Markakis over the off-season, are sitting nice in first place, 5 games over .500. Quite a strong start in Hotlanta.

Two items of note:

First, MLB instituted some rules to speed up the game. They seem to have worked. The impact on the game itself, though, isn't clear—maybe we'll have an idea by the end of the season. On the other hand, if the MLB really wanted to speed up games, they'd eliminate the challenge provisions. That seems unlikely, though. Does anyone know how many decisions on the field have been overturned by the challenges?

Second, there are some increasing concerns being raised about head trauma among catchers. One of the big differences between football and baseball is the lack of similar collisions among persons of high body mass with consequent transfer of energy often manifesting in the skull as a concussion or just trauma. Unlike football, in which it is difficult to imagine how the game might be preserved in something akin to its current form without such transfer of energy, in baseball, such collision are relatively rare. The exception is the catcher. Backstops do not, generally speaking, experience head trauma so much from efforts to tag a runner at home (though there is some of that) as from the foul tips/foul balls, and even an occasional hit with the tip of the bat (not often though, fortunately). The former though can impart much energy to the catcher, usually through the catcher's mask. That mask has been around for almost 110 years, and it's hard to imagine how the battery operated before those masks became prevalent. The amount of evolution in the mask during that time hasn't been nil, but it hasn't been that great, either. More recent versions of the mask have been somewhat more protective, but the basic problem of how to dissipate the energy imparted through contact of the ball and the mask remains. How soon the MLB will address this matter is unclear, but fans certainly hope it is sooner rather than later.

The discussion of baseball vs football brings to mind that classic from George Carlin:

"Baseball is different from any other sport, very different.

For instance, in most sports you score points or goals; in baseball you score runs.

In most sports the ball, or object, is put in play by the offensive team; in baseball the defensive team puts the ball in play, and only the defense is allowed to touch the ball. In fact, in baseball if an offensive player touches the ball intentionally, he's out; sometimes unintentionally, he's out.

Also: in football,basketball, soccer, volleyball, and all sports played with a ball, you score with the ball and in baseball the ball prevents you from scoring.

In most sports the team is run by a coach; in baseball the team is run by a manager. And only in baseball does the manager or coach wear the same clothing the players do.

If you'd ever seen John Madden in his Oakland Raiders uniform, you'd know the reason for this custom.

Now, I've mentioned football. Baseball & Football are the two most popular spectator sports in this country. And as such, it seems they ought to be able to tell us something about ourselves and our values.

I enjoy comparing baseball and football:

Baseball is a nineteenth-century pastoral game.
Football is a twentieth-century technological struggle.

Baseball is played on a diamond, in a park.The baseball park!
Football is played on a gridiron, in a stadium, sometimes called Soldier Field or War Memorial Stadium.

Baseball begins in the spring, the season of new life.
Football begins in the fall, when everything's dying.

In football you wear a helmet.
In baseball you wear a cap.

Football is concerned with downs - what down is it?
Baseball is concerned with ups - who's up?

In football you receive a penalty.
In baseball you make an error.

In football the specialist comes in to kick.
In baseball the specialist comes in to relieve somebody.

Football has hitting, clipping, spearing, piling on, personal fouls, late hitting and unnecessary roughness.
Baseball has the sacrifice.

Football is played in any kind of weather: rain, snow, sleet, hail, fog…
In baseball, if it rains, we don't go out to play. [The same is true in snow—in mid May, 1986, a 15 inch blizzard in Minneapolis forced postponement of a game. This decision was notable not because of the condition of the field being unplayable (it was the Metrodome, an indoor park) but that the teams could not get to the park.]

Baseball has the seventh inning stretch.
Football has the two minute warning.

Baseball has no time limit: we don't know when it's gonna end - might have extra innings.
Football is rigidly timed, and it will end even if we've got to go to sudden death.

In baseball, during the game, in the stands, there's kind of a picnic feeling; emotions may run high or low, but there's not too much unpleasantness.
In football, during the game in the stands, you can be sure that at least twenty-seven times you're capable of taking the life of a fellow human being.

And finally, the objectives of the two games are completely different:

In football the object is for the quarterback, also known as the field general, to be on target with his aerial assault, riddling the defense by hitting his receivers with deadly accuracy in spite of the blitz, even if he has to use shotgun. With short bullet passes and long bombs, he marches his troops into enemy territory, balancing this aerial assault with a sustained ground attack that punches holes in the forward wall of the enemy's defensive line.

In baseball the object is to go home! And to be safe! - I hope I'll be safe at home!"


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1 Comment so far

  1. Craig Bowles on April 19, 2015 7:22 am

    Yankees had some great young players in spring training but but choose to play Mark Teixeira and Carlos Beltran with their .200 batting averages. (Bases loaded last night for Teixeira and Tampa gives him the whole left side of the field, because he either can’t or refuses to bunt down the 3rd base line.)

    The horse racing prognosticators are using the lingo “kickback”. It’s talking about dirt getting kicked into the horses face and might be useful in the coming months.

    For example:
    Your horse fades in the stretch. You say, “He reacted badly to kickback.”

    Your horse is middle of the pack the whole race. You say, “He suffered badly from kickback.”

    Your horse moves to the outside but loses ground around the turn. You say, “Well, he had to move to outside to avoid the kickback but the extra ground he had to cover in the turn was too much to makeup.”

    Your horse is in last place the whole race. You say, “He couldn’t overcome the kickback.”

    Now there’s always an easy excuse to use when your horse loses. It’s not the horse, it’s the kickback. This will be especially useful for the Kentucky Derby’s big field. I’m already planning a few to use.

    “My horse has never encountered that kind of kickback before.”

    “The kickback was horrendous. No horse could overcome that.”

    “My horse hasn’t run on this surface before, so was unfamiliar with that kind of kickback.”

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