Take me out to the ballgame!

[JewelSong]

Welcome, baseball fans one and all, old and new!

Baseball is more than a sport. It is romance. It is superstition. It is mystical. It is heartbreak and triumph. It is the one game that isn't over 'til it's over (as the great Yogi Berra said!)

Baseball has heart, soul and the crack of the bat. It has tar pitch and dirt, green grass and white baselines. It has history and dark times.

Recommended: Ken Burn's 9 "Innings" of baseball history - shown originally on PBS and now available on DVD and Video. Also - a trip to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. (Where Abner Doubleday supposedly invented the game of baseball one fine summer's day. Except he didn't!)

Baseball movies I like:
Pride of the Yankees (Old, but Gary Cooper as Lou Gehrig still makes me cry!)
A League of Our Own (about the professional women's baseball teams)
For Love of the Game (chick-flick and baseball movie rolled into one!)
Bull Durham (sexy baseball)
Field of Dreams ("If you build it - he will come!")

Oh, and I personally believe that the Designated Hitter position ruins baseball.

So...any other baseball fans? Come in! Discuss! Spit in the provided receptacles, please. And no corked bats.

[fisssh]

Oh, and I personally believe that the Designated Hitter position ruins baseball.

Well I must disagree with you there. Give me 9 hitters who can hit and a pitcher who just pitches any day!

And no corked bats.

Sammy Sosa is a member of HoF?

[Sassafras]

Baseball!

The Yankees!

*sw00n*

Jewel, I must know which team you support. (So I can supply suitable insults when appropriate) I thought you lived in the Boston area and, as such, are part of the Red Sox <spit> Nation ... but since you don't approve of the DH you must be a NL fan???

Oh, you missed one marvellous baseball film.
Billy Crystal's *61 about the legendary year of Mantle and Maris. Which, coincidentally, happens to be the year I began my love affair with the Yankees and baseball. I was a mere green girl at the time. An immigrant from the motherland (England), a lonely waif (well, not really lonely ... there were plenty of men) alone in the big city and by sheer chance happened to end up living a few blocks away from Yankee Stadium in the Bronx.

And that was how it began ....

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Sassy, I can almost forgive you for being a Yankee's fan for that.

I myself grew up as a Mets fan. I have only vague memories of the Miracle Mets of '69, but rooting for the "You Gotta Believe" last-to-first Mets of Yogi Berra and Tug McGraw (and Tom Terrific, the greatest pitcher of all time, of course) in '73 was one of my forming experiences.

Beth, of course, having grown up in New England and gone to school in Boston (okay, Cambridge) was/is a big Red Sox fan (you'd still like her, Sassy). So it was quite interesting that the first World Series that we spent together was in 1986 - the infamous Bill Buckner year. We were, at the time, very firmly in our hippie Deadhead phase. The night of the sixth game, we went out to bar where a Grateful Dead cover band was playing, and where they had the game on TV as well. We were, shall we see, properly mentally adjusted for listening to the band, rather then for watching the game. It was a very interesting night, and that's all that I will say about that.

In the years since we moved out West, I have become a pretty big Giants fan, with only a mild attachment to the Mets (which has as much to do with that "interesting night" that I describe above as it does me being so far away, but that's another story). In particular, I must admit, I am a huge fan of Barry Bonds. I think he is going to go out in a blaze of glory in 2006, leading the Giants to the first World Series victory in San Francisco (and his own first championship), and retiring two or three home runs short of Hank Aaron's record.

You gotta believe!

[vison]

There are those to whom Baseball is only a game. What dorks.

Still, I have no great affinity with any Big League team, maybe the Yankees, or the Mariners (since they're the closest thing Vancouver will ever have to a major league team).

I have 2 grandsons who play ball. As a matter of fact, in about an hour we will be off to a clinic that runs all winter. Coach Eddie, who runs things, is a Red Sox fanatic. He has every game available on DVD and video, not just Series games or Pennant games but every game he can. Two of the boys who help out on Fridays have been signed by the bigs, one for Baltimore and the other for Seattle. After New Year's they are off to training camps and who knows, may play in the bigs this season coming up, or at least AAA.

There is simply no better way to spend a summer evening than to watch the kids play. It is absolutely astonishing what great ball they play.

And I agree, the DH rule SUX. It's BASEBALL, not "pitcherball", and I speak as the grandma of two kids who can pitch. A ball player should be able to hit the durned ball. These wimpy pitchers who can throw maybe 40 pitches and then have to sit down.......grrrr...... Then they don't even have to hit? Wussie guys. Jeez.

[Primula Baggins]

I love the game of baseball. I just have trouble caring about the teams.

I really do love it. My town has a class A team that plays in a 1938 stadium where they still change the scoreboard by hand, where most fans sit on bleachers and buy peanuts and beer and at the seventh-inning stretch we all stand up and SING "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." And little kid teams get to run out on the field with the big guys for the national anthem at the start of every game. It's a small-city get-together, warm and friendly and fun for the whole family (about $4 for a bleacher seat, $10 for a family).

I love it, I love watching the games, I have a great time. For me it's baseball as theater, I guess. I almost always enjoy any game I see, in life or on TV.

But I don't care who wins. So I don't fit here!

[JewelSong]

But I don't care who wins. So I don't fit here!

Oh, yes you do, Prim! I often watch a game just for the joy of it. This summer, Luke and I went to a game at Wrigley Field. What a great place to watch a ballgame! We had seats in the top row of the upper deck, it was warm and sunny and I sat there with a draught brew in one hand and some double-fried potatoes in the other and watched the Cubs lose....and I thought, "It doesn't get any better than this!"

I grew up in NY, so was a Yankees fan, but now root for the Red Sox when they're playing so as not to anger my son! My father grew up in Brooklyn and he often said that when the Dodgers moved, he lost all interest in baseball. He would sometimes tear up when talking about "da bums!" That was the era of the true hometown teams.

I remember the '69 Miracle Mets very well...and I even remember the Mantle/Maris homerun year! I'll have to check out "61" - I think we have it somewhere.

I will save my DH reasoning for another rant...I mean, post!

"Buy me some peanuts and crackerjack..."

[Sassafras]

O Faramond ... where art thou, Faramond?

What dost thou think of this?

The Dodgers' pre-holiday shopping frenzy continued Sunday when they confirmed the signing of free agent five-time All-Star Nomar Garciaparra and moved very close to landing free agent six-time All-Star Kenny Lofton.

Garciaparra, 32, will be the No. 5 hitter and first baseman in a dramatically rebuilt lineup. Lofton, 38, would probably bat second and replace center fielder Milton Bradley, who was traded to Oakland last week.

A former Mets fan wrote:

We were, shall we see, properly mentally adjusted for listening to the band, rather then for watching the game. It was a very interesting night, and that's all that I will say about that.

Oh, do tell!

How colourful was it?

Meanwhile ... Teh Yankees still need to fill CF ... with Damon? (I hope not. Wants too much money for too many years ... and his arm isn't that great either ) So, will we see Bubba Crosby on opening day? Or Bernie?

Questions. Questions that need answering.

[JewelSong]

Boston was very sad when Nomar got traded, but it turned out to be the best thing for us, as that was The Year!

Now, if they start talkin' 'bout trading VARITEK, I am so becoming a Mets fan...

[Tinsel_the_Elf]

Meanwhile ... Teh Yankees still need to fill CF ... with Damon? (I hope not. Wants too much money for too many years ... and his arm isn't that great either ) So, will we see Bubba Crosby on opening day? Or Bernie?

Questions. Questions that need answering.

And now answered. New York teams continue their ongoing poaching of Teh Red Sux. The question is: Will Johnny Damon lose his strength like Samson once his hair is cut?

[JewelSong]

ARGGGGG!!!! What is wrong with the Red Sox? How could they let Damon go?

What were they thinking?

Or, to be precise, were they thinking??? At all? Even a little?

[Sassafras]

And now answered. New York teams continue their ongoing poaching of Teh Red Sux. The question is: Will Johnny Damon lose his strength like Samson once his hair is cut?

He'd better not! He's being paid 52 million dollars! for 4 years.
Let's see, 52 divided by 4 = $13mil per year ... Ya think that paltry amount is enough to put food on the table?

Still, he's bound to be the leadoff hitter, so Derek (sw00n) can move to the # 2 spot where he belongs ... as for fielding ... we'll have to wait and see ... the Yankee Stadium outfield is very different than Fenway.

Jewel:

[JewelSong]

*is totally disgusted*

(My son, however, asserts that "Damon is over-rated, anyway!")

*sigh*

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Will Johnny Damon lose his strength like Samson once his hair is cut?

Look what happened to Giambi when the Yanks signed him for big bucks and he got all cleaned up. I don't think the Boss got his money's worth there (though is was impressive the way Giambi came back last year).

A former Mets fan wrote

Not totally former. I certainly wroted for the Mets the last time the made it the Fall Classic (after rooting against them in the division series against the Gigantes).

[Sassafras]

Look what happened to Giambi when the Yanks signed him for big bucks and he got all cleaned up. I don't think the Boss got his money's worth there (though is was impressive the way Giambi came back last year).

Two points: 1.) Steriods do not suddenly confer talent if no talent exists ... they only increase strength and endurance and 2.) next ... it seems to take every not-brought-up-in-Yankee-farm-system player at least one entire year to adjust to playing under the microscope in NYC. Giambi, btw, used to work out at my gym (he's a local boy) I have spoken with him a few times ... he also has 20/10 vision which is why his OBP is so high ... he can literally see the seams on the ball so he knows if it's a cutter, a slider, a fastball etc.
Cool, huh?

As for Damon ... he has a fairly weak arm but he hustles (he'll need to hustle in Yankee Stadium CF ... it's huge compared to Fenway) ... and he is a good lead-off hitter. But we'll have to wait and see ... the free agent pickings were very slim this year ... we were not going to give up Cano so players like Rowand and Hunter were out of the question.

Not totally former. I certainly wroted for the Mets the last time the made it the Fall Classic (after rooting against them in the division series against the Gigantes).

Ah, that would have been the 2000 WS. We beat the Mets in 4 games IIRC. That was the infamous Rocket slinging bat at Piazza series.

[Sassafras]

That is so weird ... my post appears with Voronwë's avatar and sig and then again with mine.

Is there a poltergeist lurking on this board?



I could delete it but that would spoil the fun!

[Voronwë the Faithful]

That's right. So are the Yanks going to entice Clemens to come back to them not that the Astros have cut him loose?

As for steroids, I think they are much ado about very little. I don't think steroids did Giambi in, and if I recall correctly, he had his best year with the Yanks his first year (.314 ave., 41 homers, 122 rbis, .435 obp, .598 slg, to be exact).

Of course, Giambi's best year by far was his MVP year with the A's in 2001. And who was the leadoff hitter for that team (the only year he played for the A's)?

Going back to steroids, I agree that they do not suddenly confer talent if no talent exists. For instance, I am completely convinced that Barry Bonds is the best hitter that the game of baseball has ever seen, steroids or no steroids.

[nerdanel]

Sass, I only see it once, with yours.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Sass, I think you edited my post instead of quoting it. But why it then repeats under your name, I can't figure out. Nor can I figure out why tp doesn't see it twice, once under my name and once under yours. But I am now going to go back and edit my post so that it appears the way that it originally did, so maybe tp is seeing what it will look like in the future. (Which of course will be "now" for most people when they read this.)

[nerdanel]

But I am now going to go back and edit my post so that it appears the way that it originally did, so maybe tp is seeing what it will look like in the future. (Which of course will be "now" for most people when they read this.)

Voronwë, reading that gave me a headache (until I understood what you said Sass did), my obvious powers of foresight notwithstanding.