I watched every Cubs game as a kid - 1:20pm afternoon games on WGN. It was a summer joy for me. I collected baseball cards (big time). Our annual trek to Wrigley was a rite of passage and something I looked forward to for weeks. I played baseball from age 7 through high school.
I continued to follow and watch baseball through a few years ago. I hate to be so overtly political, but I stopped watching when MLB decided to get political and moved the All-Star game out of Atlanta due to a voting integrity law. They bought into the Democrats and I got out.
That's where I reside today, and I haven't looked back. I have too many other things to do.
I do miss it, though, but it's more nostalgia than something I need.
Crushed me. I was 6. Hey hey, holy mackeral....Before I traded, I clerked for Rich Nye who pitched for them. He had great stories. I still detest the Mets.
I too disagreed with MLB’s Atlanta decision but have continued to watch. NFL lost me for their total disrespect of half their fans. I have not looked back. NBA lost me years ago for a variety of reasons.
Jeff, couldn't agree with you more. I have been a Cub fan since 1968. They break your heart every year except 2016 but they almost did then too. My sister in laws brother in law played in the majors. His name is Buzz Capra. Played on ISUs NCAA championship team. Played for the despicable Mets and the Braves. He has some good stories about some of the greatest players. One was he was pitching against the Reds when either Rose or Bench hit a home run off him and as he was rounding the bases he told Buzz to keep it down rook. He played on the braves when Arron broke the home run record. But the best one was when he was scouting Frank Thomas and told him he wouldn't make the majors. There are a ton more he could tell, these players were all my heros growing up.
I am with you regarding baseball. It is funny, my father asked a while back if I ever dream about playing basketball- I told him no but I dream about playing baseball. I quit playing when I was 12 so I could focus on basketball I guess. It is to me the most truly American sport there is, for all of the reasons you stated. I love it quirkiness, the fact that you can have guys from 5'3" to 6'10" playing. I miss being able to go to Yankee games now that I live in the South. Yankee stadium, I have not been in the new one, was a place that when you walked into it you could feel the ghosts of past greats. I was in NYC when they were in the middle of winning several World Series in the 1990's. Probably my greatest brush with greatness was working at Bankers Trust across from the Trade center during one of the parades. I ran down a back road when I realized there was no way I would get to the street for the parade because there were thousands upon thousands lined up at each cross street. I ran down that backroad and walked through TGIF's which had a backdoor to the adjacent street and front door out to the main parade route. I walked through and as I walked out I found myself six feet from the car carrying Joe DiMaggio. He waived and that was closest I have ever come to legendary sports greatness.
I went to the old Yankee Stadium for one of the last games in 2008. Never been to the new one. Funny story about Yankee Stadium.
My friends in the hog pit were big White Sox fans. They heard Yankee Stadium was coming down. It was 2007. They bought tickets right behind home plate for one of the last games of 2007. They chartered a jet, and a limo to the airport so they could fly to NYC after the close, take in the game, fly back to Chicago and be in the pit by the open.
At the closing bell, 1PM CT, they went down to the limo and started drinking. They drink all the way to the jet, drink on the jet, drink in the limo to the game, and by the 6th inning, they are ripped. One of them walks to a beer vendor to get a round of beers since they stop selling in the 7th. He says to the vendor, "Man, you got to be sad since they are tearing this down in a couple of weeks." Vendor looks at him and says, "Uh, they are tearing it down next year."
He didn't have the heart to tell everyone until they were on the plane home.
When I was a kid I played through HS and had dreams of playing beyond but had shoulder and knee injuries that set me back. I had a massive passion for the game. Practiced, watched it, read books on it. Since the PED scandal, I have been super jaded about pro sports in general and have since lost all interest. Was also a huge Packers fan (a religion in WI), but since the kneeling during the anthem, I’m out. I’m kind of surprised but I don’t miss them at all anymore.
Excellent article. I agree with a lot of it as a baseball fan since 1965. The excessive noise at the stadiums are so annoying as is the nerdish elements like sabermetrics, gimmick (the ghost runner in extra innings) and specialization (including the dh). Yet it’s a great game for the reasons you gave.
In 1969 in baseball camp as a 12 year old I batted against Bob Feller, then about 50. I had never seen a curve ball before and he gave no breaks to us youngsters. Hitting a foul ball was a moral victory. That was probably the highlight of my baseball career.
I could not imagine digging in against Bob Feller. I met Jim Bunning a couple of times. The DH is the DH. Too late to change and I agree about the extra innings treatment....
Great post Mr Carter! Even I, a fan a the forlorn South Side Baseball team appreciate your nostalgia and love of the game! (Just can't seem to say S*x after the dismal season we just had)
I tend to agree about the current playoff format diluting the regular season. Baseball should be a two team shootout at high noon immediately following completion of a marathon.
Baseball has always been a blend of cold hard probability and gut feel. Has probably leaned much more heavily to probability for the last 20 years - but there will always be an advantage to having a feeling for some player who will NOT revert to the mean in a season. In the 90's, it was anyone with a hypodermic needle. Prior to the 90's it was guys who could handle the greenies the best.
Baseball as a consumer product has always tried to balance offensive production (immediate thrill - chicks dig the long ball) vs pitching production (delayed gratification and suspense). Today pitchers seem to have the upper hand. Last time this happened - the mound was lowered. Kling suggests making the ball larger to limit pitchers ability to grip the ball ( and thereby minimize spin rate).
Baseball is definitely the thinking man game. I love the stories of Greg Maddux setting up guys during an at-bat (Luis Gonzalez with the Dbacks) and across the season (Jeff Bagwell). That's like 3 dimensional chess - but having to also execute the physical moves of the chess pieces.
Speaking of Maddux. I hope baseball never moves to an automated strike zone. While the dimensions of home plate have never changed, each ERA of baseball has had an evolution in the interpretation of what a strike is. In the 70's, when AL umps still used ballon chest protectors, their strike zone was generally higher than their peers in the NL. Maddux was a guy who adapted his capabilities to conform to the zone of the period. If an ump regularly allowed an outside corner of 1 ball off the edge, Maddux would consistently stick 1.25 or 1.5 and dare the umpire not to call it a strike. He didn't have the upper-90 fastball to get guys to swing and miss the high strike - so he pushed the horizontal edges of the zone.
Pete Rose died last week. Luis Tiant died today. Being a north side kid in the 70's, we only got to see that funky windup once or twice a season. But we all imitated it on the wiffle ball field. I wonder if pitching will ever return to anything but the robotic arm-slots every prospect needs to demonstrate today. I don't think so - fewer American kids play "unstructured" hardball games and even Latin American kids are being fed into MLB run programs. Pete Rose would never be allowed to hit out of that crouch by any self-respecting little coach.
Bobby Witt led the MLB with 211 hits this year. Combined with his hits over the last two seasons, Witt will need to replicate 211 hits per year through the 2041 season to surpass Rose.
Shohei Ohtani arguably had the greatest offensive season ever (50/50 club is amazing). But sorry - he ain't the Babe as a two-way player. To achieve the 700/90 club (home runs/pitching wins), Ohtani would need to hit 54 home runs for the next 9 seasons and average 6 wins per season. He would be 39 years old. Don't think either happens.
Lived in New England thru 6th grade, then moved to IL. Rooted for both Boston & Chicago teams. Loyalty depended on the circumstances whenever they played each other. 86 Superbowl was a little bittersweet, hated to see Eason get completely embarrassed. The 20 aughts and teens finally sated my desire for baseball & football championships. I really dislike the behind the plate advertising and the uniform situation is awful. Don't care for the degree to which the rosters can change year to year either. Once the Sox traded Mookie I was done.
Former Dodger's pitcher Trevor Bauer has an interesting YT channel. After getting Me too'd he's spent a season in both Japan and Mexico. His home stadium this season was in Mexico City at over 7,000 ft. There's definitely a difference in pitch movement between there and sea level.
Brought back a lot of great memories. My father owned a drug store when I was very young and I taught myself how to read before I was 4 years old, because of the backs of baseball cards and I taught myself mathematics and statistics and probabilities and percentages because of baseball cards.
Later when he went to work for a friend's drug store, they sold supplies to the trainers of the Cubs, Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks, and we got free tickets for each with great seats as often as we wanted them and I also got to go into the Cubs locker room more than once. Just a kid's dream come true.
I will never forget my dad yelling at Leo Durocher during the 1969 season for taking his (Leo's) girlfriend, Lorraine Day, up to Lake Geneva or wherever the hell they went, during the heat of the pennant race. To this day I have never heard my father speak that way to another adult LOL
As you know, since we have been to Cubs games together, I am a huge baseball fan. There is nothing like a good close game, even last night's Dodgers/Padres game. Yes, we played the other sports, but nothing was baseball. There was so much fun Playing in the alley in Chicago, playing running bases and destroying front lawns, playing spinners or fast pitch. Playing catch with the neighbors and yes, with my dad. Playing 16 inch softball or just catch with it. Playing on the corners where the sewers and light poles lined up just so right for us kids to play added to every year. Going to games with my dad, my neighbors and my grandpa was always special. That el train from Howard to Addison and the time in the grandstand and bleachers was always amazing. Wrigley has always been a magical place, a place of wonder. A place where I saw Banks and Williams and Gibson and so many others from all teams.
The first time, I stepped foot on the field, I bent over to kiss the ground like the Pope would when he landed. It is a shrine. Wrigley is perhaps the most magical place ever.
Then there was 2016. I sat at Wrigley and then in Cleveland and saw the greatest play ever- 5-3 on a rainy Wednesday night in Cleveland. Tears came to my eyes they still do.
But, when it is all said and done, as you say, it comes down to this, I got to play catch with my grandpa, my neighbors, my brother and my dad. Baseball is so special.
Great post, Jeff. For me, what sets baseball apart from other sports is that baseball is the thinking person's game.
This is true. Slow thinking until it isn't. Football is all about preparation. Basketball and hockey are more like jazz.
I watched every Cubs game as a kid - 1:20pm afternoon games on WGN. It was a summer joy for me. I collected baseball cards (big time). Our annual trek to Wrigley was a rite of passage and something I looked forward to for weeks. I played baseball from age 7 through high school.
I continued to follow and watch baseball through a few years ago. I hate to be so overtly political, but I stopped watching when MLB decided to get political and moved the All-Star game out of Atlanta due to a voting integrity law. They bought into the Democrats and I got out.
That's where I reside today, and I haven't looked back. I have too many other things to do.
I do miss it, though, but it's more nostalgia than something I need.
This is very similar to my story. For me the end was the way the Twins reacted to the George Floyd fiasco.
Jack Brickhouse and Vince Lloyd. And Ernie, Let’s Play Two, Banks. 1969 was a bitter disappointment.
Crushed me. I was 6. Hey hey, holy mackeral....Before I traded, I clerked for Rich Nye who pitched for them. He had great stories. I still detest the Mets.
I too disagreed with MLB’s Atlanta decision but have continued to watch. NFL lost me for their total disrespect of half their fans. I have not looked back. NBA lost me years ago for a variety of reasons.
Jeff, couldn't agree with you more. I have been a Cub fan since 1968. They break your heart every year except 2016 but they almost did then too. My sister in laws brother in law played in the majors. His name is Buzz Capra. Played on ISUs NCAA championship team. Played for the despicable Mets and the Braves. He has some good stories about some of the greatest players. One was he was pitching against the Reds when either Rose or Bench hit a home run off him and as he was rounding the bases he told Buzz to keep it down rook. He played on the braves when Arron broke the home run record. But the best one was when he was scouting Frank Thomas and told him he wouldn't make the majors. There are a ton more he could tell, these players were all my heros growing up.
I am with you regarding baseball. It is funny, my father asked a while back if I ever dream about playing basketball- I told him no but I dream about playing baseball. I quit playing when I was 12 so I could focus on basketball I guess. It is to me the most truly American sport there is, for all of the reasons you stated. I love it quirkiness, the fact that you can have guys from 5'3" to 6'10" playing. I miss being able to go to Yankee games now that I live in the South. Yankee stadium, I have not been in the new one, was a place that when you walked into it you could feel the ghosts of past greats. I was in NYC when they were in the middle of winning several World Series in the 1990's. Probably my greatest brush with greatness was working at Bankers Trust across from the Trade center during one of the parades. I ran down a back road when I realized there was no way I would get to the street for the parade because there were thousands upon thousands lined up at each cross street. I ran down that backroad and walked through TGIF's which had a backdoor to the adjacent street and front door out to the main parade route. I walked through and as I walked out I found myself six feet from the car carrying Joe DiMaggio. He waived and that was closest I have ever come to legendary sports greatness.
I went to the old Yankee Stadium for one of the last games in 2008. Never been to the new one. Funny story about Yankee Stadium.
My friends in the hog pit were big White Sox fans. They heard Yankee Stadium was coming down. It was 2007. They bought tickets right behind home plate for one of the last games of 2007. They chartered a jet, and a limo to the airport so they could fly to NYC after the close, take in the game, fly back to Chicago and be in the pit by the open.
At the closing bell, 1PM CT, they went down to the limo and started drinking. They drink all the way to the jet, drink on the jet, drink in the limo to the game, and by the 6th inning, they are ripped. One of them walks to a beer vendor to get a round of beers since they stop selling in the 7th. He says to the vendor, "Man, you got to be sad since they are tearing this down in a couple of weeks." Vendor looks at him and says, "Uh, they are tearing it down next year."
He didn't have the heart to tell everyone until they were on the plane home.
When I was a kid I played through HS and had dreams of playing beyond but had shoulder and knee injuries that set me back. I had a massive passion for the game. Practiced, watched it, read books on it. Since the PED scandal, I have been super jaded about pro sports in general and have since lost all interest. Was also a huge Packers fan (a religion in WI), but since the kneeling during the anthem, I’m out. I’m kind of surprised but I don’t miss them at all anymore.
Forgiveness is a part of the American ethos too. Second chances.
Dear Jeffrey,
Excellent article. I agree with a lot of it as a baseball fan since 1965. The excessive noise at the stadiums are so annoying as is the nerdish elements like sabermetrics, gimmick (the ghost runner in extra innings) and specialization (including the dh). Yet it’s a great game for the reasons you gave.
In 1969 in baseball camp as a 12 year old I batted against Bob Feller, then about 50. I had never seen a curve ball before and he gave no breaks to us youngsters. Hitting a foul ball was a moral victory. That was probably the highlight of my baseball career.
Thanks,
Dean Vigliano
I could not imagine digging in against Bob Feller. I met Jim Bunning a couple of times. The DH is the DH. Too late to change and I agree about the extra innings treatment....
Great post Mr Carter! Even I, a fan a the forlorn South Side Baseball team appreciate your nostalgia and love of the game! (Just can't seem to say S*x after the dismal season we just had)
Have you read Arnold Kling's postmortem on the regular reason?
https://open.substack.com/pub/arnoldkling/p/baseball-2024-post-mortem?r=qbtur&utm_medium=ios
I tend to agree about the current playoff format diluting the regular season. Baseball should be a two team shootout at high noon immediately following completion of a marathon.
Baseball has always been a blend of cold hard probability and gut feel. Has probably leaned much more heavily to probability for the last 20 years - but there will always be an advantage to having a feeling for some player who will NOT revert to the mean in a season. In the 90's, it was anyone with a hypodermic needle. Prior to the 90's it was guys who could handle the greenies the best.
Baseball as a consumer product has always tried to balance offensive production (immediate thrill - chicks dig the long ball) vs pitching production (delayed gratification and suspense). Today pitchers seem to have the upper hand. Last time this happened - the mound was lowered. Kling suggests making the ball larger to limit pitchers ability to grip the ball ( and thereby minimize spin rate).
Baseball is definitely the thinking man game. I love the stories of Greg Maddux setting up guys during an at-bat (Luis Gonzalez with the Dbacks) and across the season (Jeff Bagwell). That's like 3 dimensional chess - but having to also execute the physical moves of the chess pieces.
https://www.mlb.com/video/see-how-greg-maddux-could-perfectly-predict-an-at-bat
https://www.mlb.com/video/mlbn-presents-one-of-a-kind-facing-bagwell
Speaking of Maddux. I hope baseball never moves to an automated strike zone. While the dimensions of home plate have never changed, each ERA of baseball has had an evolution in the interpretation of what a strike is. In the 70's, when AL umps still used ballon chest protectors, their strike zone was generally higher than their peers in the NL. Maddux was a guy who adapted his capabilities to conform to the zone of the period. If an ump regularly allowed an outside corner of 1 ball off the edge, Maddux would consistently stick 1.25 or 1.5 and dare the umpire not to call it a strike. He didn't have the upper-90 fastball to get guys to swing and miss the high strike - so he pushed the horizontal edges of the zone.
Pete Rose died last week. Luis Tiant died today. Being a north side kid in the 70's, we only got to see that funky windup once or twice a season. But we all imitated it on the wiffle ball field. I wonder if pitching will ever return to anything but the robotic arm-slots every prospect needs to demonstrate today. I don't think so - fewer American kids play "unstructured" hardball games and even Latin American kids are being fed into MLB run programs. Pete Rose would never be allowed to hit out of that crouch by any self-respecting little coach.
Bobby Witt led the MLB with 211 hits this year. Combined with his hits over the last two seasons, Witt will need to replicate 211 hits per year through the 2041 season to surpass Rose.
Shohei Ohtani arguably had the greatest offensive season ever (50/50 club is amazing). But sorry - he ain't the Babe as a two-way player. To achieve the 700/90 club (home runs/pitching wins), Ohtani would need to hit 54 home runs for the next 9 seasons and average 6 wins per season. He would be 39 years old. Don't think either happens.
I had not, thanks for the link
Lived in New England thru 6th grade, then moved to IL. Rooted for both Boston & Chicago teams. Loyalty depended on the circumstances whenever they played each other. 86 Superbowl was a little bittersweet, hated to see Eason get completely embarrassed. The 20 aughts and teens finally sated my desire for baseball & football championships. I really dislike the behind the plate advertising and the uniform situation is awful. Don't care for the degree to which the rosters can change year to year either. Once the Sox traded Mookie I was done.
Former Dodger's pitcher Trevor Bauer has an interesting YT channel. After getting Me too'd he's spent a season in both Japan and Mexico. His home stadium this season was in Mexico City at over 7,000 ft. There's definitely a difference in pitch movement between there and sea level.
Brought back a lot of great memories. My father owned a drug store when I was very young and I taught myself how to read before I was 4 years old, because of the backs of baseball cards and I taught myself mathematics and statistics and probabilities and percentages because of baseball cards.
Later when he went to work for a friend's drug store, they sold supplies to the trainers of the Cubs, Sox, Bulls and Blackhawks, and we got free tickets for each with great seats as often as we wanted them and I also got to go into the Cubs locker room more than once. Just a kid's dream come true.
I will never forget my dad yelling at Leo Durocher during the 1969 season for taking his (Leo's) girlfriend, Lorraine Day, up to Lake Geneva or wherever the hell they went, during the heat of the pennant race. To this day I have never heard my father speak that way to another adult LOL
As you know, since we have been to Cubs games together, I am a huge baseball fan. There is nothing like a good close game, even last night's Dodgers/Padres game. Yes, we played the other sports, but nothing was baseball. There was so much fun Playing in the alley in Chicago, playing running bases and destroying front lawns, playing spinners or fast pitch. Playing catch with the neighbors and yes, with my dad. Playing 16 inch softball or just catch with it. Playing on the corners where the sewers and light poles lined up just so right for us kids to play added to every year. Going to games with my dad, my neighbors and my grandpa was always special. That el train from Howard to Addison and the time in the grandstand and bleachers was always amazing. Wrigley has always been a magical place, a place of wonder. A place where I saw Banks and Williams and Gibson and so many others from all teams.
The first time, I stepped foot on the field, I bent over to kiss the ground like the Pope would when he landed. It is a shrine. Wrigley is perhaps the most magical place ever.
Then there was 2016. I sat at Wrigley and then in Cleveland and saw the greatest play ever- 5-3 on a rainy Wednesday night in Cleveland. Tears came to my eyes they still do.
But, when it is all said and done, as you say, it comes down to this, I got to play catch with my grandpa, my neighbors, my brother and my dad. Baseball is so special.
You lost me with your immigrants/football correlation. They're illegals. And fuck the cubs.