9. Baseball is not a violent sport. The pitcher tries to throw the ball past the batter, not at him.
8. Baseball seems to me such a civilized game, played at a conversational speed that encourages discussions and friendships among the fans.
7. Baseball is a humbling sport. Even the best teams lose about 60 games a season. Even the best hitters are put out two-thirds of the time. Players tend to be a little more philosophical about pacing themselves through a season of 162+ games.
6. Baseball has a tradition that allows fans to compare numbers over the course of a century - that’s tradition.
5. The numbers that get compared are so fuzzy (it wasn’t until 1950 that whites had to compete with blacks, baseball fields vary greatly in the ease with which they accommodate home runs, of late players were probably “juicing,” etc.) that comparisons between players inevitably provokes great arguments (see point 8).
4. Baseball is played outdoor in the late spring and summer. If it rains, everyone comes back later to play and watch the game. In this sense, baseball comes with a good weather guarantee.
3. Baseball is scalable. Kids who are 12 can play an engaging game as can college kids who are 20 and professionals who are 30. As long as the players are roughly matched in ability, the game promises to be interesting.
2. Baseball lets the fans feel superior. Batting champs strike out, Cy Young Award winners give up home runs. They make grown men wear those funny little uniforms. A guy making $30,000 a year can holler at a guy making $3 million.
1. There is almost no correlation between athleticism and the ability to hit a 95 mph curveball. There is no classic hitter’s physique, giving the sport an everyman look in spite of the fact that only about .0003% of the population can consistently hit a 95 mph curveball. Lean, chubby, and muscular players, Japanese or Latino guys who speak little or no English, black guys or white guys who talk too much, serious guys and silly guys – the great players seem to defy any stereotype of personality, intellect, or physical characteristics.
R World (Ron Davison muses aloud)
baseball......zzzzz *yawn*...how predictable is it that your a baseball guy and I'm more of a football guy...I'm open to the notion that perhaps I just don't "get" the game and all I need is to spend a lazy afternoon at the park with a true fan to explain why there are so many *sses in the seats....but until then I'll just nod off every time the sportsguy 'splains how the cubs are 29 games back in the ....*zzzzz*... oh man I keep driftin off... oh hell ...if I keep talk in about this "sport" for one second longer I'm gonna start stabbin' my eyes with a rusty dull fork!... so with out any further adieu I present the last post of an ancient thread from the mesozoic era caried forward into the modern age of life in 4-1-07 (aka april fools, but I'm not playin that tired game my n*gga... oops!!! ...I mean my negro....aw heck... I'm kinda screwin up in the ol edikit department...ok...lets move on ...here it is ,read and respond: Well done my brother !!(from another mother)...now we're gettin some where *cranks up Ozzy, settles in...it's Miller time*...
ReplyDeleteRegarding the first question: the word "entrepreneur" means different things to different people. To me it means someone who is primarily responsible for developing a business from scratch, out of whole cloth, ...business plan, raisng capital and creating a fully functioning organization. Not a "consultant" or a contract worker who just performs the same function they did as a salaried indivdual for the company they just left 5 minutes ago and returns as a free agent. I assume you agree with this definition? What business did you develop?
I've been a small business owner for most of my carrer and currently I'm a partner in two businesses.
Regarding question number two: Wow so given the hypothetial situation you just described your primary sentiment would be that after having given the federal goverment half of your inheritance you would feel"flush" and that would be good enough for you...wow!.. just wow!...I don't know you very well but I'll bet you could do a much more efficient job of making sure that money got to someone in your life that was truely needy as opposed to flushing it down the sh*t hole that is the federal bureaucracy. The difference between you and me, my friend, is that I truly believe that the government is worse than the individual and the private sector in just about everything they try to accomplish (even when you factor in the Paris Hiltons of this world) Social (ponzi scheme) Security , Medicare,Welfare, Johnson's "War on poverty" all abject failures. I find it ironic that liberals will defend the free speech rights of some FDB burning an American Soldier in effigy but they won't defend the right of an individual to keep as much of their own money, real or inherited, even if they're selfish and decadent. In order to maintain a free society sometimes you have to protect the rights of someone to express themselves in a way that you might not agree with to preserve that liberty for a more principaled individual. I think my opinion on this subject is self evident (I consider it my patriotic duty to preserve as much of my assets as possible so that I can make sure my hard earned dollars do the most good)
Regarding question number three: I think you might be in denial about your liberal oreintation. Your no doubt a complex guy "free thinker" n what not but you are probably not a moderate.
*tries his best Jeff Foxworthy impersonation* "If youv'e aever subscribed to Mother Jones....you just might NOT be a moderate...(insert laff here)...If you've aever voted for a Green Party candidate, a Libertarian (aka not a chance in h*ll party) John Anderson, Bill Clinton, Al Gore AND John Kerry...you just might NOT be a moderate...(insert laff here)...If you've aever believed that hybrid cars are enviromentally resposible and that "carbon credits" are anything less than a scam to assuage liberal guilt and create a huge industry in China to build polluting factories and then get paid to tear them down..you just might NOT be a moderate...(laff again)
If your party line anti walmart, pro choice, pro ACLU, think Dennis Kusinich is slightly left of center, Think Fox News has a conservative bias, but ABC CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, PBS, NYT, LAT, etc DON'T have a liberal bias, find your self getting caught up in the Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, Halibuton,Tom Delay "six degrees of separation" parlor game/rabbit hole/anger-a-thon (reminds me of the Vince Foster conspiracy theorist of yesteryear)... you just might NOT be a moderate... (okay ..only laff if ya feel like it.)
No shame in bein a liberal...we all gotta be somethin..me? I'm a conservative (HEYYY there's a shocker!!) Voted mostly for Republicans ,but I was so repulsed by the Repubs in 06 I almost stayed home. (Btw; for the record I believe FOX NEWS does have a conservative bias)
Any who, I'm kinda havin fun here so I hope yer not fixin ta ban me n what not...*still scratchin his head about the whole "racism" thing*
30 March, 2007
"zzzzz" inducing event: getting past midway through the second "paragraph" of the previous comment. Didn't make it.
ReplyDeleteDid you write a comment to your own post for April 1?
Now after my nap, my reason for a comment: a curveball can go 95 mph? No wonder I could never hit one.
Mets 1986 was the last time baseball rocked my socks!
ReplyDeleteEnjoy though :)))