Free Friday: A New Baseball Fan's Five-Point Plan
LONDON — A few jet-lagged thoughts from London. But first…
I’ll be at the Waterstones at Trafalgar Square today (Friday—at least I think it’s Friday) at 5 p.m. to sign copies of the UK edition of WHY WE LOVE BASEBALL. It’s a pretty informal thing, best I can tell, so if you happen to be around Trafalgar Square for the big baseball celebration that they’re having today, stop on and in and say hi. It should be fun.
After the signing, we’ll head over to the Theodore Bullfrog pub for a pint and some friendly baseball banter.
Saturday at noon, I’ll be in conversation with Kelley Franco Throop at the Riverside East Bar, not far from the stadium. This is being put on by the great folks at the British Baseball Federation, and it should be a blast. We’ll be talking Mets and Phillies and whatever else happens to come up.
I’ll be at the London Series games on Saturday and Sunday. I’ll be wearing my KC Royals hat in Monarchs colors, so I should be fairly easy to find among the Mets and Phillies fans if you’d like to say hello.
Wow, do I love British baseball fans. I mean, I generally love all baseball fans, but British fans—and this is really true for all European baseball fans—have to work SO HARD to be fans because of the time difference, and the lack of access to baseball, and the longstanding notion that baseball is boring and inaccessible and overloaded with too many rules to understand.
I’ve already met so many great fans and, really, the festivities begin today, when they turn Trafalgar Square into a baseball party. I’ve already been asked quite a few times, by any number of people, how fans can get into baseball*. I had not exactly thought about baseball that way before, but I’ve come up with a rough five-point suggestions list for the London Series. This will all be super-basic for most of you, but I figure I’ll pass it along anyway.
*Including, by new pal Jared Shurin, who is head of marketing campaigns and strategic communications for the mayor of London. Jared has been working in London for a couple of decades, but he’s from Kansas City, and he’s invested in: (1) Looking to see how baseball can make inroads in London; and (2) Finding actual Kansas City barbecue in London. I would think that, with the popularity of “Ted Lasso,” that (2) would have happened by now. Apparently not yet.
No. 1: Take it all in.
There’s a sense that baseball is complicated and impenetrable because of its long history and statistical bent and periods of inaction and obscure rules, like the infield fly. No hardcore baseball fan would deny any of that. Most of us would talk about that stuff happily… it’s all part of why we love it.
But that’s certainly not the only way to enjoy baseball. It seems to me that there are few places in the world that are happier than a baseball game. Go to the park. Have some of the food. Take in the smells. Listen to the organ. Watch the players move around. There’s something beautifully Zen about it all. Think of it as a summer picnic.
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No. 2: Remember: The action begins (and often ends) in the battle between pitcher and hitter.
I tell people who are curious about baseball to focus first on the hitter and pitcher, while keeping this in mind: The hitter is a massive underdog. You think about it: The hitter is almost always facing a pitcher with an arsenal of different pitches—a fastball that might travel upwards of 100 mph, a breaking ball of some sort that will bend in a mind-twisting way, a change-of-pace that will look like a fastball coming out of the pitcher’s hand but will arrive a beat later. The batter will have less than an eyeblink’s time to recognize the pitch and hit it.
Then, even if the batter should hit it, there are seven fielders behind the pitcher who can get the batter out by (1) catching the ball on the fly or (2) throwing the ball to first base before the batter can get there.
As such, the batter faces titanic odds. To bring one simple statistic into this—the league batting average this year, so far, is .240. That means that batters only get a hit 24% of the time. So when you see a batter get a hit, you’re seeing an athletic triumph. When you see multiple batters get hits in the same inning, leading to runs, you’re seeing something of a minor miracle.
No. 3: Enjoy the little customs.
I’ve long thought that baseball actually fits the British character because it’s a proper sport with numerous traditions and a close connection to its history.
There are wonderful little examples everywhere—ones that longtime baseball fans barely think about anymore. For example, when a pitcher is removed from a game, the manager will walk to the mound, take the baseball, then wait for the new pitcher to come in and hand him the baseball. This is the closest thing in sport, I would say, to the changing of the guard.
Players and coaches will not step on the chalk foul lines when coming on and off the field at the end of innings. Players will throw the ball around between innings. Every now and again, the grounds crew will rake the infield in a lovely little parade. We all stand in the middle of the seventh inning. If you’re an adult, and you happen to catch a foul ball, you get to keep it—and you will win adoring praise from the other fans if you happen to give it to a child.
No. 4: Don’t get bogged down by the complicated rules.
When I watch cricket, I will follow along and follow along and then something will happen that will utterly baffle me. That could happen with baseball. My best advice is: Don’t worry about it. Most of baseball’s rules are actually pretty simple. Four balls is a walk. Three strikes is an out. A run is scored when a runner gets to home plate safely. Don’t sweat the small stuff.
On average, teams score four or so runs per game, so if you’re watching a game where three runs or fewer are scored, you’re watching a game dominated by pitching. If you see a game where five or more runs are scored, you’re watching a high-scoring game.
In last year’s London Series, the Chicago Cubs crushed the St. Louis Cardinals 9-1 in the first game—Chicago’s Ian Happ hit two home runs in that game, a pretty rare feat. In the second game, Chicago scored four runs in the first inning, but St. Louis rallied with a stirring comeback and won the game 7-5. There are thousands of baseball games played every year, but each has its own character.
No. 5: The Mets and Phillies have their own character.
Every team in baseball has its own character—but this one is particularly fun. New York and Philadelphia have a longstanding rivalry that goes back to the Revolutionary War. The teams have faced each other more than a thousand times, and they’ve had their famous battles. Both teams have this star-crossed history, with brief, glorious moments of success and long, painful droughts of heartbreak and ineptitude. Philadelphia has not won a World Series in 16 years, but this team is one of the favorites to win this year. The New York Mets have not won a World Series in almost 40 years, and they have an owner desperate for success and the highest payroll in baseball, but things are not working out so far.
That’s all you really need to know to enjoy the weekend. It would be nice if one of the big stars—Philadelphia’s Bryce Harper or Kyle Schwarber, New York’s Pete Alonso or Francisco Lindor—puts on a show. Maybe the Phillies’ Ranger Suarez, who has been pitching as well as anybody in the game, will have a special performance on Saturday. Maybe it will be a complete unknown who will be the hero.
Hey, if you feel like it, I’d love if you’d share this post with your friends!
I don’t think I’ve told you this amazing little story I heard while doing the British Baseball Podcast with a lovely guy from Manchester named Matthew. (If I have told it, apologies, I’m telling it again.) Matthew was telling me that his six-year-old son has become a baseball fan and his favorite player is… well, I’m going to give you 10 million guesses who his favorite player is.
Before I tell you, I want to say that while in London, I’ve been thinking a lot about Buck O’Neil. Nobody, and I mean nobody, would better enjoy the spectacle and celebration of bringing baseball to the UK. He’d love this all so much. Buck was, at heart, a baseball apostle. He believed in the power of baseball and the goodness of baseball… he never stopped believing in that power and that goodness despite all he endured.
And nothing thrilled him more than when he met people who wanted to know more about the Negro leagues. For 40-plus years after he stopped playing and managing in the Negro leagues, few wanted to hear the stories, few wanted to know the players, few BELIEVED that Negro leaguers played the game with such skill and mastery and enthusiasm and love.
Which brings us back to the boy’s favorite player of all time… Hank Thompson.
There’s a good chance that even if you’re a devout baseball fan, you have never heard of Hank Thompson. He was a star player for the Kansas City Monarchs, and one of the five Black players who played in the American/National League in 1947. He had a very short stay in ’47 (just 27 games with the St. Louis Browns) before returning to the Monarchs. In 1949, he signed with the Giants (the first Black player to do so) and was a Giant until 1956, when he was 30. Thompson had his demons off the field, but on the field, he did a bit of everything—hit with power, run the bases, play good defense and so on.
The reason he’s the favorite player of a six-year-old in Manchester is because he’s featured in the video game “MLB: The Show.”
How happy do you think that would make Buck O’Neil? I’m giddy just thinking about it.
JoeBlogs Week in Review
Monday: Revisiting Greatness: A Plaque Project.
Tuesday: Revisiting Greatness, Part II and London Calling.
Thursday: Revisiting Greatness, Part III.
Joe, I spent a July 4 in London once and we came across a pub having an Independence Day celebration. I went up to the fellow at the door and asked him why they were celebrating our victory. He said, "Because it's the day we got rid of you lot." You have to love the British sense of humor.
I have other comments, but this can't wait: that photo of Thompson is amazing!!!!
His arm cocked and ready to throw, the ump's finger pointing "fair," the little awning in centerfield letting you know it's The Polo Grounds.
Wow. Gives me chills.