The picture of the Dodger Dog smushed on its foil wrapper is a perfect metaphor for the joys of baseball. Never error free, not always pretty, but always delicious!
What makes baseball the best sport to watch is its slow, gradual pace, its duel between the pitcher and the batter, and the role of the umpire (thank goodness for two challenges now), etc. It's a thinking person's sport -- a "hmm" sport -- except for outbursts of cheers. Like a football team moving down the field, baseball team pile up emotions during rallies. Managers' dueling wits.
Bouncer over the mound, Mantilla up with it, throws low and wild..Hodges scores...and we go to Chicago! (Vin's call in 1959 when the Dodgers beat the Braves to go to the World Series) I'll never forget it. Vin is my favorite Dodger!
Look up 1959 Dodger Hi-lite record on You Tube. You'll love it, especially Scully's call of a rhubarb between the Dodgers
and Giants over a Willie Mays fly ball that hit a guide wire in the Coliseum. My favorite Scully call of all time. It's about 9-10 minutes long on side 1 about 6-7 minutes in. He is so good. Maybe the greatest description of a baseball argument of all time.
Scary to see what could become of this grand old game. Can you imagine how much we would have missed had they cut short games from three to two hours while Vin was on the mic?
Re: Vin Scully! I feel like I've told this story before, but it's a good one. When I was in high school, I went to a Dodger game with my boyfriend, who played baseball in high school and college. He came back from the restroom and announced, "I just took a leak next to Vin Scully!!!" I said, "Who is Vince Cully?" Needless to say, I now and will always remember Vin Scully!
Re: Dave Roberts! My daughter, Chelsey, hung out with him in the early '90s. She taught high school with the wife of a UCLA baseball player who was a good friend of his. She said they once took a limo to Goat Hill Tavern, a dive bar in Costa Mesa. (Wanna meet there sometime?) She said Dave is absolutely the nicest guy you could ever meet!
Great column. Made me think of Jim Murray, who I think is the greatest sports writer of all time. This was right up there. I'm putting Chris Erskine on the mantle right next to Jim Murray. Thanks for the great writing. And if you start a strike against high prices, I'll be right next to you! Go Dodgers.
There’s so much beautiful writing about baseball. We could make a new list of five books probably every day of the season. (OK … maybe ‘til the All-Star break.) But I think every one of my lists would have something from the great Roger Angell, the New Yorker writer who covered the sport well into his nineties.
Indeed, the poet laureate of baseball. Angell said he was inspired by Updike's famous essay on Ted Williams. Weren't we all? Best magazine piece of all time.
As an avid reader of books about the game and its players, I would also suggest I Was On Time by Buck O'Niel and Doris Kearns Goodwin's Wait 'Til Next Year.
Dave Roberts seems to be a first-class human being, besides being a great coach. I love him and the geriatric (wise, seasoned) Dodgers. Not being as avid/knowledgeable a baseball fan as you, I have to ask: What is an "owners' strike"? Are the multi-millionaires striking for more millions?
The picture of the Dodger Dog smushed on its foil wrapper is a perfect metaphor for the joys of baseball. Never error free, not always pretty, but always delicious!
Pay Ball!
I'd add "Ball Four" by Jim Bouton to your book list. Great inside look at the game from a rowdy player.
It was on my initial list
My favorite day of the year!
What makes baseball the best sport to watch is its slow, gradual pace, its duel between the pitcher and the batter, and the role of the umpire (thank goodness for two challenges now), etc. It's a thinking person's sport -- a "hmm" sport -- except for outbursts of cheers. Like a football team moving down the field, baseball team pile up emotions during rallies. Managers' dueling wits.
“Self medicate with baseball” Me, too!
$45 to park and to me it's robbery: yet what can we do? Go Boys in Blue...
Can’t wait until tonight, a Dodger fan since I was 10 and I’m now in my 70’s although I’ve since moved to Palm Desert.
I wonder if they’ll still have those necklaces?
“When Vinny died, baseball lost its Beethoven “ is what l want to tattoo on my chest. I won’t, but it occurred to me.
No tattoos, Susan!
I can’t believe I wrote that!
Bouncer over the mound, Mantilla up with it, throws low and wild..Hodges scores...and we go to Chicago! (Vin's call in 1959 when the Dodgers beat the Braves to go to the World Series) I'll never forget it. Vin is my favorite Dodger!
Look up 1959 Dodger Hi-lite record on You Tube. You'll love it, especially Scully's call of a rhubarb between the Dodgers
and Giants over a Willie Mays fly ball that hit a guide wire in the Coliseum. My favorite Scully call of all time. It's about 9-10 minutes long on side 1 about 6-7 minutes in. He is so good. Maybe the greatest description of a baseball argument of all time.
OPENING PANDORA's BOX
You'll know the baseball season's start
When something shifts in the fine art
Of sunlight on a uniform
And the nights begin getting warm
From blinding lights in the night sky
And the distance roars-don't ask why--
It's possibly a comet's fall
More likely a smoky fastball
That was reversed to end it all
Or the rage at an umpire's call;
As to the latter: new this year
A disparity: umpire fear
That a batter will tap his hat
To see where the umpire was at
When he called the last pitch a strike
Which of course the batter did not like
A camera calling the pitch
That made the batter freeze then twitch--
Idiocy now in a rule
To see which one's the greater fool:
The one who did not take the swing
Or the ump who mis-called the thing;
There'll be a lot more balls this year
Than strikes--that simple thing is clear
The reason? statistics, and yet
Don't rule out another--sweat!
Coming soon: yet much more to vet--
A box behind the plate to set
The standard: "Ball!" or "Strike!", its cry
Powered by that brainless twit--A.I.;
The richest team in all baseball
Subject to sport's technology thrall--
The games will slow: a hat-tipped crawl
We'll see where they're at in the Fall
World Series now December--inside...
All those balls and strikes to deride...
Umpire and batter thus laid low
By technology they don't know;
Soon, batter's smart caps will decide
You can give it a ride
Or let it go and thus abide
The call, the tech then on each side;
If I were an ump I'd hide
In the dugout: refuse to decide!!!
Thanks Forrest. Earliest opening day in history. And soon, as you say, we'll be seeing December baseball.
Scary to see what could become of this grand old game. Can you imagine how much we would have missed had they cut short games from three to two hours while Vin was on the mic?
Re: Vin Scully! I feel like I've told this story before, but it's a good one. When I was in high school, I went to a Dodger game with my boyfriend, who played baseball in high school and college. He came back from the restroom and announced, "I just took a leak next to Vin Scully!!!" I said, "Who is Vince Cully?" Needless to say, I now and will always remember Vin Scully!
Re: Dave Roberts! My daughter, Chelsey, hung out with him in the early '90s. She taught high school with the wife of a UCLA baseball player who was a good friend of his. She said they once took a limo to Goat Hill Tavern, a dive bar in Costa Mesa. (Wanna meet there sometime?) She said Dave is absolutely the nicest guy you could ever meet!
Great column. Made me think of Jim Murray, who I think is the greatest sports writer of all time. This was right up there. I'm putting Chris Erskine on the mantle right next to Jim Murray. Thanks for the great writing. And if you start a strike against high prices, I'll be right next to you! Go Dodgers.
No Roger Angell books? There's got to be at least one!
There’s so much beautiful writing about baseball. We could make a new list of five books probably every day of the season. (OK … maybe ‘til the All-Star break.) But I think every one of my lists would have something from the great Roger Angell, the New Yorker writer who covered the sport well into his nineties.
Indeed, the poet laureate of baseball. Angell said he was inspired by Updike's famous essay on Ted Williams. Weren't we all? Best magazine piece of all time.
As an avid reader of books about the game and its players, I would also suggest I Was On Time by Buck O'Niel and Doris Kearns Goodwin's Wait 'Til Next Year.
"We're born again,
There's new grass on the field."
-John Fogerty
Hi Michael, Goodwin's book was on my initial list and would've made my top 10. Probably should've made my top 5. Go Ducks!
Love Fogerty. Centerfield is my favorite Fogerty song! Such a great baseball song!
Dave Roberts seems to be a first-class human being, besides being a great coach. I love him and the geriatric (wise, seasoned) Dodgers. Not being as avid/knowledgeable a baseball fan as you, I have to ask: What is an "owners' strike"? Are the multi-millionaires striking for more millions?
Owners say they’re not making money. So they may shutdown game till they get concessions from players
Even if they're not making money, the equity they gain on these teams in in the hundreds of millions. That said, salaries are ridiculous.
Oh, so I basically had it right.