trotsky

Although I'm more of a Sox fan, I still watch the Cubbies and want them to
do well. However, when you have the two go head to head, one is invariably
going to take a hit in the standings, and I think MLB really screwed fans of
multiple teams in this way. Sure, it's a media event, and they sell lots of
tickets and concessions and shit, but for some reason I still think there
was a point in time when baseball was about more than just the hype and
money.

john persons

Nah, it's always been about the hype and money. It's just that as time
passes, they come up with new ways to make money.

anthony giacalone

Absolutely right, John. The best book on the business of baseball from the
very early days is _Never Just a Game_. Really, a great book.

Hey, John are the Clippers playing at home this weekend? My 20th reunion
(Upper Arlington HS) is this weekend and I may be in town. BTW, what the
heck happened to the High Street bars?
--
------------------------------
Anthony Giacalone
Proud sponsor of the 1977 Chicago White Sox team page at
Baseball-Reference.com
http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/CHW/1977.shtml

john persons

Only 20 years -- you're a *young* turk!

Yes, the Clippers are in town. They play Indianapolis Friday and Saturday,
then Ottawa Sun/Mon/Tue/Wed. They ripped out the astroturf a few years
ago, so it's now much more pleasant to go see a game.


Big redevelopment project at the south end of the High Street campus area.
I think they are calling it the Gateway Project -- something like that,
anyway. Retail, residential, a movie theater IIRC. The university is
trying to make that area a little less sleazy.

trotsky

in article 2klskqF3tl1gU1@uni-berlin.de, Anthony Giacalone at

That would stand in stark contrast to the made for HBO (I think) "When it
Was a Game." You gotta love the internet: two guys agree with each other
and they sound convinced the rest of the free world is wrong.

anthony giacalone

John and I are not voices in the wilderness on this one. I cannot think of
a single baseball historian, who would argue that baseball was someohow less
of business (hype and money) than it is now. If you would like I can give
you another dozen sources on the subject. Really, the evidence is
overwhelming.

I do like the _When It Was Game_ films. It's really cool to see all those
old home movies. Seeing Lou Gehrig or a host of other sepia-toned stars in
color is really awesome. However, the film's script, while well done, is
not exactly baseball scholarship. Almost all of the "dialogue" is written
much, much later and drawn from non-baseball specialists, like Donald Hall
(poet) and Bart Giammati (literature professor). It is not a strong
historical film as far as scholarship goes. The problem that most casual
baseball observers have is that their evidence is based on distant oral
memories, which are generally horribly flawed.

This is not to say that interleague play, wild cards and the designated
hitter are horrible gimmicky "solutions" to increase revenue. It's just to
say that people said exactly the same thing about the innovations of
outfield seating, the home run, night baseball, franchise shifts and
integration. Things always seem better before today.
--
------------------------------
Anthony Giacalone
Northern Illinois University

trotsky

in article 2km8beF3s4a9U1@uni-berlin.de, Anthony Giacalone at

Uh, it's a little worse than that. Baseball is a ****sy weensy problem with
hypocrisy, as they still regard the Black Sox scandal as the most heinous
thing of all time, and the Pete Rose situation as the second most heinous.
They don't seem to have the ability to even mention, though, their utterly
appalling and disgusting history with dealing with drug use, though, which
still remains a problem today in the form of steroids. Strawberry, Gooden,
Steve Howe were just given chance after chance after chance, with the
integrity of the game never properly being called into question. Also, the
single biggest bastardization of the game that I've seen in my lifetime is
the shrinking strike zone. There is simply no reason why a letter high
pitch shouldn't be called a strike, other than that it makes it harder for
the hitter to get hits, which sells less tickets (supposedly). The lowering
of the mound could be said to be along the same lines, but I think that is a
little different, in that it levelled the playing field (so to speak)
between batters and pitchers. But there is simply no excuse for the
shrinking strike zone, and the slugging numbers that we see as a result does
taint what we experience as baseball compared to yesteryear. And even
though we do all this to tilt the balance in favor of the hitter, we still
don't see the likes of DiMaggio or Ted Williams.

I think it's one thing to make baseball more economically viable, such as
night games at Wrigley. Certain traditions like day baseball I think made
it even more distinctive, but something has to be done to make the money
situation more realistic. A different tack, though, should be taken when it
comes to morphing the rules to make the game more of a circus or the rampant
drug use including steroids. This is corruption to the core, and obviously
if it's sold well enough people look the other way. Baseball, in terms of
the caliber of play and fundamentals is garbage compared to where it was 20,
30 or 50 years ago. There is simply no excuse for the vast majority of
players not knowing how to bunt, or their inability to run base paths at any
strategic level. You can cite a trillion sources that tell you that
baseball was always about the Benjamins, and I'll explain how they're wrong
every time.

justforfun

When?

justforfun

So when was MLB NOT a business??

You ARE wrong....of course, that's nothing new.

justforfun

How many games did Strawberry and Gooden cost the Mets, again? Oh,
they were responsible for most of the Mets WINS, you say?

Uh, yeah, there is. 100MPH letter high is UNHITABLE. You can't call an
unhittable pitch a strike. Period. That little machine MLB has
installed in select parks has shown pitch calling is VERY accurate.
Ther is MUCH more scrutiny on an umpire calling a game today than
there was when Babe Ruth was getting anything he didn't swing at
called a ball, for instance.


Huh? Ever heard of Barry Bonds? His numbers make Joe and Ted look like
rookie leaguers. And you think Joe and Ted didn't have favorable
strike zones? Laughable. They had MORE favorable strike zones than Barry has.


Bill Veck is turning over in his grave with THAT specious comment.

WOW. "Rampant drug use", eh? You DO have proof of this, right?

That's just plain STUPID.


Shit, you can't even explain how YOU are wrong every time...