Once again, we’re in the midst of the baseball season and here’s me with no knowledge whatsoever of the sport.  What, I think, can be so difficult?  You hit a ball from home plate, run around a field, touch three bases, then go back home again.  Or you pitch the ball to said hitter.  Or you stand out in the outfield and try to catch the ball the hitter hit and stop him with the ball he hit before the hitter makes it home.  Or you yell out "Safe!" or "Out" then get in a yelling match with hitter or pitcher or coach or the stadium or by some there-in-spirit fan at home.

Yet I’m told it’s a very intellectual game.  Nuances, intricate rules, and the art of meticulous observation decide the game and, in the process, make the sport interesting.  I argue (and I should know, I think; I went to a game in Milwaukee a couple years back when Sosa was near a batting milestone or something or the other) that what is going on out there on that field is: spitting, grabbing, clutching, hitting bat against shoe, looking over here, staring at something over there, advertisements and averages flashing across the screen, sausage races, and—every so often—someone would hit the ball.  More often than not, the hit would be: foul.  Strike?  No, a strike is when you miss, right?  Sometimes (let’s say a quarter of the time), the player would hit the ball and make it to first base.  Before he makes it to third, almost invariably, he’d be struck out.  Or hit out?  What’s the terminology?  I think there may have been a couple of home runs but, by that time, I was mentally somewhere else.

I cannot talk about baseball.  I become mute when someone here at the office mentions the KC Royals or the NY Yankees.  Sorry, folks.  But, for your blogging perusal, I offer you links of writing I find enjoyable about baseball:

Baseball Musings is, from what I can tell (see above), a very informative blog of the ins and outs of the sport.  The writer previously hosted Baseball Tonight Online for ESPN in 2001.  He also has a radio show, accessible from the blog.

Baseball fans like statistics, then they like comparing statistics.  Mike’s Baseball Rants does a lot of compiling and comparing statistics.

Kansas City Review, mentioned here because the Royals is one of the closest big league teams and  because someone here has a family member on the team.  Just a fan site.

A quote and a link: "Baseball Toaster is a collection of blogs by a group of friends who love baseball and enjoy writing about it."

And for all things sports (I even put a link on the sidebar last year), check out the popular site Deadspin.

Oh, if you hadn’t noticed, I now italicize blog titles as I would a book title.  Haven’t checked any manual, but thought that since a blog is, in a sense, complete work (such as a book or an album), it should be treated like one. 

Enjoy your weekend.

Now Available from the University of Nebraska Press
Playing in Isolation: A History of Baseball in Taiwan By Junwei Yu
Branch Rickey: Baseball’s Ferocious Gentleman By Lee Lowenfish
Scoring from Second: Writers on Baseball Edited and with an introduction by Philip F. Deaver; Foreword by Lee K. Abbott
Level Playing Fields: How the Groundskeeping Murphy Brothers Shaped Baseball By Peter Morris
Invisible Men: Life in Baseball’s Negro Leagues By Donn Rogosin; Introduction by Monte Irvin