Posted on 10/03/2019 1:19:49 AM PDT by Jacquerie
There’s nothing like the sounds of baseball. Whether one is a player in the batter’s box, the outfield, or sitting in the stands or listening on the radio or internet . . . nothing compares to its sounds.
The sounds today conjure memories of my first mitt, the one my father bought for me at a Five and Dime in the early 1960s. It was too big for my hand, but that was okay. Having a mitt was a rite of passage, a step toward manhood. Sounds of the surrounding city while playing pickle with my elementary school buddies in the alley behind my house, and dodging cars during pick-up games in the city side streets . . . all remain.
I can say for certain there was NOTHING in the world like the crack of MY bat off a fastball.
I suspect those who complain about a slow game hardly ever played it. But if they did, maybe they just didn’t listen. The sounds of baseball, the anthem, the announcers, jeers, groans, hawkers, umpires, players, organ music and clapping and roars of the crowd are sounds I love.
The sounds of baseball are the sounds of my America.
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My mom was never a baseball fan, but she used to say the exact same thing about the soothing sounds of a game in the background on a warm summer afternoon.
The sounds made by the boys of summer was the background music of the 1950’s. Waite Hoyt, Russ Hodges, Red Barber, Jack Brickhouse, Ernie Harwell. Life’s pace, like baseball, was slow and mellow.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2OYBbWd2S0
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I still remember Richie Ashburn coming to our Saturday morning Little League field in Collegeville. It was around 1957 and I was about 10 years old. Even at that age, I had a hard time settling for hitting singles.
If you want to see a real baseball game, watch the final game of the '52 World Series. (And I was a Giants fan!)
ML/NJ
I trace the decline of baseball as America’s Pastime to the introduction of the Aluminum Bat.
There is no sound so sweet, that goes straight to the core of one’s very Life Force, as the complex Crack of a polished stick of ash hammering a hidebound ball on that perfect spot, just the right distance from the end of the bat, where all the energy goes into the heart of the ball, and you can FEEL the ball soar long and deep into the sky.
A polished stick of aluminum, on the other hand, makes a sound like a rock on a chain-like fence pipe.
“Tink”.
“Tink” doesn’t go to the core of anybody’s soul.
My love of baseball goes way back too. A Class D team in my small town, where on most nights there would be more people in the stands than lived in town. Three months of games, then the boys of summer would be gone. We couldn’t wait til next year!
It's a Beautiful Day for a Ball Game--The Harry Simeone Songsters (1960)
We're going to cheer and boo
And raise a hullabaloo
At the ball game today.
At age nine I began work cleaning up a flower shop for ten cents an hour. The money made went into a dime bank. When I saved enough I bought my first mitt. It was to big for the hand, but I grew into it. I remember the joy of ownership like it was yesterday.
I miss the old days when baseball - sounded like baseball.
Nowadays, you go to a game and are bombarded with loud commercials on the scoreboard every second they can squeeze one in. Not to mention the “walk up” music (?) they insist on blasting throughout the game.
Sorry to be a downer on this thread.. just my observations..
I was so bad that I was happy with singles. Then I learned that baseball was a brainy game and the brain mattered almost as much as physical ability.
Kids had a hard time throwing strikes because they wanted to throw fast rather than accurately. So I learned to choose my pitches carefully and even learned how to throw accurately.
A walk was as good as a single with nobody on base or even with bases loaded, so I moved from last in the batting order to leadoff. I also got called in as relief pitcher a lot because I could throw accurately.
The result was that I went from a crummy player to a star until about the age of 15 or so when the marginal players had quit baseball and moved on to something else and the competition (including kids who could throw accurately) was much keener.
Yeah, it was a huge ego letdown, but those good memories still remain. And, once in awhile, as an adult, those skillsets honed at ages 9-15 or so would come in handy for an inning or two.
I have fond memories of watching my grandfather sitting on his porch in the hot summer sun, listening to the Tigers on his transistor radio......
Thank goodness I never had to swing an aluminum bat. You’re right. “Tink” goes nowhere. Nothing like the sweet spot of an ash bat. The bat flows right through the ball.
My grand dad would sit in his room and listen to the Orioles.
i would sit with him. we would not talk much, just be. Like most of us i was too young and full of myself to ask any of the questions i now have for all who have passed.
Boy, do I have those regrets too.......so sad.
Especially about my grandfather, who my uncle's ex-wife gathered history about him and his side of the family......WW-1 in France, college degree in pharmacy, lost his business in Calif during the depression, moved back to Michigan.....etc.
Yes, but the line drives off of an aluminum bat could make Mark Belanger hit like Mark McGwire.
As well as decapitate unwary infielders.
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