Baseball Essay Research Paper Baseball is an

Baseball Essay, Research Paper

Baseball is an immensely popular American game,

known as the “national pastime,” played between two

teams of nine players each. The basic implements used in

the game are a leather-covered ball, wooden bats for

hitting the ball, and gloves for catching it. Baseball is played

on a large scale in Latin America, Japan, and other places

besides the United States, but it is in the United States that

it thrives most both as a participant’s and spectator’s sport.

It is played at its highest level in the United States and two

Canadian cities, where 26 teams make up the American

and National Leagues (each with two divisions, East and

West). Combined, these leagues are called major-league

(professional) baseball. Most players who reach the major

leagues have worked their way up through Little League,

scholastic, college, and minor-league (professional) ball.

The vast majority of major-league players are

American-reared, although since the 1960s the sport has

seen an influx of Latin American players. Following a

regular season of 162 games, the division winners vie for

each league’s pennant; the American and National League

champions then compete in the World Series. Both rounds

of competition employ best-of-seven series of games.

Baseball’s popularity is in part a result of the fact that

almost every American boy plays the game at one time or

another, and the lore of the game is intertwined with

American life. Baseball has supplied the American culture

with a wide range of legendary heroes, as well as books,

magazines, movies, and songs. The game has contributed

hundreds of words and phrases to the American language.

The History of Baseball The popular myth that Abner

DOUBLEDAY invented baseball in Cooperstown, N.Y.,

in 1839, is without foundation. Actually, baseball evolved

from cricket and rounders, with town ball and the New

York game, popular in the eastern United States by the

1820s, as intermediaries. On June 19, 1846, a New York

team defeated the Knickerbocker Baseball Club of New

York, which had drafted (1845) rules establishing the

nine-player team and the four-base diamond. The score at

Elysian Fields in Hoboken, N.J., that day was 23-1 in four

innings. In 1857 a convention of baseball clubs established

the length of a game as nine innings instead of 21 runs. One

year later the first organized league, the National

Association of Base Ball Players, was formed. The first

professional team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, won 91

and tied 1 of their first 92 games in 1869-70. Their success

helped spread professionalism, and the National

Association of Professional Base-Ball Players operated a

loose league for five years (1871-75) until the owners

formed the National League of Professional Base Ball

Clubs in 1876 and made baseball a business. The

independent American Association (1882-91) prospered

by allowing Sunday games and the sale of beer in the

stadium. Both leagues survived the rival Union

Association’s challenge in 1884, but in 1890 the athletes

formed the Players League, which financially pressed the

National League and mortally wounded the American

Association. In 1892 the eight-team National League

absorbed four American Association teams, but it reverted

to eight teams after 1899. In 1901 the American League

declared itself a major league, invaded National League

cities, and raided the older league for players. The result of

the eventual truce was the World Series, which has been

played every year since 1903–except 1904, when the

New York Giants refused to meet the American League

champions (Boston). The major leagues successfully met

the challenge of the Federal League (1914-15). But further

problems arose with the revelation that eight members of

the Chicago White Sox had conspired to throw the 1919

World Series to Cincinnati. Only the appointment of Judge

Kenesaw Mountain LANDIS as commissioner and the

introduction of a livelier ball saved the game. Landis

enforced strict regulations regarding integrity of players,

and the livelier ball significantly increased the number of

crowd-pleasing home runs. Star players, reared in a

minor-league system that comprised 59 leagues in 1949,

increased baseball’s popularity and caused it to be called

America’s pastime. The annual All-Star Game between

teams composed of the best players in each league was

begun in 1933. The introduction of night baseball (1935)

and the entry to the majors of black players (1947),

previously consigned to all-black leagues, changed the style

of play and expanded the potential talent pool. Then, during

the 1950s, dramatic organizational changes occurred. In

1950 a $6-

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