Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Children Are Abandoning Baseball

wsj.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 65 posts

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#51

Post by Someone »

agumonkey wrote: post #21
douche wrote: post #16

Let's see... 1.) You need a shit-load of people to play baseball anything like for-real. At minimum 15-20 people for two teams. Pretty tough to do as a kid, unless you're free to roam free all over town to gather a crew, which approximately 0% of kids have license/protection from CPS to do. 2.) You need a big enough area for a baseball diamond, where you don't have to worry about knocking out a window with a foul bal…

Makes me wonder why did this sport ever become so famous. It's like cricket, except there are two large competing sports (football and basketball, even hockey and tennis somehow).

Basketball and tennis are high-tech sports in the sense that they require a carefully prepared playing area and balls that bounce predictably.

That makes it much harder to improvise a playing field than is the case for baseball, cricket (needs a fairly small area where the ball can bounce off, and having an unpredictable bounce is considered a plus there), or, especially, soccer.

To play soccer, the minimum you need is an old newspaper or old rags that you shape into a ball-like form, something to tie around it to make it keep that shape, and anything that can be placed on the ground to indicate where one should imagine the goal posts to be, such as the coats of four players, marks drawn in the sand, etc.

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#52

Post by pcl »

firebones wrote: post #37
w1ntermute wrote: post #19

That's because baseball is terribly boring, especially compared to football or basketball. Who wants to spend 90% of the time standing around?

That sounds like American football too. 3.25 hours of clock time, 60 minutes of a game, and 11 minutes of actual action (or closer to 96% of the time standing around.) http://www.sportsonearth.com/article/64441086/nfl-statistica... Good quote: It's curious that few complain about NFL game lengths, considering they take 13 minutes longer, more time than the 11 total minutes of actual game play during an NFL game. In o…

I started to enjoy watching football a lot more once a friend explained that it's really more like chess than soccer. Really, the game is between two coaches, who have an array of players, practiced plays and assistant coaches at hand. Viewed that way, the 60-minute game time is comprised of a series of moves, with the coaches responding to each other and the time remaining on the clock.

There's still a bunch of time lost to unnecessary commercial breaks and the halftime rigmarole, though.

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#53

Post by IVDV »

diego_moita wrote: post #39

It is not only baseball. The graph on the article shows decline for soccer and baseball, too. And the same decline is happening on Brazil and some European countries (for soccer). I'd suggest another reason: computer/phone games and internet.

Competitive gaming (esports) is growing rapidly among the typical varsity high school sports audience. I used to run a high school varsity esports league around this: http://www.hsstarleague.com

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#54

Post by wycx »

Symbiote wrote: post #41
douche wrote: post #16

Let's see... 1.) You need a shit-load of people to play baseball anything like for-real. At minimum 15-20 people for two teams. Pretty tough to do as a kid, unless you're free to roam free all over town to gather a crew, which approximately 0% of kids have license/protection from CPS to do. 2.) You need a big enough area for a baseball diamond, where you don't have to worry about knocking out a window with a foul bal…

Does anyone play cricketin the USA? It solves some of your problems - you can see poor kids in India playing it in alleyways pretty much the same way rich kids in England do - and, I think, it's a bit easier to hit the ball. Plus breaking for tea is part of the game...

You really need only 2 people to play backyard cricket and it scales well with increasing numbers from there. You only need a bat-shaped object, a ball and something to use as the wicket. Objects from the local environment make excellent stand in fielders.

I think bowling competently is the barrier for new players.

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#55

Post by wycx »

I wonder if the fact the the US is largely a sports-isolationist is part of the problem.

Growing up in Australia, the summer was defined by international cricket. Everyone grows up supporting the national team, everyone can watch the game on free TV, and an international summer comprises as little as 5 tests and 8 one-day matches, so it is tractable for kids to watch most of the games. (1990s era fixtures, things are a little different today: less one-day internationals, more 2020, and the BBL, though still on free TV). The lack of constant cricket on TV gives kids time to play it in between watching it.

Contrast with baseball without (1) season-defining international fixtures, (2) a clearly-defined pinnacle of the game, (3) a national team for all kids to get behind. Are those hundreds of MBL fixtures largely hidden on cable TV?

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#56

Post by astrange »

jlgaddis wrote: post #42
brandonmenc wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Who wants to spend 90% of the time standing around? If you've never managed to throw a nice curveball, or hit a homer, or make a great diving catch, you'll never understand. You do something like that once, and you can easily get hooked on standing in line for another chance to replicate it. It's kind of like golf, but it sounds like you probably don't like that game either.

You're probably right. Like w1ntermute, I find baseball incredibly boring (even though I did play baseball for a few years when I was younger and quite enjoyed it). Golf? Even worse. Probably related, I am an incredibly impatient person. I absolutely cannot stand to be sitting around "idle" or doing something I perceive to be a waste of time. It even bothers me to be having a conversation with people who take forever…

Taking long drives to nowhere needs constant short term attention, so you're engaged even though in the end it was an hour you could've done something better in.

By the way, if you find yourself unable to do anything without a constant reward or threat of death if you stop paying attention, you have ADHD and should see a doctor.

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#57

Post by emidln »

wycx wrote: post #54
Symbiote wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does anyone play cricketin the USA? It solves some of your problems - you can see poor kids in India playing it in alleyways pretty much the same way rich kids in England do - and, I think, it's a bit easier to hit the ball. Plus breaking for tea is part of the game...

You really need only 2 people to play backyard cricket and it scales well with increasing numbers from there. You only need a bat-shaped object, a ball and something to use as the wicket. Objects from the local environment make excellent stand in fielders. I think bowling competently is the barrier for new players.

You only need 2 people for backyard whiffle ball. I played 1 v 1 a lot because even if you joined several baseball teams, that could only get you 2-3 hours of baseball a day anytime except Saturday. 1v1 baseball generally required more work since a well hit baseball covers more ground.

We also played "pepper" which was a bunting game with at least two kids. "Hotbox" and "burnout", a base running drill/game and a slightly sadistic game of catch, were two more we could play with 2+. I also practiced pitching solo via a brick wall.

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#58

Post by PhantomGremlin »

Yhippa wrote: post #17

I get the feeling that having so many games dilutes the quality. I can't watch regular season basketball, baseball, or hockey because you get the feeling players sleepwalk through the season until it gets closer to playoff time. The playoffs of these sports are very exciting to me usually because if you don't win you're done. Add to that the idea of intentionally tanking your season so you can do well in a draft (hap…

you get the feeling players sleepwalk through the season until it gets closer to playoff time

I've also had this feeling. What I think should happen (so of course it won't) is for players to only get paid their absurdly high salaries for the games they win. Lose and only get league minimum. This would give players an incentive to play hard each and every game. I'm sure there's a lot wrong with that idea, and I haven't really though it through.

I don't think that sort of salary structure would work quite as readily in the NFL. There's much less guaranteed money, and marginal players are always getting cut. So most on an NFL team do play pretty hard. Also coaching decisions affect football far more than basketball. Suck for Luck is more on management than on the players. How do you disincentivise management from doing that?

And, every so often in the NFL, an Albert Haynesworth comes along and stops playing after getting a lot of guaranteed money. But that's mostly owner stupidity at work. Probably a little of that going on this year with Ndamukong Suh. Certainly a lot lot more of that going on in baseball and basketball with their ridiculously high guaranteed contracts.

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#59

Post by PhantomGremlin »

brandonmenc wrote: post #25
w1ntermute wrote: post #19

That's because baseball is terribly boring, especially compared to football or basketball. Who wants to spend 90% of the time standing around?

> Who wants to spend 90% of the time standing around? If you've never managed to throw a nice curveball, or hit a homer, or make a great diving catch, you'll never understand. You do something like that once, and you can easily get hooked on standing in line for another chance to replicate it. It's kind of like golf, but it sounds like you probably don't like that game either.

If you've never managed to throw a nice curveball, or hit a homer, or make a great diving catch, you'll never understand.

I grew up watching baseball on TV. But it was only after watching my daughter play competitive softball for a number of years did I really begin to understand how much was happening. On every single pitch of every at bat.

It's totally different than "standing around".

Re: Children Are Abandoning Baseball

#60

Post by ColinWright »

ColinWright wrote: post #5

Registration required - I can't care enough to bother finding an alternate source. Closed.

Take this as a learning opportunity. Anyone who visits your site and gets irritated by something is likely to close it and leave. And even if they were only there out of idle curiosity, you've just lost a chance to convert them.

So enough with the down-votes already - I really just didn't care enough even to click twice more to see what it was about. Telling you that shouldn't be punished, and is absolutely relevant to HN.

Post reply on HN