how can you be a fan of this sport?

[zagosh]

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IMO, it's all about going to a game.

on a nice day, there's very little that's better than going to the ballpark with good freinds, lazily watching the game as you while away the afternoon eating hotdogs and drinking beer in the sun.

...and then...

...the sharp crack of the bat hitting a ball just right interrupts your conversation- it's a particularly singular sound... the ball sails over the fence... all of the sudden, you're on your feet, clapping and screaming like a mainiac, giving high fives to strangers...

then it's back to your beer and stadium food for a couple more innings... maybe some freshly opened peanuts that you just found in the empty seat beside you, like a glistening gift from god , dropping the shells under your seat... the green grass... the community feeling that comes with sharing conversation with strangers that you do not know at all, but you do know that you have at least one thing in common...

...and then...

...once in a while, something truly amazing can happen... if you ever get to watch a pitcher work a no-hitter into the seventh or beyond, or you ever get to see a guy win a game in the bottom of the ninth... you'll be hooked. there is no other sport that is capable of attaining the level of tension and relaese that base ball can... waiting for the pitch, with the game on the line, the batter has lasers for eyes, concentrating inhumanly hard, waiting to try to hit a round ball with a round bat as a professional trys to throw it past him at 100MPH. he knows that he will fail 70% of the time or more, but the game is on the line, the crowd leans foward en masse...

the tension builds and falls like waves on a beach with each pitch. higher... higher... and in an instant (actually about 7/10ths of a sec).. it's either over or it's not... he's a hero or the goat...

baseball: its all about teamwork, but there is nothing as essential within it as the one-on-one confrontation as the pitcher trys to gun down yet another batter... it's a perfect metaphor for anything you'd like: it's life, it's death, it's democracy and brotherhod and rugged individualism, it's futility and suffering; it's glorious redemption and rebirth...

I could go on like this for hours. you should go to a game.

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