When baseball was a Game

[Jim Porter]

Originally posted by greymule
I simply can't remember any of these interference/obstruction questions that now clog the boards ever mattering.

A lot of the board-clogging plays have to do with an unprecendented interest in lower-level baseball. When I played Little League, there was no such thing as T-ball, machine pitch, or coach pitch. We did have a Minor League, but no one wanted to watch it. Parents passed the time drinking coffee, chatting, and waiting to take their kids home.

Now, there's more people gathered and cheering at the T-ball field than the LL Majors field. Kids are being pressured to perform even before they've developed adequate skills. Some youth leagues have developed All-Stars at this level, and one has a World Series for six-year-olds!

When I played ball, priorities were straight. Minor League was for the younger kids to learn and build skills. The score was forgotten once the post-game hot dog hit the lips. And certainly no one would file a protest for anything. Now, the number of posts I've read, from T-ball to machine pitch to coach pitch to Minors, where there was a rule dispute, a protest, or someone was bitter because his team lost on a bad call, absolutely astounds and frightens me.