- Over the course of a 162-game season, you really find out who the best teams are.
- When a runner is on third base, you just say he's "on third base." You don't say he's "in the red zone."
- No penalties.
- Mascots, not cheerleaders.
- People care when baseball players use performance-enhancing drugs. (Rodney Harrison is an NBC commentator? Seriously?)
- No instant replay (almost).
- Less awful music.
- In baseball, a little guy like Tim Lincecum can routinely make a big guy like Wily Mo Pena look silly.
- Fewer shots of wives in skyboxes.
- Fewer shots of owners in skyboxes.
- You rarely, if ever, hear a baseball manager described as a "genius."
- No wristbands around biceps.
- No war metaphors (blitz, shotgun, bomb...).
- You can see the players' faces.
- No Terry Bradshaw or Boomer Esiason.
- You can't run out the clock in baseball.
- On almost every play in the NFL, someone celebrates in a way that makes K-Rod seem restrained.
- Brett Favre's never retired from baseball.
- And, of course, baseball has much, much better stats.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Things I Like Better about Baseball than Football
Just a few things that occurred to me watching the Packers-Bears game last night.
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11 comments:
Bozzie covered this a long time ago:
http://www.baseball-almanac.com/legendary/libvf100.shtml
And you're pretty much spot on correct. However, I would note that Earl Weaver was a genius, and little guys like Barry Sanders routinely make big guys like defensive linemen look silly.
For coaches:
SI listed 15 MLB managers that have played in at least 300 MLB games. How many NFL coaches have played in that many NFL games?
Also, many NFL coaches have never been a head coach of a football team, at ANY level- pros, college, or HS. With the exception of the D'backs current manager, I don't think that's true for any other MLB manager.
But that's okay, because NFL coaches are geniuses - who needs experience....
I agree with all except the war metaphor one. what about a bomb as in a home run? or blast? or a cannon for an arm? or shooting one through the hole? or blowing a hitter away? or attacking the strike zone? or a pitcher who's a flamethrower or a headhunter? or gunning a runner down at base? or a platoon?
... maybe i have too much time on my hands
I dunno. I think cheerleaders are OK. I like the Nats Pack routine at the 7th inning stretch. Except I never have 1st base line tickets. :(
Also, I like that there are no owners in baseball that are worse than Dan Snyder.
I was with you right up until your point about music. =
I'll take the marching band playing "Hail to the Redskins" over anything in the game, organs included.
Marching bands are ok. But I was more reacting to what you get on TV, the constant heavy metal or totally over the top pompous stuff.
Your screed seems heavy on how the media presents the game. Though I agree that most NFL broadcasts are a painful experience (remember the silent game?), I disagree that it is less entertaining. Lets think about the "in-person" experience. I like baseball because I can keep score and monitor the strategy in slow motion. Football, on the other hand, does not have the same quantitative, cerebral connection. The strategy in NFL is less transparent, but it exists and is equally intriguing. Between at bats/innings in baseball and timeouts in football are both insufferable.
Baseball is a beautiful but a incredibly complex game of throwing, catching, and hitting the ball. I love it!
@ Anon
I hear what your saying about NFL "geniuses" with no experience, but asking a football player to play in 300 games is a bit extreme. That's Between 15 and 19 years without missing games (depending on whether they make the playoffs occasionally or not). A better comparison would be a baseball player playing 300 games and a football player playing 30 games. About 2 seasons each. I don't know what the numbers are, but it would be a more logical comparison.
Baseball and football are both great, just for their own reasons. It's like trying to compare a pitcher to a batter- very difficult for me to do. I prefer to enjoy them both for what they are. War references and racist names included...
Speaking of the genius of Earl Weaver...
You can't sit on a lead and run a few plays into the line and just kill the clock. You've got to throw the ball over the goddamn plate and give the other man his chance. That's why baseball is the greatest game of them all — Earl Weaver
The little girl at the Phillies game last night whose dad caught a foul ball, gave it to her, and she promptly threw the ball back, and her dad could only hug her afterwards.
(Almost makes me think there are some decent Phillie fans.)
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