John Thorn

[weams]

http://ourgame.mlblogs.com/2015/06/30/self-portrait/

"Of course. While the story of baseball's "birth" and rise may be one of evolution, the Garden of Eden exists in the minds of fans and is memorialized in Cooperstown. Baseball is a game in which no matter how admirable the players of today and how compelling their accomplishments, we believe in our hearts, 'Well, it wasn't as good as the Babe woulda done.'"

[DrungoHazewood]

I'm a big John Thorn fan, and I highly recommend Baseball In the Garden of Eden. Great accounting of the formative years of the game, as it melded a bunch of schoolyard games and cricket into a professional spectator sport. But I do take issue with the Babe quote.

I do love this quote from the linked piece:

“It has not been part of my job description to challenge folklore but instead to embrace it as being more powerful and enduring than fact. And it’s fun. If people wish to credit Abner Doubleday with the invention of baseball, they are free to do so; it is, on the whole, harmless and does not impede the progress of historical investigation. Commissioner Selig and I share the belief that Abner Doubleday is baseball’s ‘Father’ to those who feel the need for such a figure; some folks find a depersonalized evolutionary tale excessively dull. There are those who believe in Santa Claus, or Dracula, or Bigfoot. To them I say, mazel tov. The world spins anyhow.”

I was just in Cooperstown last week with my boys, 6 and 8. I had to explain to them that the reason we were in Cooperstown, and that the Hall is in Cooperstown, is the hazy recollections of a 90-year-old who claimed, at the age of five, to have seen the future Civil War General Doubleday invent baseball there. Which was almost certainly untrue, as Doubleday wrote memoirs late in life which never once mentioned the game. Oh, and during 1839 when he was supposedly in Cooperstown inventing baseball he was, in fact, at West Point training to be a military officer.

[weams]

I'm a big John Thorn fan, and I highly recommend Baseball In the Garden of Eden. Great accounting of the formative years of the game, as it melded a bunch of schoolyard games and cricket into a professional spectator sport. But I do take issue with the Babe quote.

I do love this quote from the linked piece:

I was just in Cooperstown last week with my boys, 6 and 8. I had to explain to them that the reason we were in Cooperstown, and that the Hall is in Cooperstown, is the hazy recollections of a 90-year-old who claimed, at the age of five, to have seen the future Civil War General Doubleday invent baseball there. Which was almost certainly untrue, as Doubleday wrote memoirs late in life which never once mentioned the game. Oh, and during 1839 when he was supposedly in Cooperstown inventing baseball he was, in fact, at West Point training to be a military officer.

And yet, Cooperstown appears to be the exact perfect place that the game SHOULD have been invented in.

[DrungoHazewood]

And yet, Cooperstown appears to be the exact perfect place that the game SHOULD have been invented in.

Yes, it makes for great myth. It's a beautiful little prototypically American small town. But not only did Doubleday not invent it there, the early game was very urban. In the 1840s and 1850s the game grew exponentially, but almost completely in and around big cities of the northeast. It was this new concept of leisure time after work that allowed people to knock off and go play a game.

[weams]

Yes, it makes for great myth. It's a beautiful little prototypically American small town. But not only did Doubleday not invent it there, the early game was very urban. In the 1840s and 1850s the game grew exponentially, but almost completely in and around big cities of the northeast.

Don't you love the lake? And the way they can make a town of 2500 accommodate 75000 when Cal is inducted?

[DrungoHazewood]

Don't you love the lake? And the way they can make a town of 2500 accommodate 75000 when Cal is inducted?

The town and the lake are very beautiful. I was at Cal's induction, and I suppose they made the 75k people work as well as a town of 2500 can.

[weams]

The town and the lake are very beautiful. I was at Cal's induction, and I suppose they made the 75k people work as well as a town of 2500 can.

I was too. I thought they pulled it off spectacularly.

[bobmc]

I'm going in two weeks for a nephew's LL tourney. Anything new to see? It's been twenty years for me.

[Creamsicle]

I'll reserve judgment on John Thorn until I hear how he pronounces "Encarnacion".

[DrungoHazewood]

I'm going in two weeks for a nephew's LL tourney. Anything new to see? It's been twenty years for me.

I can't say that it's changed all that much in the 32 years I've been going. No big changes from 2007 to today as far as I could tell. Doubleday Field and the nearby batting/pitching range seems identical to how I remember it in '83. Maybe that's part of the charm of Cooperstown and the Hall, it almost seems frozen in time.

[weams]

I can't say that it's changed all that much in the 32 years I've been going. No big changes from 2007 to today as far as I could tell. Doubleday Field and the nearby batting/pitching range seems identical to how I remember it in '83. Maybe that's part of the charm of Cooperstown and the Hall, it almost seems frozen in time.

I have been there four times. It has been similar each time.

[weams]

I'm going in two weeks for a nephew's LL tourney. Anything new to see? It's been twenty years for me.

The LL Tourney's are a few miles south of the town. I recommend that you visit the Tunicliff and play golf at the Otesaga. And go see Pete Rose and Denny McLain (if he is still living).