On Baseball’s National Anthem

I get e-mails from the History Channel. I must have signed up for their newletter at some point in the past, but I couldn’t say when that was. Normally, I just delete them, unless the subject line looks interesting. And yesterday, I got a very interesting one. To me, anyway. “Forgotten Baseball Poet Receives StarContinue reading “On Baseball’s National Anthem”

A Tale of Two Baseball Caps

Yesterday, the Stars & Stripes Washington Nationals Baseball Cap arrived. Baseball teams started wearing patriotic baseball caps on national holiday weekends a few years ago. (And yes, the Toronto Blue Jays have their own patriotic cap, with the Maple Leaf instead of the Stars and Stripes.) Despite my love of the Cubs :cubs: I don’tContinue reading “A Tale of Two Baseball Caps”

On Baseball’s Sad Lexicon

Exactly one hundred years ago today — July 12, 1910 — one of the most famous poems about the Chicago Cubs :cubs: was published in the New York Evening Mail — Franklin P. Adams’ “Baseball’s Sad Lexicon”: These are the saddest of possible words: “Tinker to Evers to Chance.” Trio of bear cubs, and fleeterContinue reading “On Baseball’s Sad Lexicon”

On a Tale of Two Baseball Teams

As I write this, the Chicago Cubs :cubs: have a record of 35 wins, 46 losses. The Washington Nationals have a similar record — 36 wins, 46 losses. The Nats are 12 1/2 games back in the National League East, the Cubs :cubs: are 10 1/2 back in the National League Central. And yet. AndContinue reading “On a Tale of Two Baseball Teams”

On Let It Be, Forty Years On

Forty years ago today, The Beatles’ Let It Be arrived, and an era came to an end. The band had already disintegrated in the summer of ’69. Paul McCartney announced that he had left the band in April, before the release of his solo album McCartney. It wasn’t just a Beatles album, it was theContinue reading “On Let It Be, Forty Years On”

On Baseball Excitement

Watching last night’s Cubs :cubs: game, this is how I felt: I’ve always said Charlie Brown was a Chicago Cubs fan, after all… 😉 It wasn’t just that Theodore Roosevelt Lilly (or as I saw him called on Bleed Cubbie Blue today, Maximus Tedimus Meridius) was back on the mound and threw shutout ball againstContinue reading “On Baseball Excitement”

On Baseball, the Harbinger of Spring

I look out from my office window at the glacier that still lays across Maryland, and a thought brightens my seasonally-affected spirits. The knowledge that pitchers and catchers have reported in Florida and Arizona. Soon, on fields of green, the boys of summer will be back. The crack of the bat, the smell of theContinue reading “On Baseball, the Harbinger of Spring”

On Baseball’s Postseason

This is October! There should be playoff baseball on television every day! Instead, thanks to the quick exits of teams in the first round of the playoffs, we have a four day layover until the championship series begin. And it’s been pointed out that if the two championship series go the minimum four games each,Continue reading “On Baseball’s Postseason”