Batman
08-10-2003, 09:37 PM
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Icebreaker
Hi! My name is Thomas Andrew Lord. I like baseball. I love baseball statistics.
If we were to attribute, say, one whole second to each of the Babe’s 714 most famous regular season swings, then we may conclude he achieved his special immortality within less than twelve minutes of his life. Spot another one whole second apiece (rounding way up) for each of his other 2,159 hits and you tack on another 36 minutes. That’s 48 minutes altogether. What the hey, let’s call it an hour.
So the greatest ballplayer who ever lived achieved such a height in less than one hour -- albeit an hour cut up and spread out over 22 remarkable years.
It’s like being in the army in times of war -- you sit around, sit around, sit around, then suddenly Kablooey! You’re in the middle of a skirmish, or you’re jumping from a plane, or the ramp comes down and you’re rushing into the middle of something in which -- whatever it is, whatever you do or don’t do -- you can be assured of one thing: The results will be permanent. Not permanent by human objectives. That stuff’s always gonna change. But permanent are the acts of men.
Remembered? Maybe, maybe not. But what’s done is done for all time. In baseball, however, we choose to remember. Everything we can, whether first-hand or fiftieth, we sock into our collective memory. The stories and anecdotes enchant us, fill us with awe. But it’s the statistics that consume us. Those neatly arranged columns of Arabic and Latin shapes on a page engross us, enthrall us.
Hidden within the numbers is greatness.
Or not -- always hidden, that is. We all know the standard tourist spots -- Ruth, Williams, Cobb, DiMaggio, Musial, Schmidt, Bonds, et al. Beyond our first glimpse and subsequent visits we get the itch to go off-trail... often to find ourselves on another visited trail, just less worn. Depending upon disposition this may be adventure enough.
Stalking greatness is a worthwhile pursuit. For some, Ruth-types perhaps, maybe greatness stalks them. Or maybe they just work really hard and that leverages their talent.
It goes back to the adage of how the difference between a major leaguer and a fry cook is about one hit in twenty at-bats. The rest is failure, statistically so.
I go by Batman because I’m too old to go by Bat Boy anymore. Cutting through the high weeds of baseball record books armed with my trusty spreadsheet, failing most of the time but connecting every once in a while, I forage for a new view of greatness. Like a pangrammist (a highly-specialized poet), what do you do when you find that elusive 26er? What does a bird watcher do when he finds that rare genus? What do you do? You behold it, maybe take a picture. And know that you know greatness. It’s a fact of you, whether acknowledged by anyone else, ever, or not.
Thanks for the warm welcome. I trust you’re less weird than me, and hope I’m wrong.
;-)
-- Tom Lord
.
Icebreaker
Hi! My name is Thomas Andrew Lord. I like baseball. I love baseball statistics.
If we were to attribute, say, one whole second to each of the Babe’s 714 most famous regular season swings, then we may conclude he achieved his special immortality within less than twelve minutes of his life. Spot another one whole second apiece (rounding way up) for each of his other 2,159 hits and you tack on another 36 minutes. That’s 48 minutes altogether. What the hey, let’s call it an hour.
So the greatest ballplayer who ever lived achieved such a height in less than one hour -- albeit an hour cut up and spread out over 22 remarkable years.
It’s like being in the army in times of war -- you sit around, sit around, sit around, then suddenly Kablooey! You’re in the middle of a skirmish, or you’re jumping from a plane, or the ramp comes down and you’re rushing into the middle of something in which -- whatever it is, whatever you do or don’t do -- you can be assured of one thing: The results will be permanent. Not permanent by human objectives. That stuff’s always gonna change. But permanent are the acts of men.
Remembered? Maybe, maybe not. But what’s done is done for all time. In baseball, however, we choose to remember. Everything we can, whether first-hand or fiftieth, we sock into our collective memory. The stories and anecdotes enchant us, fill us with awe. But it’s the statistics that consume us. Those neatly arranged columns of Arabic and Latin shapes on a page engross us, enthrall us.
Hidden within the numbers is greatness.
Or not -- always hidden, that is. We all know the standard tourist spots -- Ruth, Williams, Cobb, DiMaggio, Musial, Schmidt, Bonds, et al. Beyond our first glimpse and subsequent visits we get the itch to go off-trail... often to find ourselves on another visited trail, just less worn. Depending upon disposition this may be adventure enough.
Stalking greatness is a worthwhile pursuit. For some, Ruth-types perhaps, maybe greatness stalks them. Or maybe they just work really hard and that leverages their talent.
It goes back to the adage of how the difference between a major leaguer and a fry cook is about one hit in twenty at-bats. The rest is failure, statistically so.
I go by Batman because I’m too old to go by Bat Boy anymore. Cutting through the high weeds of baseball record books armed with my trusty spreadsheet, failing most of the time but connecting every once in a while, I forage for a new view of greatness. Like a pangrammist (a highly-specialized poet), what do you do when you find that elusive 26er? What does a bird watcher do when he finds that rare genus? What do you do? You behold it, maybe take a picture. And know that you know greatness. It’s a fact of you, whether acknowledged by anyone else, ever, or not.
Thanks for the warm welcome. I trust you’re less weird than me, and hope I’m wrong.
;-)
-- Tom Lord
.