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KG Erwin -> Why I Love Baseball (7/7/2006 1:58:47 AM)
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To tell you the truth, I didn't become a serious fan until the mid-1980s, when I was already in my late twenties.
The game itself is perfection -- symmetrical, distances perfectly designed to test human endurance, the odd human obsession with threes --can't explain it all, but it works.
Being a wargamer, I'm a historian by nature, so I dived headfirst into the glorious history of baseball in America.
The one era I kept going back to was the post-war age, up until the first expansion in the modern era, and before pro football became the default "America's Sport".
Now, I'm a Democrat, and the 1947 debut of Jackie Robinson was indeed the moment when baseball became The National Pastime for everyone. The influx of black players elevated the quality of play, and the poplularity of the game, to unprecendented levels.
However, I think you know what fascinates me the most about that era -- it's those classic ballparks. A mysticism has grown about them, and that's why I'm so grateful for the current spate of "forward to the past" parks.
What more could we ask for than to have these marvelous new fields, with their modern conveniences, designed as memorials to the game as it was meant to be played -- on grass, with irregular and distinctive designs, and just beautiful to look at?
Sorry for my rambling, but I think we're entering a new Golden Age in baseball's third century.
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