this is an interesting little game, and i can't say that prior to reading this article i've heard about it, which is weird since it doesn't seem that esoteric. the article describes it as...
this is an interesting little game, and i can't say that prior to reading this article i've heard about it, which is weird since it doesn't seem that esoteric. the article describes it as something of a clusterfuck to follow, and i can't say i disagree with that based on videos of it, but it looks pretty enjoyable if also incredibly fucking wacky.
It basically looks like American baseball without a century+ of tradition weighing it down (for better or worse). Reminds me of the modernization efforts that Indian cricket made to make it their...
It basically looks like American baseball without a century+ of tradition weighing it down (for better or worse). Reminds me of the modernization efforts that Indian cricket made to make it their own game, which ended up spreading across the world. There was a really interesting short documentary I watched on it, although sadly I can't recall where or what it was called. Found it. It was an episode of Vox's Explained series on Netflix. Season 1, episode 11 "Cricket".
American baseball is kind of boring to watch on TV though. It's a lot of fun to play and I really enjoy the experience of going to see games in-person, but I just can't watch it on TV. Although I am very thankful that MLB team uniforms aren't plastered in ads (aside from the MLB, team, and uniform manufacturer logos)
baseball really is one of those sports that's just better to watch in person than it is on TV. i think of it more as a social experience than like, a sports one, since it's slow, there's a ton of...
baseball really is one of those sports that's just better to watch in person than it is on TV. i think of it more as a social experience than like, a sports one, since it's slow, there's a ton of downtime and you don't need to really be paying attention at every moment like you might with hockey or basketball--of course, that makes for an incredibly painful TV experience because there is zero social aspect if you're watching it on TV.
Same as cricket. I love cricket but I very rarely watch it live on TV. Highlights of a match, condensed down to 45 minutes or so, are great to watch but realtime cricket on TV is pretty dull. Live...
Same as cricket. I love cricket but I very rarely watch it live on TV. Highlights of a match, condensed down to 45 minutes or so, are great to watch but realtime cricket on TV is pretty dull. Live cricket in person is totally different. It's like a day-long picnic in the sun with friends/family. Some sport happening as well.
Some forms of cricket are more exciting than others. 20/20 is pretty fast and exciting in realtime, matches only last about three hours. 50 over matches take most of a day and Test Matches (the longest and best type of cricket imo) can take five days..
"I have MLB TV in my phone and I watch it every night," Kemppainen said, a smile spreading across his face. "Because I think that's the best way to get sleep."
Having grown up in Finland, this for me is the "real" baseball, whereas the American version is a strange approximation (and yes, also quite a bit more boring if I may say so). Of course, as the...
Having grown up in Finland, this for me is the "real" baseball, whereas the American version is a strange approximation (and yes, also quite a bit more boring if I may say so). Of course, as the article says, historically it goes very much the other direction.
When I lived in Japan back in the 90s, I tried to teach Finnish baseball to my local friends, since American baseball is so popular there. It was an uphill battle though, not least because I think I never quite managed to convince them that this was indeed a real sport, and not just something that I made up on the spot. The concept of the pitcher throwing the ball up into the air and not towards the batter as well as the idea of running a weird zigzag instead of a diamond were just too funny for them. Based on this meeting of cultures, my assessment also was that American baseball requires more skill and individual performances, whereas Finnish baseball requires more strategy and team effort. But I'm not an expert on either.
In fact, I actually never personally enjoyed Finnish baseball. I guess that's mainly because it was pretty much a compulsory sport in school, and I think part of the national curriculum. In late spring and early autumn when there was no snow, we just wanted to play football (soccer) or floorball, but every so often teachers would force us to get the bats and gloves out instead, which was always a disappointment. Felt like a good sports class wasted.
Still, because of its role in schools, I assume pretty much everyone in Finland knows the rules to pesäpallo, and as the article says it's considered the national sport. However, in terms of popularity, it is far from being among the most popular sports. Granted, I haven't lived in Finland for a couple of decades now, but I don't know anyone who would play or follow pesäpallo. In terms of audiences, it's nowhere near the numbers that ice-hockey, football, track and field, formula1, winter sports and others attract, or so I understand. I think it remains a bit of a marginal sport, one for the "uncivilised countryside folks".
It's interesting to see this article today, because this morning I was listening to an episode of Frangraph's baseball podcast Effectively Wild and they had a segment on how much baseball could...
It's interesting to see this article today, because this morning I was listening to an episode of Frangraph's baseball podcast Effectively Wild and they had a segment on how much baseball could change and still be considered baseball, like what are the core components of the game that cannot be replaced without fundamentally changing the game to a unambiguously different sport. Beyond the requirement of a bat and ball and bases, which seem pretty obvious, both hosts agreed that the competitive relationship between the pitcher and batter is fundamental to the game, and is required for something to still be baseball. I just thought that was interesting since it seems that pitcher/batter competition has basically been eliminated in Pesäpallo. If competitive pitching is fundamental to baseball then is it even reasonable to call this baseball?
this is an interesting little game, and i can't say that prior to reading this article i've heard about it, which is weird since it doesn't seem that esoteric. the article describes it as something of a clusterfuck to follow, and i can't say i disagree with that based on videos of it, but it looks pretty enjoyable if also incredibly fucking wacky.
It basically looks like American baseball without a century+ of tradition weighing it down (for better or worse). Reminds me of the modernization efforts that Indian cricket made to make it their own game, which ended up spreading across the world.
There was a really interesting short documentary I watched on it, although sadly I can't recall where or what it was called.Found it. It was an episode of Vox's Explained series on Netflix. Season 1, episode 11 "Cricket".American baseball is kind of boring to watch on TV though. It's a lot of fun to play and I really enjoy the experience of going to see games in-person, but I just can't watch it on TV. Although I am very thankful that MLB team uniforms aren't plastered in ads (aside from the MLB, team, and uniform manufacturer logos)
baseball really is one of those sports that's just better to watch in person than it is on TV. i think of it more as a social experience than like, a sports one, since it's slow, there's a ton of downtime and you don't need to really be paying attention at every moment like you might with hockey or basketball--of course, that makes for an incredibly painful TV experience because there is zero social aspect if you're watching it on TV.
Same as cricket. I love cricket but I very rarely watch it live on TV. Highlights of a match, condensed down to 45 minutes or so, are great to watch but realtime cricket on TV is pretty dull. Live cricket in person is totally different. It's like a day-long picnic in the sun with friends/family. Some sport happening as well.
Some forms of cricket are more exciting than others. 20/20 is pretty fast and exciting in realtime, matches only last about three hours. 50 over matches take most of a day and Test Matches (the longest and best type of cricket imo) can take five days..
Haha, I love it.
Having grown up in Finland, this for me is the "real" baseball, whereas the American version is a strange approximation (and yes, also quite a bit more boring if I may say so). Of course, as the article says, historically it goes very much the other direction.
When I lived in Japan back in the 90s, I tried to teach Finnish baseball to my local friends, since American baseball is so popular there. It was an uphill battle though, not least because I think I never quite managed to convince them that this was indeed a real sport, and not just something that I made up on the spot. The concept of the pitcher throwing the ball up into the air and not towards the batter as well as the idea of running a weird zigzag instead of a diamond were just too funny for them. Based on this meeting of cultures, my assessment also was that American baseball requires more skill and individual performances, whereas Finnish baseball requires more strategy and team effort. But I'm not an expert on either.
In fact, I actually never personally enjoyed Finnish baseball. I guess that's mainly because it was pretty much a compulsory sport in school, and I think part of the national curriculum. In late spring and early autumn when there was no snow, we just wanted to play football (soccer) or floorball, but every so often teachers would force us to get the bats and gloves out instead, which was always a disappointment. Felt like a good sports class wasted.
Still, because of its role in schools, I assume pretty much everyone in Finland knows the rules to pesäpallo, and as the article says it's considered the national sport. However, in terms of popularity, it is far from being among the most popular sports. Granted, I haven't lived in Finland for a couple of decades now, but I don't know anyone who would play or follow pesäpallo. In terms of audiences, it's nowhere near the numbers that ice-hockey, football, track and field, formula1, winter sports and others attract, or so I understand. I think it remains a bit of a marginal sport, one for the "uncivilised countryside folks".
It's interesting to see this article today, because this morning I was listening to an episode of Frangraph's baseball podcast Effectively Wild and they had a segment on how much baseball could change and still be considered baseball, like what are the core components of the game that cannot be replaced without fundamentally changing the game to a unambiguously different sport. Beyond the requirement of a bat and ball and bases, which seem pretty obvious, both hosts agreed that the competitive relationship between the pitcher and batter is fundamental to the game, and is required for something to still be baseball. I just thought that was interesting since it seems that pitcher/batter competition has basically been eliminated in Pesäpallo. If competitive pitching is fundamental to baseball then is it even reasonable to call this baseball?