Interesting Dusty quote

[Transmogrified Tiger]

I blame video games and the suburban effect, the population has spread out over the last 50 years and it's hard to play baseball when you can't round up enough people to field a game. Equipment makes it more difficult as well especially in lesser economic areas.

 

Go to Latin America, the cities are more condensed, no video games, and you're left w/sports as far as recreation.

 

But that doesn't explain a certain type of kid, which is what Goony was originally referring to.

[USSoccer]

i was on many a little league all star team before committing full time to soccer....

[CuseCubFan69]

i was on many a little league all star team before committing full time to soccer....

 

I take it your dad coached the baseball team? :D

 

I see a lot of good athletes go to soccer and Lacross around here because there's a lot more action. I lost a one of my best players last year to Lacross because he wanted to play something to stay in Hockey shape which Lacross does more than baseball. Kids around here get Lacross scholorships big time and any good player can go to a Syracuse, Duke, Virginia or Notre Dame on a full ride. Also, there is a severe push by parents and coaches to make kids play one sport. They think they can get that scholorship and save the parents some big bucks by doing so which 98% of the time doesn't happen....other than Lacross that is. I wrote on here many years ago that LaCross was going to take away many players from baseball and once it gets more national it'll take away a lot of good athletes from baseball. It will hurt it more than soccer IMO because it's played in the spring like baseball and the kids have to decide in 7th or 8th grade on which sport they want to play. I think it will pass soccer in 15 years in popularity because of the exciting nature of the sport. You can body check, score a lot more points and has the potential to get a very big TV base.

 

There are so many "voluntary" practices in some sports and when the kids miss them because they are playing another sport they get shot down the playing time ladder and on that coaches poop list. There are just less and less of the 3 sport athletes out there because of it. Also, since baseball is the last sport in the high school season kids tend to tire of sports and want/need a break and baseball is the one that suffers. A lot of the times the kids regret not playing baseball but they just don't want to go into a third season so close to the one that just finished.

 

Another thing are grades. By the the time spring rolls around some kids are buried in bad grades. Football doesn't even have to worry about any marking periods while baseball has many to deal with.

[dalgreen]

I think a big part has to do with the overall interest level dropping off among young kids whether you're talking small and fast or big and slow.

[Blueheart05]

One could also argue that the prototypical leadoff hitter, that Baker described, has been a victim of the "steroid era." For more than a decade, teams have focused on hitting homeruns while simultaneously diminishing the "value" of speed and stolen bases. Like big boppers in their time, small speedy players have impacted baseball (i.e. 1980's Cardinals teams). I suspect that the new rules against performance enhancing drugs will see a return to the so-called speed game to aid in stimulating offenses. Some of the most sought after position players this offseason have been speedy top of the order guys (Furcal, Damon, Pierre, Crisp, and Lugo [even though he remains in Tampa Bay]) while some career power hitters are either still looking for work, were traded, or relugated to minor league contracts because of age and declining health (which may be steroid induced).

[USSoccer]

i was on many a little league all star team before committing full time to soccer....

 

I take it your dad coached the baseball team? :D

 

Ouch :)

[biittner77]

i was on many a little league all star team before committing full time to soccer....

 

I take it your dad coached the baseball team? :D

 

I see a lot of good athletes go to soccer and Lacross around here because there's a lot more action. I think it will pass soccer in 15 years in popularity because of the exciting nature of the sport. You can body check, score a lot more points and has the potential to get a very big TV base.

 

There are so many "voluntary" practices in some sports and when the kids miss them because they are playing another sport they get shot down the playing time ladder and on that coaches poop list. There are just less and less of the 3 sport athletes out there because of it. Also, since baseball is the last sport in the high school season kids tend to tire of sports and want/need a break and baseball is the one that suffers. A lot of the times the kids regret not playing baseball but they just don't want to go into a third season so close to the one that just finished.

 

Another thing are grades. By the the time spring rolls around some kids are buried in bad grades. Football doesn't even have to worry about any marking periods while baseball has many to deal with.

 

I agree with most of this except the part about Lacrosse becoming popular. Without a professional league it will remain highly regionalized. Also, Lacrosse requires equipment and lots of space. Thus it seems like it will be a tough sell in the inner city.

 

One other factor that takes away from baseball, at least at the HS level is track. If someone is fast and wants to play a college or professional sport, football might seem like a better bet. A kid that picks football will probably run track in the spring rather than play baseball as it is more likely to keep him in shape.

[goonys evil twin]

I agree with most of this except the part about Lacrosse becoming popular. Without a professional league it will remain highly regionalized.

 

http://www.majorleaguelacrosse.com/

 

 

One other factor that takes away from baseball, at least at the HS level is track. If someone is fast and wants to play a college or professional sport, football might seem like a better bet. A kid that picks football will probably run track in the spring rather than play baseball as it is more likely to keep him in shape.

 

This has been the same story for 40 years.

 

Dusty is talking about short fast guys, his prototypical leadoff hitter. Short fast guys aren't moving into football in droves, especially not compared to days gone by. And track is a stagnant sport.

 

If you are small and fast, and an elite athlete, the one sport that you have a chance of making it big in is baseball.

 

This is not why leadoff men are in such short supply. A major part of the problem is that Dusty has such a narrow view of what a leadoff guy could be. If he was more open minded about what roles players could play, I think this would be much less of a problem.

[UK1679666180]

I blame video games and the suburban effect, the population has spread out over the last 50 years and it's hard to play baseball when you can't round up enough people to field a game. Equipment makes it more difficult as well especially in lesser economic areas.

 

Go to Latin America, the cities are more condensed, no video games, and you're left w/sports as far as recreation.

 

But that doesn't explain a certain type of kid, which is what Goony was originally referring to.

 

If you're fast, you're likely playing FB. Baseball is further down the totem pole compared to FB, some play both, but there are more elite athletes playing FB than BB.

 

Overall, baseball participation on a local setting has declined for the reasons that I mentioned. It has impacted the quality of the game as well.

[goonys evil twin]

If you're fast, you're likely playing FB. Baseball is further down the totem pole compared to FB, some play both, but there are more elite athletes playing FB than BB.

 

If you are somebody who fits Dusty's profile of a major league leadoff man, small and fast, you aren't going anywhere in football. There aren't more small fast football players today than in the past, which negates the whole theory that leadoff men are in short supply because of desertion to other sports.

[UK1679666180]

If you are somebody who fits Dusty's profile of a major league leadoff man, small and fast, you aren't going anywhere in football. There aren't more small fast football players today than in the past, which negates the whole theory that leadoff men are in short supply because of desertion to other sports.

 

There are more 6'0" 180LB athletes that run a 6.4 60 in FB than baseball.

 

There are not many small athletes in any pro sport, including baseball. Unlike most sports though, size doesn't matter as much in baseball. You can have power pitchers the size of Randy Johnson or Billy Wagner, you can have hitters like Kingman or Aaron.

[Careless]

I would definitely agree with you on most of those points, however I think Goony was referring specifically to the "small, fast athlete", which, in his opinion, doesn't have the ability to play basketball (Muggsy Bogues and Earl Boykins excepted) or football due to a lack of size.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, Goony.

 

That is what I meant. Small fast athletes, what Dusty considers to be prototypical leadoff men, aren't abandoning the sport en masse to another sport.

Because they're never entering it. You may find out when you're 16 that you'll never be big enough to play professional basketball and maybe baseball would have been the ticket, but that's far too late.