What can a cricket fan turn his attention to in the off-season of an Australian summer? Major League Baseball.
Yes, before every leather-and-willow supporter threatens to break a Gray-Nicolls or Gunn and Moore over my head, you read right. Baseball.
For someone without Foxtel, the recent tour by the Aussies of the West Indies was unavailable.
And, with due apologies to fellow Roarers that do like it, there’s still something naggingly disinteresting to me about the Indian Premier League Twenty20 tournament.
I just can’t fathom how a competition containing nine sides can manage to have three of them sharing nicknames of some kind or another. If I ever became a billionaire, I would assume that trademarking the “Challenging King Royals” or “King’s Challenging Royals” or “Royal King Challengers” should ensure instant subcontinent-wide recognition of whatever XI I choose to select. But I digress…
Yes, there are Royals in the MLB as well – Kansas City Royals. But I’ve become (slightly, somewhat of…) a Miami Marlins fan-ish person.
How did that happen?
I last caught MLB games back in late primary school and early high school. At the time I recall them being shown at around 3am on Channel Nine, so I’d tape them and watch them when I came home from class. I even bought a 1989 season guide, if my memory serves me correctly.
And, for no other reason aside from the fact that they were the first team that came on-screen on OneHD’s coverage when I tuned in back in April, I am admitting I am likely to have a Miami Marlins leaning this MLB season.
As with other sports that I come-and-go-back-to, it took about three games to really find my way as a television watcher this time around, to get to know a few player names and and a foot into the format itself. I’m the same whenever the IRB Rugby World Cup arrives – give me three matches from the opening week and I’ll remember something about scrums, line-outs and tries. And probably then end up watching all the way to – and including – the final, and maybe even offering an intelligent comment to a rugby fan.
The same applies with baseball.
Foul lines, base hits, fielding errors, it’s all coming together slowly but surely. I have now developed a habit of opening the ESPN and Sports Illustrated online pages to read about Marlins results, I can pull out random bits of information from a box scorecard, and even try to pick whether the side will win its next match, based on a combination of the Marlins’ batting averages and how well the starting pitcher has been doing.
How many runs will the Marlins make this time – around six seems a pretty reasonable average team score to me. What is the opposing pitcher’s ERA (earned run average, the equivalent of a bowler’s economy rate, really).
How many runs does he give away per appearance on the mound?
Baseball also seems to have the delightfully peaceful pace of cricket, coupled with – rather bizarrely – the fireworks moments of football.
The stand-up-in-the-stands euphoria that accompanies a vital goal hitting the back of the net seems replicated at a baseball park when the ball heads over the outfield fence for a homer.
Sure, the Marlins also apparently have a crazy side. They play in one of the league’s biggest ball parks – and opposition hitters hate the long fences, while the home pitchers love it. They have live fish in an aquarium behind the home plate.
Yes, really. A giant light-up fish sculpture for home-run celebrations.
They have a manager, Ozzie Guillen, who was lambasted by the local press and suspended for a week after claiming in an interview that he “loved” former Cuban leader Fidel Castro. He merely meant to say that he was impressed by the fact that Castro had never been shouldered off the island by the United States military, despite many attempts. As you do.
After all that madness, I still think I have picked right.
The Marlins play in the National League East division, and the rest of that side of the MLB competition all play without a designated hitter – the ability for a coach to substitute a player, usually a pitcher, for someone who can actually bat properly.
Some United States fans automatically call that against the rules – even though it’s a real one. As if the purity of the starting IX is diluted by letting someone else in on the batting line-up. For the moment, I agree, actually.
Pitchers are people, too, and deserve the chance to be part of a home run or get struck out in flailing fashion.
As for player identification, at the moment I’ve managed to recognise the following as familiar: Mark Buehrle (pitcher), John Buck (catcher), Omar Infante, Hanley Ramirez, Jose Reyes (all infielders) and Logan Morrison, Giancarlo Stanton and Emilio Bonifacio (all outfielders).
On the field, the Marlins have shaken off a stuttering start to the season to sit second in the NL East (31 wins, 23 losses) behind the Washington Nationals as of June 4 – barely a third of the way into a 160-match marathon. That translates to third overall in the entire national conference side of the draw (behind the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Nats) and sixth in the MLB overall (trailing the Dodgers, Texas Rangers, Washington, Chicago White Sox and Tampa Bay Rays).
Next up is a three-game series against the Atlanta Braves (June 5, 6, 7) at Marlins Park. My prediction? The Marlins to take the series, and let’s say a 6-4 victory in game one, shall we?
Like a cricket season, it’s not just a six-week window that will suffice for the MLB viewer. You need a six-month window. But for the casual observer like myself, a couple of hours a week should suffice. Around 9am weekday mornings (usually Wednesday to Fridays) on ONE.HD.
And I, for one, cricket fan and all, am glad to find time to enjoy an equally leisurely sporting pursuit called baseball. For 2012 anyway, go the Fish!
FIVE OF THE BEST MARLINS BATTING AVERAGES TO JUNE 4, 2012 (source: MLB official stats)
1. Donovan Solano (.556 of a run from eight games)
2. Austin Kearns (.542 of a run from 11 games)
3. Justin Ruggiano (.375 of a run from four games)
4. Hanley Ramirez (.345 of a run from 28 games)
5. Greg Dobbs (.333 of a run from 18 games)
FIVE THE BEST MARLINS PITCHING AVERAGES TO JUNE 4, 2012
1. Anibal Sanchez (ERA 2.70 from five games)
2. Carlos Zambrano (ERA 3.02 from six games)
3. Josh Johnson (ERA 3.09 frmo five games)
4. Heath Bell (ERA 3.46 from 15 games)
5. Mark Buehrle (ERA 3.67 from six games)
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