Twelve facts about baseball that you should know
- It is a bat and ball game that is played between two teams of nine players each who alternately bat and field as well as try to score runs, advance around the base, and return to the home plate. This is what Baseball is all about.
- Unlike most sports that are time bound, there is no concept of a time limit in baseball.
- An aggressive batting strategy is essential to win this game.
- Like the game of Cricket, Baseball is both a team sport as well as a game where individual skills come into play. Every player, i.e., every pitcher, batter, and fielder, is responsible for the outcome of the game.
- Furthermore, no woman has ever been part of a major league baseball game in the United States.
- Hot dogs are the most popular food item made as well as sold in baseball parks. Some of the best ballpark hot dogs are the ones found in SunTrust Park stadium, Atlanta, Chase Field stadium, Arizona, and Fenway Park stadium, Boston.
- The first World Series championship game of baseball was played between the Boston Americans of the American League against the Pittsburgh Pirates of the National League in a best-of-nine series in the year 1903. It was won by the Boston Americans with a score of 5-3.
- The oldest baseball park in Major League Baseball still in use in the United States is Fenway Park, which is located in Boston, Massachusetts. Since 1912, this has been the home of the Boston Red Sox. Fenway has hosted the World Series 10 times, with the Red Sox winning five of them. In its centennial year in 2012, the park was added to the National Register of Historic Places.
- With 27 titles to its credit, the New York Yankees is the baseball team with the most number of World Series wins.
- In the year 1990, Ken Griffey Sr. and Ken Griffey Jr. became the first father son duo to play in major league baseball games as teammates for the Seattle Mariners. In the same year, they hit back to back home runs, creating another record as a father and son pair in the history of baseball.
- With 24 players in the Hall of Fame, it is the San Francisco Giants who have the record of being the team with the most number of players in the Hall of Fame.
- This hugely popular game raked up much more than US$ 9 billion in gross revenue, with the New York Yankees being the highest earning team in Major League Baseball. Revenue is generated from ticket sales as well as from the sale of television and media rights.
- To celebrate baseball’s 100th anniversary, the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum was created in 1935 in Cooperstown, New York.
