Joe Haden asks a girl to prom on behalf of a fan
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I did not always feel this way. Football can be addictive. The strategies in having eleven men work together seamlessly in hopes of obtaining a goal can be beautiful to watch, and breaking down the individual components that make plays happen is satisfying to an analytical mind. However, as I have grown older, moved away from Cleveland, married, and had kids, the priorities of what I value in life have changed. As these priorities have changed, it has made me reevaluate what I love about sports and why sports are an important part of my life1. Through this slow life transition, baseball has become more a more prominent part of my life2, while football has become something I merely enjoy3. For me, baseball is undoubtedly better than football.
The beauty of the localization is that it builds the relationships between the local fans and helps nurture an environment where local voices can be prominent.
National versus Local Following
Football and the NFL, in particular, has become a nationalized sport. Fantasy football has played a big part, but the scarcity of games in a season is also an underlying current. So, while fans will still root for their home team first, they will also sit down and what would have been considered a random football game just a generation ago. This outcome is undoubtedly great for the bottom line value of the NFL and the money that they bring in through television broadcasting rights, but it takes away from the close relationship between the local team and it’s fans to a degree4.
Baseball, on the other hand, has largely stayed a localized sport. With 162 MLB games, fans do not need to seek out random games to watch and listen to baseball. So, many fans will know the details of their MLB team, but be largely ignorant of the league on a whole. Even those who play fantasy baseball will often restrict their leagues to American or National League. For instance, a fan in Cleveland may not know much about Starling Marte who the Pirates believe is turning himself into the next Grady Sizemore (before the injuries).
The beauty of the localization is that it builds the relationships between the local fans and helps nurture an environment where local voices can be prominent. Look no further than the voices that accompany the games themselves. Baseball has the legendary voices of Vin Scully, Tom Hamilton, and others who weave the narrative of the season one game at a time. Herb Score told me as many bedtime stories as my parents did when I was young. Football has traveling national broadcasters who may or may not have spent enough time learning about the team to offer proper insight during the telecast, and even then, it’s information obtained in the hours leading up to kickoff.
Further, the voices of the fans in debate on the sports often shows their local heritage. Fans of an American League team like Cleveland will often despise seeing a team waste a spot in the lineup and even chase the starting pitcher from the game earlier than necessary just so that a player who has no business hitting can go to the plate (the pitcher). However, fans from a National League team may appreciate the symmetry in every player both playing on offense and defense and view the near automatic out and shortened starting pitcher innings as part of the strategies of the game.
Parity
The NFL creates the illusion of parity by starting everyone on a seemingly even playing field financially5 . It is up to the intelligence of the front office and coaching staff to acquire and use players appropriate to compete. But, if that front office and coaching staff is able to get one position correct, then they have much more leeway on the rest of the team. An elite quarterback can give the defense more time to rest, give receivers passes in stride, give runningbacks less defenders in the box, and give the offensive line less time to have to hold their blocks. The Indianapolis Colts are the best example of how an organization can continually make personnel mistakes, yet remain competitive by getting the most important position correct.
MLB creates no illusion of parity from a financial perspective. A scant few teams pay the luxury tax and the revenue sharing is minimal. MLB has setup a David versus Goliath setting among the teams. However, there is no one player that can tilt the scales. A great defender needs the ball hit to his zone. A great hitter bats once every nine at bats. A great pitcher pitches once every five games. Therefore, payroll limited teams like the Oakland Athletics, Tampa Bay Rays, Kansas City Royals, Miami Marlins, and, yes, the Cleveland Indians can and do compete with the Los Angeles Dodgers, Boston Red Sox, and New York Yankees.
Moral Compass
While watching football, I find myself coming up with rationalizations for why it is okay to keep enjoying the sport. Concussions are the popular media narrative, and brain injuries are serious and worth investigating to see how damaging football really is to players. But, the players physically push themselves to the limit with more than just concussions. The Jason Taylor story about how injuries are treated in the NFL really hit me hard as it was shown how players are willing to completely numb injured parts of their bodies to play no matter how much damage they may be forcing upon themselves. Then, the violent culture that football creates at least seems to lead to more instances of alcohol related arrests, domestic violence, and even the occasional involvement in murder.
Baseball and MLB is not a sainted society by any means. The players, in particular pitchers, push their bodies to the limit as well. Concussions can and do occur especially for catchers. Giancarlo Stanton is wearing a facemask this season because a 96 mile per hour fastball hit him in the face. Pitchers are being asked to consider padded hats to protect themselves from line drives hit back at them. There are alcohol related arrests (and deaths) and I am sure there are instances of domestic violence. However, the sum of the injuries and arrests at least seem to be a fraction of the severity and scale that happens in the NFL.
Really, the difference between MLB and the NFL here can be seen in how performance enhancing drug (PED) abuse was treated. MLB allowed PED usage and abuse to go on for far too long, but, when PEDs did come to the forefront, they were vilified6 and actions were taken to at least guard against their usage in the future. In the NFL, a vast majority of fans understand that PED usage is rampant and that “vitamin regiments” that players take in the offseason to gain 40 pounds of muscle are not something that is healthy for the human body to ingest.
Conclusion
Baseball has become a more enjoyable sport for me to watch and follow than football. I can immerse myself in the team daily for the entirety of the summer, and I can focus on the game being played rather than negative off the field narratives7 , while building relationships with others who love the team. If you love baseball, then I hope that you continue to do so. And, if you do not, then I hope you give it a chance this season. It really is an amazing sport, and I hear that the Cleveland Indians have a decent team with uniforms and everything.
- See my bio/signature for the abbreviated version. [↩]
- Coaching Little League helps there. [↩]
- And even then, with caveats we will cover [↩]
- You can argue that the team itself does not have a relationship with the fans and that is fair. However, there is undoubtedly a relationship in the other direction. [↩]
- Not totally true, but from a payroll perspective it is. [↩]
- Along with the players often to an unfair degree given the complicit nature of MLB. [↩]
- Jerry Kipnis, Water Balloons, and misplaced motor vehicles can be enjoyable. [↩]
21 Comments
Baseball…America’s passtime.
Yep, it passes the time until football.
I call bull.
I greatly enjoy both sports. However, ultimately if I have to choose one it would be baseball. It is the thinking man’s sport. Skill rather than size prevails. None of us would be afraid of Omar Vizquel if we met him in a dark alley, but almost all the Browns would scare us. Also, if on offense my team has bigger and stronger lines that can open holes, and on defense overpower your offensive lines, I win regardless of strategy. (See Woody 3 yards and a cloud of dust and many high school programs). A smaller team of skilled baseball players can beat a team of bigger and stronger athletes by using their baseball skills. I truly think the strategy in football is overplayed. As Lombardi said, it boils down to blocking and tackling. Everyone knew their sweep was coming, but no one could stop it.
I do understand that a dominate pitcher can overpower a team, but at least you can bunt on him.
Shawne Merriman made the Pro Bowl the same season he was suspended for steroid use.
I don’t think anyone has ever pulled this information, but it sure seems like MLB players commit violent crimes at a much lower rate than NFL players.
Great visual, mg.
Gentlemen and others, if you’ve never seen, heard, or read the entire George Carlin comparison of baseball and football, do yourself a favor and check it out. It’s a classic.
All the thumbs ups.
And, the written word hardly does it justice as his delivery was impeccable.
Another clear advantage for MLB: the hot stove. Though I do have to say that the NFL off-season this year actually produced some excitement (thank you, Chip Kelly). Normally though, it’s just everyone standing pat.
love the Shurmur pun
Well put, as I grow older I find myself more enamored with baseball. The warm weather, the lazy pace of the game that encourages conversation. The excitement of a sudden play interspersed with lulls to relax and build excitement counting down until your favorite player appears on the mound or at the plate. Baseball doesn’t demand attention, it fosters it.
I’m in the same boat. I grew up waiting for football and sad when the season ended. It has now fallen down the ladder for me. I still enjoy it, but give me baseball or basketball – professionally or collegiately.
I love watching it on TV, but I also love going to the ballpark. It’s great to watch the game while also talking to new people. Not only is it community based with the team, it encourages community with its leisurely pace. I think it also teaches us a virtue that is increasingly lost on the modern world – patience. Waiting for the right pitch. Waiting for a fly ball in the outfield. Waiting for the right sign. Patient hitters are often some of the best and pay dividends with high on base percentages.
Add to that the fact that you are never beaten by the clock. Both teams get 27 outs and have to make the best of it. I will never forget the August 5, 2001 comeback against the Mariners. The Indians had all the time they needed and they made every at bat count. They persevered. They fought. They didn’t quit. And they didn’t have a clock there to stop them.
If the Indians are fighting for the playoffs and get in, I’ll care a lot more about them in October than the Browns. I’ve also come to enjoy the NBA quite a bit – and that happened long before this year. The Cavs are more national than the Tribe right now, but NBA teams still have the local aspect that NFL teams no longer have except on radio.
Did anybody listen to the last few innings of the Opener on the radio? Hamilton sounded like he was already going to blow a gasket.
Indeed I did. He was none too happy to see our friends Valbuena and Sipp helping defeat us and actually spawned the idea for the Help or Haunt recap category.
I love this! The idea of the local following vs national following intrigued me. I think that it’s largely true, and it’s totally true that baseball is more localized than football. But I also think that various social media outlets have affected the game and expanded fans’ knowledge beyond just their local teams. I have loved baseball since I was 7, but until a couple years ago the only players I really knew anything about were the Indians, and maybe some of the stars of the AL Central. I joined Twitter just over a year ago, and it expanded my knowledge of the game and altered how I enjoy it. Now I am in touch with players and stats from the most distant NL teams, and even if a fan makes a nice grab of a foul ball in San Francisco the chances are high that I’ll be watching it in GIF form a few minutes later. I love that baseball is localized–I love the strong connection that is able to form between a fan and their team. But I think that the expansion from local to national that has taken place through social media is largely good. It has expanded my knowledge of the game, increased my love of the game, allowed me to make new connections, build new relationships, strengthen existing ones, and, if anything, it has increased my love for my own team. I also think that social media has allowed for the fan-team relationship to be more reciprocal. I have always felt connected to the Indians, but of course that was never returned because how would they even know that I exist as an individual? But now, individual players and the teams as a whole have twitter accounts, and they use them to interact with fans all the time. If I tweet at the Indians, they might respond. Carlos Santana almost always replies to my tweets to him. The teams now have the ability to recognize and interact with fans in a way that wasn’t possible before.
Absolutely. And, I share the breadth knowledge making my understanding of the Indians that much richer. The main point was that it is not a requirement because the demand for games can be met by the local team due to the number of games. But, I definitely agree that the Indians have done a good job with interaction through social media to keep their fans involved too.
great post HOP …
great article MG … i love the browns & the detroit tigers pretty evenly , with a slight edge to the browns due to the fact the wife & i got married in the dawg pound of old municipal stadium. being from toledo , i’m actually closer to detroit than cleveland … never cared much for the lions or the indians (sorry indians fans).
not sure if you’re into fantasy sports or not , but playing fantasy football would you give you an interest in other games going on besides the browns game.
Regardless of which sport you like better, you have to love that classic George Carlin bit. “You run hooooooome.”
If we are speaking of watching in person, I’ll take baseball over football most every time. It’s just a more laid back, fun atmosphere than the often intense football scene. You can wander a bit, hang out with friends, and still keep up with what happens on the field. On tv though, football is a superior product for me. The speed, the power, and the energy just translate so well in this age of increasingly advanced viewing technology. Keeping track of everything going on from moment to moment–play clock, game clock, replays, penalty reviews–is so much more convenient watching on the tube (probably time to find a new nickname for these HD LCD C3PO units we all have now, but that’s for another day). Don’t get me wrong, I still love going to Browns games or The Shoe when I can, but even that is more about tailgating than it is the in-stadium experience.
It certainly has become harder to enjoy football knowing what we have learned and continue to learn about the health and safety risks to the players. But overall I continue to be a more rabid football fan than a baseball one, regardless of how I watch. I’m just happy I don’t have to choose.
I totally agree. The knowledge and connections available through social media aren’t a requirement to enjoy baseball, just a nice perk. I think that really, baseball is baseball, whether it’s happening on the little league field at the local park or ESPN. That’s part of what makes baseball so accessible and great.
Why baseball is better than soccer? Baseball is better than soccer because baseball is actually intresting and in soccer all you do is kick a ball and pretend to be hurt in baseball you get to actually switch positions but with soccer there is no need to switch positions because all you do is kick a ball and pretend to be hurt. In baseball you actually get to make contact in multiple different ways instead of kicking a ball and then getting concussions because for some reason soccer players think that’s a good idea. And I have a lot more facts about why baseball is a million times better than soccer. Simple example is that even in the country where baseball is 100 times more popular like Ukraine there is a worldwide known baseball team Biotexcom. I still remember the first time I saw them in match against Belgium during European baseball championship. So, baseball to me is the best sport in the world because it is so interesting and complex, there are alot of stats that go in the game and the tradition is second to none. Not trying to make soccer look bad, but overall baseball has really good teams with great competition from players who come from all over the world.