The deadball era isn't dead
Not as long as Jim Bouton is around.
The acclaimed author of "Ball Four," who happened to play a few years of major-league ball as a pretty good pitcher, announced Thursday he's launching an organization called the Vintage Base Ball Federation.
That's Base Ball -- two words.
They're going to play by 19th century rules: Six balls for a walk, foul balls don't count as strikes, foul balls caught on a bounce are an out, no hit batters and gloves are about as small as they come.
Best of all, only one ball is used per game, unless it's lost of falls into pieces.
Bouton put this kind of game on display a couple of years back on a July 4 ESPN Classic showcase, and actor Tim Robbins brought his family out to the old field in Pennsylvania to watch the Hartford Senators and the Pittsfield Hillies at Wahconah Park, a field that Bouton had to practically fight city hall to keep as a landmark.
"It's the game the way it was meant to be played," says Bouton. "No batting gloves, helmets, wristbands, elbow pads, shin guards, sunglasses. No arguing with the umpire. No stepping out of the batter’s box. No charging the pitcher or posing at home plate. No curtain-calling, chest-thumping or high-fiving. Just baseball.�
For more info on the league, go to the Vintage Base Ball website -- something that the game would have loved to have when it existed -- at www.vintagebbf.com.
Read on for more info:
From the Associated Press report on the press conference Bouton (left) had at Delmonico's restaurant in New York:
Amateur baseball and softball teams are invited to join the VBBF.
Chris Moran, who plays for the Hartford Senators, said fans look at these games the same way as the spectators viewed old-time ballplayers in the movie “Field of Dreams.�
“Where did these guys come from?� he said was the reaction.
Teams will play about a dozen games during the season. A six-team, double-elimination Vintage World Series is planned for Aug. 15-19 next summer at a site that hasn’t been determined.
There will be some allowances for modern times, such as protective gear inside uniforms for catchers and lining under the short-billed caps when players bat. There will be relief pitchers, and uniforms will have polyester, because flannel isn’t durable enough.
“A night game is not forbidden, even though it’s pushing the envelope,� said Greg Martin, the VBBF vice president and owner of a company that produces vintage gear.
While the Hartford Senators have a team spittoon, gambling will be prohibited — 19th century baseball was marked by alleged fixed games.
“The 1880s and ‘90s were characterized by very rough play and ill-mannered conduct toward umpires and opponents and spectators,� said John Thorn, a board member who serves on the 19th Century research committee of the Society for American Baseball Research.
Wearing a brown derby and a vest, Bouton said Vintage Base Ball already was played by 225 teams in 32 states. The rules will be a mixture of those in use from 1860-90, with an emphasis on the 1880s. The ball will have seams in the lemon-peel style, which was replaced by the current seam pattern designed by Albert Spalding, adopted by the major leagues in 1877. Pitching will be overhand, and games will average about 2 hours, 15 minutes.
Before each plate appearance, a batter will declare his “desired strike zone preference� — belt to knee or belt to armpits. If the umpire misses a call because his view is blocked, a team captain can ask for a “gentleman’s ruling,� in which players involved in the play are to truthfully say what occurred. If a dispute remains, the umpire may ask the cranks for their opinion.
“I’m intrigued by the concept of people playing baseball for fun,� said former MLB commissioner Fay Vincent, a member of the VBBF board. “Someone said this will be an effort where the strike will be something that goes over the plate and doesn’t involve a labor dispute.�
Because catcher’s gloves are tiny and don’t have much padding, most pitchers throw about 70 mph to avoid passed balls.
“The pitching game is less a power game and it’s more a skill game: changing speeds, moving the ball around, deception,� Bouton said.
It’s certainly different than 21st century baseball.
“What irks me about the modern game is the enlarging ballplayers and shrinking ballparks,� Thorn said. “A home run at one point in baseball’s history actually involved a run — running around the bases. There weren’t very many home runs hit out of the park where you could stand at home plate, watch the thing soaring over the fence, cast a menacing glance at the opposing dugout and then take your time around the bases.�