The USA loves sport. Most of the best players in baseball, American football, ice hockey and basketball ply their trade in the country, and there are specific leagues and TV deals to make the sports widely available to spectators across the 50 states.
The national sport has long been seen as American football, but is the USA doing baseball an injustice? There are many areas in which the game played with a bat trumps the game with the oval shaped ball. The quantity of fixtures makes baseball a dream for those who like to bet, with matches on most nights of the week. You don’t need to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the sport either, as there are professional handicappers who tell you the best bets for the benefit of the casual fan.
In this article, I’ll go over the reasons why the USA loves baseball, and why it’s really the country’s number one sport.
Viewership
The Major League Baseball (MLB) is the highest echelon of the sport and, with each team playing 162 games, there’s plenty of action for spectators to see. With 30 teams spread out all across America, there’s lots of scope for fans to go and see their favorite players in action.
The benefit of having so many games is that the ticket price is generally reduced. You can get tickets at even the most lucrative venues such as Yankee Stadium for under $20. The average attendance at MLB games has hovered at around 30,000 over the past decade, which shows how loved the sport is across America. Even on weekdays teams can fill most of their stadium. Visiting a ball game is essentially an American institution, with hot dogs, cotton candy and peanuts available for fans as they bask in the summer sun. The events cater for all from hardcore fans through to stag parties.
It’s not the physical attendance which separates MLB from its competitors though, it’s the digital viewing. MLB is the perfect game to relax and unwind with your friends at the bar. Taking on average three hours from start to finish, the game coincides with the average length of a bar visit and provides a great setting for a catch-up. With games on daily, you’ll feel right at home throughout the week knowing that there will be a game for you to catch with your buddies.
For the purists there are multiple ways to watch all the best games and catch highlights away from TV. The MLB app allows users to watch live games, review important in-game moments and see milestones, all at the touch of a button and from any location. With over 2000 games per season (not including the post-season), there’s plenty to catch up on.
Diversity
When you imagine an NFL or NBA athlete, you get a very distinct picture of what the athlete’s body type will look like. Tall, muscular and physically intimidating characters make up the vast majority of the leagues. However, it’s different with baseball.
The sport doesn’t have a distinctive somatotype which athletes need to fit in, and there’s representation across many different nations unlike the other USA based sports. It’s this openness of demographic which means there is hope for most prospective players from a young age, and they don’t give up at grassroots level.
The MLB is home to only the most elite baseball players in the world, and there’s still players of every skin tone and physiques ranging from skinny to hefty. There are role models to suit people of all ethnicities and weights, and that is the great separator which elevates baseball to the pinnacle of USA sports.
Injuries
Safety is paramount to the long term health of competitors, and that's what makes Little League so appealing to up and comers and their loved ones. People grow up playing bat and ball, and when we watch the MLB on TV it takes us right back to that happy place.
The injury rate in baseball versus other sports is minimal. Ice hockey tolerates fights during games. American Football’s helmets give people the perception of safety, when in reality almost 1 in 20 games leads to a player receiving concussion, as well as risking potential long-term brain traumas from playing professionally. Some media outlets have called for helmets to be removed from the NFL as a radical solution to make players more cautious.
Baseball is significantly safer, and the biggest risk is a rare stray ball from a pitcher. The average length of a player’s MLB career is 5.6 years – more than double that of the average NFL player – and it’s not unusual for players to stay in the league for more than 20 seasons. It’s generally not athleticism or injury which causes players to leave the game, but the arrival of better talent. As a result, it’s fair to argue that the MLB players are some of the most skilled sportspeople in the world, as well as being in one of the safest sporting environments.
Expect the Unexpected
In the NFL or NBA, you get used to seeing the same individuals in the spotlight. Whether it’s Tom Brady throwing a world class pass or LeBron James hitting the buzzer beater, the same faces crop up and the game generally revolves around them. Quarterbacks almost always have the limelight, and it’s rare for anybody other than the Franchise player in a basketball team to take the important shots.
Baseball doesn’t have such a reliance on star positions and players, with almost every player having to contribute offensively and defensively. You’ll regularly see your favorite player swinging a bat and catching balls in the same game and this makes for more unexpected results.
Your team could be trailing at the bottom of the ninth inning with only the bottom end of the batters available and suddenly, when you least expect it, they come up clutch and make headlines they wouldn’t usually get. It’s this unpredictability which makes baseball such a thrill to watch and America’s #1 sport.