Empty seats are becoming more of a commonplace for Major League Baseball

‘America’s Pastime’ is a phrase you hear quite often when discussing our much heralded game of baseball. The phrase is synonymous with the good ole’ days of Ruth, Mantle and Maris. However, when a person talks about ‘America’s Pastime’, I never conjure up the images of Halladay, Pujols and Bautista. America has evolved and begun to leave the great game of baseball behind. Instead of the slow burning buildup of a nine inning baseball game, fans are beginning to stay on the side of the hard hitting, high scoring, thrill-a-minute game of football. The decline of the game of baseball is just a microcosm of the evolution of our society as a whole. The structure and reliability of the past has been replaced by the fast paced unpredictability of today. 

AMC's Mad Men has gained both critical and popular success despite its slow moving storylines.

I am a devoted fan of the show Mad Men. As with AMC’s other recent shows, Mad Men is extremely well written and filled with characters that have been so well-developed and multi-dimensionalized that you feel like you’ve known them for years. The show has received remarkable critical reviews and even reasonable mainstream acclaim. That being said, Mad Men is a very slow and sometimes uneventful hour of television. Some episodes are devoted entirely to adding another layer to the character without progressing the main storyline of the show. I have a few friends who gave the show a shot early on and quit watching because they said ‘nothing happened’. Other people that I’ve talked to love the show for the reasons I listed above. I can watch an episode of Mad Men and become more interested in learning about another level of Don Draper’s fears and insecurities than seeing someone get blown up in a car explosion.  The first category is the majority of our current society; these are the people who would rather watch an hour of The Bachelor or Jersey Shore than watch a show of quality because they can remained entertained without much effort on their part. The second category is its own niche. They represent a large sect that enjoys the details and processes in life. They exhibit a higher level of patience and in the end are rewarded by being able to appreciate the hard work that the creators of shows like Mad Men put into their programs. In music, pop artists like Lady Gaga and Katy Perry rule the Billboard charts, but more and more people have begun to appreciate the multi-dimensional sounds of Grizzly Bear, the roots-based music of Old Crow Medicine Show and the blues-rock nostalgia of the Black Keys. Mainstream society won’t listen to this type of music because they’d have to sit back and listen to it without being able to shake their asses on the dancefloor. However, for an increasing number of people, sitting down and enjoying a vintage vinyl record or exploring the depths of an album with headphones is becoming fun and cool again.

I feel that baseball has this same quality. For all the criticism of baseball being a meandering, slow moving sport, the subtle nuances are what makes it such a great game. Some might look at a 1-0 game as a bore fest, but others look at it as a complicated process of figuring out the opposing team, predicting their next move and reacting to their offensive tendencies. For those who read the blog, we’ve been breaking down many of the popular sabermetric statistics (see our latest here), all of which give us a greater understanding of a player’s ability. The idea that teams are using these and many other advanced statistics to prepare for an opponent make the strategy of the game that much more interesting. Each at bat is a chess match between pitcher and hitter. The pitcher has done his research on the hitter in the same way that the hitter has broken down the pitcher. A simple strategical bunt can change the entire course of the game. One bad decision can turn a no hitter into a loss for a pitcher. Much like films and albums that live outside the mainstream, the game of baseball can be appreciated so much more with just a little bit of patience. In the same way people enjoy watching an hour of Mad Men to further explore the relationship dynamic between Peggy and Don, a growing niche of society also appreciates the drama of Tommy Hanson pitching to Ryan Howard near the end of a close game.  Baseball is the same game that Americans have been enjoying for the last century. With the slowly-developing trend of taking the time to sit back and enjoy the little things in life, baseball can find a special niche in our society and continue to be the ‘America’s Pastime’ we all have grown to love.