Watching Baseball Smarter: A Professional Fan's Guide for Beginners, Semi-experts, and Deeply Serious Geeks Kindle Edition

I have grown to really LOVE baseball over the past 5 years and have taken the time to really learn the game. There were some unanswered questions in my mind such as "what do they really talk about on the mound" and this book goes so far as to answer questions such as that. It has wonderful illustrations of all the pitch types - common and not so common. There are detailed explanations about all facets of the game from a "balk" to understanding statistics in baseball and other random stuff such as why baseball players always chew, etc.I found and still find the book entertaining, helpful and useful. I keep it handy as I watch baseball and can become more active in my watching. Now baseball is no longer just a boring game (I used to think that about 10 years ago). Rather, it's a game with a lot of subtleties. This book helps the reader discover the subtle and not so subtle aspects of baseball.I love it. A great and easy read and reference.5 stars

I have been into baseball for over 30 years, as a youth & adult player, as a fan (attending games in playoffs, regular season & spring training) and as a high school coach. So, I know more than the average fan. I learned quite a bit from this book. It explains the fundamentals of the game in a way that anyone can understand, even someone who has never played or watched a game. That sounds too basic for most people but it was refreshing to me to read about baseball as if it was the first time for me. For the things that I already knew it just confirmed my baseball IQ and took my knowledge to another level. For example, 60 feet 6 inches is the distance from the mound to the plate and 10 inches, the height of the pitchers mound at its highest point. The book points out that there have been changes over the years. The mound used to be closer to the plate. When it was moved to 60'6" that was the beginning of baseball's modern era. And the mound height was reduced from 20 inches to 10 inches after the 1968 season.It was not too much trouble for me to read the parts of which I was already knowledgeable about. Because in the end I learned a lot from this book and it reaffirmed what I already knew. This book is not boring at all but you can become bored if you try to read it all in long stretches of time. There is a lot of information to digest and it should not be taken in in large amounts. Other reviews mention this book as a good source for reference, from time to time, to answer questions for you as they come up in your pursuit of becoming a more educated baseball fan. I agree. I plan on keeping it in a convenient place that I can remember and retrieve it whenever I need to answer any baseball related question.Obviously the writer does not have an advance writing style or vocabulary but it's ok, it's a baseball book. I don't want to read a baseball book written by an ACADEMIC ALL-STAR anyway.As much as this book explains the basics of baseball (rules, history, strategy, etc) it doesn't do that in a dry rule-book kind of way.

I (i) am a woman; (ii) did not grow up playing (obviously) or talking about (or watching much) baseball (e.g., I did not know that there were any differences between the NL and the AL, and I didn't understand why the Red Sox and Yankees could not play in the World Series); (iii) have recently become a huge fan; and (iv) would now place myself well beyond the beginner level, but still pretty shy of the semi-expert. From my perspective, this is one of the most satisfying book purchases I've made in a long while. In fact, it's the first one I've liked so much that I wanted to write a review of it.I finally decided to start taking advantage of the fact that I had moved to a great baseball city after the Red Sox won the 2007 World Series. I was tired of coming in on game 7 of the ALCS, getting fired up about the World Series, and then forgetting all about the game until next time (if there was a next time). I wanted to be as excited for the moment as all of the other fans in Boston. So I started watching every game. I loved watching the games, but I remained in a state of moderate confusion most of the time. Someone gave me a rulebook for my birthday (Baseball Field Guide: An In-Depth Illustrated Guide to the Complete Rules of Basebal). I learned a lot, but I still had tons of questions that the rulebook didn't seem to answer. How does color announcer Jerry Remy know the pitcher's going to throw an outside fastball (there are actually universal signs; plus the catcher sets up outside)? What does it mean to pitch from the stretch (it means the shorter wind-up pitchers use when men get on base to keep the runner from having time to steal -- I might have missed that in the rulebook)? Why would a team trade away its best player halfway through the season (they know they're out of the race and can get pretty good deals from a postseason-bound team who needs the player)? How in the world could anyone understand the gestures the coaches make (rub the belt, tap the nose, tap the hat, rub the shoulder, tap the belt twice, and then tap the elbow)? What thoughts go into the order of the lineup? Why is that missed out an error, but the earlier one wasn't? Why do umpires break up conferences on the mound? What makes a ballpark a "hitter's ballpark"? Other than the cheering fans, is there a real "home team advantage"? What's with all the wacky statistics, and do they mean anything?These are just some of the many questions that Mr. Hample answers in this thoroughly entertaining and engrossing book. He also answers a bunch of questions that I didn't even think of, which was convenient, because I also got the sense that I didn't even know enough to ask the right questions and that as someone who had never actually played the game, I never would. Like, why an umpire might choose that career (he can't play but loves the game), or why I shouldn't be too quick to call a fielder a loser when he makes an error (if he's a good athlete, he's probably making the error when other fielders couldn't even reach the ball). I learned about the many things a pitcher juggles in his mind during every at-bat besides how to throw the pitch. I learned more about how batting averages are calculated. I learned that many of the goofy signs the coaches and manager make are fake to throw off the opposing team; that's why they make so many at a time.And I enjoyed doing so, because Mr. Hample doesn't just provide definitions with diagrams (although there a a few of those). In many cases he puts you in the mind of the players at different positions (and even the umpires and base coaches) by setting up scenarios and taking you step-by-step through the rapid-fire multi-tasking that goes on in their heads. I would paste in an example, but I bought the Kindle version for Kindle for Mac, and it won't let me copy text.The one thing missing from this book, for someone like me anyway, is a good description of the different kinds of pitches and how to tell them apart just by looking. Most websites are aimed at people trying to learn the pitch, so they focus on how to hold and release the ball. I want to know how to recognize the pitch. Even so, I learned so much that I would give the book six stars, if I could.I think that if you (i) love baseball (but have never actually played) and want to know what to look for in order to be able to appreciate the richness of baseball that semi-experts and deeply serious geeks already love; or (ii) are one of the semi-experts and deeply serious geeks who want a potentially fresh take on the already familiar intricacies of the game, then this book is definitely worth it.(Note that you can download one of Amazon's free Kindle readers for other devices and then download a sample of this book before you purchase it. If you're considering the Kindle version, but don't have a Kindle, you should know that there are a few minor typos, as well as a couple of references to page numbers, which at least Kindle for Mac doesn't show in its e-books. Some of the charts are pretty tiny, although still readable, in the Kindle version, too, but I think this is only an obstacle on non-Kindle Kindle readers that don't allow you to zoom on images. If I could do it over again, I would buy the hard copy.)

Not only informative but fun to read.

Très agréable à lire, une grande aide à comprendre les subtilités de ce sport. Accessible avec un anglais de base

Il libro è perfetto sia per gli esperti che vogliono saperne di più, sia per i neofiti dello sport, che possono trovare spiegazioni concise e piccole curiosità. C'è anche un ottimo glossario in fondo al volume da consultare durante la lettura per comprendere meglio alcuni termini strettamente tecnici e americani.Il libro è in lingua inglese.

I played baseball for one year when I was 12 years old and watch games occasionally. So I have a rudimentary understanding of the game. This was a great book to take me to the next level.

Absolut tolles Buch. Wer Baseball liebt und sich dafür interessiert - absolut lesenswert!!! Vielen Dank für diese Idee des Autors!!!