Kids, ask your parents/grandparents.)
Our good friend Howard Megdal posted these suggestions on”How to survive without baseball.” Among them:
- Simulated baseball games, such as Baseball Mogul, Diamond Mind Baseball, Out of the Park Baseball, and, of course, Strat-O-Matic. I would add What-If Sports to this list. They allow you to construct a roster of any players on any teams at any time, as long you keep within the budget, which, last time I played was $35 million.
- DVDs, audio and MLB Network reruns. I’ve been try to pitch (heh) a show on baseball literature to the MLB Network during the off-season, rather than multiple repeats of the same programs.
- Baseball music
- and, finally, “Bouncing cat toys off the wall and coaching my two cats to field them in makeshift outfielder drills.” Of course, this only works if you actually have cats, although I suppose the theory could be applied to dogs and hamsters. Snakes, no so much.
Surprisingly, Megdal — who has written several thought-provoking baseball books, including The Baseball Talmud — does not believe that cracking open a tome on the national pastime by a roaring fire belongs in the overall scheme:
You’ll notice the absence of baseball books. I find those only intensify my feelings of offseason baseball loss. So reading the very best work, whether Roger Angell’s collections, Jim Brosnan’s writing, or even the seminal Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, works best for me as companions to the actual season. That said, the February releases of Baseball Prospectus and John Sickels’ annual prospect guides always brightens late winter.
One man’s opinion. I think you all know where I stand on that topic.
is available on Amazon.com,
{ 1 comment }
Yes, this is baseball no-man’s land right now. The first fantasy baseball magazines are out, but let’s face it, the MLB rosters are far from solidified and there are many free agents still not signed, so those publications might be obsolete in a few weeks. Good time to revisit/read a classic, or a baseball book that came out late last summer.
Comments on this entry are closed.