View Full Version : Question about baseball weather for the historians

05-08-2009, 07:43 PM
How do you suppose it came to be that baseball developed a culture of being sensitive to the weather, with rainouts and such, while football is played in anything? A need for more precision? More gentlemanly game? Have attitudes changed at all over time?

05-08-2009, 07:47 PM
I'd say the dearth of games has something to do with it.

05-08-2009, 07:48 PM
Baseball skills are not conducive to playing in heavy rain. A slippery ball could kill someone. Not being able to see the pitch as well as on a clear day or night makes hitting nearly impossible.

Baseball skills are more refined and less brute strength.

If a hitter has a sprained wrist or even a couple of fingers, he can't play.

You tape up a football player and send them out there, regardless.

05-08-2009, 10:53 PM
Weather effects the games goal in that it hinders the players ability, at first the game was played with bare hands , that made the sport a "touch" game and thus the need for weather within reason is required. As for football it was originally a sport to play when there was no baseball, so thus it was played in more inclement weather to begin with and was at the time not a"touch" game at all so the weather was not a factor in the games goal.

The term "level playing field" applies to the beginning of the game too, an important factor was having a groomed field, not many teams did an chances are if yours didn't your team was built to take advantage of that feature. So the level field term means the grounds are acceptable by both teams.

The first tarp was used in 1908 in Pittsburgh, prior to that draining was just starting to be applied in the building of the grounds. Literally playing in the outfield in water occurred prior to the 20th century and that and other factors led the game to try and control the weather and not have the weather control the game.