The Pastime

To cap off SABR 38, roughly 15 of us went out to Public Square in downtown Cleveland for a game of Wiffle Ball.

It was epic.

Among the players were myself, Kyle Eliason, Kerry Smith, Aaron Gleeman, Ben Jacobs, some Minnesotans whose names I’ve forgotten (sorry), and a few other SABR members.

After about five minutes, some local kids joined us, and we had a great time playing with them.

I managed to go 2-for-3 with a homer and a single, but my inning on the “mound” was less than stellar.

It was one of the most fun things I’ve done in a long time. I think it reminded us of the fun that’s at the center of the game we all love. It’s what baseball is really about.

We had a small crowd of perhaps a dozen or two people gather, who really seemed to enjoy us running around and hollering at each other.

At one point, a 20-something girl ran up to me, and asked what we were doing. After I told her we were playing wiffle ball, she broke out in a big grin and exclaimed, “That’s awesome! I wish I could play!” Apparently she had a bus to catch, though, as she took off after a few more moments.

When we returned inside, some of the other SABR folks gathered in the lobby were really amused that we’d just played wiffle ball in the courtyard. Rob Neyer sounded like he wished he could have played in the game, too.

I hope it’s the start of a great tradition at SABR.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 28th, 2008 at 10:00 pm and is filed under SABR. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.