{"id":2488,"date":"2009-04-05T23:28:56","date_gmt":"2009-04-05T22:28:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=2488"},"modified":"2019-11-09T21:49:38","modified_gmt":"2019-11-09T21:49:38","slug":"roundshaw-hop-league-format-released","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/?p=2488","title":{"rendered":"Roundshaw Hop: League format released"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Roundshaw-Hop-(128x128)\"“Roundshaw Hop” is the new name for my column on the National Baseball League (NBL). This year, I am going to try to keep to opinion-style pieces on BaseballGB<\/em> (last season, I mixed up opinion pieces with more factual pieces).\u00c2\u00a0You will be able to find more factual reports on the\u00c2\u00a0NBL\u00c2\u00a0once the season gets\u00c2\u00a0started\u00c2\u00a0under the\u00c2\u00a0British baseball leagues<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0category on Mister Baseball<\/em>. In this first instalment, I will look at the format of the NBL in 2009, details of which were released this morning. But before I do that, let me explain the new name and logo for the column.
\n\u00c2\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Roundshaw Hop: What’s in the name?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I wanted to give this column a baseball-themed name that was specifically related to Britain. One term I’ve heard\u00c2\u00a0over and over during the past few\u00c2\u00a0seasons is “Roundshaw hop”, which describes the unexpectedly high bounce a\u00c2\u00a0gentle grounder can\u00c2\u00a0sometimes take (as depicted in the logo)\u00c2\u00a0on the field of the Croydon Pirates, the team I score for.\u00c2\u00a0<\/span>I suspect that, owing to the\u00c2\u00a0unpredictability of infield bounces all over Britain, there\u00c2\u00a0are\u00c2\u00a0similar\u00c2\u00a0terms in common use:\u00c2\u00a0“Grovehill hop”,\u00c2\u00a0“Finsbury hop”,\u00c2\u00a0and “Connare hop”\u00c2\u00a0are just a few potential alternatives that spring to mind (the pun\u00c2\u00a0here is\u00c2\u00a0accidental, but it should be noted that these hops more often than not adopt brainward trajectories).\u00c2\u00a0One\u00c2\u00a0diamond said to have\u00c2\u00a0a reliable bounce in its\u00c2\u00a0infield was Pavilion Field, where the Brighton Buccaneers used to play, but\u00c2\u00a0burrowing bunnies in the outfield did their best to ensure that the\u00c2\u00a0field was\u00c2\u00a0not flawless.
\n\u00c2\u00a0<\/span>\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n

The NBL format for 2009<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Each time I’ve checked\u00c2\u00a0my email over the past few days I’ve been hoping to see a message with the\u00c2\u00a0NBL schedule. It came this morning.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is now confirmed that the NBL will be exclusively southern teams this year, with the London Mets (last year’s national champions), the Richmond Flames (last year’s losing finalists), and the Bracknell Blazers and the Croydon Pirates being joined by the Herts Falcons, who were invited to join the top tier following their AAA championship in 2008. The schedule is 24 games long, with each team playing every other team in three double-headers. The season starts on Sunday 19 April with the Falcons visiting the Pirates and the Flames hosting the Mets.<\/span><\/p>\n

Returning to the subject of the email I received this morning, I was pleasantly surprised to find something else included\u00c2\u00a0among the attachments: a post-season structure. The top four teams from the five that make up the NLB will qualify, but a weighted double-elimination format will give an advantage to the higher-placed teams (see below<\/em>).<\/span><\/p>\n

\"National<\/span><\/p>\n

For the past few years, the post-season structure has been announced mid-season, and even then uncertainty about what a team needed to do to qualify remained. This was not good for players, managers, spectators,\u00c2\u00a0or writers.<\/span><\/p>\n

Aspi Dimitrov, the new Southern Senior League Commissioner, deserves a lot of credit for the work he has put into the league and post-season structure. I feel confident that baseball across the south of England is going to benefit from Aspi’s talents, in the same way that the Herts Falcons (his club) have been benefiting\u00c2\u00a0in recent\u00c2\u00a0years.<\/span><\/p>\n

The NBL National Baseball Championship will be played on the same weekend as the A-championship. The AAA- and AA-championships will be played the weekend after.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Roundshaw Hop” is the new name for my column on the National Baseball League (NBL). This year, I am going to try to keep to opinion-style pieces on BaseballGB (last season, I mixed up opinion pieces with more factual pieces).\u00c2\u00a0You will be able to find more factual reports on the\u00c2\u00a0NBL\u00c2\u00a0once the season gets\u00c2\u00a0started\u00c2\u00a0under the\u00c2\u00a0British baseball […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[556,89],"class_list":["post-2488","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-british-baseball-2","tag-british-baseball","tag-nbl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2488","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2488"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2488\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21404,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2488\/revisions\/21404"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2488"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2488"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2488"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}