Paul Dickson is a born collector, someone who has an unshakeable desire to collect together information and order it so that others can learn more about the chosen subject.\u00c2\u00a0 Thankfully for baseball fans, Dickson is regularly drawn to America\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s National Pastime and his Baseball Dictionary and book on the Joy of Keeping Score are both great additions to your own baseball library.\u00c2\u00a0 Such a pedigree makes Dickson the perfect person to compile a book about the unwritten rules of baseball.<\/p>\n
This book began life as a feature for a World Series programme, yet the subject was such a rich seam to mine that it soon became a project of expanded ambitions.\u00c2\u00a0 The blurb on the back of the book claims that nobody has ever brought together all of the unwritten rules, bits of conventional wisdom and etiquette found in baseball before, which may or may not be true (there are plenty of references to other texts that have at least partly tried to do this).\u00c2\u00a0 Regardless, there is unlikely to be a single publication that can match it for its thoroughness.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/p>\n
What exactly are these unwritten rules?\u00c2\u00a0 As Dickson explains:<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153These unwritten rules \u00e2\u20ac\u201c or unwritten laws, as they are sometimes called \u00e2\u20ac\u201c represent a set of time-honored customs, rituals and good manners that show a respect for the game, one\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s teammates and one\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s opponent.\u00c2\u00a0 They exist to provide a form of peaceful coexistence, allowing a diverse group of men on any given club to survive spring training, a 162-game schedule, and a possible postseason.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
They range from commonly held ideas on \u00e2\u20ac\u02dchow the game should be played\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 to how people within the game should behave.\u00c2\u00a0 By their very nature, they go beyond the scope of the written rules of the sport and people are expected both to know and to adhere to them.\u00c2\u00a0 As Dickson notes, such unwritten rules are not a baseball-only phenomenon.\u00c2\u00a0 They exist in any sport (\u00e2\u20ac\u02dcthe spirit of cricket\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 etc) and in any social group or community.\u00c2\u00a0 Being part of the community normally requires you to abide by the self-imposed rules by which it is governed and knowing the unwritten rules is one of the things that define you as being part of that group.\u00c2\u00a0 Dickson\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s book is therefore a valuable text for Brits hoping to cross the divide from \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcglorified rounders cynic\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 to being part of the baseball-loving minority in the UK.<\/p>\n
The Unwritten Rules of Baseball is divided into two parts.\u00c2\u00a0 The first is specifically about the unwritten rules, split into sections for players, managers, umpires, fans and official scorers (there are only two listed for the latter, a reflection of how important the official rules are to their job).\u00c2\u00a0 The second is an A-Z of various stories and quotes that colourfully bring you \u00e2\u20ac\u0153the axiomatic truths and mock-scientific laws that taken together constitute the conventional wisdom of the game\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.\u00c2\u00a0 They range from the reasonably well-known, such as Satchel Paige\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Six Rules for Life, to the more obscure Rules for Training by Babe Ruth.\u00c2\u00a0 Among other things, the Bambino was telling kids in 1931 that they should \u00e2\u20ac\u0153never prod, jerk, or punch a sore muscle\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and advising pitchers that they should \u00e2\u20ac\u0153do lots of running and daily leg and body calisthenics\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.\u00c2\u00a0 If you are already questioning whether these rules were directly penned by Ruth himself, rule 9 definitely has the air of a ghost-writer.\u00c2\u00a0 \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t eat for two hours before a game\u00e2\u20ac\u009d doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t sound very Ruthian to me.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n
One of the fascinating features of the unwritten rules is that they can change over time and are open to challenge.\u00c2\u00a0 Certainly some of them seem barmy to me, such as the idea that it is disrespectful to keep on trying to score more runs if you have a sizeable lead early in a game.\u00c2\u00a0 Apparently this amounts to \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcshowing up the opposition\u00e2\u20ac\u2122, although there doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t seem to be a counter rule that says the team that is down shouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t try and mount a comeback that will show you up even more.\u00c2\u00a0 Logic be damned: it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an unwritten rule that most still observe.<\/p>\n
The unwritten rules that are most often referred to during the coverage of ballgames are those relating to in-game tactical decisions by managers: collectively known as \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcThe Book\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.\u00c2\u00a0 One of the defining features of the section on them here is the parade of managers that are keen to stress that they don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t always follow The Book.\u00c2\u00a0 For example, managers normally bring in their best reliever, the closer, in the ninth inning when the team is leading because that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s become the conventional decision to make.\u00c2\u00a0 In reality, it may sometimes be better to bring him in earlier, such as if it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a tight game and a team has the heart of their order up with two men on and no outs in the eighth.\u00c2\u00a0 However, a manager knows if he makes that call and his team loses, he is going to be hung out to dry for doing it.\u00c2\u00a0 Why?\u00c2\u00a0 Because he has gone \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcagainst the Book\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.\u00c2\u00a0 More often than not, they will therefore take the conservative route, particularly if their team hasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t been playing well recently and the General Manager doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need many further reasons to give the manager the elbow.<\/p>\n
Such is the importance of the unwritten rules in baseball.\u00c2\u00a0 You are free to disagree with them or to directly flout them if you wish, but you had better know the rules in the first place so that you are aware of what you are doing.\u00c2\u00a0 The Unwritten Rules of Baseball is a great way for baseball fans to acquire this knowledge whilst enjoying the many interesting quotes and bits of conventional wisdom in the A-Z.<\/p>\n
Have you read \u00e2\u20ac\u0153The Unwritten Rules of Baseball\u00e2\u20ac\u009d? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments section below. Can you recommend any other similar books? If so, let us know.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BaseballGB will once again bring you regular book reviews over the offseason, normally on a Wednesday. We begin with another great book by Paul Dickson<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[76],"class_list":["post-6032","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-baseball-books","tag-book-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6032","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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6032"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6032\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6546,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6032\/revisions\/6546"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6032"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6032"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baseballgb.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6032"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}