5 ms·

I must not understand Baseball well, because it strikes me as one of the least fatiguing sports that there are.

by TwoBit 12y ago

carsongross 12y ago
Here is what I'd recommend: for four hours, alternate sitting and standing every ten minutes in a sunny park. When standing, once every thirty seconds or so tense into a squat position and concentrate as hard as you can on something about 100 feet away. Every 10th time, sprint all out in a random direction. Every 20th time, throw a rock as hard as you can as far as you can. What you will find is that you, a normal human, can keep this up for about one hour, before you collapse of exhaustion or hurt yourself. That the super humans who play professional baseball are able to do this day in and day out for more than half a year is insane.
- UnethicalHacks 12y ago
  No, if you're a professional athlete this should not be all that difficult. Boring but not difficult. Look at the average baseball player. So many of them are plump or overweight. I'd argue that soccer players running 10-15 miles every game have a bit more to deal with. baseball needs some yoga and proper nutrition.
  - parfe 12y ago
    >I'd argue that soccer players running 10-15 miles every game have a bit more to deal with. You mean kilometers, not miles. http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/06/20/how-far-do-world-cup-soccer-players-run-during-a-match/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/06...
  - DerekH 12y ago
    In general, the public has a poor understanding of being a professional athlete. Typically, when I try to explain it to others, I usually just say "it's a job like any other" - the same as staying on top of your game in the music industry, running a startup, etc. It's easy for us to dismiss the effort professional athletes put out when you only see them on TV a few times. However, it's somehow different when we see Steve Jobs or Tim Cook on stage a couple times each year. We recognize all of the hard work Steve/Tim likely put in behind the scenes. For some reason, a lot of people don't recognize that same level of effort for professional athletes. They just assume they show up for the game and perform at a high level. For every hour on the field, there's probably two hours of study (mental preparation) and two hours of treatment and/or rehab (physical maintenance). Pair that with a rigid schedule every day, fatigue is a real concern. We all know the overnight success myth. The myth exists for professional athletes as well. Athletes that make it to the highest level didn't simply wake up one morning and have all the tools to succeed. Hours and hours and hours of training, both mental and physical, had to occur. It's like anything else - you don't simply get good. It takes practice. It also takes commitment, dedication, and perseverance to succeed at a professional level - just like everything else in this world.
  - llimllib 12y ago
    The overweight players are overweight for the same reason that (American) football linemen are: it's useful for their skill. One of the reasons that Prince Fielder can hit as many home runs as he does is that he has a lot of mass; it's also one reason that steroids were effective. Not (just) for strength, but the more mass you have to swing into the ball, the farther it will go.
  - freehunter 12y ago
    A first baseman, sure. They only need to be able catch well and sometimes throw across the infield. Find me an out-of-shape center fielder. Miguel Cabrera, for example, is a bit bigger. He's slow getting around the bases. But his talent, other than being a first baseman, is hitting the ball hard enough that he can casually stroll around the bases if he wants. But humans were meant to run. That's why we stand upright, that's why we sweat. Running long distances on a flat grass field, to a trained athlete, is going to be less fatiguing than standing still in the sun waiting for something to happen. Pitchers throw 100+ pitches at 90+ MPH and for the most part, are dead accurate. Even if the ball is spiraling through the air to confuse the batter. And the players, other than the starting pitcher, are out there almost every single day, and sometimes play two games per day. Baseball has a ridiculously packed schedule. So I would disagree that soccer players have it rougher. Running is easy.
    - afogarty 12y ago
      People don't realize just how much pitching taxes the human body. There's a reason why most pitchers have several joint surgeries over the course of their careers.
    - philwelch 12y ago
      Baseball pitchers regularly play well into their 40's. Jamie Moyer was still pitching a month or two shy of turning 50. For soccer players, still playing at 40 is nearly unheard of. Ryan Giggs did it, but that's about it, and it was mostly sentimentality that kept him playing that last year or so. So I would disagree that baseball is that much more taxing than soccer.
      - jghn 12y ago
        "Baseball pitchers regularly play well into their 40's" Unless you're someone like Mark Prior who had their body give out when their career was just getting started. Why are you only highlighting the outliers, the genetic freaks (amongst genetic freaks no less)? The thing with baseball pitchers is that there's an enormous selective pressure on their bodies (primarily shoulder & elbow) being able to withstand the brutal toll throwing all those pitches causes. The absolute best pitchers (talent wise) might never even make it to the MLB because their arm falls apart before they get a chance. There are pitching motions which hurt my arm just doing them in slow motion, now imagine heaving a baseball 90+ mph repeatedly for your entire life. This is a far different selective pressure than what e.g. soccer players would have where quickness & speed on their feet is what matters. The problem with these discussions is that people are using words like "taxing" to only narrowly mean what they want it to mean.
  - ryanhuff 12y ago
    I won't pretend to appreciate the challenges of being a professional baseball player, but I can imagine that the constant travel and resulting disorientation is a contributing factor to fatigue. This article discusses the challenges. http://m.mlb.com/news/article/2878521/ http://m.mlb.com/news/article/2878521/
  - scott_s 12y ago
    I agree that one baseball game is less stress on an athlete's body than one soccer game. But soccer players play about 30-40 games a season; major league baseball players play 162 games a season.
- mdanger007 12y ago
  The people who pick your coffee probably have as exhaustive a routine. Doesn't make it a spectator sport.
- TwoBit 12y ago
  Compare that to what other athletes do in their sports and it seems trivial. The Tour de France involves racing your bike for 130 miles a day, every day for a month, over mountains multiple times a day.
MSM 12y ago
I've had a few conversations with friends about which sport I'd choose to play if I could be a professional in any sport. I think baseball would be at the bottom of my list. You have to go to the ballpark nearly every single day for almost 8 months. I'm from Detroit and I'm looking at the Tiger's schedule right now. In September they have TWO days in the entire month without a game. By that time they will also be playing doubleheaders or make up games because of weather. In May they go 21 consecutive days with a game. Even if it's not as physically demanding as hockey or american football, that's exhausting. Imagine having to go to the office that much. On top of that you're playing until nearly November if you're in the World Series and then spring training starts in Feb (it's already started). There's nearly no offseason.
- UnethicalHacks 12y ago
  And the average salary is $3.8 million. [1]http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/baseball/major-league-baseball-average-salary-rises-above-38-million/article22194485/ http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/baseball/major-league-...
  - chrisBob 12y ago
    The pay might be high but the average career is much shorter than that of a programmer. I bet the lifetime earnings aren't even that much different than the average person checking HN from California.
    - slayed0 12y ago
      Average MLB Career is 5.6 years[1] * $3.8M/year = $21.28M Divide that by 40 (assuming a career from 25-65) and you still have $532k/year. [1] http://www.ramfg.com/RAM-Financial-Group-Solutions-Professional-Athletes-Athletes-Services http://www.ramfg.com/RAM-Financial-Group-Solutions-Professio...
      - jdminhbg 12y ago
        Taxes are skewed against people who make high annual earnings for short amounts of time, and you also have to take 10% or so out for your agent. You'll still come out ahead with the baseball career, just not by quite as much.
defen 12y ago
162 games in 184 days, half of which are in not-your-home-city. Any particular game isn't too bad, but the cumulative stress of that many games and that much travel really adds up. That's also why the meta-game of baseball is important - e.g. sometimes it's better to play your weaker guys in the middle of the season, with the concomitant reduced chance of winning those relatively unimportant games, so you can have your stars rested for September/October. But don't rest them too much, or you won't even make the playoffs...

I must not understand Baseball well, because it strikes me as one of the least fatiguing sports that there are.

by TwoBit 12y ago

I must not understand Baseball well, because it strikes me as one of the least fatiguing sports that there are.

Here is what I'd recommend: for four hours, alternate sitting and standing every ten minutes in a sunny park. When standing, once every thirty seconds or so tense into a squat position and concentrate as hard as you can on something about 100 feet away. Every 10th time, sprint all out in a random direction. Every 20th time, throw a rock as hard as you can as far as you can. What you will find is that you, a normal human, can keep this up for about one hour, before you collapse of exhaustion or hurt yourself. That the super humans who play professional baseball are able to do this day in and day out for more than half a year is insane.

UnethicalHacks 12y ago
No, if you're a professional athlete this should not be all that difficult. Boring but not difficult. Look at the average baseball player. So many of them are plump or overweight. I'd argue that soccer players running 10-15 miles every game have a bit more to deal with. baseball needs some yoga and proper nutrition.
- parfe 12y ago
  >I'd argue that soccer players running 10-15 miles every game have a bit more to deal with. You mean kilometers, not miles. http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/06/20/how-far-do-world-cup-soccer-players-run-during-a-match/ http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/06...
- DerekH 12y ago
  In general, the public has a poor understanding of being a professional athlete. Typically, when I try to explain it to others, I usually just say "it's a job like any other" - the same as staying on top of your game in the music industry, running a startup, etc. It's easy for us to dismiss the effort professional athletes put out when you only see them on TV a few times. However, it's somehow different when we see Steve Jobs or Tim Cook on stage a couple times each year. We recognize all of the hard work Steve/Tim likely put in behind the scenes. For some reason, a lot of people don't recognize that same level of effort for professional athletes. They just assume they show up for the game and perform at a high level. For every hour on the field, there's probably two hours of study (mental preparation) and two hours of treatment and/or rehab (physical maintenance). Pair that with a rigid schedule every day, fatigue is a real concern. We all know the overnight success myth. The myth exists for professional athletes as well. Athletes that make it to the highest level didn't simply wake up one morning and have all the tools to succeed. Hours and hours and hours of training, both mental and physical, had to occur. It's like anything else - you don't simply get good. It takes practice. It also takes commitment, dedication, and perseverance to succeed at a professional level - just like everything else in this world.
- llimllib 12y ago
  The overweight players are overweight for the same reason that (American) football linemen are: it's useful for their skill. One of the reasons that Prince Fielder can hit as many home runs as he does is that he has a lot of mass; it's also one reason that steroids were effective. Not (just) for strength, but the more mass you have to swing into the ball, the farther it will go.
- freehunter 12y ago
  A first baseman, sure. They only need to be able catch well and sometimes throw across the infield. Find me an out-of-shape center fielder. Miguel Cabrera, for example, is a bit bigger. He's slow getting around the bases. But his talent, other than being a first baseman, is hitting the ball hard enough that he can casually stroll around the bases if he wants. But humans were meant to run. That's why we stand upright, that's why we sweat. Running long distances on a flat grass field, to a trained athlete, is going to be less fatiguing than standing still in the sun waiting for something to happen. Pitchers throw 100+ pitches at 90+ MPH and for the most part, are dead accurate. Even if the ball is spiraling through the air to confuse the batter. And the players, other than the starting pitcher, are out there almost every single day, and sometimes play two games per day. Baseball has a ridiculously packed schedule. So I would disagree that soccer players have it rougher. Running is easy.
  - afogarty 12y ago
    People don't realize just how much pitching taxes the human body. There's a reason why most pitchers have several joint surgeries over the course of their careers.
  - philwelch 12y ago
    Baseball pitchers regularly play well into their 40's. Jamie Moyer was still pitching a month or two shy of turning 50. For soccer players, still playing at 40 is nearly unheard of. Ryan Giggs did it, but that's about it, and it was mostly sentimentality that kept him playing that last year or so. So I would disagree that baseball is that much more taxing than soccer.
    - jghn 12y ago
      "Baseball pitchers regularly play well into their 40's" Unless you're someone like Mark Prior who had their body give out when their career was just getting started. Why are you only highlighting the outliers, the genetic freaks (amongst genetic freaks no less)? The thing with baseball pitchers is that there's an enormous selective pressure on their bodies (primarily shoulder & elbow) being able to withstand the brutal toll throwing all those pitches causes. The absolute best pitchers (talent wise) might never even make it to the MLB because their arm falls apart before they get a chance. There are pitching motions which hurt my arm just doing them in slow motion, now imagine heaving a baseball 90+ mph repeatedly for your entire life. This is a far different selective pressure than what e.g. soccer players would have where quickness & speed on their feet is what matters. The problem with these discussions is that people are using words like "taxing" to only narrowly mean what they want it to mean.
- ryanhuff 12y ago
  I won't pretend to appreciate the challenges of being a professional baseball player, but I can imagine that the constant travel and resulting disorientation is a contributing factor to fatigue. This article discusses the challenges. http://m.mlb.com/news/article/2878521/ http://m.mlb.com/news/article/2878521/
- scott_s 12y ago
  I agree that one baseball game is less stress on an athlete's body than one soccer game. But soccer players play about 30-40 games a season; major league baseball players play 162 games a season.
mdanger007 12y ago
The people who pick your coffee probably have as exhaustive a routine. Doesn't make it a spectator sport.
TwoBit 12y ago
Compare that to what other athletes do in their sports and it seems trivial. The Tour de France involves racing your bike for 130 miles a day, every day for a month, over mountains multiple times a day.

MSM 12y ago

I've had a few conversations with friends about which sport I'd choose to play if I could be a professional in any sport. I think baseball would be at the bottom of my list. You have to go to the ballpark nearly every single day for almost 8 months. I'm from Detroit and I'm looking at the Tiger's schedule right now. In September they have TWO days in the entire month without a game. By that time they will also be playing doubleheaders or make up games because of weather. In May they go 21 consecutive days with a game. Even if it's not as physically demanding as hockey or american football, that's exhausting. Imagine having to go to the office that much. On top of that you're playing until nearly November if you're in the World Series and then spring training starts in Feb (it's already started). There's nearly no offseason.

UnethicalHacks 12y ago
And the average salary is $3.8 million. [1]http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/baseball/major-league-baseball-average-salary-rises-above-38-million/article22194485/ http://www.theglobeandmail.com/sports/baseball/major-league-...
- chrisBob 12y ago
  The pay might be high but the average career is much shorter than that of a programmer. I bet the lifetime earnings aren't even that much different than the average person checking HN from California.
  - slayed0 12y ago
    Average MLB Career is 5.6 years[1] * $3.8M/year = $21.28M Divide that by 40 (assuming a career from 25-65) and you still have $532k/year. [1] http://www.ramfg.com/RAM-Financial-Group-Solutions-Professional-Athletes-Athletes-Services http://www.ramfg.com/RAM-Financial-Group-Solutions-Professio...
    - jdminhbg 12y ago
      Taxes are skewed against people who make high annual earnings for short amounts of time, and you also have to take 10% or so out for your agent. You'll still come out ahead with the baseball career, just not by quite as much.

defen 12y ago

162 games in 184 days, half of which are in not-your-home-city. Any particular game isn't too bad, but the cumulative stress of that many games and that much travel really adds up. That's also why the meta-game of baseball is important - e.g. sometimes it's better to play your weaker guys in the middle of the season, with the concomitant reduced chance of winning those relatively unimportant games, so you can have your stars rested for September/October. But don't rest them too much, or you won't even make the playoffs...