Keeping a baseball scorebook is a lost art...but still fun

Keeping a baseball scorebook

is a lost art...but still fun

Keeping score for baseball has become a lost art.

   Don't ask me how or why, but the majority of people I know either have no interest in keeping score for a baseball game or they have no idea what all the numbers, lines and letters all mean to keep track of the game in the

first place.

   I'll admit, in recent memory the only times I've kept score of a baseball game is while covering high school baseball, the few times I've had the opportunity to cover the Cincinnati Reds, the Chillicothe Paints, the Mid-American Conference tournament, and for the majority of my summer American Legion Post 129 baseball games. But away from the job, I don't keep

score.

   Shame on me.

   Part of it is because the big scoreboard at games or team websites keep do all the work for you. Even on TV, games give you all the info. Although sometimes I will look at a extended box score in the USA Today, where they have daily box scores from games that occurred the previous night.

   But when someone actually keeps track of a complete baseball game, it can send the person back into a time when the fan kept track of his or her game they were watching on a regular basis. Some people still do, but it is safe to say at least 80 percent of people that go to Great American Ball Park are more interested in if Mr. Redlegs beats Rosie Red in the animated race than if Drew Stubbs struck out swinging (a regular K) or if he was out looking (a backward K).

   But keeping a scorebook is a game of its own.

   Sometimes reading a scorebook is like reading a foreign language, especially if you have never kept score.

   For example, one of the sequences which is common to write in a scorebook is 4-3.

   The No. 4 is shorthand for the second baseman and the No. 3 is shorthand for the first baseman. No. 1 is the pitcher, No. 2 is the catcher. The third baseman is No. 5 and the shortstop is No. 6. The outfielders are numbered 7, 8, and 9 (LF, CF, RF).

   Though I am not a numbers guy in everyday life, I am a stat nerd when it comes to baseball. After every game I cover, I try to find different things I've kept track of during games and place them in just the right spot in the

game story.

   Take a normal F-8 in a scorebook. That means it was a fly out to the centerfielder. If you are just looking at a normal scorebook, that is all you basically know, a fly out to a centerfielder.

  See, this is where the baseball nerd in me comes into play. I like to take note of whether the centerfielder caught the ball diving or standing. Whether if he made the catch in straight, left or right-centerfield. Or the player could have ran into the rightfielder's territory and made the catch. But in most books, it just says F-8.

   I am not getting on a soap box, but I am just a fan of a finely kept scorebook.

   Trust me, I've seen some horrific scorebooks where you just shake your head and go on.

   The rarest sequence I've marked that I can remember was during a day game at Great American Ball Park with the Reds hosting the Los Angeles Dodgers. The sequence of events that I put down on the paper was 3-6-1, double play. That's correct, the play started with the first baseman to shortstop and back to the pitcher (who was at first base) for two outs.

   I not only had the opportunity to write it once, but three times in that game. I don't recall ever getting to write that before that June day, but when I do get to write a 3-6-1 (when I'm not talking about the jersey numbers of Dwyane Wade, LeBron James and Chris Bosh), it is something it see. You could say it is the greatest trio of numbers, in that sequence, a

scorebook can have.

   There is even a book about keeping score titled "The Joy of Keeping Score.”

   I haven't read it, but I'm going to.

   Tom Boswell of the Washington Post once said: "No other American sport has anything that genuinely approximates the scorecard - that single piece of paper, simple enough for a child - that preserves the game both chronologically and in toto with almost no significant loss of detail."

   I have to agree.

   Everyone should give it a shot. You never know, it might make you enjoy America's Pastime even more.

   Stephen Forsha is the sports editor of The Highland County Press.

Keeping score for baseball has become a lost art.

   Don't ask me how or why, but the majority of people I know either have no interest in keeping score for a baseball game or they have no idea what all the numbers, lines and letters all mean to keep track of the game in the first place.

   I'll admit, in recent memory the only times I've kept score of a baseball game is while covering high school baseball, the few times I've had the opportunity to cover the Cincinnati Reds, the Chillicothe Paints, the Mid-American Conference tournament, and for the majority of my summer American Legion Post 129 baseball games. But away from the job, I don't keep score.

   Shame on me.

   Part of it is because the big scoreboard at games or team websites keep do all the work for you. Even on TV, games give you all the info. Although sometimes I will look at a extended box score in the USA Today, where they have daily box scores from games that occurred the previous night.

   But when someone actually keeps track of a complete baseball game, it can send the person back into a time when the fan kept track of his or her game they were watching on a regular basis. Some people still do, but it is safe to say at least 80 percent of people that go to Great American Ball Park are more interested in if Mr. Redlegs beats Rosie Red in the animated race than if Drew Stubbs struck out swinging (a regular K) or if he was out looking (a backward K).

   But keeping a scorebook is a game of its own.

   Sometimes reading a scorebook is like reading a foreign language, especially if you have never kept score.

   For example, one of the sequences which is common to write in a scorebook is 4-3.

   The No. 4 is shorthand for the second baseman and the No. 3 is shorthand for the first baseman. No. 1 is the pitcher, No. 2 is the catcher. The third baseman is No. 5 and the shortstop is No. 6. The outfielders are numbered 7, 8, and 9 (LF, CF, RF).

   Though I am not a numbers guy in everyday life, I am a stat nerd when it comes to baseball. After every game I cover, I try to find different things I've kept track of during games and place them in just the right spot in the game story.

   Take a normal F-8 in a scorebook. That means it was a fly out to the centerfielder. If you are just looking at a normal scorebook, that is all you basically know, a fly out to a centerfielder.

  See, this is where the baseball nerd in me comes into play. I like to take note of whether the centerfielder caught the ball diving or standing. Whether if he made the catch in straight, left or right-centerfield. Or the player could have ran into the rightfielder's territory and made the catch. But in most books, it just says F-8.

   I am not getting on a soap box, but I am just a fan of a finely kept scorebook.

   Trust me, I've seen some horrific scorebooks where you just shake your head and go on.

   The rarest sequence I've marked that I can remember was during a day game at Great American Ball Park with the Reds hosting the Los Angeles Dodgers. The sequence of events that I put down on the paper was 3-6-1, double play. That's correct, the play started with the first baseman to shortstop and back to the pitcher (who was at first base) for two outs.

   I not only had the opportunity to write it once, but three times in that game. I don't recall ever getting to write that before that June day, but when I do get to write a 3-6-1 (when I'm not talking about the jersey numbers of Dwyane Wade, LeBron James and Chris Bosh), it is something it see. You could say it is the greatest trio of numbers, in that sequence, a scorebook can have.

   There is even a book about keeping score titled "The Joy of Keeping Score.”

   I haven't read it, but I'm going to.

   Tom Boswell of the Washington Post once said: "No other American sport has anything that genuinely approximates the scorecard - that single piece of paper, simple enough for a child - that preserves the game both chronologically and in toto with almost no significant loss of detail."

   I have to agree.

   Everyone should give it a shot. You never know, it might make you enjoy America's Pastime even more.

   Stephen Forsha is the sports editor of The Highland County Press.