The baseball season 2009 for Major League Baseball begins on Monday. As a fan, I cannot help feel excited. I am not really following any particular teams, but just a fan of the sport itself. I enjoy soccer, basketball, and football as well. But for those timed sports, you pretty much can tell the result before the games end. The fact that anything can happen in a baseball game until the last batter out is what attracts me the most.
Growing up in Taiwan, I watched a lot of manga as a child. Many of them were baseball related. I was not sure how much the manga contributed to me becoming a baseball fan. But the first team I followed was Seibu Lions, and the reason was because of their logo design, which was based on the famous Kimba the White Lion anime by Osamu Tezuka. Sometimes, our elementary school classmates would go to the neighborhood schools to play some balls, but nothing too serious.
Taiwan's CPBL was born when I was in the middle school. I became a fan of Brother Elephants for the very same reason -- I liked their logo design. Many people in my class were fans too. We listend to the games on the radio, made waves and cheers even during the classes. Those were good old days. Unfortunately, the passioned died with the scandals surrounding the baseball environment in Taiwan.
I went to Pittsburgh in 1998, the year of the famous homerun chases between McGwire and Sosa. I was overwhelmed by the positive energy of baseball here. Yes, there were problems here and there, but overall the baseball was still indeed a sport in everyday American life. I went to see three games that yeah, all of them Pirates vs Cardinals. Out of McGwire's 70 homers, I witnessed the homer #52 and #63 in the Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh.
When I came to United States and tried to apply my first credit card. I got a letter for MBNA (now part of Bank of America) regarding their MLB Preferred MasterCard. I browsed through all the designs and chose New York Yankees in the end. So, I guess you can say that I am sort of a Yankees fan. I also cheer for my home team San Francisco Giants and Oakland Athletics now. Choosing side is just to make the games more enjoyable.
My daughter plays youth softball and is a fan for softball and baseball as well. We spend a lot of time in the neighborhood ball park where the Foster City Little League and Foster City Youth Softball Association play. It's quite a pleasure watching the kids play when there is nothing complicated but the joy of the game.
Hello there. I'm the first follower. You should be my follower too. Heehee.
ReplyDeleteMany congrats to this new blog. Hey why not football (in the U.S. you say "soccer")? The only thing I know about baseball is Wang Jian Ming. LOL!
Anyway, enjoy your blogging!
I am your loyal follower and I don't need the setting to prove it. :P But I'll do it anyway when I figure out how to. I am still confused with the interface.
ReplyDeleteYeah, we call it "soccer" in America because "football" is taken by American football, which uses not only the feet, but also hands, and a lot of body weight. I love soccer because it's so fluent with almost no interruption during the game.