The Glossary of Baseball Part II
Baseball has many variations but the best known is Softball. It is played on a smaller field. The ball is larger and the bat is more refined. The pitching motion in the pitcher-striker duel is from the bottom to the top. These changes were made to make the sport more accessible to beginners and encourage leisure practice. It has the particularity to be practiced by women, men and mixed teams. Softball is an Olympic sport for women since the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games.
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Major League Baseball
The Major League Baseball (MLB) is a North American sports organization consisting of two leagues: the National League and the American League. The competition it organizes, bearing the same name, is the highest level in the current baseball hierarchy. The regular season, which includes more than 2,644 games, or 162 games per team, is held from April to the end of September. Playoffs follow in October, leading the champions of each league to the World Series, Major League Baseball’s annual best-of-seven final.
There are thirty franchises (29 in the United States and one in Canada) competing for the title. The top teams are the New York Yankees (27 titles), St. Louis Cardinals (11), Boston Red Sox (9), Oakland Athletics (9), San Francisco Giants (8) and Los Angeles Dodgers (7). Atlanta Braves, who won the 2021 World Series against the Houston Astros are the defending champions.
The European Baseball Confederation (EBC)
In 1954, the European Baseball Confederation (founded in 1953 by Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and Spain), organized the first European Championship in Antwerp (Belgium), with four participating nations. It became the European Confederation of Amateur Baseball (CEB) and now has 33 member countries. The European Champion Clubs Cup was created in 1963 in Haarlem (Netherlands) where six clubs met. Since 1975, European championships are organized for the youth categories (minors, cadets and juniors).
Glossary
As well as understanding the rules of this sport, you must also master its lexical field. Let’s take a look at the main terms you will hear when you watch a game in front of your screen. Once you’ve mastered the rules, and vocabulary of baseball, the doors to the MLB will be wide open and you’ll be able to talk about it.
At Bat: You are bound to hear this term used during a game; it is also the name of the MLB application on smartphones. This expression simply refers to a player’s at bat.
Ball: The umpire will call Ball, when a ball is thrown out of the strike zone and the batter does not attempt to hit it.
Bases Full: This term is used to mean that all bases are occupied by a runner.
Stolen bases: When a runner decides to run from his base to the next base while the pitcher is pitching to the batter.
Bullpen: A place on the field where relief pitchers warm up by throwing a few pitches.
Deck: Small area at the edge of the field where the next batter practices hitting with the bat in order to catch the pitcher’s timing.
Double play: Defensive action taken when the ball is hit that will eliminate two players in the same action, often by eliminating the batter and the player already at first base who is forced to run to second base.
ERA: Average number of earned runs a pitcher gives up in a season in relation to the number of innings pitched. The lower the average, the better the pitcher’s performance. To calculate it, here is the formula: ERA = 9 x (number of earned runs conceded / number of innings pitched)
Designated hitter (DH): Player chosen to hit in the lineup in place of the pitcher. At the moment, it’s only for teams in the American League.
Forced Play: For example, if a player is on first base and the next batter puts the ball in play, then the first batter is forced to run to the next base in order to leave the first pad free for his teammate, even if he risks elimination.
Home plate: This is a small, buried plate that runners must reach to score a run. It also serves as a marker for the umpires’ strike zone.
Home-run: This is the most common term and is an action where the batter throws the ball out of bounds and thus secures the run for his team.
Line-up: Term used by the Americans to designate a game sheet with the roster.
Inning: This is the way to determine the game, as there is no regulation time. A baseball game is played in a minimum of nine innings.
Pinch Runner: Player used to replace the batter who just put the ball in play. The Pinch Runner will stand on the base that the batter has reached. It is used at the end of the game to avoid tiring the batter and to protect him from possible injury.
Pinch Hitter: Player used to replace the pitcher who must come to the plate as a batter. The pinch hitter is only used in the National League.
RBI (Run Batted In): It is called the run produced when the batter hits the ball and allows a player already on base to score a run. It could be called a home run for example.
Run: We use this term to refer to runs scored, on the scoreboard it is represented by an «R».
Strike: When the pitcher throws the ball into a well-defined area and the batter does not touch the ball, either because he lets it go by or because he tried to hit it without success.
Strike-Out: This is when the pitcher throws three strikes, then he automatically strikes out the batter. It will be represented by the letter «K» in the United States.
Tag: When a base runner moves from one base to another, the defending players must touch the base runner with their glove and the ball inside before the runner reaches the next cushion.
Triple play: Very rare action that allows the defense to strike out three players after the ball is put in play.
Walk: When the pitcher throws four pitches called «Ball» by the umpire, then the batter is automatically sent to first base. This is called a «Base on Base».
Strike Zone: This is the area, sometimes shown during games, where the pitcher must throw the ball in order to make a strike.
This is the end of our glossary but the beginning of new things. With all these first-hand terms, you are already able to watch a baseball game and understand it. In addition, if you want to go a step further and want to earn money through your passion, open a betting account via agent today. Because with BET-IBC winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing!
