Baseball Question

[BJNT]

I not a huge baseball guy, but I've been getting into the sport a little more since the beginning of this decade. My question this. Football has the quarterback and basketball has the point guard. I heard that baseball's version of these positions is the catcher. Am I right?

[kehlis]

Re: Baseball Question

You could make that comparison with the only difference being the performance of the catcher has nowhere near the importance of the performance of a QB or PG.

Not to say the catchers play isn't important, he is very important to the pitchers, but a great team can have a catcher that hits .230 yet is valuable to the team for other reasons.

[Blzer]

Re: Baseball Question

As far as the "captain" of the team, sure. He is involved with every pitch in every game (as opposed to a pitcher who only throws a certain amount of innings a certain amount of games), he calls all of the pitches and directs who to take possession of the ball, where to throw it, etc. His involvement is similar to that of the quarterback and point guard.

But in a way, he becomes an underrated aspect. Catchers are generally slow runners and overall are there because of their catching abilities, much less their hitting abilities. They generally bottom out the order and thankfully aren't harked too badly if they do, say, hit .230 (look at Brad Ausmus of the past). At times you can think of them as football's place-kick holder: they are crucial to set the play in motion and are not rewarded for their efforts. However, if they screw up, they'll never hear the end of it.

It's safe to say that you can make the argument the pitcher is like the point guard of basketball and the quarterback of football. They are the "center" of focus, begin the play with possession of the ball, and half-predict its outcome. The only setbacks, like I said earlier, are they don't call the plays and there isn't just one pitcher per team, etc.

Baseball is a very different sport, where no one person shares the spotlight (football doesn't either I suppose, with a separate 11 on offense from defense). It's really hard to make an exact comparison.



This is slightly OT, but if you're interested, a long time ago I made a post on the 2K Sports forums regarding my opinion(s) on the biggest differences between baseball and other sports, and it may answer your question a little more thoroughly (or at least expand your own personal viewpoint):


http://2ksports.com/forums/showpost....3&postcount=64

When comparing baseball to the other major team sports, the five biggest differences (that better the sport of baseball), in my opinion, are:


1) It is not a timed sport. Instead, you play innings, and you are awarded more time on offense by preventing outs. The ninth inning doesn't just give you "x minutes" to try and score five runs when you're down by four. Instead, if you create your own rally, you create your own limit to how far and how long the inning can last. It's not a situation like any other sport where you score, and then you're awarded by giving the other team possession. You get to stay on offense for as long as you're producing offensively, which makes a lot of sense.

2) There is no possible way for one player to "hot dog" the spotlight. You can only field the ball when it's hit to you, and you can only bat when it's your turn out of nine players. It's not like football, basketball, hockey, or soccer where you could be passed to all of the time to boost your own statistics. That's not how this game works. Unless you're a premier home run hitting ball club with all nine players in your lineup, you must depend on others to perform well to score runs. Sure, some players will be better than others, but in a way, it is out of the starting lineup's control. It is solely based on ability, rather than bias.

3) You're playing against the ball, not with the ball. No matter what you think, what happens on the field is not in your control. You hit a home run because of your ability, yes... but it is also because of how the pitcher pitched the ball. You also get out of an inning because the ball seemingly came your way, although you may have had to take a few steps to make the play. You don't necessarily outsmart the opposing team by your antics to get the ball to the other side and score your runs. Your performance is not just based on what you do, but is also based on how the opposing team allows you to do it.

4) Costly human error. This is pretty self-explanatory, but I don't just mean by the umpires (which a certain umpire can easily dictate the outcome of a game without the opportunity to reverse a call). In baseball, just getting under the ball while making contact changes a home run to a fly out. Pitching requires ultimate command of your location, and four more inches over the plate rather than just on the corner probably results in two runs scored instead of a double play. While on defense, your first step is too crucial. One minor wrongdoing, and it's all over. While baserunning, pre-determining a caught fly ball from a fly ball not caught may either get you to score or be doubled-off. Then, of course, there are the umpires, which I won't get into. In football, you can misfire a pass by even a few feet and still allow time for a receiver to re-route and catch the ball. Even on defense, if a receiver outruns you, there should still be defensive backs behind you in your assistance once the pass is in flight. In basketball, you have a rim and backboard to play with the ball until it goes in. Hockey and soccer have turnovers and missed shots too often for anything to be considered a "fault" by the player that is passing/being passed to or shooting.

5) Come-from-behind victories. Sure, in basketball, there is an opportunity for the buzzer-beater, and in football, you can get that last play off as the clock winds down to zero and pull ahead. But it's not quite the same magic. In hockey and soccer, this is plain impossible; no matter how ultimately tricky or awesome the shot, you may never score more than one point per goal, meaning it is impossible to come from behind in a one-time opportunity fashion. In basketball, again, you have very little leeway. You must be down by no more than two points to even have a chance. In football, there is certainly more than one way to score, but more than likely, you either score three points or seven points based on the drive, meaning most scores are probably a sum of 3's and 7's (that's a good song) anyway. And again, remember that this must be as the time is winding down to zero for it to be dramatic. In baseball, again, you can be down by five runs, even fifty runs... and as long as you prevent outs, you can do what is possible to get that walk-off single or home run, potentially scoring as much as up to four runs in a single play. Or, the four runs can be on four plays. No matter, it is all in one "drive", and allows for greatness to be achieved, even from the most unexpected players (keep in mind that you can't arrange who you want to bat unless you are pinch-hitting, where in the other sports, you can pass to a specific player to better your chances). In all, the game isn't over until the third out is recorded in that last inning.





Are there more differences? Of course! But these are a top five that really make baseball stand alone from the other sports in general.

[SPTO]

Re: Baseball Question

Catchers can play a key role but it's not as strong as it used to be. Back in the day (20-25 yrs ago) catchers usually called the game with the pitcher more or less going along with what the catcher says unless it's a star pitcher like a Nolan Ryan or a Tom Seaver. Nowadays, Catchers usually get the signs from the dugout and relay it to the pitcher and the pitcher can often overturn the original sign. More often then not these days it's a mutual responsibility with rookies being the only ones to really follow what the catcher says.

That being said, catchers often have a perspective to the game that everyone else doesn't and the tasks of catching often lead to a keen sense of strategy and how to operate. This is why so many catchers end up becoming managers at one time or another.