There is No Such Thing as a Cirque du Soleil Catch

Before baseball left Montreal, it ended up in the worst place the sport could imagine, Olympic Stadium. To really help you understand and appreciate just how bad this place was, never mind that baseball wasn't meant to be played in French, I Googled up Le Stade Olympique and found two perfect descriptions.

"You can't overstate the acute, soul-sucking effect of Le Stade Olympique.  It's built into, rather than on top of, a sprawling, incoherent paved campus in the middle of a beat-down residential area.  It (Olympic Stadium) is a Communist-bloc public housing development wrapped in a waste-treatment center inside a prison....with artificial turf."

".......Olympic Stadium, the world's only 46,620-seat commode where the artificial turf is 14 years old, the visitors' clubhouse has a painted concrete floor and the roof doesn't open anymore."

It was in this mess of a baseball park that we had four season tickets for the 2000 Montreal Expos baseball season.  And it was on this stage that I undertook a task at which I'm not ashamed to admit I failed miserably.

We invited two friends who never before, ever, ever, ever, in their entire lives had seen a baseball game.  One of them was Norwegian, the other was Moroccan.  In their defense they spoke multiple languages and were far more worldly than we, but this is not a story about worldliness, it is a story about trying to explain baseball to two people who'd never before, ever, ever, ever in their entire lives seen a baseball game.  In a stadium that ESPN writer Rick Reilly called a commode - see above.  It was not a tour through the Norwegian fjords.


Most of you reading this have more embedded baseball knowledge than you appreciate.  You can read a box score, listen to ESPN and know that a dinger is a home run, a whiff is a strike out, a diamond is the field on which the game is played, that chin music is a high and tight fast ball.  Our friends spoke French, Norwegian, Arabic, some Berber and Spanish, but a balk to them was the language of a chicken.  I can't begin to explain the amount of work it takes to explain every single facet of a game that is embedded in my DNA to two people who thought a putout is what the Service d'Incendie de Montreal did at a fire.

They did understand the Canadian national anthem. It was a good start that quickly turned sour.

Batter up! (Let the explaining begin.)

One of the key pieces of equipment used in this game is a ball. The ball can be passed, curved, spit upon,  knuckled, fouled, forked, slid; it can be a fly, fast, an umpire's call, breaking, ground.  The ball can be wild. It can stay inside the foul line or roll outside the foul line.  It can be caught on a warning track or up against the wall. It's thrown from a mound of dirt by a pitcher who can be starter, middle reliever, closer, wild, lefty, righty but always part of a rotation.  He can brush back the batters. A pitcher can start or come out of a bullpen.  He stands on a rubber. And he can be perfect, but not very often.

There are three bases and a home plate that is not shaped like any plate anyone has eaten off of.  Bases can be loaded or empty or partially occupied and runners (see below) can be left on them. They can be stolen. They can be rounded. They can be slid into. They have a hot corner.

Batters use a bat that can be choked, checked and waved and even have a donut attached to it.  They stand in the batters box facing the opposing team's battery - pitcher and catcher - who exchange signs with each other all the while hiding them from the batter who is in the box - but not from the guy stealing signs in center field. Batters are part of a batting order and can be driven in by another batter. Before going to the plate, they stand in a circle, on a deck.  They go from their circle to their box which is adjacent to the catcher's box. They swing at a ball thrown to a zone.  They can be a starter or utility. Batters can be struck out. They can be walked, accidentally or intentionally.  They can hit singles, doubles, triples or dingers over the fence or the wall or up against either or into the alley or a gap. They can crowd the plate that doesn't look like one. They can switch - if they're able. It's okay. They can check their swing.  And they can be designated, at least in the American League.

Runners score runs. Runners can be run down. Runners can be batted in. They can break up a double play or run out of the base path or be run down. They can be left on. They can be picked off.  They can be pinched for. They can be be squeezed during an act of suicide.

Batters can hit a Baltimore chop or a can of corn or a lazy fly ball or a foul ball or execute a hit and run or get the green light or be part of the suicide that involves the runner or hit into a double play, triple play,  a force out or regular out.  They can hit for the cycle.  They can be hit by a pitch or take a pitch. They can whiff.  They can bat clean-up or lead off or bat down in the order. A batter can charge the mound, argue with the umpire, throw his bat, toss his helmet. He can be caught looking. So can a runner for that matter. Once on the base, they can steal. They can threaten to go.  They can slide.  They can run with their head down and they can go part way.  They can run through a signal.

Batters become runners who then become scorers who then go back to a bench and wait for their turn to become a batter again.  They play with a glove to catch the ball and with different gloves to hold the bat.

If you've not already found 867 ways that this confused our friends, then you're still on the third paragraph.  By the fifth inning, I was exhausted and had a splitting headache.  They were bored, the Expos were losing, the stadium was still a lifeless mound of concrete, so we went home.

Molson can only help so much.