A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of experiencing a live match of Australia's beloved summertime sport, cricket. Most people know the sport as going for days on end, but me, Rory and the Dans went to the Sydney Cricket Ground to check out a 20/20match, which meant that the contest between Australia and the West Indies would actually end that night. Being a dirty Yank that I am, there didn't seem something right about the sport, though, in comparison to its Amercan sister sport, baseball. Actually, ten things.
1. No tailgating. This really is an issue with all Australian sports. For a country that enjoys a good barbeque and beers, this seems like a given. They need to learn how to hang out and do both from the back of a car.
2. The uniforms. For the 20/20 matches, they look like the warmup gear for the Washington Generals, complete with sponsor logos instead of team insignias. For the test matches, they all-white with wear knit sweaters and old-style caps. None of these combos really looks cool.
3. There's only two bases. Along with a lot less activity than four bases, I immediately wondered: how do they determine how far you get with a girl? Yeah man, I gave her a wicket last night. Huuuhh??
4. The food. No Cracker Jacks, hot dogs, nachos, or even KFC, even though it was the team's main sponsor! The closest thing I came to a hot dog had the texture of a toy hot dog and was the color of fire engine red. After waiting for 15 minutes in one of the two concession stands, I opted for a meat pie and VB beer instead.
5. The format. Basically, cricket is kind of like baseball, except you watch one team have a 100 run inning, and then get to see if the other team can beat that. No back-and-forth like a good ballgame. When the West Indies only got 130 runs, you pretty much knew the Aussies were going to match it. I don't think the sport can ever really have a nail-biter bottom-of-the-ninth, two outs moment.
6. No home runs. Sure, they have something called a six, which is when the crowd cheers and the ball goes out of the park. But it's not that big of a deal when you're trying to get 150. Therefore, it's the equivalent of maybe a double. Again, no bases-loaded, edge of the seat moments.
7. What are they playing for? I'm still not sure what the whole summer's competition has been about. Against England, it's for somthing called the Ashes (and bragging rights). Maybe they're all playing for some free KFC.
9. No Wild Thing. It's a pretty cool moment when the reliever comes in to close out the deal in baseball. Think Eric Gagne circa 2003. That doesn't really happen in cricket, because the same few 'bowlers' are on the not-mound for the entire match.
10. You don't get to keep the ball. So when the guy hits six, fans have to throw it back. Not in the Wrigley Field style, but because they need the ball. So much for fan-friendly.
I could've mentioned that there's no 7th inning stretch, but don't want to pick on the sport. On a positive note, the Aussies did get past the 130 runs and whooped the Windies this summer. On to the Kiwis for another yet-to-determined title.
2 comments:
1. No tailgating - Sure, there's no tailgating. But then you're comparing it to Baseball and American sporting culture in general. I could point out a couple of things in terms of spectator/fan culture that Cricket has but Baseball doesn't... but, that doesn't necessarily mean that the lack of that particular thing demerits Baseball's quality.
2. The uniforms - I personally find Baseball uniforms stupid and weird. The pants and the belt remind me of soldiers serving in the military. But then again, it's just a matter of opinion. Cricket uniforms in Twenty20 matches are pretty cool. And sure, they wear all-whites for Test matches; that's just the culture aspect of traditional cricket. It's like wearing a suit when you have an important presentation at work. Test cricket is considered to be a pure and traditional form of cricket and wasn't designed to be a spectator game.
3. There's only two bases - Again, you're thinking of Cricket through the lens of Baseball. There's no such thing as a Base in Cricket. There's far more activity on a cricket pitch than in a ballpark with two bases loaded. There's constant running between the wickets, something you barely get to see in baseball given that batters get to hit the ball with their bat only 1/3rd of the time.
4. The food - Just because you couldn't find food that you're familiar with at the stadium doesn't lessen Cricket's quality.
5. The format - There's plenty of nail-biters in cricket (Test cricket is an exception). But seriously, Twenty20 cricket matches almost always end up in nailbiters. Sure, there's no back and forth mechanism in Cricket, but that's the beauty of it. Back and forth mechanism doesn't contribute to nail biter situations AT ALL. Nail biting games are created out of a team's ability to perform at par with the opposing team throughout the duration of play. In baseball you won't get to see a nail-biter if the home team is scoring a run every alternate inning but the visiting team isn't. In the 9th inning, you'll still end up with something like 4-0 despite the back-and-forth format.
6. No home runs - Sixes are indeed a big deal.. Sixes become a very big deal when the opposing team has put up a very big score on the board... at which point you have to rely on sixes to reach that run chase given the limited number of balls for the inning (120 balls in total = 20 overs).
7. What are they playing for? - There's a huge sum of money paid out to winners of the tournament. The Champions League T20 for example pays out US $ 2.5 MM to the champions.
8. - Item # 8 is missing on your list :-P
9. No Wild thing - There's far more variety in Cricket's bowling than in Baseball pitching. The rules of Cricket dictate that you have to rotate bowlers every over. And there's also a limit as to how many overs a bowler can bowl. In Twenty20 matches, a bowler can only bowl 4 overs. There's a lot of strategy that goes into Cricket, especially Bowling. The Captain has to decide which bowler he wants to use based on the strengths/weaknesses of the batsman on strike. Also, unlike Baseball, you have to use a lot of strategy to place fielders on the field. You have some 40 positions to choose from and you only have 9 fielders.. so you have to choose the 9 best positions you deem to be optimal based on the type of Bowler you are and the kind of Batsman you're bowling to. I grew up watching Cricket and have been watching Baseball ever since I moved to the U.S. - so I can certainly confirm that there's far more 'wild things' in Cricket than in Baseball.
10. You don't get to keep the ball - Yep, that's because the ball is VERY important to the game. Throughout the inning, the bowlers work on the ball by maintaining a shine on one side of the ball whereas letting the other side wear out through natural play. Such a ball (with opposing texture on each side) allows the bowler to deploy wide variety of swing and spin in their bowling delivery. The bowler cannot do 'wild stuff' without such a texture - that's why the fans throw the ball back to the ground.
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