Friends...let us all come together: you putting your chocolate in our peanut butter, and us putting our peanut butter in your chocolate. Let us come together and play KICKBALL.

daniel robert chapman wrote:

tommydski wrote:This thread is a nice blast from the past. Look at how thin we all were back in 04!

I should weigh in here since I'm one of the very few Brits that likes Baseball and yet was raised on Football. My appreciation of it came by degrees when I ultimately realised that it can be enjoyed by removing the sense of sport from the spectacle. I find the appeal of the punditry, strategy and form to be sufficient to sustain my interest. I've never even been to a Baseball game and frankly I don't have to. To me it's just some numbers, names and figures. This satisfies the geek in me.

Football goes much deeper because I have lived it in the same manner that someone might have lived a faith such as Christianity. Thus, I vote Football but I wouldn't write either off.

Blimey, that's pretty much my attitude summed up right there. I went through a period of watching baseball overnight on Channel Five, and really enjoyed it. When I got back to sleeping again, I taped games for a while, but it was difficult to maintain. As a result, I know sod all about who the good players/teams are. But - sit me down in front of a ball game on TV, and I'm all about it. By the end of it, I'll have absorbed a lot. Like Tommy, a lot of it is due to the 'ephemera' of the TV spectacle. I tried just watching highlights clips, and it didn't have it for me: I missed the commentators talking about baseball in their lovely, warm, American accents. The actual at-bats - right? - are like punctuation, for me.

This is why I asked in another thread if there's a way of getting televised baseball via the internet. I can't follow the sport through box scores, I'd just like to catch some games. Maye I'll start taping off Channel 5 again.

All that said, football, and Leeds United, is just an implicit part of me. No matter how into baseball I ever got, it would never mean as much to me as the Leeds teams of 1989-1993.

Have you tried to listen to the baseball on the radio? As has been discussed here many times before, mlb.com has the streaming radio broadcast of every game available for a flat fee for the entire season. I can't see any reason why it wouldn't be available worldwide. Streaming video, though, I don't know how one would go about getting that.

On this note, I've been trying to listen to the football and cricket on BBC online radio but it always says that these services are only reserved for listeners in the UK. All the other BBC radio channels are available here in the U.S., mind, but live sporting events are black-out. Is there any way I can listen to these? Century FM has broadcast some of the Newcastle matches in the past but lately the coverage has been a bit spotty.

johnB wrote:On this note, I've been trying to listen to the football and cricket on BBC online radio but it always says that these services are only reserved for listeners in the UK. All the other BBC radio channels are available here in the U.S., mind, but live sporting events are black-out. Is there any way I can listen to these? Century FM has broadcast some of the Newcastle matches in the past but lately the coverage has been a bit spotty.

Hmm, I had no trouble listening to Scottish football over the internet when I was in France. That was using the BBC Scotland website.

Are you trying to listen to Five Live? That usually has the big premiership games.

Nico Adie wrote:
Are you trying to listen to Five Live? That usually has the big premiership games.

Yes! The pre-match commentary comes through all fine but right before the kick-off the recorded voice interrupts: "we're sorry, due to contractual obligations and what not, the following programme is available only to UK-based listeners."

Granted, I don't pay the license fee, so I don't have any real reason to complain, but it would be nice to get that coverage here.

Baseball is a terrible thing to watch. Boring to the core. It is on par with watching golf. Playing baseball is equally boring. If im gonna play a sport i would choose one where i am actually physically active.

Baseball would be more palettable to watch (although i wouldnt) if the games actually mattered. there are way to many games. this goes for hockey and basketball as well.

Soccer is one of the worlds finest creations.

Soccer is fun to play, fun to watch, and shouldnt even be compared to baseball.

johnB wrote:Have you tried to listen to the baseball on the radio? As has been discussed here many times before, mlb.com has the streaming radio broadcast of every game available for a flat fee for the entire season. I can't see any reason why it wouldn't be available worldwide. Streaming video, though, I don't know how one would go about getting that.

I've considered radio, but I'm unsure about paying for something I might not follow through on; also, the major stumbling block is time difference. I think the proper solution is for me just to sort my life out and remember to tape and watch the twice weekly games shown overnight on Five. That ought to satisfy!

As for football - I'm not sure about the BBC over the internet, I haven't been in a position to try. On my Mac, though, I have a dashboard widget which serves as a radio for all the BBC's radio streams - and has separate channels for Five Live UK, Five Live International, Sports Extra UK, and Sports Extra Int'l. Perhaps that gets around the location issues, if you tune into the UK streams. Lastly, for following Newcastle (or other soccer games), if you're the of the heinous type who break copyright laws with little regard for the consequences then you may wish to sign up at www.fbtz.com, where all sorts of football video is available via BitTorrent and other means (I was hoping there'd be a baseball equivalent, so that I could take a firm moral stand against that,too).

I'd avoid anything involving last night's Toon match, though.

I watch the simulated games on the ESPN website.

It's like watching a little computer game.

six acre lake wrote:Soccer is fun to play, fun to watch, and shouldnt even be compared to baseball.

You got the last third of this sentence correct.

daniel robert chapman wrote:I've considered radio, but I'm unsure about paying for something I might not follow through on; also, the major stumbling block is time difference. I think the proper solution is for me just to sort my life out and remember to tape and watch the twice weekly games shown overnight on Five. That ought to satisfy!

Aye, hadn't thought about the time difference. On most days through the baseball season there are games that start at lunchtime (the Cubs, for instance, play the majority of their home fixtures at this time) so that would make for some nice tea-time listening over there. I assume that most of these mlb.com is not retrievable after the fact so you've probably gotta be there as it happens. And is says here that it's only $14.95 for the full season streaming audio, and with the exchange rate these days that's really not much at all innit?

As for football - I'm not sure about the BBC over the internet, I haven't been in a position to try. On my Mac, though, I have a dashboard widget which serves as a radio for all the BBC's radio streams - and has separate channels for Five Live UK, Five Live International, Sports Extra UK, and Sports Extra Int'l. Perhaps that gets around the location issues, if you tune into the UK streams. Lastly, for following Newcastle (or other soccer games), if you're the of the heinous type who break copyright laws with little regard for the consequences then you may wish to sign up at www.fbtz.com, where all sorts of football video is available via BitTorrent and other means (I was hoping there'd be a baseball equivalent, so that I could take a firm moral stand against that,too).

Thanks for the widget idea. Since I upgraded my OS I've scarcely used the widgets for much of anything but that sounds practical enough.

I'd avoid anything involving last night's Toon match, though

Aye, thank fuck that wasn't televised stateside but having never really gotten my hopes up to begin with I can't say I was really disappointed with the result. Part and parcel of supporting this club. We've got to win the rest of the matches for even a prayer at Europe next season and there's not much faith in Roeder anymore. Hopefully they'll not rush Owen back and just let him regain his fitness so next year we'll start out strong.

Fucking shame about Leeds, though. You lot were in the Champions League semi-final only five years ago. Jesus H., what's happened to football?

Neither. Although I would rather play baseball....I'm lazy I guess.