...Baseball America’s Past-time Author: Dane A Smith SO103 JAN 18, 2015 Baseball as we know it today began as a folk game in many civilizations throughout the world, but can be traced back most closely to England. Several alternate versions were played in Colonial America, including stoolball, cricket, and other "bat and ball" games. References to "baseball" can be traced back to 1791, but modern day baseball first came to light, according to many, when Abner Doubleday wrote the rules for the game in 1939 in Cooperstown, New York. Another version of the rules, this time written by Alexander Cartright in 1845, came about for the first official baseball team, the New York Knickerbockers. By 1857, adult baseball clubs came together and created the National Association of Base Ball Players, forming the first official Baseball League. The National League of American Baseball Players would evolve to the National League of Professional Baseball Clubs in 1875. Until the 1880s, African American, "Indian", Southern and Central Americans, played in these baseball clubs, including players Fleet and Welday Walker. However, these players would be demoted out of the Major Leagues in the 1880s, and Major League Baseball would remain a "White Only" sport until 1947 with the signing of Jackie Robinson to the...
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...complex and unusual also comes with activity of this nature, and this is the ability to forget the destitution and difficulty of everyday life and the capability to be on a level playing field with many people that believe the same way, no matter what socio-economic class they represent. One sport in particular has transcended all other games, has continually been a psychological shelter from pain and hardships of life, and also a cultural rocket breaking through the social barriers in the American society. That sport is simply the most beloved American game of all, baseball. The purpose of this essay is to critically explore a myriad of aspects of life that have been changed due to sports, all the while concentrating on baseball as the main focal point. Further, this work will continually pose the question of how it is conceivable that a single and simple sport could greatly impact a country the way baseball has the United States. At the time of the first foreign inhabitants of North America, life was more difficult than someone of the twenty-first century could have imagined. The hardships were endured by every colonist nearly twenty-four hours a day, with little to relieve their minds of the complexities of early American life. Nonetheless, there was at least one aspect of life that offered them the ability to escape the perennial cruelties of life, and that was sports. Throughout the colonies, no matter north or south,...
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...Robby Walker English 100 11/15/15 Lance Berkman Lance Berkman is my idol. In my opinion he is one of the greatest baseball players of all time. He played for the Houston Astros, Texas Rangers, St. Louis Cardinals, and New York Yankees. He has the most home runs by a switch hitter in Major League Baseball History. A switch hitter is someone who can hit from the right and left side of the plate. Berkman was well known for being a class act and a stand up gut in the Houston community. He now coaches for a baseball team in Houston, which is a branch off of my Major Kinesiology. Kinesiology is a huge, broad field you can do so many things off of this major, such as, Coach, Therapists, and teacher. Lance Berkman started his career late and that’s because he played in the Major League for 13 seasons. Now, he is in my field of study and he coaches and teaches now. Berkman played baseball at Canyon High School, Berkman then attended Rice University, where he played college baseball for the Rice Owls. He was named the 1997 National College Player of the Year. The Houston Astros selected Berkman in the first round of the 1997 MLB Draft, and he debuted in MLB for the Astros in 1999. Berkman was one of the Astros' "Killer B's" in the mid-2000s, along with Jeff Bagwell, Carlos Beltran, Craig Biggio, and Derek Bell. The Astros traded Berkman to the Yankees at the 2010 trade deadline. He spent the 2011 and 2012 seasons with the Cardinals, and the 2013 season with the Rangers...
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...a year after Jackie was born, the family moved to Pasadena, California. There Jackie grew up watching is older brother excelling in sports. His brother became a track star who won a silver medal in the 200 meter dash the 1936 Olympics. Jackie loved to play sports. In high school he ran track like his older brother and also played other sports like football, baseball, tennis, and basketball. He was the quarterback of the football and the star player on the baseball team. Jackie had a deal to racism all through high school. Most of his teammates were white. Most of the white people would cheer him on the field. He was treated second class citizen off the field. After college, Robinson went to play professional football, but his career to a quick end with the start of World War II. He was drafted into the army. Jackie met the famous boxing champion Joe Lewis at basic training and they became friends. Joe helped Robinson get accepted into officer training. Once Jackie finished his officer...
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...Compare and Contrast Christopher Smith University of Phoenix COM-170 COMPOSITION AND COMMUNICATION I January 14, 2014 Regina Vega Compare and Contrast Growing up, there are countless young boys, who have the dream of someday being a professional football or baseball player. Going outside and letting the imagination of being on the big stage and making the final pitch to win the World Series or the final Hail Mary throw to win the Super bowl. As a young kid, the dream of one day being the best and be paid to play a sport they grew up loving and playing. Although the sports of football and baseball are both very popular, there are a substantial amount of differences between them. Compared to baseball, football is the more popular sport in the country. In 2012, Super bowl XLVI had an estimated average of 111.3 million people watching as the Giants beat the Patriots. However, the World Series that year only managed to average 12.7 million viewers to watch the series between the Giants/Tigers. So looking at the two championship events in both individual sports the super bowl was clearly the more popular championship game of the two sports. Due to such a high amount of viewers, Super Bowl commercials can cost advertisers millions of dollars for a commercial spot in the Super Bowl. In last year’s super bowl XLVII, the cost for a thirty second commercial slot during the super bowl cost around 3.5 million to 4 million dollars...
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...Robinson Jackie Robinson was a kind man who got racist comments put towards him because of his race by the fans of Major League Baseball I feel like Jackie Robinson is not just a baseball hero but also I feel like he is a hero in general. Some facts about Jackie Robinson are that he had a normal life like everybody else Jackie Robinson was born in Ciaro, Georgia on January 31,1919 Not long after he was born him and his family moved to Pasadena, California Robinson had four siblings growing up. His siblings names were Edgar,Frank,Matthew,and Willa Mae Having Robinson being the youngest Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier when he became the first black athlete to play Major League Baseball in the 20th century He played his Major...
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...Performance Enhancement Drugs in Sports, the Ethical Choice In May 28, 2002, former Major League Baseball player Ken Caminiti admits to Sports Illustrated in the article “Caminiti Comes Clean” that he used steroids during his 1996 National League MVP (most valuable player) season with the San Diego Padres and he estimated that half of the players in the big leagues were also using steroids. He later died of a heart attack at age 40 where it was ruled by the New York Medical Examiner that drugs are a factor in his death. In October 5, 2007, track star Marion Jones admits to use steroids during the 2000 Olympic Games where she won three Gold Medals and two Bronze Medals. She was later sentenced to six months in prison for lying to the court and stripped off of all of her medals. Throughout history, there have been many stories of athletes using performance enhancing drugs, but none more than in the last 20 years. As technology advances in science as well as the media, more drugs has been engineer to enhance performance as well as the test to detect such drugs, as the results get to the hands of the media, the entire world would be at noticed in a manner of minutes. The fact is that performance enhancing drugs have existed since the time of the ancient Greek during the original Olympic Games from 776 BC – 393 BC. The question is why should we care? If most athletes are using it, is it a plain level field? And why is the government involved? Should the government be involved? ...
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...raised in poverty with his mother. He attended John Muir high school, and later on went to Pasadena college. During his college years, he was an excellent athlete. In fact, he was such a great player that he played four sports: football, basketball, track, and baseball. Robinson was inspired by his older brother to go into sports. His brother, Matthew Robinson, went to the olympics in Berlin, Germany. Later, Jackie continued his education at the University of California. Here, he became the university’s first student to receive varsity letters in all four sports. However, Jackie was forced to leave UCLA due to a financial issue. Because of this, he moved to Honolulu, Hawaii to play for the semi-professional Honolulu bears. His admission to the bears was cut short due to World War II, when he had to be enrolled into the army. Jackie served two years in the army but never saw combat. Also, at a...
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...The Dallas Cowboys are a professional American football team in the Eastern Division of the National Football Conference (NFC) in the National Football League (NFL). They are based in the Dallas suburb of Irving, Texas. The team currently plays their home games at Texas Stadium in Irving, but they are scheduled to move to a new stadium in nearby Arlington in 2009.[1] The Cowboys joined the NFL as a 1960 expansion team.[2] The team's national following might best be represented by its NFL record of consecutive games in front of sold out stadiums. The Cowboys' streak of 160 sold-out regular and post-season games began in 1990, and included 79 straight sellouts at their home, Texas Stadium, and 81 straight sell-outs on the road.[3] An article on Forbes Magazine's website, published September 13, 2007, lists the Cowboys as the most valuable sports team in the world, with an estimated value of approximately $1.5 billion, ahead of the Washington Redskins ($1.467 billion) and the New England Clint Murchison, Jr. and Bedford Wynne were awarded a National Football League (NFL) expansion franchise on January 28, 1960, located in Dallas, TX. At the annual meeting, they purchased the team for $600,000 (Bohls 1). They were given the status of a “swing team” meaning that they would play every other team in the league their first season of play. They were displaced in the Western Division Standings. Murchison’s and Wynne’s next moved was to high their front office personnel which were:...
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...During his high school career he was very successful in sports such as football, baseball, basketball, and tennis. He was the quarterback for his football team, and a star player for the baseball team. He constantly had to deal with racism while he was playing sports; most of his teammates were white people so he had to deal with them, and also the spectators of the sport he was participating in. Jackie Robinson decided to further his education at UCLA and he also played sports in college and was the star in the sports he played such as baseball, football, basketball, and track. Robinson was the first athlete at UCLA to ever get a varsity letter in all four sports. During Robinson’s senior year at UCLA, he met a girl named Rachel Islum, they fell in love, and eventually got married (1946) and soon had three children, Sharon, David, and Jackie Robinson...
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...I further agree that my name typed on the line below is intended to have, and shall have, the same validity as my hand written signature. Students’ signature (name(s) typed here is equivalent to a signature): Your Name Here Employee Privacy Report The Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) is a not-for-profit organization comprised of nine non-salaried members who are appointed by the Governor of Texas for staggered six year terms known as the Texas Board of Criminal Justice. The board is charged with governing the TDCJ, implementing policies which guide operations. There are different divisions of TDCJ and amongst those divisions is the Correctional Institutions Division of which I am employed and am tasked with the confinement and supervision of convicted felons. Email, use within the agency includes communicating with other employees within the agency, other agencies and departments. Email is a method of communicating and documenting the communication at the same time. Clear communication is an essential function to ensure the agency works smoothly. There are 119 units across the State of Texas housing approximately 740,905 offenders (Texas...
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...the chair across the court. The crowd could not believe their own eyes. No one had ever seen a coach react in such a rude and temperamental manner. Many people say Bobby Knight is one of the most controversial coaches in the NCAA history. Some people say that his coaching methods are cruel; some might even say abusive. However, no one can argue that he was not a successful coach and coached his teams to national titles. Bobby Knight is one of the most talented college basketball coaches to have coached in the NCAA and has led his teams to numerous championships. Before one may look at his achievements, they first must know a certain amount of background information. Bobby Knight was born on October 25, 1940 in Massillon, Ohio. He wanted to be a basketball player his entire life, which was considered odd at this time period because most boys back then wanted to be professional baseball players (Hammel 36). But Knight always had his sites on being a basketball player. High School Basketball actually started for him in eighth grade. His High School coaches name was Jack Graham. He was a very talented basketball player in high school. As soon as he started high school he was put on varsity. He was also talented in football and baseball during high school. He had been inducted to the Orrville High School Hall of Fame by the end of his high school career for basketball (Hammel 51-52). He attended college at Ohio State University. He was coached under Basketball Hall...
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...2012 A Border in a Blender The United States and Mexico have shared cultures throughout history. Soccer and cuisine are the two that stand out to me. I grew up in Lubbock, Texas where generally there isn’t much soccer played and there are not many Mexicans in general. We had one Tex-Mex restaurant, and it wasn’t even good. It wasn’t until my college writing class took a field trip to a local Mexican food trailer, that I truly experienced the fusion between Mexico and the United States through food. On the other hand, I do not have a lot of experience with Mexican food, so this topic is kind of new to me. I play baseball, so I am immediately attracted to the soccer aspect of both cultures because of the competition and how a sport can bring two nations together. Its interesting how cultural fusion can blend two different countries together as one. Mexican cuisine and soccer fuse the cultures of the United States and Mexico in ways that have made both countries into what they are today because of the increase of cultural fusion. One way cultural fusion is expressed and elaborated on through cuisine is shown in Patricia Sharpe’s article “Let’s Have Mex-Tex.” She communicates the change over the years from Tex-Mex to “Mex-Tex.” This article focuses on how the “Mex-Tex” food is increasing in Texas and allows the reader to be informed of good restaurants with such origins. On the official Texas Monthly website she states that Mexican food from the heart of Mexico is the start of “the...
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...stories. Since 1947, American history has portrayed Jackie Robinson as a hero, and he has been idolized as a role model to the African American baseball community. It is an unarguable fact that he was the first to tear down the color barriers within professional baseball. The topic of Robinson’s role in integration has long been a point of discussion amongst baseball historians. Researchers have accumulated thousands of accredited documents and interviews with friends and team mates such as short stop, Pee Wee Reese, and team owner, Branch Rickey. However, few journalists have asked why Robinson was selected and what was Branch Rickey’s motivation? While Robinson was the first Negro player to break into the ranks of professional baseball, it can be argued that he was not the first to attempt the undertaking. In actuality, Jackie possibly was not even the first player the Brooklyn Dodgers’ organization considered for the job. The Warner Brothers film, 42, The Jackie Robinson Story (2013), highlights the accomplishments of Jackie and rightfully so, as he was an amazing man. The story actually starts prior to 1947 and ends years later in 1959, three years after his retirement in 1956. Early in his career at Ohio Wesleyan University, where Branch Rickey played and coached baseball, an incident occurred with one of his young black players, Charlie Thomas, which would forever change Rickey’s life, the future of integration of major league baseball, and would have an impact...
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...History of Men’s Basketball and the influence On American Society Will have on College Sports Abstract Basketball is an organized team sport which consists of 5 players from each team competing against each other. The object of the game is to shoot a round ball into a circular basket. Basketball can be played in an organized manner or at a park or local gym for recreational purposes. Over the past 100 years the game of basketball has grown from a peach basket to highlight slam dunks. As time has passed by, the rules and the way the game is played has changed. New rules were implemented to make the game more enjoyable and create more of a competitive balance for all those who play. Players were given titles for the position they played like for example, the tallest player on the team was called the center. While the shortest player on the team or the person who dribbled the ball the best was called the point guard. The history of basketball has correlated with the history of the US during the 20th century. As the game and the country began to evolve, the game of basketball became the 2nd most played sport in the world behind soccer. Some of the major events in American history in the 20th century such as Brown vs. Board of Education impacted the growth and development of basketball in the beginning. Although, whites and blacks both played basketball, they did not play with or against each other until the 1950s on a pro level. Basketball was the only...
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