What Baseball Means to Me by Josh Randolph

By Josh,

I know I have written in the past about what baseball means to me but I’ve come to realize that my thoughts and feelings on baseball change now from year to year.  Life changes and with the changes in life come new perspectives.

Baseball is just a game. Yet to me it is so much more.  Baseball is the memories that I have growing up spending countless weekends at softball tournaments with my dad.  It is all of the early mornings getting ready for the first game of a tournament.  It is the hours of staring at brackets to see who my team would face next.

Baseball has always been a place where I could step away from stress, struggles and whatever was going on in my life. Whether I was playing or just watching a game I can always find the joy of being at a game.

When my daughter was born in 2012 going to games meant even more because it began to become a time when I could just be with my daughter. She had no clue what was going on, and even now she still doesn’t understand the game but having her go with me is an amazing joy that is hard to describe.

Meeting players has become more exciting to me in the past couple of years. I collect autographs, but not for the reasons that many people do. I’m not trying to become rich off of getting autographs (face it most autographs I get I couldn’t sell if I tried), I don’t get autographs to brag (even though I do from time to time), but instead the real reason I get autographs is for the memories.

I can remember the trip I took to the Arizona Fall League in 2013, or the year I took the photos for a few of the baseball cards for a minor league team.  The memories I have now, and am reminded of from my autographs mean a lot to me.

I know a lot of non-baseball fans see it has been a game that takes too long, slow and at times boring.  I simply counter with these thoughts. Baseball is played during the summer and I’d rather be outside watching a game then sitting in front of a TV so who cares if the game is three hours long.  Yes the game feels slow but that is only because you never learned patience and to enjoy the moment as a child. Baseball is only boring for you because you don’t understand what is really going on.

Baseball isn’t just a game, it’s a relationship. It’s a relationship between; coaches and players, players and fans, fans with other fans, a father and his son.  Baseball may be the most social of all major sports because of the design of the game.