1.
American football
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The offense must advance at least ten yards in four downs, or plays, or else they turn over the football to the opposing team, if they succeed, they are given a new set of four downs. Points are primarily scored by advancing the ball into the teams end zone for a touchdown or kicking the ball through the opponents goalposts for a field goal. The team with the most points at the end of a game wins, American football evolved in the United States, originating from the sports of association football and rugby football. The first game of American football was played on November 6,1869, during the latter half of the 1870s, colleges playing association football switched to the Rugby Union code, which allowed carrying the ball. American football as a whole is the most popular sport in the United States, Professional football and college football are the most popular forms of the game, with the other major levels being high school and youth football. As of 2012, nearly 1.1 million high school athletes and 70,000 college athletes play the sport in the United States annually, almost all of them men, in the United States, American football is referred to as football. The term football was established in the rulebook for the 1876 college football season. The terms gridiron or American football are favored in English-speaking countries where other codes of football are popular, such as the United Kingdom, Ireland, New Zealand, American football evolved from the sports of association football and rugby football. What is considered to be the first American football game was played on November 6,1869 between Rutgers and Princeton, two college teams, the game was played between two teams of 25 players each and used a round ball that could not be picked up or carried. It could, however, be kicked or batted with the feet, hands, head or sides, Rutgers won the game 6 goals to 4. Collegiate play continued for years in which matches were played using the rules of the host school. Representatives of Yale, Columbia, Princeton and Rutgers met on October 19,1873 to create a set of rules for all schools to adhere to. Teams were set at 20 players each, and fields of 400 by 250 feet were specified, Harvard abstained from the conference, as they favored a rugby-style game that allowed running with the ball. An 1875 Harvard-Yale game played under rugby-style rules was observed by two impressed Princeton athletes and these players introduced the sport to Princeton, a feat the Professional Football Researchers Association compared to selling refrigerators to Eskimos. Princeton, Harvard, Yale and Columbia then agreed to play using a form of rugby union rules with a modified scoring system. These schools formed the Intercollegiate Football Association, although Yale did not join until 1879, the introduction of the snap resulted in unexpected consequences. Prior to the snap, the strategy had been to punt if a scrum resulted in bad field position, however, a group of Princeton players realized that, as the snap was uncontested, they now could hold the ball indefinitely to prevent their opponent from scoring. In 1881, both teams in a game between Yale-Princeton used this strategy to maintain their undefeated records, each team held the ball, gaining no ground, for an entire half, resulting in a 0-0 tie
2.
Baseball
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Baseball is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of nine players each, who take turns batting and fielding. A run is scored when a player advances around the bases, Players on the batting team take turns hitting against the pitcher of the fielding team, which tries to prevent runs by getting hitters out in any of several ways. A player on the team who reaches a base safely can later attempt to advance to subsequent bases during teammates turns batting. The teams switch between batting and fielding whenever the team records three outs. One turn batting for both teams, beginning with the team, constitutes an inning. A game is composed of nine innings, and the team with the number of runs at the end of the game wins. Baseball has no clock, although almost all games end in the ninth inning. Baseball evolved from older bat-and-ball games already being played in England by the mid-18th century and this game was brought by immigrants to North America, where the modern version developed. By the late 19th century, baseball was widely recognized as the sport of the United States. Baseball is now popular in North America and parts of Central and South America, the Caribbean, in the United States and Canada, professional Major League Baseball teams are divided into the National League and American League, each with three divisions, East, West, and Central. The major league champion is determined by playoffs that culminate in the World Series, the top level of play is similarly split in Japan between the Central and Pacific Leagues and in Cuba between the West League and East League. The evolution of baseball from older bat-and-ball games is difficult to trace with precision, a French manuscript from 1344 contains an illustration of clerics playing a game, possibly la soule, with similarities to baseball. Other old French games such as thèque, la balle au bâton, consensus once held that todays baseball is a North American development from the older game rounders, popular in Great Britain and Ireland. Baseball Before We Knew It, A Search for the Roots of the Game, by David Block, suggests that the game originated in England, recently uncovered historical evidence supports this position. Block argues that rounders and early baseball were actually regional variants of other. It has long believed that cricket also descended from such games. The earliest known reference to baseball is in a 1744 British publication, A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, David Block discovered that the first recorded game of Bass-Ball took place in 1749 in Surrey, and featured the Prince of Wales as a player. William Bray, an English lawyer, recorded a game of baseball on Easter Monday 1755 in Guildford and this early form of the game was apparently brought to Canada by English immigrants
3.
Jersey City, New Jersey
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Jersey City is the second-most-populous city in the U. S. state of New Jersey after Newark. It is the seat of Hudson County as well as the countys largest city. 7% from the 2010 United States Census, when the citys population was at 247,597, ranking the city the 75th-largest in the nation. Part of the New York metropolitan area, Jersey City is bounded on the east by the Hudson River and Upper New York Bay and on the west by the Hackensack River and Newark Bay. After a peak population of 316,715 measured in the 1930 Census, the land comprising what is now Jersey City was inhabited by the Lenape, a collection of tribes. After spending nine days surveying the area and meeting its inhabitants, by 1621, the Dutch West India Company was organized to manage this new territory and in June 1623, New Netherland became a Dutch province, with headquarters in New Amsterdam. Michael Reyniersz Pauw received a grant as patroon on the condition that he would establish a settlement of not fewer than fifty persons within four years. He chose the west bank of the North River and purchased the land from the Lenape and this grant is dated November 22,1630 and is the earliest known conveyance for what are now Hoboken and Jersey City. Pauw, however, was a landlord who neglected to populate the area and was obliged to sell his holdings back to the Company in 1633. That year, a house was built at Communipaw for Jan Evertsen Bout, superintendent of the colony, during Kiefts War, approximately eighty Lenapes were killed by the Dutch in a massacre at Pavonia on the night of February 25,1643. Scattered communities of farmsteads characterized the Dutch settlements at Pavonia, Communipaw, Harsimus, Paulus Hook, Hoebuck, Awiehaken, and other lands behind Kil van Kull. The first village established on what is now Bergen Square in 1660, among the oldest surviving houses in Jersey City are the Newkirk House, the Van Vorst Farmhouse, and the Van Wagenen House. During the American Revolutionary War, the area was in the hands of the British who controlled New York, in the Battle of Paulus Hook Major Light Horse Harry Lee attacked a British fortification on August 19,1779. During the 19th century, former slaves reached Jersey City on one of the four routes of the Underground Railroad that led to the city. The City of Jersey was incorporated by an act of the New Jersey Legislature on January 28,1820, from portions of Bergen Township, while the area was still a part of Bergen County. The city was reincorporated on January 23,1829, and again on February 22,1838, on February 22,1840, it became part of the newly created Hudson County. Soon after the Civil War, the idea arose of uniting all of the towns of Hudson County east of the Hackensack River into one municipality. A bill was approved by the legislature on April 2,1869. An element of the bill provide that only contiguous towns could be consolidated, while a majority of the voters across the county approved the merger, the only municipalities that had approved the consolidation plan and that adjoined Jersey City were Hudson City and Bergen City
4.
Ormond Beach, Florida
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Ormond Beach is a city in Volusia County, Florida, United States. The population was 38,137 at the 2010 census, Ormond Beach is the northern neighbor of Daytona Beach and is home to Tomoka State Park. Ormond Beach was once within the domain of the Timucuan Indians, Ormond Beach was frequented by Timacuan Indians, but never truly inhabited until 1643 when Quakers blown off course to the New England area ran ashore. They settled in an encampment along the Atlantic shore. Early relations with neighboring tribes were fruitful, however, in 1704 a local Timacuan chief, Oseanoha, in 1708 Spaniards inhabited the area and laid claim until British control began. The city is named for James Ormond I, an Anglo-Irish-Scottish sea captain commissioned by King Ferdinand VII of Spain to bring Franciscan settlers to this part of Florida. Ormond had served Britain and Spain in the Napoleonic Wars as a ship captain, Ormond later worked for the Scottish Indian trade company of Panton, Leslie & Company, and his armed brig was called the Somerset. After returning to Spanish control, in 1821, Florida was acquired from Spain by the United States, in 1875, the city was founded as New Britain by inhabitants from New Britain, Connecticut, but would be incorporated in 1880 as Ormond for its early plantation owner. With its hard, white beach, Ormond became popular for the wealthy seeking relief from northern winters during the Floridian boom in tourism following the Civil War. The St. Johns & Halifax Railroad arrived in 1886, John Anderson and James Downing Price opened the Ormond Hotel on January 1,1888. Henry Flagler bought the hotel in 1890 and expanded it to accommodate 600 guests and it would be one in a series of Gilded Age hotels catering to passengers aboard his Florida East Coast Railway, which had purchased the St. Johns & Halifax Railroad. Once a well-known landmark which was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1980, one of Flaglers guests at the Ormond Hotel was his former business partner at the Standard Oil Company, John D. Rockefeller. He arrived in 1914 and after four seasons at the hotel bought an estate called The Casements, sold by his heirs in 1939, it was purchased by the city in 1973 and now serves as a cultural center. It is the communitys best-known historical structure, beginning in 1902, some of the first automobile races were held on the compacted sand from Ormond south to Daytona Beach. Pioneers in the industry, including Ransom Olds and Alexander Winton, the American Automobile Association brought timing equipment in 1903 and the area acquired the nickname The Birthplace of Speed. In 1907 Glenn Curtiss set an world record of 136.36 miles per hour. Lee Bible, in the record-breaking, but fatal, White Triplex, was less fortunate, driving on the beach is still permitted on some stretches. The city was renamed Ormond Beach in 1949, the city held the annual car event, Simply Clean 5, on November 16,2013 showing off 350+ cars
5.
History of the Boston Braves
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The Atlanta Braves, a current Major League Baseball franchise, originated in Boston, Massachusetts. This article details the history of the Boston Braves, from 1871 to 1952, the Boston Franchise played at South End Grounds from 1871 to 1914 and at Braves Field from 1915 to 1952. Braves Field is now Nickerson Field of Boston University, the franchise, from Boston to Milwaukee to Atlanta, is the oldest continuous professional baseball franchise. The Cincinnati Red Stockings, established in 1869 as the first openly all-professional baseball team, the original Boston Red Stockings team and its successors can lay claim to being the oldest continuously playing team in American professional sports. Two young players hired away from the Forest City club of Rockford, Illinois, turned out to be the biggest stars during the NAPBBP years, pitcher Al Spalding and second baseman Ross Barnes. Led by the Wright brothers, Barnes, and Spalding, the Red Stockings dominated the National Association, the team became one of the National Leagues charter franchises in 1876, sometimes called the Red Caps. Boston came to be called the Beaneaters by sportswriters in 1883, although somewhat stripped of talent in the National Leagues inaugural year, Boston bounced back to win the 1877 and 1878 pennants. The Red Caps/Beaneaters were one of the dominant teams during the 19th century. For most of time, their manager was Frank Selee. The 1898 team finished 102-47, a record for wins that would stand for almost a century. The team was decimated when the American Leagues new Boston entry set up shop in 1901, many of the Beaneaters stars jumped to the new team, which offered contracts that the Beaneaters owners didnt even bother to match. They only managed one winning season from 1900 to 1913, in 1907, the Beaneaters eliminated the last bit of red from their stockings because their manager thought the red dye could cause wounds to become infected. The American League clubs owner, Charles Taylor, wasted time in changing his teams name to the Red Sox in place of the generic Americans. The all-white outfits gave rise to the sobriquet Doves in 1907, however, clever monikers did nothing to change the National League clubs luck. The team adopted a name, the Braves, for the first time in 1912. Their owner, James Gaffney, was a member of New York Citys political machine, Tammany Hall, two years later, the Braves put together one of the most memorable seasons in baseball history. After a dismal 4-18 start, the Braves seemed to be on pace for a last place finish, on July 4,1914, the Braves lost both games of a doubleheader to the Brooklyn Dodgers. The consecutive losses put their record at 26-40 and the Braves were in last place,15 games behind the league-leading New York Giants, who had won the previous three league pennants
6.
Halfback (American football)
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A halfback is an offensive position in American football, whose duties involve lining up in the backfield and carrying the ball on most rushing plays, i. e. a running back. The halfback position is one of the more glamorous positions on the field, sometimes the halfback can catch the ball from the backfield on short passing plays as he is an eligible receiver. Occasionally, they line up as wide receivers. When not running or catching the ball, the responsibility of a halfback is to aid the offensive linemen in blocking. Before the emergence of the T-formation in the 1940s, all members of the backfield were legitimate threats to run or pass the ball. Most teams used four offensive backs on every play, a quarterback, the quarterback began each play a quarter of the way back, the halfbacks began each play side by side and halfway back, and the fullback began each play the farthest back. Historically, from the 1870s through the 1950s, the position was both an offensive and defensive position. There has also been a shift in most offense’s dependence on halfbacks, however, the average output of the halfback has not changed. Older systems require the halfback be proficient at throwing the ball downfield as well, many of the “scat backs” in the modern era produce more total yards and touchdowns than their ancestor “power backs” by breaking off big plays on outside runs and receptions. The spread offense and the hurry-up offense change the halfback’s role, the spread, the hurry-up, and the pro-style offenses dominate American football but the “smash-mouth” style of play is far from extinct. A power-running scheme is often utilized to counter an effective Spread attack, as it allows a team to control the clock and this strategy is utilized in NFL, college, and all other forms of American football. The need for “power backs is very prevalent, alongside the need for “scat backs”, in the past few decades the role of the halfback has gone through a great shift as most offensive game plans are now fueled by creativity and finesse instead of raw force. Stamina and durability is more important than ever in the hurry-up offense, on the other hand, speed is often valued over strength, and pass-catching ability is sometimes valued over blocking proficiency. Power was once the most desired trait in a halfback, but has been taken by the need for a diverse skill set. In the last few decades the running back’s individual share of output has declined as quarterbacks are generally treated as the cornerstone of the offense. The demands of an up-tempo offense also favor a multiple running back system, from the dawn of American football through the 1880s most offensive schemes focused on the running game. In a running based game plan the halfback was typically the cornerstone of the offense and this system focused on a physical run attack concentrated in the inside of the field, and therefore depended on a skilled “power back”. There were no forward passes, and pure speed took a backseat to tackle-breaking and bucking ability, there was a focus on physicality over finesse, as this type of playing style earned the moniker of “smash mouth” football
7.
Bowdoin College
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Bowdoin College is a private liberal arts college located in Brunswick, Maine. At the time Bowdoin was chartered in 1794, Maine was still a part of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the college currently enrolls 1,839 students, and has a student–faculty ratio of 9,1. Bowdoin offers 33 majors and four additional minors, and offers joint engineering programs with Columbia University, Dartmouth College, the college was a Founding Member of its athletic conference, the New England Small College Athletic Conference and the Colby-Bates-Bowdoin Consortium. Bowdoin has over 30 varsity teams and the mascot was selected as a Polar Bear in 1913 to honor a Bowdoin alumnus who led the first successful expedition to the north pole. For 2017 the college has been ranked as sixth-best liberal arts college in the U. S. by U. S. News & World Report, Bowdoin College was chartered in 1794 by the Massachusetts State Legislature and was later redirected under the jurisdiction of the Maine Legislature. It was named for former Massachusetts governor James Bowdoin, whose son James Bowdoin III was an early benefactor, at the time of its founding, it was the easternmost college in the United States, as it was located in Maine. The college also graduated two literary philosophers, the writers Nathaniel Hawthorne and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, both of whom graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1825, franklin and Hawthorne began an official militia company called the Bowdoin Cadets. From its founding, Bowdoin was known to educate the sons of the politically elite, fessenden and Hugh McCulloch both served as Secretary of the Treasury during the Lincoln Administration. However, the involvement in the Civil War was mixed as Bowdoin had many ties to slave labor. The Jefferson Davis Award was given to a student who excelled in legal studies after a donation was given to the college by the United Daughters of the Confederacy, President Ulysses S. Grant, too, was given an honorary degree from the college in 1865. Another alumnus in the sciences is the controversial entomologist-turned-sexologist Alfred Kinsey, the college went on to educate and eventually graduate Arctic explorers Robert E. Peary, class of 1877, and Donald B. Bowdoin began competing in the Colby-Bates-Bowdoin Consortium, with Bates and Colby in 1970, the consortium became an athletic rivalry, and academic exchange program. The three schools produce numerous contentions in athletics, most notably a football game and the Chase Regatta. In 2001, Barry Mills, class of 1972, was appointed as the fifth president of the college. President Mills stated, Some see a calling in such vital, as an institution devoted to the common good, Bowdoin must consider the fairness of such a result. In February 2009, following a $10 million donation by Subway Sandwiches co-founder and alumnus Peter Buck, class of 1952, the college completed a $250-million capital campaign. Additionally, the college has recently completed major construction projects on the campus, including a renovation of the colleges art museum. She insisted that distribution requirements would ensure students a more well-rounded education in a diversity of fields, current requirements require one course each in, Natural Sciences, Quantitative Reasoning, Visual and Performing Arts, International Perspectives and Exploring Social Differences
8.
Pittsburgh Panthers football
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The Pittsburgh Panthers football is the intercollegiate football team of the University of Pittsburgh, often referred to as Pitt, located in Pittsburgh. As of the 2013 season, Pitt competes as a member of the Atlantic Coast Conference, Pitt has claimed nine national championships and is among the top 20 college football programs in terms of all-time wins. The Panthers are currently coached by Pat Narduzzi, a 130-pound WUP student, Bert Smyers, along with senior student John Scott, assembled a football team that year composed of only three players who had previously witnessed the sport. The team played in one game, a loss against Shady Side Academy, in which Smyers made himself quarterback. In Smyers case, his uniform was pieced together by his mother and sister, the first official game for the university was played on October 11,1890, when the Allegheny Athletic Associations opponent, Shadyside Academy, failed to appear for its game at Exposition Park. Allegheny A. A. called Smyers who brought the WUP team as a replacement, in an inglorious start to Pitt football history, WUP was defeated 38–0. Smyers team next faced Washington and Jefferson College, losing 32–0, the following season saw the university collect more losses en route to a 2–5 record. Smyers suffered a nose in a 40–6 loss to Washington and Jefferson. Perhaps the most important development for the season of football was Smyers recruitment of Joseph Trees from Normal University of Pennsylvania. The 210 pound Trees became WUPs first subsidized athlete and, later in life, made millions in the oil industry and became an important benefactor for the university and athletic department. Today, Trees Hall, a facility on the University of Pittsburghs main campus in the Oakland section of Pittsburgh. The first winning record for the university came in the season of competition in 1892. The following season in 1893, the team had its first official coach, Anson F. Harrold, who led the team to an unremarkable 1–4 record. However, during that season the first contest was played in what would become a 96-game series versus Penn State, in 1895, the school suffered a 1–6 season under coach J. P. Linn. The 1895 season was notable for the first Backyard Brawl on October 26,1895, with WUP losing to West Virginia 8–0 in Wheeling, the university did not see another winning season until Fred Robinson led WUP to a 5–2–1 record in 1898. In 1899, Robinson continued his success with a 3–1–1 record and this was followed by two more consecutive winning seasons, including a record seven-win season in 1901 under coach Wilbur Hockensmith. That season, Hockensmith led the school to its first victory over West Virginia, in the early years of the 20th century, interest in college football grew both in Pittsburgh and throughout the nation. In 1903, Arthur St. Leger Texas Mosse was hired away from the University of Kansas, other players were recruited from surrounding Western Pennsylvania colleges, including star half back Joseph H. Thompson
9.
Tufts University
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Tufts University is a private research university incorporated in the municipality of Medford, Massachusetts, United States. Tufts College was founded in 1852 by Christian Universalists who worked for years to open a nonsectarian institution of higher learning, Charles Tufts donated the land for the campus on Walnut Hill, the highest point in Medford, saying that he wanted to set a light on the hill. The name was changed to Tufts University in 1954, although the name remains the Trustees of Tufts College. For more than a century, Tufts was a small New England liberal arts college, the university is organized into ten schools, including two undergraduate degree programs and eight graduate divisions, on four campuses in the Boston metropolitan area and the French Alps. The university emphasizes active citizenship and public service in all of its disciplines and is known for its internationalism, among its schools is the United States oldest graduate school of international relations, the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. The School of the Museum of Fine Arts offers art programs affiliated with a major museum, the university maintains a campus in Downtown Boston which houses the medical, dental, and nutrition schools, affiliated with several medical centers in the area. Some of its programs have affiliations with the institutions of Harvard University. Tufts is a member of and athletically competes in the New England Small College Athletic Conference. Tufts accepted 14% of undergraduate applicants to the Class of 2020 from a pool of 20,223 and it is consistently ranked by U. S. News & World Report and Forbes as one of the top schools in the United States. In the 1840s, the Universalist Church wanted to open a college in New England and his 20-acre donation is still at the heart of Tufts now 150 acre campus, straddling Somerville and Medford. During his tenure, Ballou spent a year travelling and studying in the United Kingdom, the methods of instruction which he initiated were based on the tutorials that were conducted in the University of Oxford and the University of Edinburgh. Now more than 160 years old, Tufts is the third oldest college in the Boston area and that building now bears Ballous name. The campus opened in August 1854, President Ballou died in 1861 and was succeeded by Alonzo Ames Miner. Though not a graduate, his presidency was marked by several advances. These include the establishment of schools for Tufts which include Goddard Seminary, Westbrook Seminary. During the Civil War the college supported the Union cause. The mansion of Major George L. Stearns which stood on part of the campus was a station on the Underground Railroad, in addition to having the largest classes spring up,63 graduates served in the Union army. The first course of a program leading to a degree in civil engineering was established in 1865
10.
Major League Baseball
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Major League Baseball is a professional baseball organization, the oldest of the four major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada. A total of 30 teams now play in the National League and American League, the NL and AL operated as separate legal entities from 1876 and 1901 respectively. After cooperating but remaining legally separate entities since 1903, the merged into a single organization led by the Commissioner of Baseball in 2000. The organization also oversees Minor League Baseball, which comprises about 240 teams affiliated with the Major League clubs, with the World Baseball Softball Confederation, MLB manages the international World Baseball Classic tournament. Baseballs first professional team was founded in Cincinnati in 1869,30 years after Abner Doubleday supposedly invented the game of baseball, the first few decades of professional baseball were characterized by rivalries between leagues and by players who often jumped from one team or league to another. The period before 1920 in baseball was known as the dead-ball era, Baseball survived a conspiracy to fix the 1919 World Series, which came to be known as the Black Sox Scandal. The sport rose in popularity in the 1920s, and survived potential downturns during the Great Depression, shortly after the war, baseballs color barrier was broken by Jackie Robinson. The 1950s and 1960s were a time of expansion for the AL and NL, then new stadiums, Home runs dominated the game during the 1990s, and media reports began to discuss the use of anabolic steroids among Major League players in the mid-2000s. In 2006, an investigation produced the Mitchell Report, which implicated many players in the use of performance-enhancing substances, today, MLB is composed of thirty teams, twenty-nine in the United States and one in Canada. Baseball broadcasts are aired on television, radio, and the Internet throughout North America, MLB has the highest season attendance of any sports league in the world with more than 73 million spectators in 2015. MLB is governed by the Major League Baseball Constitution and this document has undergone several incarnations since 1875, with the most recent revisions being made in 2012. Under the direction of the Commissioner of Baseball, MLB hires and maintains the sports umpiring crews, and negotiates marketing, labor, MLB maintains a unique, controlling relationship over the sport, including most aspects of Minor League Baseball. This ruling has been weakened only slightly in subsequent years, the weakened ruling granted more stability to the owners of teams and has resulted in values increasing at double-digit rates. There were several challenges to MLBs primacy in the sport between the 1870s and the Federal League in 1916, the last attempt at a new league was the aborted Continental League in 1960. The chief executive of MLB is the commissioner, Rob Manfred, the chief operating officer is Tony Petitti. There are five other executives, president, chief officer, chief legal officer, chief financial officer. The multimedia branch of MLB, which is based in Manhattan, is MLB Advanced Media and this branch oversees MLB. com and each of the 30 teams websites. Its charter states that MLB Advanced Media holds editorial independence from the league, MLB Productions is a similarly structured wing of the league, focusing on video and traditional broadcast media
