1.
Catcher
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Catcher is also a general term for a fielder who catches the ball in cricket. Catcher is a position for a baseball or softball player, when a batter takes his/her turn to hit, the catcher crouches behind home plate, in front of the umpire, and receives the ball from the pitcher. In addition to primary duty, the catcher is also called upon to master many other skills in order to field the position well. The role of the catcher is similar to that of the wicket-keeper in cricket, positioned behind home plate, the catcher can see the whole field, and is therefore in the best position to direct and lead the other players in a defensive play. The catcher typically calls for using hand signals. The calls are based on the mechanics and strengths, as well as the batters tendencies and weaknesses. Foul tips, bouncing balls in the dirt, and contact with runners during plays at the plate are all events to be handled by the catcher and this includes a mask, chest and throat protectors, shin guards, and a heavily padded catchers mitt. The physical and mental demands of being involved on every defensive play can wear catchers down over a long season, because of the strategic defensive importance of catching, if a catcher has exceptional defensive skills, teams are often willing to overlook their relative offensive weaknesses. A knowledgeable catchers ability to work with the pitcher, via selection and location. Many great defensive catchers toiled in relative anonymity, because they did not produce large offensive numbers, notable examples of light-hitting, defensive specialists were, Ray Schalk, Jim Hegan, Jim Sundberg and Brad Ausmus. Schalks career batting average of.253 is the lowest of any player in the Baseball Hall of Fame. That he was selected for enshrinement in 1955 was largely a tribute to his defensive skills. Catchers are often able to play first base and less commonly third base, in the numbering system used to record baseball plays, the catcher is assigned the number 2. In the middle of the century, the game of baseball began to evolve from a sport played by amateurs for recreation into a more serious game played by professionals. One of the most dramatic changes was the transition of the delivery from an underhand motion to an overhanded throw. As the game progressed towards professionals and became serious, pitchers began to attempt to prevent the batter from hitting the ball by throwing faster pitches. With the introduction of the strike in 1858, catchers began inching closer to home plate due to the rules requirement that a strikeout could only be completed by a catch. These developments meant that catchers began to take on a defensive role
2.
Baltimore Orioles
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The Baltimore Orioles are an American professional baseball team based in Baltimore, Maryland. The Orioles compete in Major League Baseball as a member of the American League East division, Louis, Missouri to become the St. Louis Browns. After 52 often-beleaguered years in St. Louis, the franchise was purchased in November 1953 by Baltimore business interests led by Clarence Miles, the franchise officially moved to Baltimore for the 1954 season and adopted the historic Orioles name in honor of the official state bird of Maryland. The Orioles name had also used by several previous major and minor league baseball clubs in Baltimore. Nicknames for the team include the Os and the Birds, the Orioles experienced their greatest success from 1966 to 1983, when they made six World Series appearances, winning three of them. The franchise has won a total of nine division championships, six pennants. The Orioles are also known for their successful stadium, the trend-setting Oriole Park at Camden Yards. The modern Orioles franchise can trace its roots back to the original Milwaukee Brewers of the minor Western League, the Brewers were there when the WL renamed itself the American League in 1900. At the end of the 1900 season, the American League removed itself from baseballs National Agreement, two months later, the AL declared itself a competing major league. As a result of several shifts, the Brewers were one of only two Western League teams that didnt fold, move or get kicked out of the league. In its first game in the American League, the team lost to the Detroit Tigers 14–13 after blowing a lead in the 9th inning. To this day, it is a league record for the biggest deficit overcome that late in the game. During the first American League season in 1901, they finished last with a record of 48–89 and its lone Major League season, the team played at Lloyd Street Grounds, between 16th and 18th Streets in Milwaukee. The Miles-Krieger -Hoffberger group renamed their new team the Baltimore Orioles soon after taking control of the franchise, the name has a rich history in Baltimore, having been used by a National League team in the 1890s. In 1901, Baltimore and McGraw were awarded a franchise in the growing American League. After a battle with Ban Johnson, the Head of the American League in 1902, McGraw took many of the top players including Dan McGann, Roger Bresnahan and Joe McGinnity to the New York Giants. As an affront to Johnson, McGraw kept the black and orange colors of the New York Giants, which San Francisco wears to this day. In 1903, the rest of the team was transferred to New York where they were nicknamed the Highlanders until circa 1912, as a member of the high-minor league level International League, the Orioles competed at what is now known as the AAA level from 1903 to 1953
3.
Rawlings Gold Glove Award
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Managers are not permitted to vote for their own players. Additionally, a sabermetric component provided by Society for American Baseball Research accounts for approximately 25 percent of the vote, eighteen Gold Gloves are awarded each year, one at each of the nine positions in each league. In 1957, the glove manufacturer Rawlings created the Gold Glove Award to commemorate the best fielding performance at each position. The award was created from a made from gold lamé-tanned leather. For the first four seasons of the award, individual awards were presented to left fielders, center fielders, from 1961 through 2010, the phrase at each position was no longer strictly accurate, since the prize was presented to three outfielders irrespective of their specific position. Any combination of outfielders, often three center fielders, could win the award in the same year, critics called for awarding a single Gold Glove for each individual outfield position, arguing that the three outfield positions are not equivalent defensively. Starting in 2011, separate awards for each position were once again presented. In the 1985 American League voting, a tie for third-place resulted in the presentation of Gold Glove Awards to four outfielders, the Gold Gloves are selected by managers and coaches that may have seen a player as few as six times during the season. Bill Chuck of Comcast SportsNet New England wrote that Gold Glove voters frequently counted only errors to determine winners, geoff Baker of The Seattle Times said the votes for the Gold Gloves rely largely on a players past reputation. The Associated Press wrote that fans have viewed the Gold Gloves as mostly a popularity contest. Derek Jeter, winner of five Gold Gloves, believes that many defensive factors cannot be quantified, in 2013, Rawlings collaborated on the Gold Glove Award with SABR, who provided the SABR Defensive Index to add a sabermetric component to the selection process. The index accounted for 25 percent of the vote, while managers, afterwards, Jay Jaffe of Sports Illustrated wrote that the Gold Gloves appear to have significantly closed the gap on their more statistically-driven counterparts. The most Gold Gloves ever won by one player is 18 by pitcher Greg Maddux and he won 13 consecutive awards from 1990 to 2002, all in the National League. Brooks Robinson has the most wins as a third baseman, with 16 Gold Gloves, and is tied for the second-highest total overall with pitcher Jim Kaat, Iván Rodríguez has won the most Gold Gloves as a catcher, with 13 career awards in the American League. Ozzie Smith has 13 wins at shortstop, he and Rodríguez are tied for the fourth-highest total among all winners, among outfielders, Roberto Clemente and Willie Mays, who played primarily right field and center field, respectively, are tied for the lead with 12 Gold Gloves. Keith Hernandez, the leader at first base, has won 11 times, other players with 10 or more wins include shortstop Omar Vizquel, catcher Johnny Bench, third baseman Mike Schmidt, and outfielders Ken Griffey Jr. Ichiro Suzuki, Andruw Jones, and Al Kaline. The only player to win Gold Gloves as an infielder and outfielder is Darin Erstad, the only other player to win Gold Gloves at multiple positions is Plácido Polanco, who won at second base and third base. In 2016, Rawlings announced it would begin awarding a gold glove annually to a female fastpitch softball player in the National Pro Fastpitch league, NPF coaches and managers vote for a winner
4.
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
5.
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
6.
Georgia Institute of Technology
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The Georgia Institute of Technology is a public research university in Atlanta, Georgia, in the United States. It is a part of the University System of Georgia and has campuses in Savannah, Georgia, Metz, France, Athlone, Ireland, Shenzhen, China. The educational institution was founded in 1885 as the Georgia School of Technology as part of Reconstruction plans to build an economy in the post-Civil War Southern United States. Initially, it offered only a degree in mechanical engineering, by 1901, its curriculum had expanded to include electrical, civil, and chemical engineering. In 1948, the changed its name to reflect its evolution from a trade school to a larger and more capable technical institute. Today, Georgia Tech is organized into six colleges and contains about 31 departments/units, with emphasis on science and it is well recognized for its degree programs in engineering, computing, business administration, the sciences, design, and liberal arts. Student athletics, both organized and intramural, are a part of student and alumni life, Georgia Tech fields eight mens and seven womens teams that compete in the NCAA Division I athletics and the Football Bowl Subdivision. Georgia Tech is a member of the Coastal Division in the Atlantic Coast Conference, the idea of a technology school in Georgia was introduced in 1865 during the Reconstruction period. However, because the American South of that era was mainly populated by workers and few technical developments were occurring. In 1882, the Georgia State Legislature authorized a committee, led by Harris and they were impressed by the polytechnic educational models developed at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Worcester County Free Institute of Industrial Science. On October 13,1885, Georgia Governor Henry D. McDaniel signed the bill to create, in 1887, Atlanta pioneer Richard Peters donated to the state 4 acres of the site of a failed garden suburb called Peters Park. The site was bounded on the south by North Avenue, and he then sold five adjoining acres of land to the state for US$10,000. This land was near Atlantas northern city limits at the time of its founding, the surrender of the city took place on the southwestern boundary of the modern Georgia Tech campus in 1864. The Georgia School of Technology opened in the fall of 1888 with two buildings, One building had classrooms to teach students, The second building featured a shop and had a foundry, forge, boiler room, and engine room. It was designed for students to work and produce goods to sell, on October 20,1905, U. S. President Theodore Roosevelt visited Georgia Tech. On the steps of Tech Tower, Roosevelt delivered a speech about the importance of technological education and he then shook hands with every student. Georgia Techs Evening School of Commerce began holding classes in 1912, the evening school admitted its first female student in 1917, although the state legislature did not officially authorize attendance by women until 1920. Annie T. Wise became the first female graduate in 1919 and was Georgia Techs first female faculty member the following year
7.
Spring training
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Practices andthe start of the regular season. Spring training allows new players to try out for roster and position spots, Spring training typically starts in mid-February and continues until just before Opening Day of the regular season, traditionally the first week of April. In some years, teams not scheduled to play on Opening Day will play spring training games that day, pitchers and catchers report to spring training first because pitchers benefit from a longer training period. A few days later, position players arrive and team practice begins, Spring training by major league teams in sites other than their regular season game sites first became popular in the 1890s and by 1910 was in wide use. Hot Springs, Arkansas has been called the birthplace of Spring Training baseball. The location of Hot Springs and the concept of getting the players ready for the season was the brainchild of Chicago White Stockings team President Albert Spalding. In 1886, the White Stockings traveled to Hot Springs to prepare for the upcoming season, practicing at the Hot Springs Baseball Grounds, the White Stockings had a successful season and other teams took notice and began holding spring training in Hot Springs. The Cleveland Spiders, Detroit Tigers, Pittsburgh Pirates, Cincinnati Reds, Brooklyn Dodgers, Whittington Park/Ban Johnson Park, Majestic Park and Fogel Field were all built in Hot Springs to host Major League teams. Famously, a young pitcher named Babe Ruth of the Boston Red Sox was playing a game at first base on St. Patricks Day,1918. Ruth would hit two home runs that day in Hot Springs, and the second was a 573-foot shot that landed across the street from Whittington Park in a pond of the Arkansas Alligator Farm, soon he was playing the field more often. The First Boys of Spring is a 2015 documentary about Hot Springs Spring Training, the film was narrated by area native, actor Billy Bob Thornton, and produced by filmmaker Larry Foley. The documentary began airing nationally on the MLB Network in February,2016. The Detroit Tigers are credited with being the first team to conduct spring training camp in Arizona and they trained in Phoenix at Riverside Park at Central Avenue and the Salt River in 1929. The Philadelphia Phillies were the first of the current major-league teams to train in Florida, Spring training in Florida began in earnest in 1913, when the Chicago Cubs played in Tampa, and the Cleveland Indians in Pensacola. One year later, two teams moved to Florida for spring training, the real start of the Grapefruit League. Since 2010, major league teams have been divided during spring training. All but six of the league teams have gone to spring training in Florida at one time or another. Many of the most famous players in history have called Florida home for 4–6 weeks every spring. According to the autobiography of former Cleveland Indians owner Bill Veeck, in 1947, Veeck was the owner of the minor league Milwaukee Brewers and the team trained in Ocala, Florida
8.
Home run
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In modern baseball, the feat is typically achieved by hitting the ball over the outfield fence between the foul poles without first touching the ground, resulting in an automatic home run. There is also the home run, increasingly rare in modern baseball. When a home run is scored, the batter is credited with a hit and a run scored. Likewise, the pitcher is recorded as having given up a hit, a batted ball is also a home run if it touches either foul pole or its attached screen before touching the ground, as the foul poles are by definition in fair territory. A batted ball that goes over the wall after touching the ground is not a home run. A fielder is allowed to reach over the wall to attempt to catch the ball as long as his feet are on or over the field during the attempt. If the fielder successfully catches the ball while it is in flight the batter is out, however, since the fielder is not part of the field, a ball that bounces off a fielder and over the wall without touching the ground is still a home run. A home run accomplished in any of the above manners is a home run. This stipulation is in Approved Ruling of Rule 7.10, an inside-the-park home run occurs when a batter hits the ball into play and is able to circle the bases before the fielders can put him out. Unlike with a home run, the batter-runner and all preceding runners are liable to be put out by the defensive team at any time while running the bases. This can only happen if the ball does not leave the ballfield, with outfields much less spacious and more uniformly designed than in the games early days, inside-the-park home runs are now a rarity. They are usually the result of a ball being hit by a very fast runner, either way, this sends the ball into open space in the outfield and thereby allows the batter-runner to circle the bases before the defensive team can put him out. The speed of the runner is crucial as even triples are relatively rare in most modern ballparks, all runs scored on such a play, however, still count. An example of an unexpected bounce occurred during the 2007 Major League Baseball All-Star Game at AT&T Park in San Francisco on July 10,2007, by the time the ball was relayed, Ichiro had already crossed the plate standing up. This was the first inside-the-park home run in All-Star Game history, Home runs are often characterized by the number of runners on base at the time. A home run hit with the bases empty is seldom called a one-run homer, with one runner on base, two runs are scored and thus the home run is often called a two-run homer or two-run shot. Similarly, a home runs with two runners on base is a three-run homer or three-run shot, the term four-run homer is seldom used, instead, it is nearly always called a grand slam. Hitting a grand slam is the best possible result for the turn at bat
9.
2009 Major League Baseball season
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The 2009 Major League Baseball season began on Sunday, April 5,2009 with the New York Yankees defeating the 2008 World Series champion Philadelphia Phillies 4–2. The regular season ended on October 6, extended two days for a playoff between the Detroit Tigers and the Minnesota Twins to decide the American League Central Division champion. The postseason began the day with the Division Series. This was the time the season was completed in November. The American League champion had home advantage for the World Series by virtue of winning the All-Star Game on July 14 at Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Missouri. Both teams wore replicas of their 1965 uniforms in the contest, the New York Yankees, with 103 wins, clinched Major League Baseballs best record in the 2009 season, and the #1 seed in the American League by winning the AL East. The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim won the second seed with a 97–65 record, in the AL Central, the Minnesota Twins defeated the Detroit Tigers in a one-game playoff for the division championship and the #3 seed. The Los Angeles Dodgers had the National Leagues best record, clinching the top seed in the Senior Circuit, the NL East champion Philadelphia Phillies, who were defending their 2008 title, was the #2 seed with a 93–69 record. The St. Louis Cardinals, from the NL Central, notched a 91–71 record, note, Major League Baseballs playoff format automatically seeds the Wild Card team 4th. Normally, the No.1 seed plays the No.4 seed in the Division Series. † –11 innings † –13 innings ‡ –11 innings The Seattle Mariners named Milwaukee Brewers scouting director Jack Zduriencik its new manager on October 22. Washington Nationals GM Jim Bowden resigned on March 1 amid allegations that he was skimming money from Latin American players. During the last days of the season, two teams fired their general managers, effective at the end of the season. On October 3, the Toronto Blue Jays fired J. P. Ricciardi after eight seasons, the following day, the San Diego Padres axed Kevin Towers, who had been the longest-tenured GM in Major League Baseball at 14 seasons. Gaston had previously been the Blue Jays manager from 1989 until 1997, on January 15, the owners of the 30 Major League Baseball clubs approved two rule changes governing the playing of postseason and one-game playoff games. The game is resumed when conditions permit at the location from the point of suspension. This rule change codifies the controversial interpretation of the rules made by MLB commissioner Bud Selig during Game 5 of the 2008 World Series. Coin tosses will no longer be used to determine home-field advantage for one-game tiebreakers held to determine division champions or wild card teams, instead, performance-based criteria—including head-to-head record between the tied clubs—will be used to determine home-field advantage
10.
Washington Nationals
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The Washington Nationals are a professional baseball team based in Washington, D. C. The Nationals compete in Major League Baseball as a club of the National League East division. From 2005 to 2007, the played in RFK Stadium. The Nationals are the major league franchise to be based in Washington, D. C. The original Washington Senators, who were referred to as the Nationals. They were followed by a second Washington Senators franchise in 1901, a member of the new American League. The second Senators franchise moved to Minnesota in 1961 and became the Minnesota Twins and they were replaced that season by a third Senators franchise, who eventually moved to Arlington, Texas, after the 1971 season and became the Texas Rangers. The current National League club was founded in 1969 as the Montreal Expos, part of the MLB expansion, which included the Seattle Pilots, Kansas City Royals, based in Montreal, the Expos were the first Major League team in Canada. Home games were played at Jarry Park Stadium and later in Olympic Stadium, the franchise had its highest winning percentage in the strike-shortened season of 1994, when the team had the best record in baseball. While the team struggled after moving to Washington, the Nationals have experienced moderate success in recent years, winning division titles in 2012,2014. Two of the teams first overall picks in the MLB Draft, Stephen Strasburg in 2009 and Bryce Harper in 2010, attracted new levels of attention to the team. At the time of his selection, Strasburg was called the pick in draft history. The Montreal Expos joined the National League in 1969, along with the San Diego Padres, with a majority held by Charles Bronfman. Named after the Expo 67 Worlds Fair, the Expos initial home was Jarry Park, starting in 1977, the teams home venue was Montreals Olympic Stadium, built for the 1976 Summer Olympics. Two years later, the team won a franchise-high 95 games, the team spent most of the 1980s in the middle of the NL East pack, finishing in third or fourth place in eight out of nine seasons from 1982 to 1990. Buck Rodgers was hired as manager before the 1985 season and guided the Expos to a.500 or better five times in six years, with the highlight coming in 1987. They finished third, but were just four games behind the division-winning Cardinals, Bronfman sold the team to a consortium of owners in 1991, with Claude Brochu as the managing general partner. Rodgers, at that second only to Gene Mauch in number of Expos games managed, was replaced partway through the 1991 season
11.
Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets baseball
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The Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets baseball team represents the Georgia Institute of Technology in NCAA Division I college baseball. Along with most other Georgia Tech athletic teams, the team participates in the Atlantic Coast Conference. The Yellow Jackets play their games in Russ Chandler Stadium. Baseball is a successful sport at Georgia Tech, where it is one of the premier baseball teams in the NCAA. Georgia Tech baseball is notable for its high-scoring offenses and stout defenses, before Tech had its own baseball field, it played at Brisbine Park. The teams success is guided by head coach Danny Hall, Danny Hall has coached Tech since 1994 and has posted 579 wins over that span. He has led Georgia Tech to 13 years of NCAA regional play, the baseball team, under Hall, has become an annual contender for the ACC regular season and tournament titles winning each four and three times respectively. The Yellow Jackets play their games in Russ Chandler Stadium. The NCAA Division I Baseball Tournament started in 1947, the format of the tournament has changed through the years. Jason Variteks number 33 is the number retired at Georgia Tech. List of NCAA Division I baseball programs Official website
12.
Hit (baseball)
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If a batter reaches first base because of offensive interference by a preceding runner, he is also credited with a hit. A hit for one base is called a single, for two bases a double, and for three bases a triple, a home run is also scored as a hit. Doubles, triples, and home runs are also called extra base hits, an infield hit is a hit where the ball does not leave the infield. Infield hits are uncommon by nature, and most often earned by speedy runners, a no-hitter is a game in which one of the teams prevented the other from getting a hit. Throwing a no-hitter is rare and considered an accomplishment for a pitcher or pitching staff. In most cases in the game, no-hitters are accomplished by a single pitcher who throws a complete game. A pitcher who throws a no-hitter could still allow runners to reach safely, by way of walks, errors, hit batsmen. If the pitcher allows no runners to reach base, the no-hitter is a perfect game, in 1887, Major League Baseball counted bases on balls as hits. The result was skyrocketing batting averages, including some near.500, Tip ONeill of the St. Louis Browns batted.485 that season, the experiment was abandoned the following season. There is controversy regarding how the records of 1887 should be interpreted, the number of legitimate walks and at-bats are known for all players that year, so computing averages using the same method as in other years is straightforward. In 1968, Major League Baseball formed a Special Baseball Records Committee to resolve this issues, the Committee ruled that walks in 1887 should not be counted as hits. Most current sources list ONeills 1887 average as.435, as calculated by omitting his walks and he would retain his American Association batting championship. However, the variance between methods results in differing recognition for the 1887 National League batting champion, cap Anson would be recognized, with his.421 average, if walks are included, but Sam Thompson would be the champion at.372 if they are not. The official rulebook of Major League Baseball states in Rule 10, Rule 10.05 Comment, In applying Rule 10.05, the official scorer shall always give the batter the benefit of the doubt. Runner is called out for interference with a fielder attempting to field a batted ball, unless in the scorers judgment the batter-runner would have been safe had the interference not occurred
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