Paul, I don't doubt what you say, but my experience was different. I'd see the 20 somethings playing after work in Grant Park. They were all baseball jocks who were trying to out do each other. The slow pitched 16 inch softball looked like a watermelon hanging over the plate. The guys would twist up into a might wind-up and then pound that ball with all they could muster! Results were simple outfield flys to the fielders who never played too deep. No home runs, never hit over the outfielder's heads...just couldn't. Most of them never got it and continued to make outs this way. Regards, Bob S.
On Mon, Jun 8, 2009 at 6:21 PM, paul stenquist<pnstenqu...@comcast.net> wrote: > The sixteen inch balls do get soft after they've been used for a while. But > in organized leagues, a new ball is used for every game. And back in the > sixties and fifties, the game was played without mitts. A lot of teams were > stocked with body-builder types who hammered the ball with leaded bats. They > were like cannon balls. Catching one took some guts. Third basemen were all > real men:-). > > Former White Sox slugger, Dave Nicholson, was a 16-inch softball player. > It's said that he once hit one out of Comiskey Park. That's probably the > equivalent of hitting an ordinary baseball 600 feet. Of course he also hit > an ordinary baseball over the roof of Comiskey Park. It landed in the > parking lot, close to 600 feet from home plate. > Paul > On Jun 8, 2009, at 5:28 PM, Bob Sullivan wrote: > >> Bill, >> To clarify: >> Major league baseball is played with a hardball, probably a 6 inch >> circumference. >> Softball is played with a 12 inch or 16 inch ball. >> 12 inch fast pitch (underhand but still) is a wicked game and the ball is >> hard. >> As kids, the 16 inch ball got pretty soft after a couple of summers. >> Are we on the same page? >> Regards, Bob S. >> >> On Mon, Jun 8, 2009 at 10:14 AM, William Robb<war...@gmail.com> wrote: >>> >>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Paul Stenquist" >>> Subject: Re: another completely useless off topic question -Roller >>> Bat/RollerBall >>> >>> >>>> I don't know if sixteen inches is an accurate circumference measurement >>>> of the Chicago "Clincher" balls. The diameter appears to be closer to >>>> seven >>>> inches. They're pretty substantial. And hard as a rock when new. >>> >>> We call those things "softballs" here, and the smaller baseballs we call >>> "hardballs". I suspect this has nothing to do with the ball itself, and >>> more >>> to do with the way the ball is used. >>> >>> William Robb >>> >>> -- >>> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >>> PDML@pdml.net >>> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >>> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and >>> follow the directions. >>> >> >> -- >> PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List >> PDML@pdml.net >> http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net >> to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and >> follow the directions. > > > -- > PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List > PDML@pdml.net > http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net > to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and > follow the directions. > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
