{"id":1156,"date":"2009-04-22T20:30:53","date_gmt":"2009-04-23T03:30:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2009\/04\/22\/living-baseball-novel-connects-fans-to-games-past\/"},"modified":"2009-04-22T20:30:53","modified_gmt":"2009-04-23T03:30:53","slug":"living-baseball-novel-connects-fans-to-games-past","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2009\/04\/22\/living-baseball-novel-connects-fans-to-games-past\/","title":{"rendered":"“Living Baseball Novel” Connects Fans to Game’s Past"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was made aware of a fantastic new web site launched by Jeff Polman, who is replaying the 1924 Major League Baseball season using Strat-O-Matic Baseball.\u00c2\u00a0 You can follow Jeff’s progress at “1924 and You Are There!!<\/a>” but before you step through this compelling time portal, I’ll let Jeff explain his concept in his own words.<\/p>\n

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1924 And You Are There!<\/a> is a new kind of Web blog. It is for lovers of pure baseball, meaning baseball without steroids, without contract news and without wet, freezing World Series games past midnight. It is also for lovers of story and character, and of the daily fun of not knowing how either will turn out. In short, it is like plunging into a living baseball novel.<\/p>\n

Back in the early 1960s, Hal Richman invented a fun, realistic baseball board game called Strat-O-Matic Baseball and has since developed his small business into a nationwide success. Bob Costas, Jon Miller, Spike Lee and Lenny Dykstra have played it.\u00c2\u00a0 With its uniquely crafted cards for every player, it gives us the ability to enter a baseball world from the past or present with the mere drop of three dice.<\/p>\n

Now, writer and longtime “Strat fanatic” Jeff Polman is replaying the entire 1924 season and reporting the events through the eyes and words of two fictional characters:<\/p>\n

VINNY SPANELLI, a 17-year-old hardcore Phillies fan who spends his every waking hour following his beloved and usually awful Phils by sneaking out of school to sneak into mid-afternoon games at Baker Bowl. Vinny supplies his daily diary of the National League season and all the adventure it comes with.<\/p>\n

CAL BUTTERWORTH, star baseball beat writer for the Detroit Free Enterprise, files game stories on Ty Cobb’s Tigers from Navin Field and wherever they travel. Cal’s a bit flowery with his prose, but is tough enough to get the best quotes from the Georgia Peach and other players, and reports on the daily events in the American League as objectively as he’s capable of.<\/p>\n

Polman enjoyed recent acclaim for his amusing replay posts on the popular Strat Fan Forum Web site, but his goal with 1924 And You Are There! is to broaden the appeal, to draw new baseball fans and readers who may or may not have ever heard of Strat O-Matic, and just want a brief, everyday escape from the sad realities of our Tough Times.<\/p>\n

No one has any idea how the story of this season will play out, but many readers are already finding it amusing, entertaining, and gloriously different. 1924 is already into the month of May and the races are heating up, so check out the daily action at:<\/p>\n

http:\/\/1924andyouarethere.blogspot.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was made aware of a fantastic new web site launched by Jeff Polman, who is replaying the 1924 Major League Baseball season using Strat-O-Matic Baseball.\u00c2\u00a0 You can follow Jeff’s progress at “1924 and You Are There!!” but before you step through this compelling time portal, I’ll let Jeff explain his concept in his own […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1156","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1156\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}