One of the unpublished books I’ve written is a baseball story. It follows my main character, a nine-year-old girl, as she spends the summer playing on an organized softball team. She’s a well-known jock at school, and sports usually come easy to her, but her initial cockiness makes her feel like she’s better than she is at this particular sport. When she gets demoted from her preferred position, she has a hard time coming to terms with it, especially when her best friend seems to be moving up in the ranks.
I’ve always wanted to write a baseball novel, and this character was the perfect vehicle for checking that box off my list. I first got to know her through my previous novel featuring her older sister who’s more like me. But getting comfortable with writing a character who is not like me has been fun and eye opening, and it allows me to be able to write about my favorite sport.
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My baseball history
Like I said, I’m not my main character. My entire organized sports experience is encompassed in one single season of softball when I was 10, and it took all season of me playing, practicing in my free time, and making some crucial plays to convince my coaches that I was a dedicated and decent player.
After that, my softball skills were relegated to pickup games in my neighborhood. This suited me better. I played mostly with younger players, so I felt more like a mentor than someone who had to prove herself, and the game was more fun because of it.
In terms of professional baseball, I didn’t really get into the MLB until college. One visit to a home game got me watching on TV each night, eventually staying up late into the night to watch the west coast games and amassing a collection of t-shirts and memorabilia of my favorite team.
These days, it’s hard to catch games on TV without an expensive subscription service. I miss it. I also sometimes wonder if I’d still remember how to catch, hit, and throw a ball if given the chance.
What helps to ease that yearning of the game is watching, reading, and writing stories about baseball. Sports are hard to capture in print especially. It helps to have a knowledge of the game, but it’s hard to balance the technical jargon and actions with the spirit and character that both fans and non-fans of baseball will appreciate. Below are examples of those who have gotten it right.
Baseball in movies
Baseball movies are a great place to start. Having a visual to back up the words shows what works in terms of telling a baseball story.
From a group of kids playing a never-ending pickup game at a sandlot in California in the 60s to angels helping an MLB team win the pennant, the story benefits from getting to see the plays and the effort put into trying to score some runs while keeping the other team from doing the same.
Baseball players don’t wear heavy equipment or face shields. Their game isn’t timed. So, you can jump ahead to the good parts without feeling like you missed anything. And you can come back from any major deficit with the right combination of skill, determination, and luck.
Movies also show how to balance the game with the characters and any other B plots that you have circulating through your story. The screenplay can easily be broken up to show how much time to devote to each element. It also shows you how to pace and layout these stories in a way that takes nothing from the main conflict or message that you’re trying to convey.
Studying the movements, focusing on specific details, and describing what’s going on in front of you can help to determine the best vocabulary, actions, and emotions to convey in a written version of these scenes. They also remind you that it’s more about stats and scores. It’s about the effort put into every play and how that affects each player, coach, and spectator, and that’s what’s really going to translate well into print.
Baseball books for inspiration
Reading and sports don’t usually go hand in hand. Readers tend to want to read about other topics, and sports kids tend to not like to read at all. This is a generalization, of course. I once attended a conference in which a local sports announcer came to talk about the fantasy novels that he had written. It played against type, but it was awesome to hear that his passion for reading and writing matched his passion for baseball.
As a kid, when I wasn’t playing at the playground or in the woods in the summertime, I was usually at the library borrowing books to read for fun. There, I discovered Matt Christopher, a middle grade author who wrote hundreds of middle grade sports books. At least one shelf in my library was dedicated to his work, primarily his baseball stories.
Christopher’s novels were short but sweet. You could read them in an hour, and they were full of action and usually a singular conflict that got resolved quickly and to the reader’s and protagonist’s satisfaction.
In school, I read stories that weren’t necessarily centered around baseball but had baseball in them. These included Finding Buck McHenry and Me, Mop, and the Moondance Kid. They didn’t get too crazy into the game. So, even non-fans could appreciate them for their main plots.
A few years ago, I got to review a picture book from author Mickey Carolan called Sky, The Deaf Home Run Hero. The story, about a deaf boy who shows off his skills on his local baseball diamond, was inspired by his father, and you can see his love for both come through in his writing. It definitely inspired me to pick up my own baseball story draft and run it through another edit.
Writing about baseball
A college professor once asked my class to write a stream-of-consciousness story. I wrote about an aging relief pitcher who was called in early in a game when the starting pitcher gave up multiple runs in the first inning. The story stayed in the pitcher’s head as he wrestled with self-doubt, straying thoughts, and analysis of every pitch he threw throughout the innings.
After reading my story to the class, the majority of the students praised it. Then, they admitted that they weren’t baseball fans and had no idea what I was talking about, but they were impressed with my knowledge of the game.
This exercise showed me that, while you’re likely writing for an audience who are fans of the game, it’s important to also write for those who aren’t. In the end, doing so will serve all readers because your writing will be clear and easy to follow.
This is especially important in fiction writing. When writing a sports article, readers will be looking for the technical stuff, including the stats, the triumphs, and the errors. Readers are expected to keep up. In fiction, there’s more ground to cover.
Even with a firm grasp on the game, it can still be difficult to depict these plays clearly and accurately. It takes a lot of charting in terms of keeping track with who is playing each position, how many outs there are, the pitch count for each batter, and the location of the ball as it’s thrown, batted, and caught.
I kept lineups listing each player and position during every game I depicted in my novel. I also tallied how many pitches had been thrown and the outcome of each pitch in the at-bats that I conveyed. Then, I made sure to work in details such as how a player looked, their mannerisms, and my main characer’s observations from her point of view.
Then, there are the activities going on in the stands. There is the weather to consider. And there are other sights, smells, and sounds that get worked into a scene. It’s chaotic, but it’s also fun, and it can get as big and crazy as you want.
Is baseball obsolete?
When I was growing up, soccer began to take over as the most popular sport to play. Now, I see local baseball diamonds turning into soccer and football fields. It has me wondering if my story is still going to be relevant to modern kids.
Will kids pass this story over for one of a more popular sport? Will it seem old-fashioned or be out of touch with them?
These doubtful thoughts creep in with every writing session, no matter what the story is about. So, my goal is to write the best story I can and hope that kids can see beyond any hangups they have with the sport and maybe even inspire them to get into it. If nothing else, I hope that they can see how much it means to me and to the characters on the page.
What are your favorite baseball/sports stories? Leave your answers in the comments below!
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