Two specific problems were selected by the researcher as the basis for this study: (1) What is the extent, if any, of ressentient among the selected college baseball coaches, and to what extent is this ressentient perceived by their players? (2) Does a relationship exist between ressentient attitudes of the selected coaches and the amount of dissidence they perceive in the attitudes of their players? Before attacking these main problems, the researcher was faced with two sub-problems: (1) To obtain or devise instruments for identifying and measuring ressentient in selected college baseball coaches and their players’ perception of same. (2) To devise a method of rating the amount of dissidence exhibited by the members of a college baseball team.

This paper is an investigation into the effect of the bat support conditions on the collision between a baseball and a baseball bat. Bat performance is tested using both machines and human subjects. For the machine tests, a baseball is fired from an air-cannon at a stationary bat, where the bat is either allowed to rotate only or is completely unrestricted after impact. The initial and rebound ball speeds are measured for a range of impact locations. For the human tests, a person swings the bat and hits the ball off of a tee. The bat speed prior to impact and the ball speed after impact are measured. The results for each method of testing are compared, and the final ball speed is found to be independent of the bat support condition.

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No description available.

This dissertation is a history of the change in form and location of ballparks that explains why that change happened, when it did, and what this tells us about broader society, about hopes and fears, and about tastes and prejudices. It uses case studies of five important and trend-setting ballparks to understand what it meant to go to a major league game in the twentieth century. I examine the Polo Grounds and Yankee Stadium in the first half of the twentieth century, what I call the classic ballpark era, Dodger Stadium and the Astrodome from the 1950s through the 1980s, what I call the multi-use ballpark era, and Camden Yards in the retro-chic ballpark era—the 1990s and beyond. I treat baseball as a reflection of larger American culture that sometimes also shaped that culture. I argue that baseball games were a purportedly inclusive space that was actually exclusive and divided, but that the exclusion and division was masked by rhetoric about the game and the relative lack of explicit policies barring anyone. Instead, owners built a system that was economically and socially stratified and increasingly physically removed from lower-class and non-white city residents. Ballparks’ tiers allowed owners to give wealthier fans the option of sitting in the seats closest to home plate where they would not have to interact with poorer fans who owners pushed to the cheaper seats further from the action. That masked exclusion gave middle- and upper-class fans a space that was comfortable and safe because it was anything but truly accessible to all Americans. I also argue that owners had to change the image of the ballpark and tinker with the exclusion there as fans’ tastes and their visions of what a city should look and feel like changed. / History

The investigator had the following purposes in undertaking the present study: 1. To determine administrative practices for the conduct of Interscholastic League baseball programs. 2. To determine common practices in coaching baseball in Conference A high schools in Texas. 3. To determine the organization of baseball practice periods.

Introduit à Taïwan durant la période japonaise (1895-1945), le baseball est associé au projet colonial japonais d'assimilation au tournant des années 1920. Il est ensuite instrumentalisé par le régime nationaliste chinois qui prend possession de l'île au lendemain de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, avant de s'y réfugier en 1949, bouté hors de Chine par les forces maoïstes. Inscrit dans le programme de culture physique du Kuomintang, il devient un lieu privilégié de la mobilisation nationale pour la reconquête du continent et de la construction d'un État-nation pluriethnique. Les enfants aborigènes sont plus spécifiquement incités à participer à des compétitions de baseball scolaire où ils sont censés représenter les valeurs morales exemplaires d'une société majoritairement han. Ils résident durant toute l'année au sein de dortoirs où ils construisent prioritairement leur identité autour de leur communauté de pratique. Ce mode de vie ascétique s'impose aux joueurs professionnels qui doivent gérer le rythme effréné des saisons. Ils sont concernés par les mêmes contraintes d'exemplarité mais se heurtent à une corruption endémique qui s'inscrit au sein de leurs réseaux d'interconnaissance. Les supporters, qui construisent leur appartenance à un club au travers des valeurs qu'ils représentent, doivent composer avec les scandales récurrents qui frappent leurs vedettes. Ils les soutiennent durant le match par la mise en œuvre d'une animation bruyante et bariolée. Le baseball se trouve ainsi au centre d'enjeux locaux et nationaux. Il s'inscrit dans la globalisation comme symbole de l'existence d'une nation taïwanaise, ou chinoise. / Introduced in to Taiwan during the Japanese Period (1895-1945), baseball was associated with the Japanese colonial assimilation project at the start of the 1920s. It was subsequently exploited by the Chinese Nationalist regime which took possession of the island in the aftermath of World War II, before seeking refuge there in 1949 after being driven out of China by the Maoist forces. Incorporated into the program of physical culture of the Kuomintang, baseball has become a privileged place of national mobilization for the reconquest of the continent and the building of a multi-ethnic nation-state. Aboriginal children are particularly encouraged to participate in school baseball competitions during which they are supposed to represent the exemplary moral values of a predominantly Han society. Residing throughout the year in dormitories, their identity is constructed primarily around their community of practice. A similar ascetic lifestyle is required by professional players who must deal with the hectic pace of the seasons. Whilst affected by comparable constraints of exemplarity they also come against widespread corruption embedded within their social networks. Supporters, who construct a sense of belonging to their club based on the values they represent, have to deal with the recurring scandals affecting their stars whom they support during matches through exuberant and colourful performances. Baseball is thus at the center of local and national issues. It equally plays into debates on globalization, being a symbol of the existence of a Taiwanese, or Chinese, nation.

This study compares the U.S. National Football league (NFL) and Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB). The goal of the study is to develop recommendations for the rebuilding of NPB's popularity in terms of marketing policy practices after the efficiency of both leagues is analyzed.

In the first chapter of this dissertation, I exploit the Covid-19 pandemic and associated government restrictions as a natural experiment in order to study the resilience of businesses in the United States. I use a border-county identification strategy with data on government restrictions, employment and open small businesses, in order to assess the resilience of small businesses in the United States. In my main results, I find negative impacts of stay-at-home orders on the number of open small merchants. In particular, shutdowns of businesses accelerated 8 weeks after imposition of a stay-at-home order, suggesting that many businesses were only resilient enough to handle adverse conditions for 8 weeks. On average, a county with a stay-at-home order experienced an additional 1.51 percentage points loss in the number of open small businesses, relative to January 2020, 8 weeks later compared to a neighboring county that did not have a stay-at-home order. Firms were quicker to resort to layoffs. On average a county with an active stay at home order in a month experienced an additional 1.19 percentage point loss in employment, relative to January 2020, the following month compared to a neighbor that did not have a stay-at-home order the previous month. My results suggest that in future scenarios where governments consider enacting similar restrictions further aid is needed for businesses in order to help them stay afloat. In particular, more assistance should be delivered to businesses within two months from the enacting of the order. In the second chapter of this dissertation, I study economic spillovers in the context of theCovid-19 associated government restrictions. I use a detailed geolocation dataset to construct data on the number of visitors per-capita between neighboring counties in the early stages of the pandemic, which I use as a proxy for economic spillovers. I employ a similar border-county identification strategy as in the first chapter to identify the causal effect of stay-at-home orders on inter-county movement. Additionally, I provide evidence for an assumption used in chapter one by examining if there are reduced spillovers in county-pairs that lie in the different commute zones. I find that stay-at-home orders caused reductions in inter-county visits in both directions in a county-pair. That is, I find a decrease in travel from the county without a stay-at-home order to the county with one, as well as a decrease in the opposite direction. On average, a county that does not have stay-at-home order will receive 408 fewer weekly visitors from their neighboring county that has a stay-at-home order. I also examine the effect of stay-at-home orders on the ratio of travel between the two directions in order to find evidence of a net spillover effect between the two counties and fail to find evidence of a net spillover effect. I also find that spillover effects are indeed reduced in neighbor county-pairs where the two counties are in different commute zones. The results of this paper imply that residents in counties with stay-at-home orders decreased travel to their neighboring counties even when those counties did not issue their own orders. In future situations where policy makers need to consider similar restrictions, they should focus on acting more quickly and not be concerned if neighboring counties are not cooperative. In the third chapter of this dissertation, I test the predictions of career concerns models by studying Major League Baseball umpires. Major League Baseball games can be dramatically shaped by minor lapses in judgement from the umpires officiating the game. Due to the indefinite length a game may have, this can include having the game shaped in a way that ends it faster. I study whether evidence for the career concerns model can be found in baseball umpires. A career concerns model would suggest that older umpires, whose careers and reputations are much more established than younger ones, would be more inclined to improperly make judgements that favor the end of the game in extra innings. I use data on MLB umpires and extra-innings games from the 2010-2018 seasons to conduct my empirical analysis and use a linear probability model to isolate the impact of the umpires’ tenure on the probability they make a “bad call.” I find evidence supporting the career concerns hypothesis and that the probability that an umpire makes a bad call that shortens the length of the game and allows them to go home increases with their tenure. I show that these results are likely driven by career concerns, rather than carelessness, by showing their error rate does not increase with tenure in situations where it would not reduce their workload.