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All shapes and sizes of fields
Exactly what constitutes a field? We all knew what a real baseball diamond
looked like but most of the time, we didn't have anything near that elegant.
Streets, sidewalks, stoops, school parks and empty lots were the places in
which we played. Fields reflected the reality of our physical space. Rules
were developed to turn our unique and very localized space into legitimate
ball parks.
Games were developed to take into account all kinds of situations. In tight
quarters, you might declare that balls hit on the fly out of the infield were
out. If it was confined by walls, a ball might only be considered in play if
it first hit one of the vertical boundaries.
Perhaps the most common situation was the lack of actual players. If there
were not enough guys for a full field, the boundaries could be shifted so that
only one side of the field was fair. You might even replace the diamond with a
triangle shaped field thereby requiring less bases and fielders. Games with
few guys and smaller fields fit more easily into the street environment and
might even become the preferred sport for awhile.
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