Baseball and Horse Races

I know this sounds absurd, but recently we’ve gone to both an Angel game and to Del Mar to watch the horse races, and I’ve found they are surprisingly similar!

First of all, there is a lot of running involved; the ball players run around the bases and the people run to make their bets. Oh…the horses run too, usually in an oval, while ball players run in diamonds.

Each participant wears a specific numeral on their back by which their position is tracked.  There can be as few as five horses and as many as twenty in a race, but only nine players on each baseball team. The baseball uniforms are mostly white but can be changed according to location of the game. The horse colors

are always assigned the same numerals: one is red, two is white, three is blue, and so on. The names of horses can be unusual such as “Our Coco Beans” or “Tick Me Off,” while baseball players only sport names like Satchel, Cookie,

Pee Wee, and Duke.

The goal of each activity is to score by crossing over a predetermined spot in the dirt, and both can be very exciting for the observer especially if your choice of mammal has crossed the spot in the dirt first.

Some differences are that the horses want to pass each other, but the ball players must NEVER pass each other while running around. The horses might get hit by a stick to encourage them to run, but in baseball, the stick or bat is only used to hit the ball and must not come into contact with the player.

Money is involved in some way; tickets must be purchased to watch the action, and in horse racing, betting and winning money isn’t a secret.

No matter which sport one attends, the cost of food is outrageous, there are loud, sometimes obnoxious people in the stands, but a day in either park provides a lot of fun!