Baseball

- Season 1

(1994)

In New York City, in the 1840s, people need a diversion from the "railroad pace" at which they work and live. They find it in a game of questionable origins.

In 1894, a sportwriter named Byron Bancroft "Ban" Johnson takes over a struggling minor league - the Western League - and turns it into a financial success.

Before and after World War I, a steady stream of immigrants lands on the shores of America. They want instantly to become American. To pursue the American dream. To play the American game.

The 1920s begin with America trying to recover from World War I and baseball trying to recover from the scandal of the 1919 World Series.

In the period 1930-40, the Depression had a major impact on the game of baseball. Many teams were nearing bankruptcy with attendance dwindling and fan interest at its lowest ebb. The owners introduced many innovations in an attempt to revive interest and attendance including the All Star game. Night games were introduced in 1935 and the Hall of Fame opened in Cooperstown in 1939 on the mythical 100th anniversary of creation of the game. The sport still provided its heroes however. Babe Ruth was larger than life and in 1930 signed an $80,000 a year contract; his ...

In Europe, in the Pacific, on the homefront, both African-Americans and whites fight to make the world safe for democracy. When the world ends, Major League Baseball becomes, in fact, what it has always claimed to be: the national pastime.

Americans are on the move. Moving to the suburbs. Moving across the country. They are, it seems, restless. Of course, if you're a baseball fan in New York, you don't want to move. You're in baseball heaven.

The 1960s are a turbulent decade for America. There are race riots, anti-war protests, hippies, Woodstock. It is also a turbulent decade for baseball, as one by one its "sacred" institutions fall.

America and the world are seeing more changes than at any time in history. And so is baseball.

This latest entry covers the period from the early 1990's onward. Labor relations deteriorated badly in the early part of that decade leading to the players strike in August 1994. The Montreal Expos were the best team in baseball at the time but when a Federal judge blocked the owners from unilaterally imposing a contract (which would have let them use replacement players) it quickly came to an end and the players returned to work under the old contract. Attendance dropped after that but the game recovered quickly with the heroics of Cal Ripkin Jr. By the end of 1990'...

As the new millenium dawns, Baseball is more popular and profitable than ever, but suspicions and revelations about performance enhancing drugs keep surfacing, calling the integrity of the game itself into question.