Say What? The World of Baseball Vocabulary

This fall's major league baseball season opened up a new lexicon in my brain — baseball jargon.  It all began with a recent opportunity to see the Dodgers play on their home field in Los Angeles, California.

Dodger Field, Los Angeles

When the Dodgers began playing for the National League Championship, the excitement of watching the team play on TV made me eat my words about not enjoying baseball on the screen. 

I soon discovered that although English is my native language, the baseball announcers often used words and phrases that were not communicating any meaning to me.

Baseball vocabulary

At first I would ask my husband, Wayne, to interpret, but making him pull off his headphones every few minutes to hear my questions was not a solution to my vocabulary problem.  I decided to start a list of baseball terms to investigate.

Many terms already have a meaning in the non-baseball word and have acquired the following additional definition in the world of baseball (my amateur definitions!).

Walk Batter is allowed to advance to first base after the pitcher has failed to strike him out.

Strike Pitcher delivers the ball in a defined area (strike zone), or batter swings at the ball.

Ball  Pitcher delivers the baseball to the batter outside of the strike zone.

Tag  Opposing team member touches a runner or a base to force an out.

Out  Batter or runner is not allowed to continue at play.

Retired  Batter fails to achieve a hit after three strikes.

Slide Runner tries to reach a base by diving toward it.

Triple Runner hits ball and reaches third base.

Dugout Structure that houses the players' bench

Choke up Batter holds bat further from knob end for more control.

Bull pen Location for pitchers to "warm up" (prepare to take over pitching duties)

Grand slam Batter hits a home run, allowing himself and runners on three bases to run to home base for a total of four runs.

Whew!  Those terms were hard to explain in a few words or without referring to other baseball terms. Thank goodness I'm not trying to explain the game of baseball to a Martian!  And sometimes baseball announcers use colorful and even metaphorical language to describe action on the field. Here are some phrases I heard recently, some of which required a bit of interpretation.

"the big guys delivered"

" all the way to the wall"

"dropped in the basket"

"go ahead, three-run homer into the short porch in right field in the second"

"a bloop single to center"

"intentional walk"

"maybe the batter struck out because he was feeling bee stings"

"the batter missed because the ball was upstairs"

I have only made a start in discovering baseball jargon. Needless to say, I am looking forward to watching the Dodgers play in the World Series next week.  And I'll have eyes on the scoreboard and ears tuned in for more baseball jargon, which Google informs me is unbelievably extensive.