Wikipedia:Today's featured article/November 12, 2004

A batter follows through after swinging at a pitched ball

Baseball is a team sport that is popular in the Americas and East Asia. In the United States, baseball has often been called the national pastime, and the total attendance for Major League games is more than that of all other American professional sports combined. In Japan, the Dominican Republic, Cuba, South Korea, and several other countries, baseball is the most popular sport by any measurement. Among American television viewers, however, it has been surpassed in popularity by American football and, in the South, car racing. Although the three most popular team sports in North America are ball games (baseball, basketball and American football), baseball's popularity was once so great that the word "ballgame" in the United States specifically refers to a game of baseball, and "ballfield" or "ballpark" to a baseball diamond. Baseball is played between two teams of nine players each on a baseball field, usually under the authority of one or more officials, called umpires. The game is played in nine innings in which each team gets one turn to and try to score runs while the other pitches and defends in the field, attempting to get three players of the batting team out. (more...)

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