Finnish Baseball

lornamarie · Post by **lornamarie** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 12:56 pm

Hei, I have just spent a lovely week in Finland and my friend took me to see a Finnish baseball game (pesäpallo). It was fantastic. I went to a match betwwen Hyvinkää and Juensuu (sorry if spellings wrong). It took a little while to get the hang of, but i really enjoyed seeing the match. Sadly the team I needed to support (Hyvinkää) lost (my friend's team), but I enjoyed watching the game. People were suprised to see an english person there.

**Sponsor:**

sammy · Post by **sammy** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 1:31 pm

Anyone interested in pesäpallo (and how it's different from baseball) can find some info on the rules here:

http://www.pesis.fi/tuomaritoiminta/pes ... lisaannot/

(Maybe only in Finnish?)

Anyway, let me take this opportunity to tell the world that personally I dislike pesäpallo almost more than anything. A born southpaw, I was never any good at it at school & used to positively hate those sports lessons when it was obligatory pesäpallo time. If ever I will be punished for my sins and rewarded for my good deeds and thoughts, the perfect and most logistically economical way to do these two things unto me simultaneously is to make me spend my afterlife in the Elysian fields... playing pesäpallo.

Sorry, just an old school trauma erupting

159753 · Post by **159753** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 6:17 pm

Info on pesäpallo in english:
http://www.pesis.fi/nuorisopesis/intern ... n_english/

en français:
http://www.publiscan.fi/sp02f-8.htm

auf deutsche Speche aus dem deutscher Pesäpallo Liga Deutschland:
http://www.pesis.de/

sinikala · Post by **sinikala** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 6:44 pm

159753 wrote:Info on pesäpallo in english:
http://www.pesis.fi/nuorisopesis/intern ... n_english/

pesis.fi wrote:Introduction to the game - Pesäpallo is the national game of Finland.

Hmm, what about ice hockey?

I'm quite neutral to both sports, that is I find them equally dull. But, I'm given to believe that pesis is something of a red-neck sport, possibly true?

Hank W. · Post by **Hank W.** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 6:56 pm

Well, lets say "mainly played outside ring III"...

sinikala · Post by **sinikala** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 7:05 pm

Hank W. wrote:Well, lets say "mainly played outside ring III"...

10/10 for diplomacy

Outside Ring III? There be dragons!

sammy · Post by **sammy** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 8:05 pm

sinikala wrote:Outside Ring III? There be dragons!

Given the choice between pesäpallo and dragons, it's asbestos suits for me any day!

lornamarie · Post by **lornamarie** » Thu Jun 08, 2006 9:59 pm

159753 wrote:Info on pesäpallo in english:
http://www.pesis.fi/nuorisopesis/intern ... n_english/

en français:
http://www.publiscan.fi/sp02f-8.htm

auf deutsche Speche aus dem deutscher Pesäpallo Liga Deutschland:
http://www.pesis.de/

Hi, thanks for the links=)

Ravvy · Post by **Ravvy** » Fri Jun 09, 2006 12:08 am

lornamarie wrote:my friend took me to see a Finnish baseball game (pesäpallo). It was fantastic. I went to a match betwwen Hyvinkää and Juensuu

Aha, I have been wondering about this. So Joensuu has a team! Being a long-time USA baseball fan, I would like to see what this game of pesäpallo looks like. Can anybody provide me with a link to team schedules and locations?

polamook · Post by **polamook** » Fri Jun 09, 2006 2:15 am

I suspect many Finns share your traumatic experiences, sammy. I'd like to think I have a fair amount of native talent for ball games, but I was always crap at pesäpallo.

Also, it's quite tedious. Too much standing around with your gloves sticking out of your back pocket.

Mattlill2000 · Post by **Mattlill2000** » Fri Jun 09, 2006 6:38 am

I heard that pesapallo was invented by a Finn after he took a trip to the States and saw a baseball game totally hammered. Then upon returning to Finland he tried to explain the game he saw and pesapalllo was invented!

sammy · Post by **sammy** » Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:22 am

polamook wrote:I suspect many Finns share your traumatic experiences, sammy. I'd like to think I have a fair amount of native talent for ball games, but I was always crap at pesäpallo.

Also, it's quite tedious. Too much standing around with your gloves sticking out of your back pocket.

Yeah, could be

However I don't mean to say it is a silly sport as such, and I believe it can be quite exiting (and fast) if you're really into it. But personally I never got the message

Wasn't it Tahko Pihkala who "invented" baseball? The same guy, who (according to a Kiwi web site on sauna history - http://www.sauna.co.nz/saunashistory.htm) had this another great idea...

"Tahko Pihkala had the audacity to dream as early as 1912 that the day Helsinki is granted the Olympic Games will also be the day that sauna bathing has come into its own as a competitive endurance sport."

Hank W. · Post by **Hank W.** » Fri Jun 09, 2006 9:53 am

Well, the "idea" of baseball it could be used as clandestine military training. Throwing a grenade and running short spurts.... in the world back then... Also the size of the Finnish pesäpallo field and tha lack of a mound can be explained that the sports fields of that time were designed for maybe football, so you don't want to put up a sport you need a special field for, just get some chalk lines...

enk · Post by **enk** » Fri Jun 09, 2006 10:33 am

From the viewpoint of someone who played a heck of a lot of baseball
and softball, there are two majorly annoying things about Finnish baseball
(doesn't stop me from playing though

): no such thing as a homerun
by whacking the sucker out of the park and you have to run in the wrong
direction once you hit the ball!

BTW, there is a league for women who want to play called
Lady-Pesis. No experience required, but it does require the following:

1. Older than 18.
2. A good attitude and a desire to play

According to that web page, they also seem to have "Mister Pesis" for
men and Pari-Pesis (which I don't want to know what this is).

If you work in Finland, ask around at your workplace to see if they
have a team or if they go out and hit the ball for the heck of it
once in a while.

-enk

lornamarie · Post by **lornamarie** » Fri Jun 09, 2006 8:44 pm

Ravvy wrote:
lornamarie wrote:my friend took me to see a Finnish baseball game (pesäpallo). It was fantastic. I went to a match betwwen Hyvinkää and Juensuu
Aha, I have been wondering about this. So Joensuu has a team! Being a long-time USA baseball fan, I would like to see what this game of pesäpallo looks like. Can anybody provide me with a link to team schedules and locations?

Yeah they do and they won, to the horror of my friend, she supported Hyvinkää. I found the directions they run strange I thought it be like USA baseball or English Rounders, so wondered why they were heading! I was never any good at these type of sports at school. I enjoyed the match though especially once I started to understand it more. At first I was a bit lost.

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