Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Dugout Locations

Growing up, I thought that the first base dugout was the home dugout. Automatically. At some point early on I noticed that the Tigers had the third base dugout at home. And the Blue Jays. I thought they were anomalies. Then I got the 1987 American League Red Book and saw all the other teams listed with this bizzaro home dugout. And this story really stalls until last night, when I decided to look up the current dugout configurations, or at least the ones I didn't know off the top of my head.

1st base side: Red Sox, Yankees, Mets, Braves, Mariners, Nats, Orioles, Padres, Phillies, Rays, Rockies, Astros*, Brewers*, Cards*, Marlins*, Rangers*, Reds*, Royals*.

3rd base, or inferior, side: Angels, Athletics, Jays, Cubs, D'backs, Dodgers, Indians, Pirates, Tigers, Twins, White Sox, Giants*.

It's weird, after I filled in 22 teams (the ones I either knew or found on their web site), it was 11 to 11. Then I had to find the others through pictures, and seven of the remaining eight were first base, giving our side an 18-12 victory. Those eight are the starred ones, so don't quote me on their accuracy, but they're probably right.

So the AL is split, 7-7. The NL is 11-5 in favor of first base. I have no idea why teams choose first or third. I know my high school coach liked the third base side. He was vehement about claiming that third base dugout when we'd arrive at a field. We quickly figured out it was because he also acted as third base coach since he had no assistants, and he didn't want to drag his lazy ass across the field every inning.

Comments:
Unless there is a dugout preference due to sun angle or prevailing wind, I always thought the default would be the 1st base dugout as your players can see each pitcher's move to first base more easily.

Of course, I noticed that LSU used the 3rd base dugout at their stadium and FINALLY noticed that they built it about 20 feet closer to home plate than the 1st base dugout was.

I guess the reasons run the gamut.
 
Well it's not like these thoughts are weird or anything.

My dad tells me from time to time that when he grew up in northern Maine and spent weekends at his grandmother's house they only got one channel. Channel 6. CBC. Hockey Night in Canada. So he'd watch hockey games.

When a player scores a goal almost every time they show that player after he scores, he's sitting down on the bench. Well my dad never noticed that he was sitting on the bench, so for the longest time he thought if you score a goal you have to go to the penalty box.
 
I definitely have things like that, where I assumed something was one way as a kid but turned out to be wayyy off.

I'll have to make a list, the only one I can come up with right now is how I thought the phrase "next door" was "next store." It's almost like I heard the phrase, and then in my mind made it make sense: "Okay, it's as if each house represents a 'store,' so the next house over is called the 'next store'." Store made sense because a store is a building--I'd never think people were saying "door" to describe an entire house!
 
I had a hard time reading the word, "cupboard" because it was always pronounced cub-bird. So I'd read something that talks about a cupboard and I'd think what the eff?
 

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