Question posed by Judge Landis

[byrone]

Reading sportswriter Fred Lieb’s book “Baseball as I Have Known It”, Lieb describes this scene:

“After the last game of the 1924 Washington-New York World Series, I was alone with (Judge) Landis on a little balcony outside his room in the Raleigh Hotel in Washington. Below us in Pennsylvania Avenue snake-danced a joy-maddened crowd. Washington’s beloved Senators had just won the deciding seventh game, and Saint Walter Johnson had been the winning pitcher in the twelve-inning cliff-hanger. It was not only Washington’s first World Series victory but also its first major league pennant. Congressmen, department heads, barbers, bootblacks, janitors, office secretaries all joined in on the frivolity. They blew trumpets and beat drums. Some beat wash basins with large spoons. Anything that could make noise was being used in this joyous paean to victory.

Landis put his hand on my shoulder and looked directly in my eyes as he said ‘Freddy, what are we looking at now- could this be the highest point of what we call our national sport? Greece had its sports and its Olympics; they must have reached a zenith and then waned. The same for the sport of ancient Rome, there must have been a year at which they were at their peak. I repeat Freddy, are we at the zenith of baseball’.’”

So in 1924 a century ago Landis was questioning if baseball was at its peak.

Looking back, what is the zenith of baseball?

[Hankphenom]

3173.

[packs]

For all the wrong reasons 1998 was probably the zenith of the modern game. I can't think of another time in modern media where baseball was featured so heavily again across every medium and was so widely talked about by everyone.

[rats60]

1978 was baseball's peak. It has been in decline ever since, replaced by the NFL as our country's sport of choice.

[Brent G.]

Originally Posted by packs

For all the wrong reasons 1998 was probably the zenith of the modern game. I can't think of another time in modern media where baseball was featured so heavily again across every medium and was so widely talked about by everyone.

I don't see any way that's duplicated again, in any sport.

Might've also been the peak for forged autos -- The Chase and Michael Jordan's last championship run. The forgers were BUSY.

[mortimer brewster]

Early 1960's.

The NFL championship game of 1958 showed how exciting football could be on the medium of television. The popularity of the sport exploded.

[Hankphenom]

What other sport could sustain interest over 200+ games a year? Answer: not a one. The others are great, but the Babe said it best in his farewell: "The only real game, I think, is baseball." I have no idea what he meant by that, but hey, it's the Babe!