OOTP Developments Forums - View Single Post - In the Shadows of Olympus: The Modern Invention of Baseball

Bryan Swartz · 06-10-2009, 01:42 PM

INTRODUCTION

I've always enjoyed alternative history. For those who know of it, I'm particularly a fan of the work of Harry Turtledove, espescially The Guns of the South. A lot of dynasties and stories here revolve around changing history, whether it's full sims from 1871/1901 to the present, a specific era, or various combinations of fictional and historical elements.

This will be different, though. This dynasty is about an idea that I've been playing around with in my head for a long time(years) and I've finally decided to just go ahead with -- an idea that I've never seen explored here. What if baseball had never been invented? Imagine a world where we have soccer, tennis, golf, American football, basketball, etc. ... but Abner Doubleday, Joe Jackson, Ted Williams, Sandy Koufax, Barry Bonds, and the hundreds more of baseball stars too numerous to mention that we all know were just ordinary citizens, or perhaps starred in other sports. Imagine a world where baseball was never the American pastime. Imagine a world where instead the game was invented as a reaction to the modern, western fascination with instant gratification and constant action in it's entertainment.

What would the sport look like? Could it even survive against the competition of other, more established competitions in the modern world? Where would it begin, and how would it spread if it did survive? Who would play it, and how might the sport ultimately differ from the incarnation of baseball we know today? This dynasty will catalogue a hypothetical vision of those events.

The story begins in the seat of one of the great ancient cultures of the world, and very near the place where long-held ideal of pure competition, the Olympic Games, took it's root. I'm speaking of course of Athens, Greece, near the northern shore of the Meditteranean Sea.

06-10-2009, 01:42 PM	#1
Bryan Swartz Major Leagues Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 457	In the Shadows of Olympus: The Modern Invention of Baseball INTRODUCTION I've always enjoyed alternative history. For those who know of it, I'm particularly a fan of the work of Harry Turtledove, espescially The Guns of the South. A lot of dynasties and stories here revolve around changing history, whether it's full sims from 1871/1901 to the present, a specific era, or various combinations of fictional and historical elements. This will be different, though. This dynasty is about an idea that I've been playing around with in my head for a long time(years) and I've finally decided to just go ahead with -- an idea that I've never seen explored here. What if baseball had never been invented? Imagine a world where we have soccer, tennis, golf, American football, basketball, etc. ... but Abner Doubleday, Joe Jackson, Ted Williams, Sandy Koufax, Barry Bonds, and the hundreds more of baseball stars too numerous to mention that we all know were just ordinary citizens, or perhaps starred in other sports. Imagine a world where baseball was never the American pastime. Imagine a world where instead the game was invented as a reaction to the modern, western fascination with instant gratification and constant action in it's entertainment. What would the sport look like? Could it even survive against the competition of other, more established competitions in the modern world? Where would it begin, and how would it spread if it did survive? Who would play it, and how might the sport ultimately differ from the incarnation of baseball we know today? This dynasty will catalogue a hypothetical vision of those events. The story begins in the seat of one of the great ancient cultures of the world, and very near the place where long-held ideal of pure competition, the Olympic Games, took it's root. I'm speaking of course of Athens, Greece, near the northern shore of the Meditteranean Sea.