Wednesday, August 3, 2016

Seeing Yellow, Part II

Today's Uni Watch includes this wonderful 1938 photo from Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, colorized by Baseball by Bsmile:


Readers may remember that we've talked about this before, although although we didn't have this particular picture; there have been many attempts to improve visibility by coloring the baseball, the first of which was held at our very own Borchert Field. On August 29, 1928, the New York Times reported on an event which took place the previous day:

American Association Tries Yellow Baseball in Milwaukee
MILWAUKEE, Aug. 28 (AP)–For what is believed to be the first time in a professional game, a yellow baseball was experimented with here today in the second game of a double-header between Milwaukee and Louisville. President T. J. Hickey of the American Association was here to see the result. The new balls are said to have greater visibility than white ones, particularly with a bleacher background of white shirts. They are not easily discolored. Further experiments will be made and if successful the ball will be officially adopted for 1929.
Those experiments never went anywhere, and a decade later the Brooklyn Dodgers tried again with no greater success.

Thanks to Bsmile, we have a little better idea of what that ball might have looked like in action.

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