This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Working Title: Smart Guys Love Baseball: From YKTTW
Paul Power: I'm wondering if there's a way to work cricket into here as well, as the Commonwealth equivalent of this trope: cricket also being a game of statistics, strategy and cerebralism. Can't think of many examples beyond Lord Peter Wimsey and Truth in Television examples like the mathematician G.H. Hardy though.
Andrew: I'm not sure; it's a fair question. You might want to bring it up in YKTTW.
Hasher Britarse: Okay, first to reveal my own nerdism, it's passtime, guys, not "past time". Second, the Peter Davidson version of Doctor Who and the Real Life Prime Minister and unlikely red-hot lover John shirt-tucked-into-his-underpants Major are cricket nerds. (Okay, the underpants thing is an Urban Legend but it's a good 'un). Finally, the big Jerk Jock types won't like my saying this, but in the UK, American Football is a bit of a game of nerds. See, it was popular for about two years, 1985-86 as I recall, after which it's just another bygone fad as far as the UK is concerned, too many rules and statistics and too much huddling to discuss strategy as compared to rugby, Jerk Jocks being replaced by "Rugger Buggers" on British university campuses. Only the kind of English boys who like to be able to talk about a game that the "in crowd" won't know more about than them and who care about "plays" with fancy names and the number of "intercepts" "incompletes" and what-have-you would ever watch the NFL in preference to a rugby match.
Daibhid C: The Tom Baker Doctor was also fond of cricket, although unlike Davison's incarnation, he didn't wear cricket whites. Arthur Dent probably counts as well.
Romanticide: I'm sure this one will get a troper tales quickly XD
J. Frank Parnell: Okay, how can you NOT know Bob Gibson's 1968 ERA? It was one of the best years ever by a pitcher, and the best in modern baseball by miles.
