When baseball rules were translated into Dutch, one rule about pitching was lost in translation. It took forty-six years before this mistake was discovered. Read on and you learn about how.
In the Netherlands, Baseball is played since 1908. In those days there wasn’t a regular competition yet. Even though the sport was introduced in 1906 by English teacher J.C. Grasé, it took a few years before the sport gained ground. The few teams that existed came and went. But in 1913, AHC Quick (Amsterdamsche Honkbalclub Quick) was founded and this club proved to be a constant. It would take until 1921 before the first official competition would be played and AHC Quick would win that very first championship.
But back to J.C. Grasé. He was the one who translated the complex rules. Because of the complexity of the game, one rule was translated in a wrong way. It took until 1952 before that error was discovered.
When Han Urbanus, a pitching legend in the Netherlands, playing for the O.V.V.O. baseball branch (O.V.V.O. means Op Volharding Volgt Overwinning, loosely translated as Perseverance is Followed by Victory), was invited by the New York Giants in 1952, he accepted the offer to go.
Han Urbanus noticed that American pitchers threw about 20 MPH faster than their Dutch colleagues. It became clear that the Dutch pitchers were throwing in a wrong way. When J.C. Grase (he again) translated the baseball rules from English into Dutch, the rule that a pitcher should keep contact with the plate on the mound was lost in translation. The Dutch pitchers literally kept contact with that plate, which led to a loss of velocity. When Urbanus returned to the Netherlands and told about the rule, there were plenty of stubborn Dutchmen who insisted that the way they were pitching was the right way.
Anyhow, from that year the Dutch had to adapt their way of pitching. It took them a while but eventually they managed to adapt to the “new” way of pitching.
Post Views: 4