Johnsports15

          After the Chicago Cubs won the world series in 2016, I was lucky enough to be invited with my dad to Wrigley Field from my godfather. My godfather won VIP tickets to a Cubs game the following year, so in 2017, I went to Wrigley Field. These VIP tickets didn't just have great seating, they also granted our little group access to be on the actual field before the game started. On top of that, we even had a Cubs player assigned to our group. The Cubs player that I got to meet was Ben Zobrist. In case your unfamiliar with Zobrist, he was on the Cubs team in 2016 when they won the world series, and he played left field. He was even on the field playing left field when the final play was made that solidified the Cubs as world series champions. Zobrist was the player to hit the RBI double in the 10th inning, giving the Cubs the lead, and ultimately leading to their win.      Once I had taken pictures with Zobrist and gotten his autograph...

     The Chicago Cubs have been my favorite major league baseball team for a long time now. I've seen them have plenty of difficulties over the years, but I'm starting to get tired of them consistently being an average team within the MLB. The Cubs had a lot of potential going into the start of this year's season, but somehow managed to squander it when it mattered the most for them. The teams lack of consistency is apparent to almost every Cubs fan. One game they could perform very poorly and lose by a lot of runs, and the next game against the same team they can absolutely crush the team. Thats due their bullpen, defense and. hitting.      Usually if you want to win a baseball game, you want to be able to hit the baseball. Apparently, that's a very hard thing to do for some of the Cubs players. Despite being skillful enough to be a part of the MLB, they just cannot make contact. If players make contact, it's against a mediocre team that a high school te...

    The Chicago Cubs were looking for a new manager to coach their team. On November of 2023, the Cubs hired Craig Counsell as their current manager. He was hired in as the new manager for the Cubs, previously being the longtime manager for the Milwaukee Brewers. Counsell is also a former Major League Baseball (MLB) player who played for the Brewers, Florida Marlins, and the Arizona Diamondbacks. During his time playing on these teams, he played as an infielder and was known for his intelligence, leadership, and interesting batting stance. During his time as an MLB player, Counsell also won two World Series championships with these teams. His world series win in 1997 was with the Marlins, and his World Series win in 2001 was with the Diamondbacks     Counsell retired from playing major league baseball back in 2012, and soon after became a member of the Brewers front office. Then in 2015, he became the team's manager. Counsell did a fantastic job as a manager when he ...

     The Chicago Cubs have had a very interesting history as a professional baseball team. The team has been all over the place being good in some years and bad in others. For instance, the Cubs won the world series in 1907 and in 1908, but then didn't win a world series until 2016. Now after the high of winning, the Cubs have been a relatively average team since their world series win. Like many other Cubs fans, we always wonder when it will be our next winning season, and how we will perform in the next season. I always wonder at the end of each season; how will the Chicago Cubs perform next year?     Attempting to predict your favorite teams next season can be very challenging since there are many moving parts in a major league sports team. The main factors that I take into account when making predictions for how the Cubs will perform next year, are their current roster, player development, the competition, and what moves they make offseason.   ...

 In baseball, there are many diverse types of pitches that can be thrown. Each of these pitches serves their own purpose in messing with the batter which keeps them guessing on what will be thrown next. In this post, I will be going over some of the more popular and common pitches you see being thrown as well as their purpose for being thrown.    The Four-seam Fastball:      The four-seam fastball might be the most common pitch in all of baseball. The main goal when throwing this pitch is to throw it as hard and straight as possible. The pitcher hopes to maximize the velocity, arm slot, and to catch the batter off guard by the speed of the pitch. Starting with a four-seam fastball often messes up the batter which then can lead to him misjudging the next few pitches. The reason it is called a four-seam, is because as the ball is rotating in the air after being thrown, four of its seams are spinning against the air. The ball spinning this way makes it mo...

  Wrigley Field is one of the most beloved baseball stadiums by fans in the United States. I myself have been to Wrigley Field multiple times, and I want to take a few minutes to review it for those that haven't been there. Since I have been to Wrigley as both a regular guest and a VIP guest, I am going to review it as a regular guest since the majority of visitors have regular tickets.       After my first visit to Wrigley Field, I can say that it was a very unique and exciting experience. For starters, Wrigley is located in a very ideal spot in Chicago. It is located two to three minutes from a train station, which makes transportation much easier. It also has many restaurants and bars that surround the main entrance of the stadium.      Once entering the stadium and passing through security, the sight is electrifying. Stands for food and drinks are abundant with plenty of options as long as you don't mind spending a pretty penny. There...

Hello, my name is John Wilson, and I write the JohnSports15 blog to help people to better understand the game of baseball as well as learn more about this fantastic sport. I grew up in a town called Mundelein, in the state of Illinois. Around the age of six, I found my interest in baseball when I decided to join the little league with some encouragement from my dad. By this point I was already playing two other sports, soccer, and basketball. After two more years of playing all three sports, I dropped soccer and basketball to continue playing baseball, which I found much more enjoyable. I continued to play baseball until my junior year of high school when covid hit and it shut all of our sports down and changed the rules of how we'd be playing. Playing baseball for those twelve years made me an expert on everything related to baseball. Rules, plays, strategies, I know the majority of them and still know most of them all these years later as a twenty-one-year-old.  Along with pl...

In baseball, timing your swing to each pitcher is very important. Pitchers throw at different speeds and throw some types of pitches more than others.  When you go to time up your swing, you’re “on deck,” and you’re the next batter to go hit against the pitcher. In this blog post, Ill describe how to properly time up your swing. The first thing you do when timing up your swing is getting into your batting stance. A batting stance is the position you put yourself in when swinging your baseball bat around. Next you turn towards the pitcher so that you're facing him and it's easier to see the ball release from his hand. As the pitcher winds up to throw his pitch, you start to wind up your swing. This involves lifting your leg front leg and cocking your arms back with the bat to get more power on your swing. Once you identify the pitch and speed, you then complete your swing by dropping your front leg and throwing your arms forward which swings the bat forward. Repeat these steps a...

The game of baseball is considered one of Americas oldest past-times and unique sports. Many people don't know exactly who or how baseball came to be. Some people that are familiar with baseball believe the sport has been around since 1839, when a civil war hero named Abner Doubleday developed the game. However, this is untrue since references about games resembling the concept of baseball in America date back to the 18th century.    Around the time of the American Revolution, variations of baseball were being played on both college campuses and on schoolyards with young children. The games continued to grow in popularity across the country, especially in newly industrialized cities, leading up to New York City in 1845.   In September of 1845, a group of men living in New York City founded the New York Knickerbocker Baseball Club. Perhaps the most influential person amongst this group was a man named Alexander Joy Cartwright. Cartwright made a new set of rules for...