"Forever Baseball" is something very rare...an episode of "The American Experience" I just didn't like! This was a surprise as I watched, as I adore this series and think it's one of the best programs ever made for television. Why did I dislike it? Because the show is not about baseball in any chronological, traditional or historical sense. Instead, folks waxed poetic about the sport and talked about it with a weird sort of reverence. Plus, having the likes of Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Updike interviewed about baseball seemed, well, too intellectual for such a non-intellectual activity. After all, it's just a game. Similarly, folks talked about F. Scott Fitzgerald at one point...and I kept thinking what does the average baseball fan think or care about Updike or Fitzgerald?! Now, I have no hatred about these authors...but they just didn't seem to fit in such a show. My feeling is that perhaps the show should have picked a single topic and talked about it, such as the creation of the sport or the Black Sox scandal (which was talked about briefly...too briefly) or perhaps the integration of baseball. Overall, a rather dull look at an American pastime.
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