Scorekeeping Book

[treydawgmt]

I understand I'm not going to get many people here who care, or may be able to help. This is primarily an umpire forum, and most don't care about rule 10, or scorekeeping at all.

However, I truly enjoy keeping score when I go to a MLB game. EVERY game I have been to in the last, oh, 20 years or so, I have a scorebook sheet from. I feel I'm pretty good at the scorekeeping, and it was the first thing I enjoyed about baseball.

My problem is with the actual score books I use. I am having a hard time finding a score book that really works with MLB games. Most have about 12 or 14 batting positions. Not gonna use more than 9 in an MLB game! They don't have spots for pitch counts, and have some things that I don't care about. Anyone have an idea where to get a good book to use for MLB level games? There really isn't a scorekeeper's forum that I've ever found, so let me know if there is one and I'll ask this question there.

Thanks!

[bigbird69]

Believe it or not, I have found that the best scorebook for MLB is the I-Phone/I-Pod app, espn Iscore... It is digital and keeps much of that stuff for you (like pitch counts...etc)

As far as where to get an actual book, that is made more difficult by the fact that many times, sporting goods stores will change their suppliers and the next book will either be better or just plain suck.

I try to find one that has the scoring done in a horizontal format, with the boxes for balls and strikes. The horizontal ones will have spaces for more innings and about 12 batters. The vertical ones, usually will have room for 14-16 batters and 9-10 innings, and may skip the boxes that I use to help with PC's (I can add dots for extra foul balls.) I also usually put two numbers in the upper left corner of the box. first number is pitches in the at-bat. The second is the total pitches for that pitcher in the game.

[Tim_C]

Actually I got so frustrated with the poor scorebooks available I designed m own in excel, printed 100 copies and had an administrative assistant at work bind them.

There was once-up-on-a-time that I even scored games on TV . . . they cut away to often now to keep things accurate.

Tim

[gatoremt]

I would also say to try the gamechanger app. It is free unlike iScore.

[alexgreenlee]

Unless you have an iPad, iScore is hard (for me). It's a little cumbersome and wont respond with the agility that a pencil will.

I have also scored all of the games I've been to in the last 4 years and had the same problem until a couple years ago. I discovered that this book is by far the best:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0000C4LUG/ref=wms_ohs_product_T2

It comes in a nice sturdy spiral binding and opens on the bottom, not the side, has a rigid cover, is printed on good paper stock and looks very sharp overall. I only have a couple complaints about it, one being that it is made for coaches/managers so therefore it has a few sheets of paper at the end (line-up cards and stats keeping) that are unnecessary for the casual game-going-scorer. I just rip those out though when I get a new one and I'm set. My only other complaint is that it only has spots for 10 innings, but a lot of room at the end for hitter's stats. Could have a 12th or even 13th inn on the page.

It has 11 line-up slots, which is perfect because I live in DC (NL team) so I see a lot of pitching changes and pinch-hitting in the 9 spot at the end of games, and has 3 spots in each slot which is great when the D. switch happens.

The pic on Amazon is small, so I've attached a couple of mine. Hope this helps!!!