“The Baseball Sentinel’s vision is to bring to life the sights and sounds of the game of baseball for all generations. To tell the stories of people connected to the game and others who want the connection of the game.”

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Baseball fans experience a live “in-person” game different from one that is broadcast on TV or radio. One goal is to capture the meditative sound of a ballgame that isn’t filtered through broadcasters, but the unfiltered one where the PA announcer is the background, you hear the crack of the bat and the snap of the ball, people are talking, cheering, and groaning, beer vendors are yelling and selling, kids are laughing, parents are drinking, smiling, and commenting.

Baseball Buddha wants to bring this sound to fans far and wide, the elderly who can’t make a day of it and people that find it calming. These captured sounds will be presented on the Ballpark Confidential Podcast. Another goal is to capture the sights and sounds of the ballpark by walking the stadiums and fields where the games are being played and to check out all the great sight lines.

Baseball Buddha will be reading on the Baseball Is Happiness Podcast vintage young adult baseball books published prior to 1968, it is a lost genre Baseball Buddha is bringing back for young and old baseball enthusiasts. Baseball Buddha will read the book as written and will comment on the era of baseball in which the book was published. The fan base is quite large for this kind of nostalgia.

The Baseball Buddha is John Reimer, he started this adventure 10 years ago. John took a year off of work in 2014 and set off on the Baseball in America Tour. He attended 248 games, not missing a day, beginning February 14th, the start of college season to the end of the MLB season.  That included spring training in Florida and Arizona, a game at all 30 MLB ballparks, four Opening Days, the MLB All Star game, Little League World Series, American Legion World Series, College World Series and MLB World Series. He got to meet many different personalities and see many ballparks, making it to a ball game in all of the 48 continental United States and two Canadian provinces. He has traveled to Japan where he has attended 4 games.

The original idea behind Baseball Buddha was to document the 2014 seasons journey, at the beginning of spring training when everything is fresh and exciting; when hopes and aspirations of a new season is upon all and then follow baseball from its infancy on the year through the ups and downs of the season until the very end concluding the journey at the final game of the MLB World Series.

It is not about win or lose, it is about following baseball around America and watching how it interacts with everyday life, game after game, day in day out, from California to Maine, North Dakota to Florida, and everywhere in between, from small town to metropolis. It is about the overall experience, it is about the energy when you enter into a stadium or ball field for the first time. The simplicity of it all followed by the momentary happiness shared by dozens if not thousands of others. Whether it is a little league game or a major league game, there is a level of excitement, from the kid that just learned to hit, to the grizzled veteran trying to hang on. There is a sense of pride fans have for their local merchants’ team and for those who have traveled a great distance to cheer on their team, win or lose. Maybe they are following a former college friend, or a hometown kid gone pro, maybe they are supporting their team because it was a family tradition. There are the cat calls at the umpires that make a terrible call or at least in the eyes of the old timer who still shows up every Sunday to root on the club team that can’t seem to get over the hump. There are those who are at the ball park for the first time in their life to watch their own child, niece, nephew, or grandchild get to swing the bat for the first time. In the end, all of us have a story to tell when we enter a stadium or go to the local ball field and become spectators.

Baseball Buddha is the spectator of the people. The goal is happiness. Baseball, for some, and especially me, creates a level of happiness. We all have our hobbies from collecting stamps to traveling that we find happiness in. It is what we use to fill the void in our lives or enter into a moment of contentment. When we enter into a stadium or go to a game, for those few hours in a day, we are all in a state of contentment. I watch closely as I see the father with his arm around his son holding a baseball glove with pure joy in his eyes watching attentively to the game waiting and hoping for that rare foul ball to come his way, then the satisfaction of knowing that he has captured a piece of that game forever, knowing that the memory is intensified and will be remembered longer. I turn to watch a few older gentleman with their statistics books out writing profusely marking their books as each pitch is thrown. For them, this is contentment. This is a few hours in the day in which they feel whole, they feel happy, feel a part of something bigger. For me, I want to take this journey, the path less traveled, and not only experience my own joys watching games, but understand the joys of the fans, the people, and the game.