Raising a baseball fan is no big deal.
You've got a little kid following you around everywhere, with a baseball game going in the background.
When you hear the crack of the bat or the roar of the crowd, you shush the little kid (gently and lovingly, of course), listen to the action, then let the kid resume the autobabble.
When he's about 3 or 4, you can start taking him to actual games, starting with the minor leagues, just like the players.
The first few times, you'll spend most of the game wandering the concourse or hanging out at the playground, but eventually he'll understand that the point of going to a baseball game is to actually watch a baseball game.
The Beach Bums weren't around when I was conditioning my own kid, but they're perfect for this kind of upbringing.
On the other hand, when my kid was old enough to go to a Major League game, Tiger Stadium was still around so he got that "holy cow!" moment of walking into the stadium and seeing the green, green field below.
The kid, who's 15 now, actually watches a game better than I do.
I tend to miss entire innings as I study the intricate aerodynamics of a certain slugger's bouncing curls.
So it's no big deal to raise a baseball fan. Converting one, on the other hand, is impressive.
When I met my husband all those years ago, you could fit everything he knew about baseball -- nay, about sports -- on the head of a bat.
He said the best thing about home football games at Michigan State was that the library was deserted.
The first few baseball games he went to weren't spent wandering the concourse, but befriending the hot dog guy.
Family lore has it that he ate 14 hot dogs during one game, but the number goes up every time the story is told.
The change was subtle, but thorough. By the time the Tigers were in contention in 2006, he loved baseball. Who wouldn't?
Who could possibly watch Magglio Ordonez (the slugger with the bouncing curls) hit a walk-off home run to send the Tigers to the World Series and not be a fan for life? And we watched it in person.
Later that winter, he e-mailed me a link to a Web site and said, "This is interesting ..."
I clicked on the link, thinking it was something political or scientific or computer-related.
It was a new way to figure baseball statistics so you'd know who was most likely to get on base in the eighth inning when a left-hander is pitching and the wind is from the west (or something).
Yep, he's a convert. Play ball.
Jodee Taylor can be reached at jtaylor@record-eagle.com.
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