The 7th Inning Stretch (Part 2)

That was tradition number one. The second tradition that began that day was the first seventh-inning stretch. President Taft, as you may or may not know, was a very large man. At 300 pounds, he was the largest president our country has ever had. That opening day game between the Athletics and the Senators was beginning to drag on.

 

In the middle of the seventh-inning, President Taft just couldn’t sit still on that hard wooden seat much longer, so he stood up to “stretch his legs” and move around a bit. When he did that, everyone else did the same thing. Who knows, if he was sitting on a catchers mitt, we might not have a seventh-inning stretch today? At any rate, he didn’t-and we do. Now, for some other theories…

Related posts:

1. The 7th Inning Stretch (Part 1)
2. The 7th Inning Stretch (Part 4)
3. The 7th Inning Stretch (Part 5)
4. The 7th Inning Stretch (Part 3)
5. Catchers Mitt