Mushball, a game everyone can play.

If you have no idea what mushball is, you've come to the right place. Mushball is a lot like softball, except the ball is so much softer and larger. There is no need for a glove, you catch it with your hands and because it is so soft, it is difficult to hit very far. All we need is you to join our team, everyone hits and nobody strikes out. We'll have an old fashioned wooden bat, some bases and homeplate where your sure to score, and of course a Mushball imported from the Mushball Capital of the World, Chicago.

From http://lakelinesthoug...

Baseball for Casual Fans: Installment #11
16-inch Softball
Or, If You Don?t Stop Calling It ?Mushball*? I will Stuff One Into Your Nose

16-inch is the preferred form of softball in Chicago. The suburbs have more 12-inch ? heck, they even have a pro team now! The city still sticks mainly to the traditional 16-inch, though, and it is popular in many suburbs as well.

A story to prove this: My husband?s family moved from the south side out to the suburbs when he was 10 years old. That was also first time he had ever seen a 12-inch softball and he was fascinated. He pulled on his dad?s arm and said, ?Dad! Look! It?s a really big baseball!?

16-inch is played without gloves. This is a big adjustment when switching between 16 and 12 inch leagues. Jammed fingers are pretty common while getting used to the size and weight of the ball. But switching to 12-inch can be hard also, as most kids play 16-inch and baseball. By putting on a glove, they feel that they?re playing baseball and often close the glove too soon or don?t open it wide enough causing a few extra errors. When we lived in Colorado for a couple of years, my husband had at least one play a game for the first few weeks where he looked silly ? and it was all due to adjusting to using a glove for softball. There are plenty of catching techniques to be learned when playing 16-inch though. Those jammed fingers aren?t necessarily inevitable!

Pitches are generally thrown with a very high (10 ft.-ish) arc. A small mat sits directly behind home plate, and if the ball hits the mat it is called a strike. If it hits the plate or anywhere else, it?s a ball. Sometimes catcher will stick their hands out over the mat to give the pitcher a target, but it all depends on what the pitcher likes.

New converts to 16-inch often see the size of the ball and assume that it will be the easiest thing in the world to hit. Not the case at all. It?s pretty easy to make contact with the ball (and it is true that strikeouts are pretty embarrassing. Especially when they?re swinging strikeouts) But often they try to kill the ball. But they usually get an infield pop-up instead. 16-inch requires different skills to be able to bat well.

Chicago has many different leagues, from co-ed beer leagues to quasi-professional ones that are sometimes broadcast on ESPN 2. It?s a fun game, and is yet one more thing that makes Chicago unique and very proud. More history and such is here as well.

*In Indiana (and a few other places I?ve been to as well), a 16-inch softball is called a ?mush ball?. This is stupid. The ball is not particularly soft until it has been overused, at which point Chicagoans would throw it out or give it to the dog as a toy. Since few sporting goods stores outside of the Chicago area carry 16-inch balls, they often have to use the ball until it falls apart ? which isn?t the poor ball?s fault!