In today’s landscape of sports and entertainment, many think that baseball—rather than our national pastime—is just one among an unlimited number of options. According to a survey done by Pew Research in 2023, when asked what they consider “America’s sport,” 53 percent of responders chose football. Baseball finished a distant second (27 percent) and basketball an even more distant third (8 percent). Yet, in the same survey, 62 percent of Americans said they do not follow sports very closely, if at all.

So what is real America’s pastime today? Perhaps it’s online streaming services like Netflix or scrolling through social media.

While baseball may play a diminished role in the lives of most Americans, it remains significant in America’s self-understanding. Baseball is, after all, one of our longest-standing cultural institutions. For this reason alone, Americans ought to understand what accounts for its enduring appeal.

There is no denying football’s primalappeal. Players take to the gridiron every weekend in pursuit of violent glory, like the gladiators of the colosseum in Ancient Rome. Yet the pundit George Will once correctly observed that football “combines two of the worst things in American life. It is violence punctuated by committee meetings.” Will’s description of the game refers to the continuous flow of running a play followed by a huddle. Commanding officers plan their attack, execute their plan, and then regroup to plan the next one. It’s a series of battles played out over 60 minutes of warfare.

My intent here is not to knock football. Yet, football, in so many ways, requires perfection. It also demands a total team effort, where every player must execute his job correctly for the team to advance.

Baseball is something different. It reflects the American character in a way that blends the best of both the community and the individual. Baseball is a team sport that requires each player to perform with the spotlight shining upon him. It’s a constant duel between the pitcher and hitter. A hitter may go into a slump and have to make adjustments before he can work his way out. A pitcher may give up the game-winning run in one outing and save the game the very next day. The daily nature of the game offers players countless opportunities for renewal and redemption—or fresh disgrace. This is a feature of the game that makes it relatable to the lives of everyday Americans.

Despite suggestions that baseball is in decline as America’s pastime, youth participation numbers tell a different story. More than 2.5 million American youth played organized baseball in 2024. Only basketball and soccer have higher enrollment. The basketball and soccer figures are co-ed, however; when you combine baseball with the 1.1 million girls who are softball players, baseball is still the most popular youth sport in America.

Major League Baseball reported its best attendance numbers in seven years following the 2024 season. The World Series Champion Los Angeles Dodgers average over 50,000 fans per game, totaling nearly 4 million for the season. According to several recent reports, television ratings have seen double-digit gains in 2025. These are not the signs of a sport in decline.

Baseball’s history is said to stretch all the way back to the Antebellum era. Based on the English game rounders, baseball began to gain popularity in New York City as early as the 1840s. During the Civil War, teams of soldiers played baseball at prison camps, popularizing the game despite the geographical divide. Following the war, the game gained professional status in the late 1860s, with the Cincinnati Red Stockings credited as the first professional team. The National League was formed in 1876. In other words, baseball, as much as anything else gave shape to postbellum America.

Baseball has moved with America through a Civil War, an economic transformation from farms to cities, and through two World Wars. From the post-war age through the new millennia, baseball has remained a part of America’s story. As the character Terence Mann (James Earl Jones) in film Field of Dreams put it, “America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It’s been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time.”

Baseball also ties America to its agricultural and geographic roots. Every tactile sensation of the game is, in one way or another, tied to the land. It’s a game played on a grass field, with a wooden bat and a leather glove. In fact, the baseballs used by the MLB are themselves coated in mud from the banks of the Delaware River, harvested by the Bintliff family.

At same time, however, baseball is one of America’s best exports. Japan, where baseball is unquestionably the national game, is producing some of the game’s top stars, most notably Shohei Ohtani. Throughout Latin America, baseball is the dominant sport in countries like the Dominican Republic and Venezuela. Nearly 20 percent of current MLB players are native Dominicans or Venezuelans. In recent years, baseball has even grown significantly more popular in Europe.

While the international expansion of baseball may be in full effect, still 70 percent of Major League Baseball players are American born. For generations, the sport of baseball has served as an integral part of America’s story. From the cornfields to city street corners, generations of American young men have pursued their dreams on the diamond. Baseball has been a significant part of American history and (thankfully) it’s not going away anytime soon.