The Federation’s Field of Dreams.

“Death to the opposition!” Starfleet officers are expected to be good sports and, for many of them, the lessons they’ve learned while playing their favorite games—tennis, fencing, even water polo—are ones they’ve brought with them onto the bridges of their starships. But no Star Trek character is as closely identified with his personal sporting passion than Captain Benjamin Sisko, whose deep love of baseball shines through all seven seasons of Deep Space Nine.

In this episode of Primitive Culture, host Duncan Barrett—who doesn’t know a bunt from a fancy dan—is joined by major-league baseball enthusiasts Mike Schindler and Zach Moore for a lesson on what makes this quintessentially American sport so meaningful to its fans. Along the way, they puzzle over why baseball is such a good fit for Star Trek’s storytelling, and what it means to be a good loser when you’re fighting a seemingly unwinnable war.

Chapters Intro (00:00:00) Inside Baseball (00:04:25) The In-Field Fly Rule (00:25:13) The Ball of the Emissary (00:41:15) Sisko the Jerk (00:52:00) Buck Bokai (00:56:20) Final Thoughts (01:01:40)

Host Duncan Barrett

Guests Mike Schindler and Zach Moore

Production Tony Black (Editor) C Bryan Jones (Executive Producer) Matthew Rushing (Executive Producer) Ken Tripp (Executive Producer) Norman C. Lao (Associate Producer) Amy Nelson (Associate Producer) Richard Marquez (Production Manager) Brandon-Shea Mutala (Patreon Manager)