Summary
- Baseball played a significant role in Star Trek lore, starting with TNG guest star Dr. Stubbs expressing his love for the sport.
- Captain Sisko's strong connection to baseball was showcased throughout Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, becoming a key element of his character.
- Despite baseball's decline in popularity in the Star Trek timeline, the sport had a lasting impact thanks to characters like Stubbs and Sisko.
Captain Benjamin Sisko (Avery Brooks) may be the Star Trek character most associated with baseball, but a Star Trek: The Next Generation guest star shared his love of baseball first. Although Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) preferred fencing, TNG introduced several imagined futuristic games, such as Parrises Squares. Despite this, many classic sports of today also remained popular in the 24th century, including tennis, racquetball, and various forms of martial Arts. Baseball, in particular, has a strong connection to Star Trek, largely because of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine's Captain Sisko.
In Star Trek's timeline, baseball began declining in popularity until the final World Series was played in 2042, and the sport was considered somewhat obscure by the 24th century. Still, baseball had its fans. In Star Trek: The Next Generation season 3, episode 1, "Evolution," an astrophysicist named Dr. Paul Stubbs (Ken Jenkins) visits the USS Enterprise-D to conduct an experiment involving a stellar explosion. Stubbs sees something of himself in Ensign Wesley Crusher (Wil Wheaton), and the two have a conversation where Stubbs brings up his love of baseball, referring to it as "the beloved national pastime of the Americas."
"Evolution" was the first Star Trek episode written by Michael Piller, who would later serve as showrunner for both TNG and DS9. It was Piller who was responsible for making both Dr. Stubbs and Captain Sisko baseball fans.
A Star Trek TNG Guest Star Loved Baseball Before Captain Sisko
"Once, centuries ago, it was the beloved national pastime of the Americas."
Throughout Star Trek: The Next Generation season 3, episode 1, the USS Enterprise-D begins experiencing systems failures that eventually cause Captain Jean-Luc Picard to put a pause on Stubbs' experiment. Considering the stellar explosion Stubbs wishes to study only occurs once every 196 years, he will not have another chance to conduct the experiment during his lifetime. Stubbs has placed all of his self-worth in this experiment, and Wesley Crusher tries to cheer him up when it looks like the experiment won't happen. Stubbs laments that he will miss his "one chance at bat," before he turns to Wesley to ask if the young Ensign knows about baseball.
Wesley replies that his father taught it to him and asks whether Stubbs recreates iconic baseball games on the holodeck. Stubbs says that he has statistics from numerous games memorized and that he replays them in his head. Later, in his quarters, Stubbs mentally reconstructs the final game of the 1951 National League tie-breaker series between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants. His imaginings are interrupted when he is attacked by the nanites that have been causing the Enterprise to malfunction. He's not the most likable of characters, but Stubbs' love of baseball established an enduring connection between Star Trek and the beloved American sport.
Captain Sisko's Love Of Baseball Became An Important Element Of His Character
"Every time I throw this ball, a hundred different things can happen in a game."
Captain Benjamin Sisko's love of baseball is established in the series premiere of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Not only can his son, Jake (Cirroc Lofton), be seen wearing a baseball glove, but Sisko also uses the sport as a metaphor to explain linear time to the Bajoran Prophets. Sisko explains that the baseball game "wouldn't be worth playing" if he already knew the outcome, just as humans spend their lives exploring and searching without knowing their future. Sisko always kept a baseball on his desk on DS9, which became an important symbol when the Dominion temporarily gained control of the station.
Captain Sisko famously kept a baseball in his office on Deep Space Nine.
In DS9 season 7, episode 4, "Take Me Out to the Holosuite," Captain Sisko and his DS9 crew are challenged to a baseball game by the Vulcan crew of the T'Kumbra. Although the Vulcan Logicians beat Sisko's Niners by nine runs, Sisko and his team celebrate their teamwork and their one run.DS9's lighthearted baseball outing offers a nice break from the darker Dominion War storyline and highlights the camaraderie and determination of the characters. Sisko's love of baseball led to some truly great moments on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, but it may not have happened without Dr. Stubbs' shoutout to the sport on Star Trek: The Next Generation.
