When I was say 11 or 12 we used to leave home on a Saturday at like noon , five or six of us, make what should have been a 30 minute walk last nearly two and a half hours, argue about what the score was going to be ,who was the best player, get there at like 2.30, claim our place next to the wall at the Rainham End, watch the game cheering every time a Gills players had the ball, then win or loose argue about the game all the way home, then it was forgotten about till the next week.
A few years later the same group minus one or two would leave home at like 2.15, drive up to the ground, park somewhere off Barnsole Road, cut through the alleys, go to the game, back to the car, talk about the game on the way home, stop for a beer or two head for home then it was all forgotten till the following home game.
I don't think any of us cared about any stat other than W.L.D. how many goals so and so had scored on the season, but we loved the game and we loved the team, but knowing a player had run 4.5 miles in the 73 minutes he was on the pitch, hahaha we didn't give a dam. We didn't need to know that stat ,just by watching the game we knew if he had worked his butt off or he was being a lazy so and so.
Baseball is a game of Stats, there is a stat for everything, but apart from a few whack jobs at games who have no life , the only people who use them are the players agents come contract time, they drag out every stat in the world to show their boy is worth an extra 10 million over 5 years or what ever.
