With No Real Baseball, This Board Game May Help Fill the Void

You can only watch so many replays of 2016 playoff games before you start yearning for something more substantial. Maybe you binge the third season of Ozark that just dropped Friday or find another new show on your streaming platform of choice. But there may come a point at which your desire for baseball joins forces with your need for social interaction with family or whomever you happen to be FaceTiming as you shelter in place.

Should you reach that point, allow me to recommend what is quite possibly the least boring thing to come out of St. Louis since Jim Edmonds’ gossip: Across The Board Baseball ($49.99 on Amazon). After seeing it from a friend on Twitter, I bought one for my family and was really impressed by both the simplicity and quality of the design. It’s just a game board, some metal pegs, a pair of dice, and a dry-erase marker. That’s it.

You roll the dice to determine outcomes, then track the score at the top. It takes very little baseball knowledge to play and there’s no skill involved, so the playing field is completely level. While the lack of strategy may not appeal to everyone, there’s something to said for being able to match any two opponents against one another without a significant advantage on one side or the other.

In the interest of full disclosure, the link above was created through CI’s Amazon Associates program and I think we earn a commission on each sale. Then again, we show zero bounties on the sales that were made when I posted on social media, so maybe we get nothing. Regardless, I really just want to spread the word about this game because it’s fun and it looks sharp enough to leave out as a decorative piece even when you’re not playing.

If you happen to order one, or if you’ve already got it, share a picture with me in the comments or on social media. Most of us will probably never meet in person, but there are still ways for us to feel connected to one another. The Cubs have always provided that common thread here, so I’m looking to fabricate something new until they come back.