Immaculate Musings
Notes inspired by the game that swept baseball fans away in 2023.
It’s like Hollywood Squares for seamheads, but without the presence of Paul Lynde, Jim J. Bullock or Alf.
In just over three months, Immaculate Grid went from being a novelty created by an Atlanta software developer, to a daily ritual performed by hundreds of thousands of baseball fans, to a newly-acquired property in the Sports Reference family. Pretty good short-term work if you can get it.
The sparse nature of the game and site lends itself to an air of mystery: there is no reward for getting a square right, there is only the risk of getting one wrong, falling short of the glory of the grid. Prior to the SR takeover, it always inspired me to go hunting on Baseball Reference, Baseball Cube and take travels around the internet remembering some Guys in ways I hadn’t undertaken in years.
Dropping at midnight Eastern Time, I’ve found myself staying up later than I should here in the Midwest, playing the game as soon as it resets.
It still inspires, but in some ways, Immaculate Grid has democratized in ways that take away from its purity. The rarity score, corner percentages and now, the one-click access to Stathead-filtered lists of players who fit each square’s criterion — all provide insight but no real value aside from internet bragging rights.
Sometimes there’s a certain graciousness in failure: in a 7/9 score reflective of a brain fart or some Hail Mary pass-grade guesses. I looked at the interlocking NY one day and accidentally guessed a New York Giant. Earlier this week, I guessed Willie Keeler for 200+ hits with the Yankees (Wee Willie did indeed get 200+ hits several times in his career, but all with the Baltimore Orioles — 1890s division — and the Brooklyn Superbas). I settled for Bernie Williams.
And then there are the house rules one can play by — if at all possible, and on most days it seemingly is, I try to include Edwin Jackson in my grid. He may have a sub-nine career bWAR, but he’s a first ballot Immaculate Grid Hall of Famer.
Handing that spark of curiosity to the participant, even after the fact, feels like a giveaway, much like how those of us who loved hunting for books in musty back rooms or crate digging for hidden treasure on wax find the internet too easy. The thrill is in the chase, the joy in the discovery. Eureka lacks its punch without an exclamation attached.
The copy of Roger Angell’s anthology The Summer Game I got from my local Half-Price Books came from the library of an esteemed professor at Hamline University. I found an early edition of Dag Hammarskjold’s Markings at that same location: it was once in the library of the Pacific Northwest-based campus minister I was supposed to intern under nearly 20 years ago. He has no apparent ties to Wisconsin, and despite being accepted into that program, I never met the man. How it traveled over 2000 miles, and how I of all people happened upon it precisely when I did, is a kind of eerie mystery that still leaves me in awe when I think about it. (So, too, does Markings; a brilliant, deeply moving work of a philosopher-poet politician.)
Granted, this is a silly daily nine-square grid; it’s not any kind of grand serendipity. But part of why we fall in love with nouns is the struggle to attain them, or the raw dumb luck that brings us to them. The charm of Immaculate Grid is in its tacit invitation for players to explore baseball’s rich history. It can grow the game while it itself grows.
(As a cheap shot, it should be noted that there is no clock arbitrarily governing the proceedings.)
I’ve talked to players who are already noticing repeats and overlaps: C.J. Cron, Miguel Cabrera — I used Tom Brunansky twice in the last two weeks, which is two more times than I’ve thought of Bruno in the last 35 years. Will we reach a time when this is just a default exercise? Is there a risk of the banality of Immaculate Grid?
On the other side of the coin, there is its accessibility: one need not think too much about any of this. It can be approached as seriously or as casually as one wants. You can take blind stabs at the grid or use Baseball Reference in another tab. You could guess Mickey Lolich in a square nine times, if you’re into that kind of thing.
Like the rare baseball event that gives the game its name, it’s nine shots at immaculacy. And if you don’t get there, there’s always tomorrow.