Speaking of hard infields, up until about 1980, Dodger Stadium used a mixture that contained about 70% crushed brick and it was as hard as, well, a brick. When they finally went to a more conventional mixture for the skinned part, a reporter told a player from another team that they had softened the skinned part of the infield. Reportedly, the player replied "What did they do? Pave it?"
Despite living in California, I've been a Cubs fan since the mid-80s. I did play city league softball until I was close to 40 and my shoulder got so bad I couldn't return the ball to the pitcher from behind the plate without having to arc it.
I wish they had turf on fields when I started playing slow pitch softball in college and for years thereafter. In baseball, the pants and the decent infields we played on kept the back of the leg "strawberries" to a minimum. Skinned knees? Well, that was another story. But in softball, those city league fields were unmaintained and abused. Plus, they were in areas (where I played, anyway) that flooded. Sliding on those fields was often torture. Thank God they came out with what we called sliding shorts (short tights; Bike made a pair then everyone came out with a lycra pair, but those weren't as protective). Didn't help the knees but I learned to slide without doing too much damage. Had we been on turf, the occasional rug burn would have been the worst of my worries. At any rate, is Bike (the company that made jocks and stuff) still around? Probably bought out by someone.
