93 Days to Opening Day 2008

Opening Day 2008 for the Timber Rattlers is April 3. That is 93 days from today. This off-season, the countdown will be based on books. Each day between now and Opening Day 2008, I will pick a random book out of my library and excerpt a passage off the page number corresponding with the number of days remaining to the first pitch of the new season. I will try not to repeat a book during the countdown.

Today’s excerpt is from What If? 2 an anthology of essays by historians who imagine what might have been edited by Robert Cowley. This essay is by Theodore F. Cook, Jr. Its title is The Chinese Discovery of the New World, 15^th Century.

China’s fleets would have seemed to the Europeans of their day to be gigantic armadas, composed of myriad vessels of undreamt –of size and sophistication. The hardy caravels of the Portuguese or Spanish that made the epic voyages of the last years of the fifteenth century would have been dwarfed by the great “treasure ships” at the heart of the Ming fleet, and surpassed in size and capabilities by many of the other ships in the fleets. Zheng He sailed with an array of vessels specializing in all the needs of expeditions that would sometimes number as many as 37,000 men. He had horse ships, capable of carrying horses both from China for his forces or back in the tribute trade. He had supply and provision vessels, freshwater transport ships especially designed for missions in little-known seas near arid lands. He also had at his command a formidable fleet of combat ships including “floating fortresses,” armed with cannon and other weapons well suited for bombardment of recalcitrant enemies, troop transports for his substantial land army, and smaller, faster vessels capable of warding off and running down pirates. They were coordinated at sea by a complex system of flags, drums, gongs, and lanterns, intended to allow the ships to remain in communication with one another, and to relay vital information about navigational or other dangers easily and reliably.

Put today’s excerpt in a baseball context.