Baseball is demanding. There are 162 games, which this year stretched from deep March until late September, except for the Boston Red Sox, who quit in August to open a llama farm in Vermont. A season can exhaust you like a turgid novel: players dazzle and slump; managers get bronzed or sacked; spring brilliance shrivels in the summer heat. Rivalries, statistics, carnage on the disabled list —it's a lot to keep track of.

For a busy fan, baseball can feel like a second job. A second job in which one spends an alarming amount...