Seventh-inning Stretch - Current Practice

Current Practice

In modern baseball, standing up and singing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" during the seventh-inning stretch is a popular tradition. The 1908 Tin Pan Alley standard was written by vaudeville star Jack Norworth, who had ironically never attended an actual baseball game prior to writing the song.

There is no certain date when the tradition began, but the practice gained exceptional notoriety from broadcaster Harry Caray. Caray would sing the song to himself in the broadcast booth during the stretch while a play-by-play announcer for the Chicago White Sox. After hearing him sing one day, White Sox owner Bill Veeck Jr., the famed baseball promoter, had Caray's microphone turned on so that the ballpark could hear him sing. When Caray moved into the Chicago Cubs broadcast booth, he continued the practice, sparking what has become a Cubs tradition by regularly leading the crowd in singing the song in every seventh-inning stretch. Since his death, the Cubs have invited various celebrities to lead the crowd during the stretch, including James Belushi, John Cusack, Mike Ditka, Michael J. Fox, Bill Murray, Dan Patrick, Ozzy Osbourne, Eddie Vedder, Mr. T and Billy Corgan. When Nelly sang the song, he famously shouted "let's get some lunch!" at the conclusion (he'd misunderstood the popular cheer of "let's get some runs!" which the celebrity singer often uses to end the song).