Watching the Yanks-Devil Rays game today, I saw Toby Hall rip a ball off the wall in the left field corner of Yankee Stadium. Hideki Matsui ran over to retrieve it, waited for it to bounce softly off the wall into his glove and made the long throw back toward the infield. For God knows what reason, the camera showed Toby Hall still on first base.

This wasn't a shot off the Green Monster in left center at Fenway, retrieved off the wall on the fly. This was deep in the corner in the Bronx, and it took two or three minutes to get back to the infield. A subsequent shot of Hall waddling out of the box at 6 mph explained his decision not to attempt doubles under any circumstances, but there's no doubt he would have made it in this case.

But the whole thing got me thinking: Is there any bare minimum speed required to play professional baseball? And how does it compare to the bare minimum required for other sports like golf, bowling or chess?