Pitcher's Mound Traditions & Rituals

Over the years I have watched numerous international baseball games and have witnessed some unique baseball traditions that countries have developed before and after the game.  USA has a few traditions or superstitions....like not stepping on the foul line as it will bring bad luck, not talking about a no hitter thats in progress,  or it could be jinxed.  I watched the Yankees final home game an noticed many of the past greats (Larsen, Ford) were scooping up mound clay to keep as a momento...soon followed several guys from the media.  It caused such a hoopla I figured the Yankees would sell the remaining clay in those mini ballparks to fans.  You never know these days.  

Asia has some of the most unique traditions. You may have witnssed the "mound flagging" event during the World Baseball Classic by South Korea in LA.  They did the same thing at Petco ballpark.   They even did the same thing in Beijing after they won the Gold Medal...( must have worked for them them). Japan has a history of staking a flag in the mound after a big game as well except they use bigger flags.  Its Probably good to break in other countries not used to this type of winning tradition by using the smaller flags. It could cause quite a hole on the mound.  Some groundskeepers may frown on this type of tradition here in the states.  Japan also has the ritual of placing a small mound of salt at the edge of the dugout before big games.

The other tradition I have seen more often are teams taking clay off the mound after a game. I recall after one game a player had a shovel and bucket and was heading to the mound.  we had to stop him.. he understood once it was explained that there was a game the next day. 

Taiwan has a pregame tradition or ritual where they set up a table of gifts behind homeplate to bring them good luck ( and good weather) to a game.  They also burn a few reams of paper around homeplate in a trash can.  The paper burns and lifts the requests for good luck prior to the game.  During this time of year in the Northeast a burning barrel sounds pretty warm.