{"id":923,"date":"2009-06-01T15:19:46","date_gmt":"2009-06-01T15:19:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/production.ou.org\/jewish_action\/2009\/achdut_on_the_field\/"},"modified":"2020-07-27T08:21:47","modified_gmt":"2020-07-27T08:21:47","slug":"achdut_on_the_field","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/","title":{"rendered":"Achdut on the Field"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"image\"<\/p>\n

The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child screaming.<\/p>\n

Down the road, at a Jewish bungalow colony in the middle of the once-and-still-Jewish Borscht Belt, a young non-Jewish girl had injured her foot in a traffic accident. The two teams\u2014one composed of Modern Orthodox players, the other of Chassidim\u2014dropped their bats and gloves and sprinted to the girl.<\/p>\n

An ambulance hadn\u2019t arrived yet.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe were the first people at the scene,\u201d remembers William Rapfogel, the executive director of the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty who is one of the players.<\/p>\n

Two players, one from each team (and both trained members of the Hatzalah volunteer emergency medical corps), began administering first aid. Strangers to each other off the ball field, \u201cthey were acting as a unit,\u201d Rapfogel says. \u201cThey knew what had to be done.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the grateful parents, the men with kippot were a godsend, taking care of their daughter until she went to the hospital. \u201cI could see it in [the parents\u2019] faces,\u201d says Rapfogel.<\/p>\n

For the players in the thirty-three-year-old Orthodox Bungalow Baseball League (O.B.B.L.), which bills itself as the \u201clargest organized sports league in the Orthodox Jewish world\u201d and which a New York Times article called \u201ca devout collection of rabble-rousers,\u201d it was a tangible symbol of achdut, Jewish unity.<\/p>\n

For a little more than two months, from the last Sunday morning in June until the Sunday before Labor Day, in the twenty-square-mile area where most of the Catskills frum bungalow colonies are located, men from Modern Orthodox, Chassidic, Yeshivish and Sephardic backgrounds, who live in different neighborhoods, daven in different shuls and travel in different circles the rest of the year, become teammates or friendly opponents.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou play with each other. You play against each other,\u201d says Rabbi Avrohom Kallus, an avid softball player. A kosher food inspector for New York State who lives in Brooklyn\u2019s heavily Orthodox Flatbush neighborhood, he is a chassid from a Munkatsch background.<\/p>\n

\u201c[The league] has brought lots of people together,\u201d he says. \u201cWe have all kinds [of Jews] playing against all kinds.\u201d<\/p>\n

An outgrowth of five inter-bungalow teams, O.B.B.L. was formed in 1977 to give men\u2014who generally join their families in the upstate New York vacation colonies during summer weekends to escape the heat of New York City\u2014a chance to get some exercise and to get out of crowded bungalow homes for a few hours.<\/p>\n

The league has steadily grown, fielding forty to fifty teams each year.<\/p>\n

In games at modest bungalow colony ball fields and on the professionally maintained diamonds of Monticello High School, players, some in full baseball uniforms (with cleats on their shoes) and others in their Shabbat trousers and white shirts (wearing sneakers), play as equals. Kippot fly off heads and tzitzit ride the wind as runners round bases and fielders dive for balls.<\/p>\n

Sometimes, wives and kids watch, sitting on the grass or on lawn chairs they\u2019ve schlepped.<\/p>\n

Over the years, the league has taken on a life of its own for the thousands of men\u2014teens and retirees, native-born and sons of European immigrants, businessmen and lawyers, and rabbis and teachers\u2014who throw and pitch and field.<\/p>\n

One year, going outside the base path of sports, the league held a fundraising dinner for an Israeli charity. This year, O.B.B.L. will be the focus of an upcoming documentary on PBS about the Catskills.<\/p>\n

The league has its own rules (no base stealing, no bunting), its own adjudication procedures (an informal beit din of three captains convenes on a bungalow porch the evening after a disputed game where there were no umpires), its own web site (www.obbl.com), its own team names (Lakeside Skullcaps, Yifei Nof Hillbillies, Lefkowitz Lions), its own twenty-six-page Captain\u2019s Guide (complete with league rules, contact numbers, schedule and empty scoring sheets), its own rules of sportsmanship (a team lacking one player for a nine-man squad may ask the opponents to supply a catcher), its own form of celebrating (the division-winning teams sponsor a community-wide kiddush), and, of course, its own Yiddishe code of conduct.<\/p>\n

Kippot fly off heads and tzitzit ride the wind as runners round bases and fielders dive for balls.<\/div>\n

No pushing. No inappropriate language. \u201cNo matter how intense the game might get, all of us must show proper derech eretz [appropriate behavior] to each other,\u201d Jerry Schreck, the long-time O.B.B.L. commissioner, warned in last season\u2019s Captain\u2019s Guide. \u201cNow, more than ever, the final standings at the end of the season are not as critical as our personal standings a few weeks later during the Yamim Noraim.\u201d<\/p>\n

Through O.B.B.L., friendships and business deals are made and stereotypes are broken. After double-headers, everyone davens Minchah together. \u201cIt produces a change in attitude,\u201d Rabbi Kallus says. People from Modern Orthodox circles, who have little interaction with Chassidim on a day-to-day basis, \u201csee that we are as normal as they are. For some people it\u2019s become an eye-opener.\u201d<\/p>\n

God willing, Rabbi Kallus says,the play will continue \u201cuntil Mashiach comes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who will Mashiach play for?<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s gonna ump,\u201d says Rabbi Kallus.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn a recreational setting, people lose their parochial attitudes,\u201d says Schreck, who formed the league with his friend Milton Pfeiffer and now serves as commissioner emeritus, having passed the reins of O.B.B.L. leadership to Brooklyn attorney Yoel Zagelbaum.<\/p>\n

On a ball field, says Rapfogel, \u201cpeople are more willing to let down their payot. It\u2019s a very different atmosphere.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis carries over\u201d to the players\u2019 relations back in New York, Rapfogel says.<\/p>\n

A disproportionate number of the older players, it turns out, are the sons of Holocaust survivors\u2014sons who readily picked up the softball version of the American pastime.<\/p>\n

Most of the players learned the game, in some form, as softball or baseball or stickball or punch ball, on the streets and stoops of New York.<\/p>\n

Most of them, they will tell you, look forward to the games throughout the year, discussing favorite memories at impromptu Bar Mitzvah or wedding reunions.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re the Boychiks of Summer.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s part of the [New York] Orthodox sub-culture,\u201d says Chaim Silber (nickname: Lobo), a computer leaser turned tzedakah distributor who ranks as a legendary O.B.B.L. figure. \u201cIt\u2019s a guy thing,\u201d he adds.<\/p>\n

Several players facing off-season knee replacement surgery say they plan to return to the sport this summer.<\/p>\n

Many of their wives, the players freely admit, think their interest in the sport is meshugah.<\/p>\n

For Rabbi Yerachmiel Shlomo Rothenberg, dean of a boys\u2019 yeshivah in Mountaindale, New York, his time playing on an O.B.B.L. team serves as a carryover from his softball and basketball games with his young students during the school year. The games, he says, reveal character. And they remove barriers.<\/p>\n

One scholar who plays O.B.B.L. softball told Schreck, \u201cYour greatest zechut [merit] so far is that you\u2019re able to get thousands of guys up for minyan early on a Sunday morning.\u201d<\/p>\n

How seriously do the O.B.B.L. players take their softball?<\/p>\n

So seriously, says Sheldon Silver, speaker of the New York State Assembly and a retired softball player, that opponents paid him no deference on the field, despite his prestigious political job and his position as one of the highest-ranking Orthodox politicians in the country. \u201cNot at all,\u201d he says. \u201cThese were hard-fought games.\u201d<\/p>\n

So seriously that one team captain, who was injured sliding into a base and required surgery, called Schreck before undergoing anesthesia in order to declare his objections to the commissioner\u2019s new no-sliding rule.<\/p>\n

So seriously that one talented Modern Orthodox woman surreptitiously joined a team several years ago, her ball cap hiding her long hair, until an opposing team discovered her true identity and enforced the league\u2019s men-only policy.<\/p>\n

So seriously that players still talk about \u201cThe Airplane Game.\u201d<\/p>\n

It took place about twenty years ago, an end-of-the-season contest between the Lobos and their archrival, Sackett Lake. A division championship was on the line.<\/p>\n

Chaim Silber, who served as captain of the Lobos, and, inexplicably, was also allowed to umpire the game, wanted to unnerve his opponents.<\/p>\n

So he hired an airplane.<\/p>\n

Inspired by a plane he had seen dragging an advertising banner over the sands of Miami Beach, he drove to a local Sullivan County airport, where he engaged the pilot of a single-engine airplane to fly over the field during the championship game.<\/p>\n

It was Orthodox one-upmanship. \u201cShtick\u2014to make the game more exciting,\u201d Silber says. Its message: \u201cWe have a plane. What do you have?\u201d<\/p>\n

The banner trailing the yellow plane said, \u201cLet\u2019s Go Lobos\/Beat Sackett Lake\/Three-peat O.B.B.L.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody knew about it,\u201d says Silber, whom the New York Times called the leader of \u201cthe most maniacal pack of rabbis, high school principals and pen importers in the Borscht Belt.\u201d<\/p>\n

The plane showed up over Monticello High School, on schedule, at 10:30 AM. Sackett Lake, behind in the game, was at bat in the third inning when the players heard it. Everyone looked up. Everyone looked at Silber. \u201cThey knew I was behind it,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople looked at me like I was crazy.\u201d<\/p>\n

The game stopped while the plane circled overhead for ten minutes, at about 800 feet.<\/p>\n

The ploy backfired. Sackett Lake scored three runs in the third inning to take the lead. The plane, Silber says, \u201cgave them incentive.\u201d But in the end, the Lobos rallied to win the game 5-3.<\/p>\n

The stunt cost Silber a few hundred dollars.<\/p>\n

Was it worth it?<\/p>\n

\u201cAbsolutely,\u201d he says. \u201cWe still talk about \u2018The Airplane Game.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Steve Lipman is a staff writer for the Jewish Week in New York.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child screaming. Down the road, at a Jewish bungalow colony in the middle of the once-and-still-Jewish Borscht Belt, a young non-Jewish girl had injured her foot in a traffic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":69,"featured_media":924,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_cloudinary_featured_overwrite":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[79],"tags":[138],"class_list":["post-923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-inspiration","tag-30th-archive","issues-summer-20095769"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAchdut on the Field - Jewish Action<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Achdut on the Field - Jewish Action\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Jewish Action\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/JewishAction\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-06-01T15:19:46+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2020-07-27T08:21:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"85\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"85\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Steve Lipman\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Steve Lipman\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"8 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Steve Lipman\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/person\/68ae2d310089113a32c7beb334843b97\"},\"headline\":\"Achdut on the Field\",\"datePublished\":\"2009-06-01T15:19:46+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-07-27T08:21:47+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/\"},\"wordCount\":1659,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"30th-archive\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Inspiration\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/\",\"name\":\"Achdut on the Field - Jewish Action\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2009-06-01T15:19:46+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-07-27T08:21:47+00:00\",\"description\":\"The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg\",\"width\":\"85\",\"height\":\"85\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Achdut on the Field\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/\",\"name\":\"Jewish Action\",\"description\":\"Jewish Action | A publication of the Orthodox Union\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Jewish Action\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/jewish-action-logo.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/jewish-action-logo.png\",\"width\":253,\"height\":74,\"caption\":\"Jewish Action\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/JewishAction\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/Jewish_Action\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/person\/68ae2d310089113a32c7beb334843b97\",\"name\":\"Steve Lipman\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e3e7e14e1b656414b10f05b42dfa15a5?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e3e7e14e1b656414b10f05b42dfa15a5?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Steve Lipman\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/author\/steve_lipmanou-org\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Achdut on the Field - Jewish Action","description":"The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Achdut on the Field - Jewish Action","og_description":"The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child","og_url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/","og_site_name":"Jewish Action","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/JewishAction","article_published_time":"2009-06-01T15:19:46+00:00","article_modified_time":"2020-07-27T08:21:47+00:00","og_image":[{"width":85,"height":85,"url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Steve Lipman","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Steve Lipman","Est. reading time":"8 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/"},"author":{"name":"Steve Lipman","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/person\/68ae2d310089113a32c7beb334843b97"},"headline":"Achdut on the Field","datePublished":"2009-06-01T15:19:46+00:00","dateModified":"2020-07-27T08:21:47+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/"},"wordCount":1659,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg","keywords":["30th-archive"],"articleSection":["Inspiration"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/","url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/","name":"Achdut on the Field - Jewish Action","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg","datePublished":"2009-06-01T15:19:46+00:00","dateModified":"2020-07-27T08:21:47+00:00","description":"The umpire didn\u2019t have to call \u201cGame suspended\u201d when a few dozen Orthodox men playing softball on a Catskills field a few years ago heard a child","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/player.jpg","width":"85","height":"85"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/religion\/inspiration\/achdut_on_the_field\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Achdut on the Field"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#website","url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/","name":"Jewish Action","description":"Jewish Action | A publication of the Orthodox Union","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#organization","name":"Jewish Action","url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/jewish-action-logo.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/jewish-action-logo.png","width":253,"height":74,"caption":"Jewish Action"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/JewishAction","https:\/\/x.com\/Jewish_Action"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/person\/68ae2d310089113a32c7beb334843b97","name":"Steve Lipman","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e3e7e14e1b656414b10f05b42dfa15a5?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/e3e7e14e1b656414b10f05b42dfa15a5?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Steve Lipman"},"url":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/author\/steve_lipmanou-org\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/69"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=923"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/923\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19943,"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/923\/revisions\/19943"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jewishaction.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}