How Many Innings Are in a Baseball Game?
There are nine innings in a professional baseball game. Each inning is divided into two halves: the top and the bottom. In a baseball game, the visiting team bats first, followed by the home team. For example, in a game between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox that is held at Yankee Stadium in New York, the Red Sox bats first. Each inning ends when a team has three outs. An out happens if a batter gets three strikes (they are unable to hit the ball within three pitches or throws), if a hit ball is caught in the air, or if a base runner is tagged out.
As mentioned in the introduction, a team should aim to have more runs than the opposing team. The two teams bat over nine innings, and the team with the most runs after nine innings wins. If both teams have the same number of runs after nine innings, additional innings are played until, at the end of an extra inning, one team has more runs than the other. A game also ends when the home team is leading at the bottom (or second half) of the ninth inning, as the visiting team (the first team to bat) is unable to get more runs to even the score.