h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Very interesting article. As an American who has tried to understand cricket, it did help understand the controversy. It is probably a little more difficult for Americans, since in baseball, hitting the batter (not pancakes, our word for batsman) with the ball normally results in the batter being awarded first base, i.e. the equivalent of a free pass. Not always:

http://www.qcbaseball.com/baseball_rules/hit_by_pitch1.aspx

Even more interesting, to a Houston fan anyway, is the controversy around our own Houston Astro Craig Biggio (now retired), who got hit a LOT (holder of the modern record with 287 hbp's). The accusation was (is) that he wore a huge pad on his arm and simply let inside fast balls hit it. The pad is now in the Baseball Hall of Fame, and the satirical online newspaper "The Onion" had an article "Craig Biggio Blames Media Pressure For Stalling At 285 Hit-By-Pitches":

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/craig_biggio_blames_media_pressure

I recall once when an umpire denied the free base, and Biggio went ballistic. This kind of thing results in websites like:

http://plunkbiggio.blogspot.com/

I'm glad this was comprehensible to you .

What's the player-umpire relationship like in baseball? I assume (perhaps quite wrongly!) that it's not like cricket where the slightest sign of 'showing dissent' is likely to fetch you a fine.

Yes, baseball players tend to show disgust at umpires, but more often tend to fight opposing players. A pitcher will hit a batter, then in the next half inning the opposing pitcher will retaliate, often leading to the "bench clearing brawl", which has earned its own Wikipedia entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bench-clearing_brawl

Generally its the (non-playing) manager who really gets into it with the umpires:

" ... among a manager's duties is the stirring up of ruckuses with umpires ..."

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FCI/is_1_61/ai_80599486