Teddy Ballgame | The Baseball Zealot

REDLINE DOUBLEHEADER ABORTED

The Unfriendly (at least to the disabled) Confines were at it again. When I got off the Red Line after watching the White Sox as the first part of my day/night doubleheader, I noticed that the brisk wind would be blowing into my face all night long. So I went over to the box office and asked if I could exchange my bleacher seat for a ticket in the wheelchair section in the upperdeck behind home plate. The guy in the ticket window, checked, and said there should be no problem as long as there was still one seat left when my ticket was dropped off at the courtesy dropoff window a little after five. But he said I’d have to do that in any of the last four ticket windows.

I told him I’d go to my favorite place to eat in Wrigleyville, the Salt & Pepper Diner, and I’d be back. I don’t know what it is, but the Salt & Pepper Diner is always empty, despite the fact the food is great and a pitcher of beer will only set you back $7.00. My dinner, which consisted of a black bean burger, tater tots, and the most delicious chocolate malt ever was just over ten bucks. After chowing down it was time to return to one of the last four ticket windows after picking up my ticket from the courtesy dropoff window.

I told the man that I wanted to exchange my bleacher ticket for an upper deck wheelchair seat. The ticket guy went away, came back, and asked if I was going to be in a wheelchair? Although I walk with crutches and long leg braces, I don’t use a wheelchair, someday I may have to, but not yet. He said the only way he could do the exchange was if I was in a wheelchair. I told him the last time I sat in those upperdeck wheelchair seats I’d purchased just an upperdeck ticket, the usher up there had customer service run my credit card for the difference in the ticket price, and told me the next time I wanted to sit there I should just ask for a seat up there. The ticket window guy said it was policy and he couldn’t sell me a wheelchair seat without me being in a wheelchair.

I took my bleacher ticket back from the ticket window guy and told him I’d never be coming back to Wrigley Field. I told him I have had seasons tickets for the Bulls for over thirty years, never a problem. I go to about 40+ games a year at the Cell to see the White Sox, never a problem. I go to the UC to see the Hawks, never a problem. The ONLY place where I have a problem is Wrigley Field. Then I told him, I HATE THIS PLACE! It’s no wonder this organization has been losing for going on 100 years.

A similar incident happened a few years back when I attempted to purchase a wheelchair seat in the lower deck boxes behind the plate. I had been sitting in those seats on and off since I attended my second big league game at the age of thirteen in 1969. However on this day I was told I needed to be in a wheelchair. When I questioned the Cubs, Frank Maloney informed me that it wasn’t his policy, it was ADA telling him that only disabled persons in a wheelchair should be allowed to sit in wheelchair seats. I called the ADA, they told me this was untrue. I informed Frank of what the ADA said, he said, it was the Cubs official policy. He told me he’d provide me with a written copy of this policy when I asked for one, then he called me back to say, there was no Cubs official policy, this was his policy. The kicker was the Cubs provided me with a seat behind the last row of the old grand stands, when I got to my seat there was no seat, just a spot for a wheelchair, they could bring me a folding chair if I’d like. Since that incident I’ve attended only Cub games in the bleachers, except for the one time I was accommodated with a wheelchair seat in the upperdeck.

Like I said, I walk with crutches & long leg braces, cannot climb stairs, and I cannot sit in regular seats because my legs do not bend & cannot fit, also people need to climb over me. Plus I cannot jump to my feet when something exciting happens, so I end up missing the best part of the game when everybody stands up in front of me.

I’m not a snot nosed whiny little loser Cub fan, I’m a White Sox fan! I will never set foot in Wrigley Field again. To my way of thinking the Cubs don’t exist, there is only one major league team in Chicago. I’ll continue to go to the Cell, where they know how to take care of their fans. LET’S GO WHITE SOX!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KID

Today, April 15th, was John Danks’ 23rd birthday, even with my birthday transposed, I’m older than he is. Danks was starting for the White Sox today versus the A’s.

But that wasn’t what I was thinking about as I got dressed for a big day of baseball. It was Jackie Robinson Day at all MLB Ballparks across America. Minnie Minoso was receiving a lifetime achievement award from the Negro League Hall of Fame. The Negro League Hall of Fame was Buck O’Neil’s place in KC. It’s a travesty and a shame that Buck passed without getting into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. Maybe his stats weren’t the greatest, but Buck was! O’Neil built the Negro League Hall of Fame and kept the Negro Leagues’ memory alive. He was also the first black coach in the majors, with the Cubs. Minnie Minoso also needs to get into the Hall before he passes, he looks great, but he’s not getting any younger, none of us are.

Joining me behind home plate today was Tade (Buehrle’s game the day before was the first game he missed all year) & Steve (another huge Sox fan, who comes as often as he can). Dick & Bea were also there, Dick told a Bubba story that had Tade & I laughing so hard, we were crying. Visited with Mike & his brother over at the caramel corn stand. Seeing it was a day game I stopped in to see Nancy Faust. Nancy looks as good as ever, a blonde, as cute as could be, and friendly! I sympathized with Nancy at the passing of her mother, who would have been 94 this year, she had cancer, and died shortly after her son-in-law, Nancy’s brother-in-law, died of pancreatic cancer. Why do bad things happen to good people?

Well John Danks celebrated his birthday by firing goose eggs at the A’s. The White Sox really flashed the leather behind JD Jr. Alexi Ramirez cutoff a sure double into right center, whirled, and fired to second to easily gun down a shocked Emil Brown. Brown saluted Ramirez as he headed back to the dugout. Joe Crede made a diving stop toward the line, got to his feet, and threw one into the dirt, that was scooped by Nick Swisher. Then there were a couple of dandies turned in by Orlando Cabrera, our new SS, I think I’m gonna like this guy. Carlos Quentin launched a three run bomb into the leftfield stands. The score was 4-0 when Ozzie Guillen lifted Danks in favor of Scott Linebrink with two out, a runner on 1st, and John at 95 pitches thrown. Linebrink allowed the first two runners to reach in the 9th, was replaced by Bobby Jenks, who allowed a sac fly, and a doubleplay closed it out.

I was off to the Red Line to catch the 2nd game of my doubleheader at Wrigley. Judy had a bleacher ticket waiting for me at the courtesy dropoff window.

SOX COMEUP SHORT ON BG’s B*DAY

Went to the Cell for the first time this year to see if history could repeat itself, last year April 18th Mark Buehrle pitched a no hitter, I was there the day before/after the no-no, but wasn’t there the night of. This year, April 14th (my birthday, Greg Maddux’ birthday, and the BZ’s birthday – Happy Birthday to all), I wasn’t gonna miss it, even though it was a brisk 30 degree night. The day before it was a chilly Sunday, I watched it on TV, listened to it on radio, and the White Sox clubbed the Tigers 11-0, behind Javier Vazquez, and two grand slams (one by Paul Konerko & the other by Joe Crede). First time the Sox ever hit two salamis in Chicago, EVER! My timing seems a bit off.

Heading down to the Cell on the Red Line was like coming home again, it just felt right. As I was about to purchase my half price Monday ticket, a woman with an extra gave me a freebie, can’t beat it. I took my usual position 34 rows behind home plate, said hi to Dick & Bea (they own the seats right in front of where I stand), Mike (he runs the caramel corn stand behind home plate), and then Al & Anthony (father & son who come to quite a few games behind the dish). It was great to see everybody again.

Also in attendance was Jermaine Dye’s father (he always gets a big bag of caramel corn from Mike). Al asked JD’s Dad if he played in the NBA, Dye’s Dad nodded and said, with the Detroit Pistons.

The White Sox ended up losing 2-1, but you can’t beat fun at the old ballpark. Maybe I’ll have better luck tomorrow as I’m planning on doing a Red Line Doubleheader (Sox in the day, Cubs at night).

IAL GOES HIGH TECH

This past Saturday the IAL stepped into the future playing the first ever series over SKYPE. The IAL is a 10 team draft 30+ year old dice baseball league, games are played using the board game APBA, a predecessor of Strat-O-Matic. You can see a complete baseball register of the Illowa APBA League here.

League members are from the Chicago area, the Quad Cities area, the Champaign area, and Pittsburgh. We play a 162 game schedule, face-to-face, we get together three times of year for the out-of-town series, and play local guys throughout the year. Our May get together will be on the May 17th weekend, I cannot make it, so we tried SKYPE.

It worked like a charm as the Green Rock Bombers hosted the Chicago Champions. Greg Maddux, the league’s all-time winningest pitcher (today’s his birthday, mine too, also the Baseball Zealot is three years old today – Happy Birthday to All!), took the bump for the Champs vs the Bombers Carlos Zambrano. Grady Sizemore opened the game with a leadoff single as Chicago took a 1st inning two nothing lead, but trailed after one 4-2. Not to be denied the Champions scored 11 enroute to a three run victory.

Last year’s first place finishers, the Bombers are retooling this year, while the Champs are poised to make a run at their 11th Championship, although we haven’t won in over a decade, boy that seems like a long time ago.

SKYPE is great technology for realtime audio & video. The picture & sound were clear, although my opponent kept asking if I could put a 25 year old female in front of my webcam. It was like we were sitting right across the table from each other. There was even the advantage of Mike being able to smoke in his basement, while my kitchen remained smoke free, blowing smoke at the camera was humorous rather than aggravating.

TREVOR H-AWFUL-MAN

Jose Valverde was brought into a tie ballgame in the bottom of the 8th to hold the Padres and give his guys a shot in the 9th. But as luck would have it Valverde allowed the go ahead run.

So the Astros would have to bat off the alltime saves leader (526) Trevor Hoffman trailing by a run with three outs to go. Trevor got the first two batters he faced before the next three batters reached base on two hits and a base on balls, then Fat Elvis, Lance Berkman ended Hoffman’s night with a three run big fly. Papa Grande retired the side in order to close it out for a back door win.

Today, after last night’s blown save (#64 of his career), Trevor rebounded against the Stros protecting a Padres one run lead with a one, two, three ninth inning for his 527th save of his career. Most blown saves in the history of MLB are Goose Gossage 112, Rollie Fingers 109, Jeff Reardon 106, Lee Arthur Smith 103, and Bruce Sutter 101. Interesting to note that of the five Hall of Fame relief pitchers, three rank high on the blown saves list, Goose Gossage, Rollie Fingers, & Bruce Sutter. Only two Hall of Fame relievers didn’t hit the high note in blown saves, Hoyt Wilhelm & Dennis Eckersley. Amazing, with perception being what it is, I’d have thought Hoffman would have blown more saves and Gossage less, go figure.

4/3/08: JOHNNY CUETO – WOW!!!

Through five innings of his major league debut Johnny Cueto is making it look much too easy. Cueto has a perfect game with eight K’s and the Reds lead the Diamondbacks 3-0. Johnny is only 5’10” tall, but has the heart of a lion and is shaking off his veteran catcher in his first big league start. He is pitching with a purpose.

I saw this kid in the grapefruit league when I saw the Reds in Dunedin. As I was leaving the ballpark I had to ask a scout with a gun what he had “that Cueto guy” clocked at, between 92-94 was his reply.

Johnny Cueto (win) 7 IP, 1 HR (Upton HR), 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 10 K

PUTTING THE FRANCHISE IN JEOPARDY

I tuned into the Dodgers/Giants game last night to watch Tim Lincecum pitch for San Francisco. When I turned the game on in the 2nd inning, neither Chad Billingsley nor Lincecum were pitching for their ballclubs. I was wondering, what the heck is going on?

As I watched further I realized there was a thunderstorm that was supposed to have hit LA a little after the game began. So both managers decided to start the game with relief pitchers and bring in their prized young flame throwers after the rain delay.

However the rains didn’t come and the waether forecasters predicted there’d be a two hour window in which to get the game in. Bruce Bochy brought in the Franchise to face the Dodgers in the bottom of the 4th of a zero-zero game, James Loney got the kid for an opposite field RBI single.

It should be noted the rain started coming down just as Lincecum took the bump. Rather than paying attention to what was going on in front of his face, manager Joe Torre followed suit by bringing on Billingsley to face the Giants in the top of the 5th. Chad allowed SF to tie the game when the umpires called for the tarp before the Giants could complete turn at bat. Perhaps the Dodgers would have been better served if Torre had brought on his closer to close out the fifth with a 1-0 lead, then if the game couldn’t be completed it would have been a Los Angeles win.

The delay lasted about an hour. Surprisingly Bruce Bochy put the Franchise back out there after the rains had stopped. Why would you jeopardize such a talent in a meaningless game of a meaningless season for the Giants? San Francisco is going nowhere this year! Maybe Bochy got away with it, perhaps Lincecum will have no ill effects from this folly, but this is what separates the good managers from the bad. Joe Torre decided not to return his young hurler to the mound in a season where it’ll come down to the wire in LA.

THE HITMAN BATS 9th

Ned Yost has decided to bat his catcher Jason Kendall 9th this season, behind his pitcher. The reason states Yost, “Jason hits into a lot of doubleplays and I don’t want him hitting into a doubleplay with my pitcher coming up next. Besides if the pitcher bunts up a runner before Kendall comes to the plate, there’s no chance to ground into a DP”.

It’s been pretty interesting to see what the media thinks of this move. There has pretty much been no comment from the media, the silence has been deafening. As opposed to when Tony LaRussa has moved a batter into the 9th spot in the order to get two leadoff batters. I have a theory about this, the media is waiting out Ned, thinking, this guy’s a goof. But with Tony, the genius, it was, we mustn’t truly comprehend the genius that’s going on here.

In yesterday’s game against the Cubs the Brewers backstop picked up three hits in four at bats, with two RBI’s, to raise his season average to a robust .500. We’ll have to see how this experiment goes. But here’s to Ned Yost for thinking outside the box.

REDS edWIN

I was watching the end of the Cincinnati/Arizona game last night on the MLB package, only on DirectTV. Brennaman & Brantley were doing the game for the Reds, the game was in the bottom of the 9th, two on, nobody out, Diamondbacks up two, with Edwin Encarnacion at the plate facing closer Brandon Lyon.

The announcers are debating whether the runners should be advanced with a bunt. Brennaman is saying EE has never successfully sacrificed in his career and his stats show him to be a clutch performer. Brantley counters that according to the book you’ve got to bunt and if Encarnacion can’t bunt then they should send somebody up there who can. And besides that states Brantley, Edwin is not clutch.

In the meantime Dusty “Play it by the Book” Baker wants the batter to bunt. I’m SCREAMING at Baker through my TV set, “He can’t bunt! Use your friggin brains!” But alas Dusty can’t hear me or he’s paying no attention to what I’m saying.

No matter, as Encarnacion is now in the hole 1-2 after two futile bunt attempts, then there’s a breaking pitch in the dirt. As Lyon comes home with the pitch, Brennaman & Brantley continue the debate. Brennaman says Edwin is clutch, Brantley yells as the sphere is headed plateward, He is not clutch!

Of course the batter connects sending a screamer into the leftfield stands for a game winning home run, Brennaman asks will it be deep enough? Is he clutch? Brantley comments that he has never been so wrong. Brennaman mutters something about, well according to the book, probably thinking to himself he has to work with this goofball all season long.

Classic: Brennaman signs off with, “That’s all from Cincinnati. Final score Arizona 6, Reds 5”.

DODGERS DELWYN

Pinch hitter Delwyn (everyone calls me “PeeWee”) Young delivered in the bottom of the 9th with a two out infield hit. Rafael Furcal scored from secondbase as Giants secondbaseman frantically tried to throw out the blur that was Young streaking toward firstbase. Durham’s throw was late and by the time firstbaseman Rich Aurilia threw home, a hustling Furcal was under Benji Molina’s swipe tag with the winning run.

San Fran had taken the lead in the top of the 7th, but beleagured reliever Brad Hennesey spit it right back out when Furcal got him with two RBI’s in the bottom of the frame.

Two Japenese imports figured in the decision, Saito got the win and Yabu picked up the loss.

It was interesting earlier in the game when Bruce Bochy removed pitch count challenged SF starter Matt Cain in the bottom of the 6th, in a nothing-nothing game, Cain had thrown 114 pitches. Wisconsin native lefthanded reliever Jack Taschner was brought on to face Juan Pierre with the bases loaded and two outs. Joe Torre went with the book, sending Matt Kemp up to pinch hit, even though Taschner was much more effective against righties than lefties last season. Of course, Matt Kemp struckout, where are you Bill James?