Looking at the Game of Baseball from all ends of the Spectrum
Pirate fans, Yankee-haters and baseball history buffs rejoice! Game Seven of the 1960 World Series will be shown on television this off-season.
All thanks to Bing Crosby who reportedly had the last copy of the game:
The copy had been in a vault Crosby built in his home and was discovered last year by an executive of Bing Crosby Enterprises. No other copy is known to have existed for nearly 40 years.
The game will be broadcast on MLB Network sometime this off-season.
On the same day, Jose Bautista hit his 50th homer of the season and Ichiro Suzuki got his 200th hit of the season for the tenth consecutive season.
Iâll give you one guess which story got the most news coverage. Yeah, Bautista.
Ichiroâs milestone is a significant one. No other player has accomplished such a feat. Not Cobb, not Hornsby nor Lajoie. Pete Rose is the only to have ten (non-consecutive) seasons with 200 hits.
Itâs a shared opinion among many of my baseball friends that if he chose to, Ichiro could hit 30 homers a season. Maybe more. He just chooses to play his brand of baseball. The one that earns him a .331 career batting average, best among active players.
I listened the other day as the talking heads on ESPN discussed the idea of Troy Tulowitzki earning this yearâs MVP based on his 14 homeruns in 15 game performance.
Sigh.
Ok, it makes for good TV and to their credit most of them came to the conclusion that if he did it again (assuming that were even possible this late in the season), he should get it. Otherwise, they wisely said no, probably not. Last year, Fangraphs had a good article on âWhen Samples Become Reliableâ. I think itâs relevant here.
But itâs more than just sample size too. Itâs choosing the range of data, too. Letâs take a hypothetical exampleâŚ
Say a player, call him Player X, goes hitless on Sunday and Monday. He then gets one hit on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. Friday and Saturday he goes hitless again. We could say:
Those are all correct statements but convey very different things. Itâs just human nature that most of us would like to probably choose to focus on the positive and most likely concentrate on the fact that Player X hit safely in three straight games.
So yeah, Tulo did hit 14 homeruns in 15 games and that is indeed a notable achievement. But letâs look at the whole picture, guys. He has 26 homeruns up to this point. The fact that Tulowitzki did this at this moment in the season probably didnât hurt. Had he done this in June, the boys on ESPN wouldnât have been bringing up his name.
Thoughts?
It is apparently big news that umpire Jim Joyce has to have his interviews approved by MLB.
This news comes in time for Joyceâs return to Detroitâs Comerica Park and his reunion with Armando Galarraga whose perfect game he bumbled earlier this year.
USA Today Sportsâ headline really puts the clamp-down on MLB officials. âUmpire Jim Joyce muzzled by MLB over Armando Galarraga reunionâ, it says. For a second or two, it even got my blood boiling. Then, I realized it was pretty much standard operating procedure for baseball employees whether they be players, umpires coaches or managers. Unless youâre Ozzie Guillen, most statements to the press need to go through a PR person who is sanctioned by MLB.
I donât like it but thatâs how it goes. It should be any surprise to anyone that MLB is still doing damage control.
They did take the muzzle off Joyce briefly so he could talk to the press about NOT talking to the press:
âYou know me â I’d normally do it in a heartbeat," Joyce said about 90 minutes before Friday’s game between Detroit and Baltimore. "But I got a call yesterday from Major League Baseball saying that I’m under restriction, and that all interview requests have to be approved by them."
Wait for Joyceâs auto-biography. Weâll hear all about it then.
I went to the Triple-A Indianapolis-Toledo game Friday night. Admittedly, the main reason was to see my friend and former Illini Shawn Roof play. Itâs the first time heâs played close to this area so I couldnât pass up the chance.
But the idea of going to Indianapolisâ Victory Field thrilled me too. Itâs been a while. The last time I went the Indians were the Brewersâ farm team. Victory Field is one of nicest Triple-A minor league parks Iâve been to. Iâm not the only one to think so⌠Baseball America named it Best Minor League BallPark in America.
The banners along the runway of former Indian player like you see above (I know a couple readers who might appreciate my choice of Minnie Minoso) were a nice touch and very well designed.
Look out! Indian mascot Rowdie looks angry.
I thought the scoreboard designed like a Facebook page was kinda hokey but I bet it goes over pretty well.
Not a particularly great photo but it does show how many people show up at games. Over 12,000 were at Fridayâs event.
No one left after the last out. It was Fireworks night.
The Mud Hens won 8-2. Shawn Roof helped the cause by going 1 for 3, scoring a run.
As we were passing by going north of Bloomington-Normal, Illinois, I got took this photo of the home of the Normal Cornbelters.
The Cornbelters who are in the independent Frontier League, have one of the more original names for a ballpark, in my opinion. Itâs called âThe Corn Cribâ.
My city-dwelling friends are snickering already. I know it. But as a farm kid who had a âcorn cribâ not too far away from the house, I think itâs pretty cool.
The Corn Crib is officially sponsored by the Illinois Corn Farmers. In this day and age of sports sponsors that consist of wireless phone companies, soda drinks manufacturers, and insurance companies, thatâs a little refreshing in my opinion. Note the tractors out front of the stadium.
For those University of Illinois sports fans, the Cornbelters have declared August 26th, âIllini Nightâ and have even convinced menâs basketball coach Bruce Weber to come down and throw out the first pitch. Thereâs added significance since the Cornbelters will be playing a team in the vicinity of Weberâs former team, the Southern Illinois Miners. More info at the Normal Cornbelters website.
I did a quick poll of the top stories of Andre Dawson entering the Hall of Fame. Of those articles with photos of him playing, the ratio of him in a Cub uniform as opposed to an Expo uni was about 2 to 1.
But Iâm not jealous. Really. Iâm just happy heâs getting in. And part of me is glad the Expos arenât forgotten. But Joe Jaffe from ESPN thinks Tim Raines should have been the first Expo, though.
and whatâs this⌠more talk about Lou Piniella eventually getting into the Hall? So says soon-to-be inductee Whitey Herzog.
I chuckled a bit when the wife brought these Feline âGreeniesâ treats home for our cat. Whatever gets our cat through her day, I guess.
My first thought? Pete Rose.
I ran this by a younger baseball fan (by younger, I mean someone born after the Ford Administration). He gave me a blank stare. Perhaps the more âseasonedâ baseball fans out there remember the significance of âgreeniesâ in baseball.
Oh yeah, drugs arenât funny.
Iâm still on this manager kick. Bear with me.
Has anyone heard of Jim Clinton or Joe Miller? Yeah, me either. They share the distinction of having lost the most games as a manager without a win. Interestingly, they both did it in 1872 and managed eleven games without taking home a win. Clinton did it with the Brooklyn Eckfords as a player/manager. He did go on to have a ten year career after that.
While Germany-born Miller did technically bat for the Washington Nationals (yeah, haha) in 1872, it was only four times so calling him a player/manager would be a misnomer. Calling him a ballplayer would almost be a stretch since he only played one more year after 1872.
To look at the other side, you wonât find as extravagant streaks on the winning end. You only have to go as far as Mel Harder. Yes, THAT Mel Harder. The All-Star Cleveland Indian pitcher managed three games and won them all. And thatâs as the most games a anyone has managed without losing a game.
Harder did this over a period of two years, 1961-62.
I guess this proves that itâs easier to lose than to win.
What do MLB managers Jim Leyland, Manny Acta and Jim Riggleman have in common?
None of these managers have ever played baseball at the major league level. In fact, of the current 30 managers, seven havenât ever played in the bigs.
Hereâs the list:
| Rk | Mgr | Yrs | G | W ? | L | W-L% | Plyof App | WSwon | PennWon |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jim Leyland | 19 | 2944 | 1461 | 1481 | .497 | 5 | 1 | 2 |
| 2 | Jim Riggleman | 11 | 1345 | 596 | 748 | .443 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 3 | Joe Maddon | 7 | 793 | 392 | 401 | .494 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| 4 | Manny Acta | 4 | 505 | 198 | 307 | .392 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 5 | Fredi Gonzalez | 4 | 555 | 276 | 279 | .497 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 6 | David Trembley | 4 | 470 | 187 | 283 | .398 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 7 | Trey Hillman | 3 | 359 | 152 | 207 | .423 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Leyland is obviously the most successful with 1461 wins, more than double than the #2 guy, Riggleman. Heâs also seen plenty of postseason time, too.