< Earlier Kibitzing · PAGE 197 OF 914 ·
Later Kibitzing> |
Jul-14-10
 | | Phony Benoni: Looks like a bad year for incumbents, even at the All-Star Game. Anyone catch Valverde's performance in the ninth inning? After years of riding the roller coaster with Todd Jones and Fernando Rodney, that's the sort of thing we're seeing now in Detroit. It's a weird feeling. |
|
Jul-14-10 | | Jim Bartle: The announcers on my channel were Rick Sutcliffe and Gary Thorne. Sutcliffe was saying it's a good thing pitchers don't bat in the AL, or Valverde would spend a lot of time in the dirt with that little hop and spin he does after a strikeout. Sutcliffe was laughing, but you could tell he didn't like it. He said Jeter and some of the AL players were stifling laughter and making a lot of comments. |
|
Jul-14-10
 | | Phony Benoni: I'm not a fan of overcelebrating, and getting pumped up over each out is a bit much for my taste. But in this case, I think the other teams are taking it too personally. Valverde's celebrations look like an internal reaction, not a personal triumph over a specific person. If he was making it personal by doing something like finger-pointing, that would be different. Or maybe I'm just being a hometown rooter.
If a person is looking for trouble, they'll find some even if they have to create it themselves. I imagine if he just stood there without emotion, they'd be mad because he was acting as though striking them out was no big deal. Sutcliffe, by the way, needs to go in for a 3,000 broadcast cliché overhaul. Valverde pitched in the NL for seven years before coming to the Tigers, and didn't get broken of the habit. Of course, as a closer he had only two at-bats in those seven years, so that old bromide didn't apply anyway. |
|
Jul-14-10 | | Jim Bartle: Sutcliffe is in fact a master of the cliche and overreaction to every little thing on the field. He's very pleasant overall, but his overpraising of ever tiny, obvious thing gets old fast. He's also one of those guys (with plenty of company) who judges the quality of every pitch by result. If a guy swings and misses, what a great pitch! If a guy hits the exact same pitch, it was a fat one, left out over the plate. |
|
Jul-15-10 | | playground player: <Phony Benoni> Sorry, PB, but your opinion in this matter doesn't count--you were obviously contaminated by Mark Fidrych and his antics on the mound. I don't remember--did The Bird pitch in an All-Star game? And if he did, did he confer with the baseball while on the mound? |
|
Jul-15-10 | | Jim Bartle: Fidrych talked to the ball, but I don't think he celebrated after a strikeout. (Of course, K's were few and far between for him.) Does anybody remember the time Graig Nettles stepped out against the Bird and started talking to his bat? Pointed to the rightfield stands and motioned with his hand where the bat needed to send the ball. |
|
Jul-15-10
 | | Phony Benoni: <playground player> Fidrych was just goofy. It wasn't like he was trying to intimidate or show any one up; he was what he was, and I think the other teams understood that. Or maybe I'm just being unduly partial again! Fidrych started the All-Star game that year, with his usual antics. Fans would have been disappointed otherwise. Indeed, other clubs began asking the Tigers to change their rotation so that Fidrych would pitch in their stadiums. The Nettles story supposedly ended with him striking out and saying, "Stupid Japanese bat. Doesn't understand a word of English." |
|
Jul-15-10 | | Deus Ex Alekhina: Phony, do have any mention of a Global World Series, Sept 1957, played at Briggs Stadium in your voluminous volumes? I can find scant reference while searching the internet. My father took me & my sister & we sat right next to the Japanese dugout & the Japs were surprisingly the crowd favorites against the Americans. As I remember, the Japanese won when an American home run was for some reason disallowed (maybe it was caught for an out - but the Americans rounded the bases & the score was posted, then reversed with no explanation). My older sister gestured to one player, asking him to autograph her program - and then he disappeared into the dugout, then came out after a few minutes with the entire team having autographed in a circular manner as if the rays of the rising sun. The Japanese flag! Sweet. |
|
Jul-15-10
 | | Phony Benoni: There's some information at http://bioproj.sabr.org/bioproj.cfm... . Down near the bottom, we find: <In 1957 Paul was invited to join the national champion Sinton (TX) Oilers team representing the United States in the third annual (and final) Global World Series, a round-robin competition matching non-professional baseball teams from eight countries on four continents. The tournament was the creation of Milwaukee industrialist (and Paul's team's sponsor) Dick Falk and former baseball commissioner Happy Chandler."Dick Falk was ahead of his time," Paul declares. "He used to say, 'We all don't speak the same language, but baseball is something we all understand.'" The 1957 games were played in Detroit's Briggs Stadium. The US team was the prohibitive favorite. Led by Paul's two triples and former New York Giant Clint Hartung's winning RBI single, the Oilers won their opening game against Colombia in 10 innings. Japan surprised the hosts, though, and defeated the United States, 3-2, and won the tournament. "The reason we lost," Paul explains, "is our pitcher was running and missed third base. It cost us a run." The only consolation for Paul was that he was named Outstanding Outfielder in the series.> This is very incomplete. The tournament used a double elimination format, so the United States was not eliminated until they lost 8-0 a few days later to Canada. The Canadians played the Japanese in the final, losing 4-2 in ten innings. There's a lot more information on the Canadian team, which featured a young Ron Fairly. Here's a few pictures: http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1957...
And a full account from the Canadian side, including the exciting playoff series that sent them to Detroit: http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1957...
By the way, I'm pretty sure it's a different Ernie Nevers. As for more information on the actual Japan - United States game, well, still looking. Odd how whenever the U.S. loses, the information seems to disappear. |
|
Jul-16-10 | | A.G. Argent: Uh-oh. Eldrick bogied the first two holes, fairly easy holes at that. +2 after three. He could be in trouble. Making the cut could be an issue. Pretty windy there, though. Actually suspended play this morning for a while because of the windier than usual conditions. |
|
Jul-16-10 | | playground player: <Phony Benoni> Greg Nettles had an unusual relationship with his bats. In his first season with the Yanks (1973, if memory serves), he tore up the league in April... until suddenly the top of the bat fell off and all these little super-balls rolled out. Good thing for Greg he had absolutely no idea who could've tampered with his bat. |
|
Jul-16-10 | | Deus Ex Alekhina: <PB> Thanks - the explanation that the pitcher, while running, missed the bag might be the reason a 3 run home run was disallowed for the American team. |
|
Jul-17-10 | | Jim Bartle: I'm watching some of the British Open and just saw something you see a lot in recreational rounds, but not often in pro tournaments. A guy had a really terrible hole (lost ball, shots in the deep rough, picking up the ball which was in play), and afterward the camera caught him looking back and pointing to the spots of his shots and counting: one there, two, three over there. Probably made a lot of hackers feel better. I think he had a 9.
And how about this? The young guy McIlroy who started with a 63 and followed it unbelievably with an 80, had a 69 today. That takes a lot more mental strength than I have. |
|
Jul-17-10
 | | Phony Benoni: Or a lot less wind. They may have to move the British Open to a dome to equalize the conditions. |
|
Jul-18-10
 | | WannaBe: Oh, baseball gurus (yeah, all of you guys and gals), do you know, of any player(s), that have stopped short of taking a base, just so he can get the cycle? E.g. stopping at first when he could have easily gotten a double, because he was a single away from a cycle? |
|
Jul-18-10
 | | Phony Benoni: <WannaBe> Here's a contemporary report of this happening to Jeff Frye of the Blue Jays. No doubt, this is just one instance of many: http://www.cbc.ca/sports/story/2001... Here's the box score from Retrosheet:
http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/... Note that the Blue Jays were ahead 11-2 at the time. I would certainly hope so. Pulling such a stunt with the game still in the balance should not be tolerated. In my opinion, the same applies to trying for an extra base to get the cycle, though that would be more justifiable. |
|
Jul-18-10 | | Jim Bartle: Say you had a homer, a single, and a double. You hit a ball over the wall. How do you get a triple? Can you just miss home plate and not come back to touch? Does that give you a triple? |
|
Jul-18-10 | | Travis Bickle: <Phony Benoni: Or a lot less wind. They may have to move the British Open to a dome to equalize the conditions.> Yes a dome would also be very effective in late December & January when sub below zero temps & snowfall could impact the golf. ; P |
|
Jul-18-10 | | Travis Bickle: <Jim Bartle: Say you had a homer, a single, and a double. You hit a ball over the wall. How do you get a triple? Can you just miss home plate and not come back to touch? Does that give you a triple?>
I'd call that an out. Marked as a homerun and failure to touch home plate. |
|
Jul-18-10 | | Jim Bartle: "Yes a dome would also be very effective in late December & January when sub below zero temps & snowfall could impact the golf. ; P" Just change to a brightly-colored ball. What's the big deal? |
|
Jul-18-10 | | A.G. Argent: Triples are hard enough in general and it's gotta be on-average, anyway, the pretty rapid guys that get 'em but Friday, ex-Giant (sorry, Jim) Bengie Molina (after hitting a grand salaam for his homer) gets his triple to attain the Cycle and he's got the hops of a sumo wrestler. But they're always dramatic and great fun. |
|
Jul-18-10 | | Jim Bartle: Bengie Molina hit a triple? Must have hit the wall and bounced away from the outfielder. |
|
Jul-18-10
 | | Phony Benoni: <JB> If the batter hits the ball over the fence and doesn't touch a base (either deliberately or by mistake), he can be called out on appeal by the other team. In such a case, he would get credit for the last base touched, so that would be a cheap way of getting a triple. A similar instance occurred in Harvey Haddix's near perfect game. Joe Adcock hit a home run, but passed Hank Aaron on the base paths. He had touched second base at the time, so he received credit for a double. Next time you see highlights of a walk off home run, tune out to the celebration and look for the home plate umpire. I can guarantee you he'll be watching to be sure the plate is touched. |
|
Jul-18-10
 | | Phony Benoni: This is not a slow motion replay:
http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp... <"Pigs have flown in Boston, Massachusetts!"> |
|
Jul-18-10 | | Travis Bickle: Phony I dedicate this clip to your forum! ; P
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rWoD... |
|
 |
 |
< Earlier Kibitzing · PAGE 197 OF 914 ·
Later Kibitzing> |