I’m a little disappointed to learn that Pokémon Go has nothing to do with Gumby’s faithful sidekick.
Do not bring your Pokémon to my world. The only Pokey-anything I recognize is an orange horse that is adorable, made of clay, and bends. My world includes Gumby, dammit.
(Don’t even try to explain Pokémon to me. Just don’t.)
It is Thursday. There is no baseball tonight.
Here are three things you can do until baseball returns.
ONE: Now that I’ve watched this old episode where Gumby meets Pokey for the first time, I wonder if I have ever even seen a Gumby cartoon. Because it’s strange and trippy, wonderful and terrifying. There are more than a few childhood nightmares lurking in GumbyWorld. It would have scared the hell out of me. I learned from this 1956 episode that Pokey is not orange as I always thought – he is red – and he talks. Gumby has an incredibly unsafe relationship with firearms, but Pokey seems all right.
Pokey The Red Bendy Horse – 1 Pokemon Go – 0.
TWO: I may not Pokémon, but I can waste hours online as well as anyone. Look what I found … a photo messer-upper! (Don’t tell me about Instagram. I don’t care.) I like this simple and satisfying way to take a photo and make it look like someone spray painted it on a brick wall. There is no reason to do this, but I’m pleased to discover I can.
“There are two ways of learning to play base ball: the one is to learn it for the objects of recreation and exercise, and the other in order to become a skillful and noted player.”
“To learn the game, therefore, for the simple purpose of a few hours of recreation of a summer’s afternoon, is an easy task; but to go into a regular course of training, in order to become a professional player … involves steady and persevering application, fatiguing exertion, plenty of pluck and nerve, thorough control of the temper, great powers of endurance, and, withal, the physical aptitude to excel. …”The Game of Base Ball. How to Learn it, How to Play it, and How to Teach it. By Henry Chadwick, 1868
It is Wednesday. There is no baseball tonight.
It’s the annual All-Star break and there will be no major league games until Friday. It’s a civilized break that all those players with plenty of pluck and nerve have earned.
I fell asleep during last night’s All-Star Game, which I’m a little ashamed about. It makes me sound old, which I suppose I am. Pluckless, I guess. Maybe I just needed a civilized break, too.
I have nothing to do on this night without baseball.
Except wonder how the Orioles will do when they play again on Friday.
There’s a lot of baseball on the 4th of July. Playing baseball on Independence Day is a tradition that goes back more than a century – pretty much as long as baseball has been baseball.
All 30 big league teams will play today (weather permitting). There will be hundreds more playing in the minors, college summer leagues, kids’ leagues, and pick-up games. There will be a lot of baseball.
This is not about any of today’s games. (Except to say, “Good luck, Orioles. Don’t screw this road trip up any worse than you already have.”)
1881 was as good a 4th of July as any for baseball, I figured.
Because there were two games in Buffalo that day, along with two in Detroit, that marked the first-ever major league doubleheaders specifically created to take advantage of a holiday.
Public Domain
Troy Trojans Pitcher Mickey Welch
Because future Hall of Fame pitcher Mickey Welch of the Troy Trojans pitched both of those games against the Buffalo Bisons – complete games, winning both, including a three-hit shut-out in the afternoon.
Because, that 4th of July also was Welch’s 22nd birthday.
Game One: Troy Trojans – 8 Buffalo Bisons – 3
Game Two: Troy Trojans – 12 Buffalo Bisons – 0
There are no box scores from that game.
Well, that’s not exactly right. There are box scores. I just can’t read them …
Game 1 Box Score. Buffalo Morning Express, July 5, 1881
Pitching was different in 1881. Complete games – and two-man pitching rotations – were as normal then as worn-out bullpens and six-inning “quality starts” from your ace are today.
Public Domain
Troy Trojans, early 1880s. Welch may be the player seated at the far left.
Troy was a pretty lousy team with few hometown fans. So, the owners agreed to move a July 5 home game to fill out the Buffalo doubleheader. The teams would make more at the gate in Buffalo on a holiday then they could ever make in Troy on a Tuesday.
The story should end there:
The 4th of July. A Monday, just like today’s.
Mickey Welch – “Smiling Mickey,” the future Hall of Famer with the friendly demeanor and an assortment of quirky underhand curves – pitches 18 innings and wins two complete games in baseball’s first holiday doubleheader.
On his birthday. On America’s birthday.
I love that story.
Except for this.
As in all things, baseball doesn’t exist in a vacuum.
New York Times, July 3 1881
Two days earlier, President James A. Garfield was shot at a train station in Washington, DC.
Public Domain
President Garfield
If you know your high school history, this will all sound vaguely familiar. Just three months into his Administration, a deranged office-seeker shot Garfield twice – once in the arm and once in the belly. And, if you remember your medical science classes, you might recall that Garfield died two months later, not from the actual gunshot wounds, but from infection caused by the virtually nonexistent sanitation practices of the time and all the unwashed, dirty fingers that doctors used to probe the belly wound.
This lets a lot of the air out of an otherwise sweet 4th of July story.
The country was in shock. Citizens clogged city streets near newspaper and telegraph offices to get the latest news on the condition of the President.
His “condition” depended on the newspaper …
Washington Evening Critic, New York Times, and Buffalo Evening News, July 4, 1881
Many cities cancelled their Independence Day fireworks and events out of respect.
Buffalo called off its military parade. The city’s annual boating regatta went on as planned because, organizers agreed, the President seemed to be doing better by Sunday, and the weather was supposed to be perfect.
Buffalo Evening News, July 5, 1881
The Regatta, a Pigeon Shoot, and the Independence Day revelry of people shooting at each other went on as scheduled in Buffalo.
Despite the somberness of the weekend, people tried to get back to normal.
Baseball went on as planned and more than 4,000 fans attended the games against the Trojans at Buffalo’s Riverside Park.
“In the afternoon the stands were filled to sardine compactness and the assemblage was very enthusiastic,” according to the next day’s Buffalo Morning Express.
Troy surprised the Bisons. “It does seem ridiculous that such a motley combination of base-ball talent should be able, when they play in this city, to do such good work as the Troys,” The Express reported. “The [12-0 afternoon game] was a disgrace to the name of the Buffalos. … Welch was too much for the home club.”
The 4th of July wins were rare ones for the Troy Trojans. They finished the season in fifth place in the National League, with a 39-45 record. Twenty-one of those wins belonged to Welch.
President Garfield never recovered. He died on September 19.
The Troy Trojans folded the following season and Welch went on to become a star with the New York Gothams, whom you may know today by the nickname which ultimately stuck with them – the Giants.
Public Domain
After finishing his playing career – amassing 307 wins and a career 2.71 ERA — Welch went on to run a hotel and saloon and then a dairy business, before returning to baseball as a gatekeeper and attendant at both the Polo Grounds and Yankee Stadium.
Mickey Welch died of heart failure, at age 82, on July 30, 1941. On his death certificate his “Usual Occupation” was listed as this: “Baseball player.”
“There was a little girl who had a little curl, right in the middle of her forehead. When she was good she was very, very good, and when she was bad she wore this divine nightdress of rose-colored mousseline de soie, trimmed with frothy Valenciennes lace.” ~ Dorothy Parker
courtesy of sportslogos.net
A recent study of clothes and fashion found that the average woman, of which I am one, has 27 pairs of shoes. (I am assuming they all belong to her and she’s not like a puppy stealing the neighbor’s shoes and burying them in her closet.)
Men have, on average, 12 pairs. (They all look vaguely similar and most of them are New Balance.)
Women take a lot of heat from guys who don’t understand why we need so many shoes, including at least one pair that we’ve never worn. Sure, it doesn’t make sense. To you. But, it does to me, so shut up about the shoes.
If you want to rag on fashion, how about Major League baseball?
Because in 2016, the 30 teams will wear all sorts of specialty uniforms – throwback days that nearly every team has, and league-wide celebrations of holidays and special events, including Mother’s and Father’s Day, Memorial Day, the Fourth of July, the All-Star Game, and even the Home Run Derby, which isn’t even a game, but three hours of watching your favorite player destroy his swing for the rest of the season.
Teams will wear each of these special jerseys and caps for one day and that will be that.
So before you make fun of what women keep in their closets, be advised that while we, on average, do have something tucked away on a hanger that we only wore once (and maybe, kind of, regret now), Major League Baseball has given every player lots of wear-it-once jerseys and caps – in addition to their regular three or four home-and-away uniforms.
With 750 active players on team rosters, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Memorial Day, and the Fourth of July alone will add up to 3,000 special caps and jerseys – which, Mathlete Alert!, will weigh about 3,000 pounds. (The average cap weighs 6 ounces, the average jersey, 10 ounces.)
After the games, players and coaches autograph their one-day jerseys so they can be auctioned off with the proceeds going to various veterans’ organizations and cancer research groups. (Although with 3,000 of these things going on the block every season, when will the “exclusive” wear off?)
But, I like the effort. Good for you, baseball.
Unfortunately, the jerseys are, for the most part, meh.
You can check out every single one that will be worn by every single team this seasonhere.
Mother’s Day?
courtesy of sportslogos.net
Pink.
Father’s Day?
courtesy of sportslogos.net
Blue.
Memorial Day?
courtesy of sportslogos.net
I can still see the logos, so that’s lousy camouflage if you ask me.
Fourth of July.
courtesy of sportslogos.net
Stars.
Whoo.
I do like the Home Run Derby jerseys which will be worn during this year’s All-Star Game festivities – but not the actual game – in San Diego.
courtesy of sportslogos.net
They pay homage to the 1970s-era Padres and their very, um, 1970s sense of fashion. In an era that churned out way too many baby blue leisure suits, elephant bell bottoms, and boxy crocheted vests, there’s something warm and retro-sweet about that Padres’ brown-orange-and-mustard combo. It reminds me of my mom’s kitchen.
Sure, I could complain about the Fourth of July and these dull star-speckled caps, but I think I do that every year around this time, mainly because I’m curious to see how the Toronto Blue Jays will celebrate a holiday that doesn’t belong to them.
This year …
courtesy of sportslogos.net
A bunch of stars for 29 teams.
courtesy of sportslogos.net
A bunch of maple leafs for Toronto.
It’s supposed to look like mesh, I suppose, but it reminds me of those old dot-matrix printers that you might be too young to remember.
The throwbacks that many teams will wear throughout the season are way cooler. Like the Pittsburgh Pirates in their Stargell-era uniforms that they are wearing on Sundays.
Awww, it’s the pillbox cap!
But, the coolest of all are those that turn up each season in the minor leagues.
Like the Stockton Ports who recently celebrated Asparagus Night.
And, the Lehigh Iron Pigs who celebrate bacon every Saturday.
And, the Fresno Grizzlies who celebrate tacos every Tuesday.
I wish every day was Taco Tuesday. I am so hungry right now I can’t even finish this post …
BIG THANKS to Chris Creamer of SportsLogos.Netwho kindly allowed me to use his photos of this year’s specialty uniforms. Check out his website here: http://www.sportslogos.net
You know what’s a great baseball movie? The Bad News Bears. That’s a pretty great baseball movie.
The original one.
Field of Dreams is an ok baseball movie.
So what if it made you cry? That doesn’t make it a great movie.
Lots of lousy things can make you cry. Fussy contact lenses, broken legs, dropping your ice cream.
This one-minute home video is as good as any movie. Cute characters. Drama. Tragedy. Loss. Heartbreak. Happy ending. (Plus, the kid’s hair swirls just like his ice cream.)
But, back for just a sec’ to Field of Dreams. As the movie winds down, Kevin Costner’s character, picks up his baseball glove, turns to his ghost father, and says, “Hey … dad? Wanna have a catch?”
Wanna have a catch?
If I asked my dad if he wanted to have a catch, he would have looked at me funny and said, “Play catch. It’s play catch, not have a catch. What the hell are they teaching you in school?”
I figured “have a catch” was just some insipid, affected phrase that the movie came up with.
Until I looked around.
Bet you weren’t expecting Shakespeare.
In Twelfth Night, which is Shakespeare (and, no, I did not know this, but the Internet can make you seem way smarter than you actually are), Sir Toby Belch says, “Welcome, ass. Now, let’s have a catch.”
“Welcome, ass,” sounds way more Bad News Bears than Field of Dreams and has encouraged me to rethink my Shakespeare.
Smart people will explain that Shakespeare’s “Welcome, ass. Now, let’s have a catch.” means “Hey stupid. Sing us a song.” Seriously? That makes no sense.
Never mind. I’m not rethinking Shakespeare.
But, Sir Toby Belch is an awesome name. Like a baseball mascot. So, credit for that.
At first, I couldn’t find a pre-Field of Dreams reference to “have a catch” except for Shakespeare. I was ready to say, “Yup, Field of Dreams just made it up.”
But, then I found this.
In May 1953, Washington Post sportswriter Shirley Povich was profiling Willie Mays.
In that piece he wrote: “Willie didn’t bother to learn the names of his Giants’ teammates. ‘Say, Hey,’ was his favorite salutation. ‘Say, Hey, wanna have a catch,’ ‘Say, Hey, we gonna beat ‘em good to-day.’ They in turn called him ‘Say, Hey Willie.’”
Say, Hey, wanna have a catch?
So, if you’re Kevin Costner or Sir Toby Belch, go with ‘have a catch’ if you want. If Willie Mays said it, then I’m willing to concede it’s ok.
But, it still sounds a bit weird and la-dee-dah to me.
It’s play catch.
Dad. Not having a catch.
My dad and I didn’t play much catch when I was growing up anyway. Mostly we played basketball together because that was his thing.
And, we shot free throws. Lots and lots of free throws. Because, free throws are something you can get right. And, so he taught me the free throw he knew I could practice and get right.
The same free throw Rick Barry used. The same one Barry also taught his kids.
The embarrassing and ugly one. But, if you practiced, it was the one that would always go in.
It was better, my dad would say, to get the point regardless of how silly you looked doing it.
Don’t say stupid things. That was something else my dad taught me.
Like “have a catch.”
Or, “It’s 13-2, the Orioles are losing.”
If my dad were around today he would grumble about that.
“They’re not losing,” he would say, “they’re just behind.”
This was his rule and he would always correct me when I got it wrong.
As he would explain it, if the game isn’t over, your team hasn’t lost, so they’re not losing. As long as there’s hope, they’re not losing, they’re just behind.
And, don’t say your team is winning either. Your team hasn’t won yet, things can change. They’re just ahead.
“You’re not losing, because you haven’t lost yet.”
He wasn’t exactly correct about this, but he wasn’t wrong either. It was his rule and I stick to it today.
As for the Orioles on Friday night, he was right. They weren’t losing 13-2. They were just behind.
Because, they “rallied” in the bottom of the 9th to make it was 13-3 and that was how they lost.
Yup, things can change. (But, not enough when the pitchers desert you.)
My dad was fussy about things. Things should be just-so. And, even though he’s been gone nearly 10 years, I try to remember the rules he taught me.
And, I’ve become fussy, too, about things. Like serial commas. Proper punctuation. And, always running out ground balls because you never know when a little mistake by the other team might be all you need. Because, you haven’t lost yet.
If it wasn’t you in high school picked last for whatever gym class you were in, then it was me – or someone who was a lot like me who could think of a hundred other things they would rather be doing than dressing for gym to play something they were not very good at.
Most days we were stuck in the gym, and sometimes I would just tell the coach I had my period. And, cramps. Cramps are the magic word in girls’ gym. They were the “out.” No one argues if you say you have cramps. I would gather my things and sit up in the bleachers with the other girls – the pregnant ones and the ones with sprained ankles and broken arms — and read a book while the rest of the class played whatever gym game the coach had come up with that day.
But, I’ve carried this secret for decades, and it’s time to come clean. I didn’t have cramps. Many times I didn’t even have my period. I lied to the coach.
Because I didn’t want to be picked last. Again.
But, being picked last to do something you didn’t want to do anyway, is sort of just a rite of teenage passage, isn’t it?
It’s nothing like being picked last in this week’s Major League Baseball draft which went on for three days and 40 rounds and more than 1,200 picks. Because last is still far, far better than not-being-picked-at-all.
So, congratulations, Jeremy Ydens who was drafted yesterday by the St. Louis Cardinals. Pick #1,216.
Ydens, a pitcher and hard-hitting outfielder from St. Francis High in Mountain View, California, is committed to UCLA and is probably heading there in the fall. The draft was a toss-away by the Cardinals, hoping maybe he’d change his mind about that college thing.
(Some draft blogs are reporting this morning that Ydens has already “undrafted” himself.)
In high school, Ydens was a .403 batter and a pitcher with a 1.32 ERA.
“Even when Ydens wasn’t feeling well, he came through in the clutch. Unable to pitch against Valley Christian in late April because he had been under the weather, Ydens ended the tense game with a walk-off home run in the 10th inning, giving St. Francis a victory that keyed its league title run. ‘That was pretty crazy,’ Ydens said last week. ‘I still get chills looking at it and thinking about it.’” ~ The Mercury News, in naming Ydens its Player of the Year in 2015.
Doctor, teacher, firefighter, nurse, baseball player. Ask a little kid today what they want to be when they grow up and that’s what they’ll say. (In that order, according to one recent survey.)
(No kid, apparently, wants to be a blogger.)
To be drafted at all – whether first or 1,200th – to get the chance to play the game that is loved and hungered for by so many thousands of other young players whose dreams, like winning the lottery, are so much bigger than their reality, is impressive. To get that chance to climb to the highest level, a level that the rest of us can’t really understand, is amazing. Maybe even life-changing.
So, congratulations to Jeremy Ydens and to the 1,215 other players who play at the top of their high school or college game and who were drafted by major league teams this week. These young players work hard to make it look easy.
Sure, I know. There are just 750 spots filling out the rosters of 30 big league teams. There just aren’t enough spots for all of you.
They think I just live in the past … just re-posting and re-watching this clipfrom 2011, one of my favorite baseball moments, over and over and over.
(You don’t need to watch it. Seriously. It’s a couple years old and, really, while it is one of my favorite moments in the history of baseball, you don’t have to waste one minute to watch this clip no matter how magical that one minute will be for you.)
I don’t hate the Red Sox.
I’m not angry at them. You know, this kind of angry …
That’s Red Sox DH David Ortiz answering the dugout phone at Camden Yards in 2013.
Actually, I think I’m pretty fair to every team.
And, in that spirit, and because it is brilliant, here’s a new commercial of David Ortiz and piñatas.
(I hope he’s trying to earn enough money to buy Baltimore a new dugout phone.)
It was during my junior year in high school that the school math team – the “mathletes” – were one player short. There were four mathletes ready to go, but they needed a five.
I’m not sure why my geometry teacher invited me to join the team. I wasn’t particularly good in his class and I was pretty clear that I hated two things in school – gym and numbers. But, I would always laugh at his jokes. So, I was his choice. Your take away from this: a good chuckle might take you far in this world.
He convinced me to join the team, which was about to go to the state tournament in Minot, by promising we would stop for banana splits on the two-hour drive back home. Yes, if there was a banana split in it for me, I could spend the day with four geeky mathletes and a teacher who told corny jokes.
I have no memory of the meet except for sitting at a long table, writing problems on pieces of paper, and being forbidden from using a calculator. We didn’t win, but I don’t think I was too terrible.
In any event, the Dairy Queen in Rugby was out of bananas by the time we got there. This is my only clear memory of my one day as a mathlete. Even the worst mathlete knows that zero bananas means zero banana splits.
So, funny that I’ve come to love baseball which is all numbery and statisticfied.
The Baseball Project even wrote a song that is only numbers – comforting and familiar baseball stats. Here are the lyrics in their entirety:
Remember the snorting bull from the movie Bull Durham?
It stood out in right field. And, included these words …
Hit Bull Win Steak.
Of course you remember, because Bull Durham is Kevin Costner’s best baseball movie.
That bull was a movie prop. There was no “Hit Bull Win Steak” bull in Durham until the movie dreamed it up. This was a little disappointing. I thought the Durham Bulls had long had a steak-feeding tradition. After all, minor league per diems are pretty slim, even today. A good steak could keep a fella going.
I guess it was too much prop to pack up when the movie wrapped – plus, think of all the bubble wrap you’d need – so it was left behind.
Movie props aren’t made to last, so it’s a new bull out there in Durham these days. It’s bigger and it’s out in left field now. And, whenever the Bulls homer, anywhere in the park, its eyes light up, its tail wags, and it snorts smoke.
Today it says:
Hit Bull Win Steak
Hit Grass Win Salad
And, yup, a local restaurant provides a steak to players who hit a home run off of the bull. (No word on whether a ball that hits the grass actually earns a trip to the salad bar, or if anyone has ever asked.)
Last season, The News & Observer in Raleigh noted that since the new park opened in 1995, the bull has been hit only 29 times. (They also report that there is no longer a steak offered to visiting players for their homers off of the bull. Boo.)
Most of the bull-snortin’ home runs come from high fly balls that hit it on their way down. You’d have to really smoke it to line a homer off the bull. You know, smack it right between the eyes.
College baseball’s ACC Tournament is underway this week at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park.
And, on Thursday, Virginia shortstop Daniel Pinero did this …
“Right Between The Eyes.”
Lots of smoke-snortin’. But, alas, no steak. College amateur rules are fussy about things like that. But, Sports Channel 8 in North Carolina is providing a “steak dinner” donation to the local food bank in honor of Pinero.
Despite the bullish homer, the ‘Hoos lost yesterday’s game against Clemson (and lost to Wake Forest again today).
THREE: There is no three. There is only killing time with Gumby, Pokey, photo messer-uppers … and this …
The Baseball Bloggess 