Kingman vs. Schmidt

[G-Fafif]

Dave Kingman should have beat out Mike Schmidt for the 1976 National League home run title. Even with the torn ligaments in his thumb he should have gotten to 39 frigging home runs once he returned to action.

I was just looking something up, came across statistics that triggered this long-dormant disappointment and now I'm modestly pissed off about it all over again.

[Guest Edgy DC]

That injury was the turning point in his career.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

I remember the night he suffered that injury, we were "camping" in Chris Walsh's backyard and I listened on transistor radio, just heartbroken. I thought he might have a shot at 58 or more that year.

[Benjamin Grimm]

I was away on vacation with my family. I would keep checking newspaper box scores to see if Kingman had homered, but after a while he stopped even appearing in the boxes, and I had no idea why. It wasn't until I returned home to New York that I learned about his injury. (I assumed he had been injured, of course, but I had no idea of the severity or how long he was expected to be out.)

[Guest themetfairy]

I didn't realize that a person could have thumb ligament injuries until that night. Knee ligaments, sure. But I had never heard of someone injuring a thumb ligament until Kingman did it.

[G-Fafif]

At the time of the mishap, Kingman 32 Schmidt 24.

Final totals, Schmidt 38 Kingman 37.

[batmagadanleadoff]

I was there. What I remember the most about that game -- besides Kingman's injury -- was walking around the field box section for the first two or three innings because an adult relative tried to hook up with his usher connection who went by the name of "The Phantom". We ended up sitting in field box, very short right field, in front of the wide aisle that split the field box section in half.