MFS62

I saw Ron Bloomberg's name come across my "people you might know" on Facebook, and thought it might be interesting friending him. He accepted, and sent this: Thank you for all the beautiful messages. While I cannot respond to each and everyone of you individually I do appreciate all of your kind words .... Just don't hate me for ruining the game of baseball. Later

Edgy MD wrote: I'm not sure what pissed me off most about the Wilpons — when they bled me dry with a romance scam or when they sent me that e-mail from Nigeria telling me that somebody with the same last name as me died and they wanted to wire me the money he left behind. And I'm still wondering about Fred's whereabouts when JFK was shot. He looks like descriptions I've read about the gunman on the grassy knoll. Later

Maybe not Ponzi per se, but still improper. Maybe just good old fashioned robbing Peter to pay Paul. I feel they defrauded past years' ticket purchasers because they did not want to make a profit, so they did not make sound baseball decisions to build a winner. Then they used those losses to offset profits from their other businesses in order to reduce their taxes. So they intentionally did not make moves the owner of a sole business would have made to produce a contending team to make each of those prior years profitable. Then they used revenue from next year ticket purchases to make just enough to keep the loss engine moving year to year. I'm neither an accountant nor a lawyer, but I feel it violates the spirit of the law if not the letter of the law. Later

Edgy MD wrote: That's not really what a ponzi scheme is. Close enough: Substitute"Ticket buyers" for "investors" fraudulent investment operations that pay out returns to investors from money paid in by subsequent investors, rather than from any actual profit earned from the operation of a business. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ponzi_schemeshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ponzi_schemes Later

Frayed Knot wrote: since you're forever paying for last year's projects with next year's money. So, in other words, a Ponzi scheme. The Wilpons know what those are, and they are now running one themselves, but the "pigeons" are their lenders and, maybe, the IRS. Lock them up! Lock them up! Later

IRRC, according to the IRS ruling that forced the Wrigley family to sell the Cubs, if a sports team loses money for seven consecutive years, it is considered a "hobby" and losses cannot be taken to offset profits from another holding (e.g.- SNY or real estate holdings). I'm not sure when their last (accounting-wise) profitable Mets year was, but it seems they've been saying they've been losing money for a long time. Its time to answer for [CROSSOUT]Santino[/CROSSOUT] Madoff, [CROSSOUT]Paulie[/CROSSOUT] Freddy. Later

The part cut off at the bottom of the left side continues to say that he believes that the "celebrity" put on the team to sell tickets actually got a cut of those increased ticket sales. And, while that person got paid, others lost their jobs. Then the next year, they made a mockery of our team by putting a celebrity on it to sell more tickets. I saw players lose their jobs because of it. We weren't playing to win, we were playing to make everyone else money. Not the players. We never saw a cut. Well, allegedly that one player did. https://sports.yahoo.com/former-mets-minor-leaguer-describes-055404834.htmlhttps://sports.yahoo.com/former-mets-minor-leaguer-describes-055404834.html Later

I would rather give birth to a flaming porcupine than listen to just one minute of that tripe. Later

I saw that announcement yesterday, and had barely recovered when I saw this post. Thanks a lot. (SM=99) I wonder if that program director got a gift basket. Later

The bandbox dimensions of the place were a far cry from the original Philly baseball park I remember - Connie Mack Stadium (nee Shibe Park) where the center field fence was, at various times, 440 feet to over 500 feet away. Later

Edgy MD wrote: If there's no baseball by July, Andy Martino will cover the continuing negotiations in a thong. I will have nightmares until I can get that image out of my mind. Later

Nice team. Both Mike Dunleavy and Brian Winters went on to have long NBA careers as players, then coaches and Alex English was an NBA all-star. Later

I hated that place and the fans who filled the place. They boo-ed Willie Mays and cheered Orlando Cepeda and for that reason alone they didn't deserve a major league baseball team. I rooted for the A's in that World Series, and when the earthquake hit, my only thought was "Too bad it didn't hit Chavez Ravine, too". Later

He finished second in the Cy Young voting to John Smoltz one year because Smoltz had, you guessed it, many more wins and strikeouts. But Brown had an ERA+ of 2.15!!! Amazing. If he had pitched these days, with voters looking at more advanced metrics (as in the case of DeGrom) he might have won it, and with it, more HOF consideration. Later

I followed his career through the minors and was happy when they brought him up. I didn't like the fact that they moved him around rather than putting him him in a spot where he could (old expression) "drive in more than he lets in". With his pugnacious demeanor and hitting skills, I envisioned that he would become our Pete Rose. I think a trade to the AL, where he could just hit would have let that talent reach full potential. The classic case of what might have been. "Wrong place, wrong time" says it all. Later

I was at Busch 1 as a teenager for a tour. We got to go on the astroturf. This was Busch Stadium I, A/K/A Sportsmans Park: http://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.htmlhttp://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.html No astroturf. It was where the Mets played their first ever regular season game. I remember the screen in front of the right field pavilion (310' down the line) which Stan Musial cleared for homers and bounced doubles off for much of his career. Later

This was Busch Stadium I, A/K/A Sportsmans Park: http://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.htmlhttp://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.html No astroturf. It was where the Mets played their first ever regular season game. I remember the screen in front of the right field pavilion (310' down the line) which Stan Musial cleared for homers and bounced doubles off for much of his career. Later

It used to get so hot on the Busch Stadium artificial turf that players would run off the field after each inning and jump — spikes and all — into tubs of ice water kept in the dugout. I seem to remember Casey Stengel saying, "This place holds the heat very well", but he was gone from the team the year before the stadium opened. Was he there for some ceremony, or just as a guest? Later

t used to get so hot on the Busch Stadium artificial turf that players would run off the field after each inning and jump — spikes and all — into tubs of ice water kept in the dugout. I remember Casey Stengel saying, "This place hold the heat very well". Later MFS62 May 23 2020 05:00 PM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium It used to get so hot on the Busch Stadium artificial turf that players would run off the field after each inning and jump — spikes and all — into tubs of ice water kept in the dugout. I seem to remember Casey Stengel saying, "This place holds the heat very well", but he was gone from the team the year before the stadium opened. Was he there for some ceremony, or just as a guest? Later Frayed Knot May 23 2020 05:27 PM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium I believe that statement came in association with the ASG held at Busch II in its inaugural year of 1966. Casey, then less than a year out of the game, could have been invited as a coach or just honored figurehead and likely had more than a few microphones shoved in front of his face during the three day break. I don't Know any of that for a fact but it would make sense that it was from that game as that was right in the window after Busch opened but also still before ASGs went to night starts. And although the BB-Ref boxscores don't have the time of game and weather conditions from that era the way they do for more recent games, the combination of a day game in mid-July, in an enclosed stadium, on artificial turf, and in StL makes it a prime candidate for a scorcher. batmagadanleadoff May 23 2020 06:44 PM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium That's gotta be right -- about ol' Case being at the new Busch for the '66 ASG. Because I've seen photos of Stengel posing with Ted Williams in 1966 and if I remember right, those photos were taken at Busch because I seem to to recall the distinctive top of the Busch roof that circled the stadium in the background of those photos. Stengel and Williams posed together because they were that year's new HOF inductees. batmagadanleadoff May 23 2020 06:46 PM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium That's gotta be right -- about ol' Case being at the new Busch for the '66 ASG. Because I've seen photos of Stengel posing with Ted Williams in 1966 and if I remember right, those photos were taken at Busch because I seem to to recall the distinctive top of the Busch roof that circled the stadium in the background of those photos. Stengel and Williams posed together because they were that year's new HOF inductees. And here it is (but I remember some other photos from that same session, slightly different angles): [FIMG=888]https://lelands.com/images_items/item_38347_1.jpg[/FIMG] batmagadanleadoff May 23 2020 06:48 PM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium And here's a HOF photo of The Kid and The Ol' Perfesser: [FIMG=777]https://ca-times.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/d680cd8/2147483647/strip/true/crop/2000x1125+0+0/resize/840x473!/quality/90/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcalifornia-times-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F8f%2F3c%2F20cfdfcded506828138f1ceda43d%2Fsd-1535560446-qurryjckvz-snap-image[/FIMG] batmagadanleadoff May 23 2020 07:47 PM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium It used to get so hot on the Busch Stadium artificial turf that players would run off the field after each inning and jump — spikes and all — into tubs of ice water kept in the dugout. I seem to remember Casey Stengel saying, "This place holds the heat very well".... Later Close enough. Former New York Yankees manager Casey Stengel, an honorary coach for the game, was credited with the most memorable quote of the day when he said, "The new park sure holds the heat well. It took the press right out of my pants." Plus... How hot was it? "It was unbelievable how hot it was," said Cubs third baseman Ron Santo later recalled "All those box seats in the sun ... by the third inning, they were almost empty." American League All-Star Brooks Robinson said afterward, "It gets hot in Little Rock (where he grew up), but not this hot. It felt like 200 degrees inside that helmet." July 12, 1966: Brand-new Busch Stadium becomes a torture chamber in 103-degree heat at All-Star Game https://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/july-12-1966-brand-new-busch-stadium-becomes-a-torture-chamber-in-103-degree-heat/article_e2c424a5-4f13-5000-b357-ada5015cfd38.htmlhttps://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/july-12-1966-brand-new-busch-stadium-becomes-a-torture-chamber-in-103-degree-heat/article_e2c424a5-4f13-5000-b357-ada5015cfd38.html ashie62 May 23 2020 09:12 PM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium I was at Busch 1 as a teenager for a tour. We got to go on the astroturf. It was July and it felt somewhere north of 120 degrees. Fire on earth. How did they play on that stuff dgwphotography May 24 2020 04:44 AM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium My biggest memory is definitely Straw's shot off the clock. Also the setting of one of my favorite baseball photographs from Walter Iooss: [attachment=0]IMG_0291.jpg[/attachment] MFS62 May 24 2020 05:54 AM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium This was Busch Stadium I, A/K/A Sportsmans Park: http://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.htmlhttp://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.html No astroturf. It was where the Mets played their first ever regular season game. I remember the screen in front of the right field pavilion (310' down the line) which Stan Musial cleared for homers and bounced doubles off for much of his career. Later MFS62 May 24 2020 05:57 AM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium I was at Busch 1 as a teenager for a tour. We got to go on the astroturf. This was Busch Stadium I, A/K/A Sportsmans Park: http://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.htmlhttp://www.projectballpark.org/history/na/busch1.html No astroturf. It was where the Mets played their first ever regular season game. I remember the screen in front of the right field pavilion (310' down the line) which Stan Musial cleared for homers and bounced doubles off for much of his career. Later ashie62 May 24 2020 06:39 AM Re: What's Your Memory?: Busch Memorial Stadium I guess it was Busch 2, thanks! Forgot about Sportsmans Park

Johnny Lunchbucket wrote: Remember listening to a game with my grandfather on the radio, and Gibson hitting a grand slam. That would have been in 76 or so. Not entirely sure it was at Busch. Which Gibson, Kirk or Bob? Later

Vince Coleman got run over by a tarp: https://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/the-day-the-tarp-ate-vince-coleman/article_5e47b555-a52b-5106-9d17-58b5303ca0f5.htmlhttps://www.stltoday.com/sports/baseball/professional/the-day-the-tarp-ate-vince-coleman/article_5e47b555-a52b-5106-9d17-58b5303ca0f5.html Later

Stearns played safety and punter at Colorado, not linebacker. Later

Frayed Knot wrote: I like how the highway there on the right just barely bends around the stadium seemingly going underneath the edge of the marquee sign which itself just about touches the building. Obviously the concept of the ballpark as destination and entertainment center, rather than just a place for the building itself, hadn't yet been born by 1966 I was there on two business trips, about seven tears apart. Two major highways run as one (75 and one other) for a few miles right by the stadium. I saw the same construction traffic cones , in the same places (I'd remembered the traffic jam) on both trips. Later

I was there on two business trips, about seven tears apart. Two major highways run as one (75 and one other) for a few miles right by the stadium. I saw the same construction traffic cones , in the same places (I'd remembered the traffic jam) on both trips. Later

Never been to Atlanta Fulton County Stadium, but I attended several games at Turner Field (The Ted), including a weekend gathering of members (from several countries and States) of my first web-based baseball site. My best memories there were: 1) having a pre-game hot dog and onion rings at the famous Varsity restaurant. 2) The beautiful view of downtown Atlanta from the upper stands behind first base. 3) At the age of 60+ (and looking it) getting carded for a beer 4) A chance to yell at Chipper Jones in his natural habitat. 5) Conspicuously staying seated during the Tomahawk Chop. Later