batmagadanleadoff

Edgy MD wrote: There are a lot of things I know and you know that other people — even professionals in their field — don't know. I know. It's just my style. But it is about the pitch. If the batter thinks it's a great pitch to hit he should swing, I think. This is a case by case, pitch by pitch, batter by batter situation, not some fixed and rigid rule. Otherwise, the manager would flash the "take" sign. He doesn't because he knows that the batter, often, should be given discretion.

I just wanna note for the official record of this here forum, my vehement disapproval of this strict blanket command not to ever swing at the first pitch when down in the late innings. I'm sick to here of reading it like every other game.. Sometimes the first pitch is a very hittable pitch. Maybe even a meatball. And the fucking batter who had seen about a zillion pitches in his life knows more than I do and you do. What if the batter thinks he can crush it and won't get a better pitch to hit? Me, I'll gripe when he swings at a bad pitch.

I have no doubt that it happened, more or less, the way I said it did. Besides, otherwise, they would've been named co-captains simultaneously instead of a year apart. Now I have to look for this on the web, which I'm vomiting from already because all I'm pulling up is knucklehead pieces about how Carter deserves to have his number retired and how he was the last piece to the puzzle which made all the sense in the world when the Mets first got him but didn't play out that way. Gaaaaaaah! Its probably in one of my Mets books. Either that, or I'll have to subscribe to the newspaper archives. This isn't something I picked up after the fact from reading historical stuff. I became aware of this in real time from contemporaneous coverage, including TV interviews.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I don't recall who you're talking about.... I can't believe you don't remember. This fiasco is permanently embedded in my brain. And it's not Franco, who, if I recall, wasn't a co-captain. Davey Johnson initially named Keith Hernandez as the sole Mets captain. Johnson was an intelligent baseball lifer who knew his team, knew the locker room, and even knew many of his Mets from their minor league days. Johnson read the room and correctly determined that Keith would make the best team captain, based on his playing skills, his leadership and the total respect Keith received from his teammates. This decision didn't sit well with Carter, who literally cried and whined and pleaded and begged and then cried some more, until he finally wore Johnson down into making Carter a co-captain. What a manipulative creep. And this right after publicly whining to the press all off-season long about how he was supposedly gypped out of the league MVP award -- the 4th or 5th best player on his own team.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I don't recall who you're talking about.... I can't believe you don't remember. This fiasco is permanently embedded in my brain. And it's not Franco, who, if I recall, wasn't a co-captain. Davey Johnson initially named Keith Hernandez as the sole Mets captain. Johnson was an intelligent baseball lifer who knew his team, knew the locker room, and even knew many of his Mets from their minor league days. Johnson read the room and correctly determined that Keith would make the best team captain, based on his playing skills, his leadership and the total respect Keith received from his teammates. This decision didn't sit well with Carter, who literally cried and whined and pleaded and begged and then cried some more, until he finally wore Johnson down into making Carter a co-captain. What a manipulative creep. And this right after publicly whining to the press all off-season long about how he was supposedly gypped out of the league MVP award -- the 4th or 5th best player on his own team.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I don't recall who you're talking about.... I can't believe you don't remember. This fiasco is permanently embedded in my brain. And it's not Franco, who, if I recall, wasn't a co-captain.

Then there was the Met who got his Met "captainship" by going into a jealous rage over initially being rejected for the role and then crying, pleading and manipulating his manager every which way possible until the manager finally broke down and just gave him the fucking captainship he had to have. Then, after he finally got his co-captainship, he bragged to everyone within earshot about the captainship he supposedly earned, over and over again, just in case anybody didn't hear it the first 85 times he bragged about it, or didn't see the fucking "C" on his uniform, leaving out the part about how he was passed over and had to beg for it.

Edgy MD wrote: José Cardenál (who switched teams in the middle of a doubleheader, if I recall correctly) Joel Youngblood played for two teams on the same day. Did Cardenal also do it? https://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/joel-youngblood-two-hits-for-two-teams-same-day-1982-mets-expos/jtp9kadw3r171hdjti066djrhhttps://www.sportingnews.com/us/mlb/news/joel-youngblood-two-hits-for-two-teams-same-day-1982-mets-expos/jtp9kadw3r171hdjti066djrh Later [FIMG=666]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52923117558_535d9cc55c_h.jpg[/FIMG]

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Benjamin Grimm wrote: I had forgotten about how newspaper box scores used to arbitrarily abbreviate players' names. Why did they have to drop the E from Buckner, for example? It's only a seven-letter name. I'm guessing that the typesetting back then wasn't computerized, but manual and there was only so much space allotted for each player. It was about the space needed to typeset each name, not the number of characters needed. Some characters were wider than others. Still, it seemed random, like you pointed out. The widest name was Tim Blackwell's, and if "Blackwel C" fit, then they certainly could have squeezed in the "e" in Buckner. Or maybe it wasn't so random. Blackwell's was the longest last name among Cubs regulars in 1980. Perhaps Buckner was shortened because on days that Barry Foote was the starting catcher instead of Blackwell, the Cubs lineup used up less typesetting space. BTW- The 1980 Mets tied Maris61 for HR's: each finished with 61.

Munson's 1976 MVP award was definitely undeserved. But back then, the writers/voters were in the dark and often awarded the MVP to the RBI leader of a first place team when there was no clearly obvious recipient, which Munson was (the RBI guy, not the deserving MVP). Also, the voters had a thing for catchers just because, without any statistical proof beyond that the catcher was a catcher. Catchers automatically got bumped up like10 or 20 spots in the voting. Because they were catchers. That's probably why knucklehead Gary Carter went around griping about not winning the award in '86. Carter wasn't even the third or fourth best guy on his own team that year but the voters placed him in third place in the voting. Bad AL vote, also. Mark Fidrych got royally screwed out of the Cy because Palmer had more wins and wins were like everything when it came to Cy voting in '76. Wins and RBIs. The Dark Ages of award voting. Dwight Gooden, like Fidrych, was another Rookie of the Year who got screwed out of a simultaneous Cy Young award. Maybe Rusty Staub was a jinx or something. And on the subject of Mets who got screwed out of a Cy, the NL 76 vote was as bad as the AL vote. It should've been Seaver instead of Randy Jones but no way a 14 win pitcher was gonna beat someone that had 15 wins at the All Star break.

I'm sure youse heard this one before: Sidelined Jacob deGrom threw a bullpen session yesterday and sez he feels great.

The Mets are still in the money. They'd qualify for the playoffs if the season ended today. Participation trophies for everybody!

Bernard GIlkey - 30/117/1996 most

Benjamin Grimm wrote: "Broeg on Baseball". Back then, I learned the names of a lot of baseball beat writers from other cities by reading The Sporting News. (God rest its soul.) I still recall Joe Falls from Detroit and Furman Bisher from Atlanta. Same here. Jerome Holtzman, Chicago. Jim Murray, Los Angeles.

Benjamin Grimm wrote: "Broeg on Baseball". Back then, I learned the names of a lot of baseball beat writers from other cities by reading The Sporting News. (God rest its soul.) I still recall Joe Falls from Detroit and Furman Bisher from Atlanta. Same here. Jerome Holtzman, Chicago.

https://twitter.com/baseballinpix/status/1660797696964464641 Not a bad lineup [FIMG=555]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48781589858_2c888886d0_c.jpg[/FIMG]

Most [FIMG=277]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52918118691_6ce45809e4_h.jpg[/FIMG] [FIMG=444]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52918505765_b9b9a5ffa8_h.jpg[/FIMG] [FIMG=444]https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52722248222_e27d15448a_h.jpg[/FIMG]

=whippoorwill post_id=126277 time=1684793316 user_id=79] =batmagadanleadoff post_id=126262 time=1684780471 user_id=68] =whippoorwill post_id=126253 time=1684772878 user_id=79] My gosh, from memory?

Oooh. This one just came to me. Donn Clendenon, 1970. 22HRs, 97 RBIs. Most column.

=whippoorwill post_id=126253 time=1684772878 user_id=79] My gosh, from memory?

https://twitter.com/baseballinpix/status/1659589730982572034 They were honoree coaches because two weeks later, they would both be inducted into baseball's Hall of Fame at Cooperstown.

Did youse know that Gsellman is pitching in Asia and that he's Trevor Bauer's teammate?

Didj'youse see Showalter just break out a smile? Never saw that before.

Edgy MD wrote: But bullpen games are just part of the pattern I lament of seeing pitchers throwing ever-fewer innings and seemingly getting hurt as much as ever, if not more. If pitchers are getting hurt more, it's because they're throwing harder. And they're being groomed to throw harder. 50 years ago, Nolan Ryan was an outlier and a unicorn -- a one of a kind with his 100 MPH fast ball that he threw all game long. Today there are more than two dozen pitchers who could hit triple digits on the gun. And it's not just the 100 MPH fastball. More pitchers today throw regular 97 and 98 MPH fastballs then in the past.