Nov 2015 Baseball Magazine

IT’S BACK!

Former Dodgers GM Fred Claire Talks About the Rebirth of Baseball Magazine bruce sutter day Artwork by former big leaguer John D’acquisto

Tom lampkin: Legendless player what we can learn from the 1982 LLWS champions

Letter From The Editor I don’t know if you have had a chance to check out Baseball Magazine’s debut digital issue from last month, but if not, I highly encourage you to give it a read. Never in my wildest dreams, did I believe when I decided to relaunch Baseball Magazine, that we would receive the tremendous amount of positive feedback that we have from everyone that has gone to our site, read our daily short pieces, along with our web issue work and the aforementioned digital download debut issue from October.

While our first digital download issue contained some of the best from our daily shorts and web issue work, it also contained exclusive content that could only be found by downloading the issue, and reading through it. I am so very proud to work with such a talented group of writers, writers that come from all walks of life, and have different backgrounds relating to the game of baseball and writing. One thing is for sure, the best is yet to come for Baseball Magazine. Behind the digital download issues each month, is our Associate Editor, Dan Hughes, who has worked tirelessly over the past several months to help our vision come to life. I am forever in debt to his work and dedication to the team, and he is the perfect lieutenant to carry out what can sometimes be difficult tasks not only with the actual formatting of the digital download, but ensuring that the staff is staying on schedule, and producing high-quality content for you, the reader, each and every month.

As our family of staff writers continues to grow, we open this issue with a contribution from Wayne Cavadi. Wayne was someone I invited to join Baseball Magazine from its inception.

Wayne is a busy guy however, writing for several other sites, and also as a contributor to NCAA. com. I’m honored that he could find the time (with his first child on the way no less), to be willing to join the team and contribute each month. His debut piece, It’s Time To Celebrate Bruce Sutter Day, looks at some of the unknown, really bad contracts in the history of the game.

Along with Wayne’s piece, there are several other excellent pieces this month that I think you’ll enjoy reading. Former Dodgers’ GM Fred Claire is one of two guest contributors this month, discussing his joy over the relaunch of our magazine. Along with Fred, former big league reliever, John D’Acquisto, who still works for Major League Baseball, shares his most recent love--his artwork, with some wonderful pieces of past teammates, contemporaries from his era in the game, and some of the game’s current stars. We are honored that he was willing to share his beautiful work with us, and with you.

Other work from this issue will discuss the long and winding journey of Bartolo Colon, long time big league back-up catcher Tom Lampkin, a piece about the Mets’ franchise you might not have heard before, an examination of big league managers, who have done much better AFTER their first opportunity might not have, and Christine Sisto’s continuing series on the origins of the Brooklyn Dodgers, and what the borough of Brooklyn meant to the identity of the franchise from its earliest days through their earliest success.

So sit back, grab a warm beverage, as the World Series is now over, and the winter is just around the corner, and enjoy the November digital download issue of Baseball Magazine! And if you are feeling so inclined, and want your voice heard on any of the work you’ve read this month, feel free to contact me directly: editorbaseballmagazine@gmail.com. Thank you again for reading our work, and I hope you’ll find it as entertaining to read, as it was for us to create.

Best,

PAGE 4- It’s Time to Recognize Bruce Sutter Day PAGE 5- Waiting to Feel the Love in Philly PAGE 6- Tom Lampkin: A Legendless Player on a Legendary Team PAGE 7- An Unappreciated Genius and His Legendary Pupil PAGE 8- Bartolo Colon’s Storybook Journey Reaches New Heights in 2015 PAGE 9- Mets World Series Futility Longer Than You Might Think PAGE 10- Artwork by former Big Leaguer John D’Acquisto PAGE 12- What We Can Learn From The 1982 LLWS Champions PAGE 13- Former GM Fred Claire Talks the Rebirth of Baseball Magazine PAGE 14- Why Ty Cobb Shouldn’t Go To Cobb County PAGE 15- After The First Time: When Managers Have Gone From Average to Great PAGE 17- Changing the One Game Wild Card Format to a Best of Three Series PAGE 19- General Managers Getting Axed More Often in Era of Analytics PAGE 20- Brooklyn’s Sacred Cathedral (Part 2): The Bums Learn To Lose Often Cover image credit: Getty Images

Table of Contents Questions? Comments?

Email us at: editorbaseballmagazine@gmail.com

NOVEMBER

2015

It’s Time to Recognize Bruce Sutter Day Admit it, baseball fans. Every year on July 1st, you do the same thing my friends and myself do. We text each other Happy Bobby Bonilla Day, remembering a contract that many people remember as the worst in baseball history.

Despite Bonilla becoming more famous for his contract that continues to pay him nearly $1.2-million every July 1 until 2035, he was at one point a solid baseball player. He was one third of arguably the sickest outfield in baseball — along with Andy Van Slyke and a skinny Barry Bonds — during the Pirates' glory years of the early '90s before sinking into a two decade drought of subpar seasons.

Bonilla was still very good when he left Pittsburgh and signed on with the Mets the first time around. The second time Bonilla joined the Mets, however, he was a shell of his former self, making more news for his mouth and off-the-field antics than with his bat. So the Mets bought out his contract, and in doing so, agreed to pay the man well into retirement.

This year, Bonilla turned 52, and on July 1st, he got a paycheck from the New York Mets that was for more money than they owed Matt Harvey and Jacob deGrom COMBINED. It has to be the most ludicrous contract of all time.

But it isn’t.

Can you believe that? It’s true, although until about a month ago, I had no idea a worse contract even existed.

From 1977 to 1984, there was no better reliever in the National League — and maybe baseball — than Bruce Sutter.

Sutter led the NL in saves five times over that eight-year span, even taking home Photo Courtesy: FoxSports.com

a Cy Young Award as a closer in 1979.

His years in St. Louis as a record-setting closer would make him a Hall of Famer in 2006.

Sutter was the cream of the crop when it came to closers, and when he became a free agent after a MLB-leading 45-save season in 1984, he was heading for a big payday.

A payday that is still paying him today.

Sutter would sign with the Atlanta Braves in 1985 at the age of 32. His arm would break down and he would fall off a cliff, and the once untouchable closer for the St. Louis Cardinals, suddenly became very hittable. In his four years in Atlanta, he never produced one season with an ERA under 4.30, nor a season with a sub1.32 WHIP, and he never notched 30+ saves again, in fact, he never even hit 25.

By the end of the 1988 season, Sutter was done.

His contract wasn’t.

According to an article written in 1985 in the Los Angeles Times, Sutter is still on the Braves books and will be for five more years. He signed a 36-year contract with the Atlanta Braves. In return, he was part of some of the worst Braves teams in recent history. Yet, at the age of 62, he is still pulling in $1.3-million a year and will until he is 67.

Believe it or not, there are actually several other teams still paying out former players. According to Hardball Talk, the Boston Red Sox are still paying Manny Ramirez nearly $2-million a year. Think about that. Ramirez has reunited with his old pal Theo Epstein as a player/coach in the Chicago Cubs minor league system.

4

By Wayne Cavadi

As his newest team rises to the top of the baseball world, his former team sits in the cellar paying him for ten more years.

Gary Sheffield is still on the books for four more years with the Detroit Tigers -- a team he spent just two of his 22year career with -- earning as much as $2.5-million a year. Ken Griffey, Jr. is still on the Reds payroll and will be, for about another ten years.

If you think about these deals in today's market -- a market that allowed players like C.C. Sabathia and Miguel Cabrera to sign 10-year mega-deals -- deferred contracts are probably not as bad as they once seemed. It allowed teams to get large lump sums off the books and spread out minimal payments over a long time, whereas the New York Yankees would do just about anything to find someone to cough up $20-million for just one year of C.C. I guess it’s true what they say about New York. The lights shine a little brighter. If Bobby Bo had been any other city, maybe he would be just another bad contract, but unfortunately, he remains THE bad contract. It seems the reality is that there are plenty of bad deals to go around.

I'll see you next Bruce Sutter Day.

Wayne Cavadi is an avid baseball junkie, whose love for the Yankees is only surpassed by his love of the game.

A proud graduate and forever loyal fan of the mighty Delaware Blue Hens Follow Charlie on Twitter: @UofDWayne

Waiting to Feel the Love In Philly With the Chicago Cubs back in the playoffs this past season, much is being made of the long world title drought for the Northsiders. The now 107-year title drought continues to stand as the longest such drought in professional sports history.

In 2004 and 2005, both the Boston Red Sox and Chicago White Sox broke long title droughts (86 and 88 years, respectively). These World Series droughts that are still ranked as the second and third longest in MLB history. But right there, sitting at number four, is the Philadelphia Phillies, who in 1980, won their first World Series title in franchise history, snapping a 77-year title drought.

But it’s actually worse than that. Prior to the first World Series in 1903, the Phillies (and Quakers before them) had gone another 20 seasons without finishing first in the National League. So, when the Phillies won the 1980 World Series, they were snapping a 97-year drought in the City of Brotherly Love.

Except that’s not entirely true. While the Phillies may not have been winning titles, the Philadelphia Athletics of the American League took home the crown in 1910, 1911, 1913, 1929 and 1930.

Even then, prior to the 1980 Series, the city of Philadelphia had not celebrated a baseball championship in 50 years.

And much like the aforementioned Cubs - who have only been to the World Series seven times since last winning it in 1908 - the Phillies have had their shots. The Phillies had their first shot

in 1915, but lost to the Red Sox in five games. In 1950, the Phillies were swept in four games by the Yankees. Then in 1976, 1977 and 1978, the Phillies lost the National League Championship Series to the Reds (‘76) and Dodgers (‘77-’78), winning just two games in the three series combined.

But in 1980, the Phillies were led by Mike Schmidt, Pete Rose and Larry Bowa on offense, with Steve Carlton headlining the pitching staff. Schmidt hit a career-high 48 homers and drove in a career-high 121 RBI en route to the first of back-to-back NL MVP awards.

Carlton won the Cy Young Award with a 24-9 record, and 2.34 ERA. With 91 wins, the Phillies had the lowest win total of any playoff team that year. The Phillies finished just one game ahead of the Montreal Expos and faced the Houston Astros - who finished just one game ahead of the Los Angeles Dodgers - in the NLCS. But in true Philly style, it wouldn’t be easy. The Phillies found themselves splitting the first two in Philadelphia and losing the first game in Houston to sit just one game from elimination. But the Phillies won the last two to go to the World Series, with games two through five all going into extra innings.

In the World Series, the Phillies found themselves up 3-2 in the series heading back to Philadelphia. Fittingly, Game Six was decided by their stars. Mike Schmidt - the Series MVP - drove in two runs in the 3rd inning, Cy Young winner Mandatory Credit: thisisitphilly.com Steve Carlton pitched into the 8th, allowing just one run, while striking out seven and closer Tug McGraw pitched the final two scoreless innings to save his fourth game of the series.

The wait was over.

5

By Dan Hughes

Photo Courtesy: explorepahistory.com

Philadelphia was celebrating a world championship not brought home by the Athletics. Three years later, in 1983, the Phillies failed to bring the city a second title in four years as they lost the World Series to Baltimore. Ten years later, the Phillies would find themselves back in the Fall Classic, but much like earlier attempts before 1980, they fell short, losing in six games to the Toronto Blue Jays, on one swing of the bat by Joe Carter.

But the Phillies wouldn’t make their fans wait too much longer, winning the 2008 World Series. But in true Philly form, they would lose the 2009 Series.

All told, the Philadelphia Phillies have been to the World Series seven times and have only won twice. Only the Chicago Cubs have a worse series winning percentage (2-for-10) among teams with at least five WS appearances.

Given the current state of the Philadelphia Phillies, one can only imagine that fans are looking at that first 77-year title drought (or 97 depending on how you look at it) and wondering if the team will challenge to make that number larger over the course of the next century.

Stranger things have happened.

Dan Hughes has been writing at various outlets since 2003.

Dan lives in Salem, Oregon with his beautiful wife of 16 years, Amy, as well as his three amazing kids.

When Dan isn’t writing, he’s coaching his 13-year old son’s team or rooting on the Braves and Mariners.

You can follow Dan on Twitter at @DEgan4Baseball

Tom Lampkin: A Legendless Player on a Legendary Team When I was just starting third grade, the Seattle Mariners had one of the greatest regular seasons in Major League Baseball history. Their 116 wins tied the most regular season wins in history, the most ever by an American league team. That team in 2001 lost only one series all season before their ALCS loss in five games to the New York Yankees.

That team sent nine players to the AllStar Game at Safeco Field in 2001. They led baseball in both runs scored and fewest runs allowed.

But with all the big names, the rookie stardom of Ichiro Suzuki, the stacked lineup and pitching staff, my favorite player was a relatively unknown veteran

University of Portland.

Then, in the 1986 MLB amateur player draft, Tommy Lampkin was drafted in the 11th round by the Cleveland Indians.

After two years in the minors, Lampkin appeared in four games for the Cleveland Indians with only five plate appearances and a walk to his name.

Lampkin then spent 1989 in the minor leagues, then saw sprinkles of playing time with the San Diego Padres, the Milwaukee Brewers, the San Francisco Giants, and the St. Louis Cardinals, Lampkin found himself on the Seattle Mariners’ roster in 1999, backing up Dan Wilson behind the dish.

The 2001 Seattle Mariners had plenty of

By Charlie Spencer-Davis

All-Star closer, Kazuhiro Sasaki, who shut the door 45 times that season with a .885 WHIP. So why was I drawn to a decidedly average backup catcher?

The history of my Lampkin fandom is simple-- Tommy Lampkin is the cousin of close family friends. Knowing they knew him, and associating his last name with both friends and sports, I was sold. I watched so many games that season as an impressionable 8 year-old, not just celebrating each Ichiro slap single but hoping and waiting for Tommy Lampkin to get in the game.

Amongst the 20 position players with an at-bat during the 2001 season, Lampkin had the Photo Courtesy: David Maxwell/AFP/Getty Images fourth-lowest batting average. His OPS was below .700. But his age-37 season had him providing much-needed rest for starter Dan Wilson, with sturdy game management skills for a team with a diverse pitching arsenal.

Lampkin only played in 100+ games in two seasons, and batted from Cincinnati, Ohio. He was the back- players easily deemed “favorites” for fans over .275 in a season just twice. He was a up to the “Mariners Hall of Fame” backyoung and old. Winning 116 games nequintessential journeyman, playing for six stop Dan Wilson. He played in only 79 cessitates at least a few standouts. major league clubs, none for more than games in 2001, amassing a .225/.309/.348 Ichiro, the 2001 Rookie of the Year and three consecutive seasons. He was the triple slash line with 5 home runs, and 22 American League MVP, whipped togeth- 13,163rd player in major league history, RBI. He was never imposing nor did he er a .350/.381/.457 triple slash with 242 and spent 13 seasons in an MLB uniform. fill up a stat sheet, but his time as a Mari- hits from the leadoff spot.

But he was a participant in one of the ner found a soft spot in my heart.

Arguably the greatest DH of allgreatest regular seasons in MLB histoMy mom came home after the elementa- time-- Edgar Martinez-- smacked the ry. And he played in more MLB seasons ry school’s auction with a present for me. ball around all ballparks to the tune of than most people ever will. Above it all An autographed baseball! By a Mariner .306/.423/.543 with 23 home runs and though, he was a kid’s favorite player. So no less, and scripted with a “116 Wins” 116 RBI. many professional athletes are. And for that made it all the sweeter. The scribe of Bret Boone had a career year with 37 reasons unbeknownst to him, he was the that autograph? My favorite Mariner, Tom home runs, 141 RBI, and a monster .578 greatest part of the 2001 Seattle Mariners Lampkin. slugging percentage. baseball season. To an 8 year-old at least.

Lampkin, born March 4, 1964 in CinOne could argue that their pitching staff cinnati, Ohio, had a long road to a comwas even better. Take first-time 20-game Charlie Spencer-Davis is a 2015 gradpass-emblazoned Mariners uniform. He winner Jamie Moyer who continued to uate from Boston College with BAs in spent his younger years in Ohio before deny Father Time in his age-38 season.

International Studies and French. A moving to Washington State, playing his Venezuelan-born Freddy Garcia led the die-hard Mariners fan born and raised high school baseball as a catcher at cathteam in innings pitched with 238.2, an in Seattle, Charlie has spent much of olic Bishop Blanchet. After some time 18-6 record and a 3.05 ERA in the thick his life writing in his spare time. at Edmonds Community College, he of the steroid era.

Follow Charlie on Twitter: traveled down I-5 to play baseball at the And don’t forget about the Mariners @C14SpencerD 6

An Unappreciated Genius and His Legendary Pupil Many tomes have been written about the great and long forsaken players of the Negro Leagues. Today, when we tell the story of the Negro Leagues, it is one of sadness and from Baseball's standpoint, regret.

We are forced to play the "what if " game, the very game our public school teachers commanded us not to play.

been denied a chance at playing in the big leagues for nothing more than his skin color. After playing for a few barnstorming all-black teams, he would go on to found the first ever Negro National League and at last, allow those who had been unfairly denied to finally play

By Matt Mirro

joined the Cuban X Giants of the Cuban National Negro Club Series at the age of 25.

In eight nonconsecutive seasons, Foster compiled a 29-20 record, a 2.44 ERA and 46 complete games (4 shutouts).

In 1917, at the age of 37, he played his

"What if Satchel Paige had pitched in the major leagues during his prime?"

"What if Josh Gibson was actually able to go head-to-head with the great slugger, Babe Ruth?"

"What if..."

We could go on and on for hours but in reality, we will never know. It is a shame that a shadow casts itself over our beloved pastime. Although the great black players of the early 1900's were excluded from the game, that did not mean they did not leave their mark on some of our most celebrated immortals.

Christy Mathewson is widely considered one of the greatest pitchers of all-time, right up there with Walter Johnson and Sandy Koufax. Mathewson was traded from the Cincinnati Reds to the New York Giants for Amos Rusie in December of 1900.

The great Giants pitcher was kindly, virtuous and, above all, a superb artist on the mound. Under the watchful eye of the great manager, John McGraw, Mathewson dominated an era.

During his 17-year career the righthander boasted a record of 373 wins and 188 losses, along with 79 shutouts, 30 saves, 2,507 strikeouts and a 2.13 ERA (2.26 FIP).

Mathewson might have gone on to have a long career as a manager or executive if a training accident during World War I did not sear his lungs from volatile mustard gas. On October 17, 1925 he died of complications due to the incident. He was just 45.

Yet, if it weren’t for one legendary and somewhat unfairly forgotten Negro League impresario, Mathewson may have been only a footnote in history.

After the Giants traded the “Hoosier Thuderbolt” (Rusie) to the Reds for the unproven Mathewson, McGraw brought in a talented hurler who baseball at large had cast off to help polish the young 19year old.

That man was Rube Foster, who had

Photo Courtesy: Wikipedia.com

the game of baseball.

We now know that McGraw frequently tried to sign talented black players, but racism fostered league-wide, prevented him from doing so. He famously bought the contract of second baseman Charlie Grant from the Negro League Columbia Giants. He tried to pass Grant off as a Cherokee Indian, claiming his name was Charlie Tokohama. Unfortunately for McGraw, Grant and really baseball as a whole (America, too) the ploy did not work. Opponents of McGraw’s Baltimore Orioles club quickly pointed him out and Grant was soon gone from the game.

While I will not try to assume or concoct a story, it may be possible that McGraw had seen Foster play in a barnstorming game while looking for someone he could pass and add to his team.

What we do know for sure, is that Foster was brought in to try and work with Mathewson and is credited with teaching the young pitching prospect the very pitch that would propel him to the top of baseball and into the history books.

That would be the offering which was then called the “fadeaway”, the pitch we now refer to as the “screwball”. Mathewson would go on to become the master of the fadeaway, the title which once belonged to Foster himself.

That was around 1900. In 1905 Foster 7

final season. Later, he would go on and build the first Negro League and his empire would rise around him. In 1926 he suffered a mental breakdown and was sent to an asylum in Kankakee, Illinois, where he died four years later. He was just 51 years old.

Today we remember Foster as the Father of Black Baseball and place him along with Albert Goodwill Spalding and Ban Johnson. He was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown in 1981.

Despite the recognition he now garners, there is little written about the tutelage of a young Mathewson. Without Foster teaching Mathewson the screwball, baseball may have never seen possibly the greatest pitcher of all-time.

As a sport, we owe a great deal of thanks to Rube Foster, not just for Mathewson but for giving a chance to those who did not have one otherwise.

Here’s to Andrew “Rube” Foster, a still unappreciated genius.

Matt Mirro is currently the Lead American League Writer at Call to the Bullpen, an MLB.com affiliate. He is a certified member of the Internet Baseball Writers Association of America.

Follow Matt on Twitter: @Mirro_The_Ronin

Bartolo Colon’s Storybook Journey Reaches New Heights in 2015 Whether it's watching him dig deep to leg out a double into the gap or flipping a ball behind his back to nail a runner at first on a bang-bang play, the New York Mets' Bartolo Colon has given fans no shortage of memories in what could be his final big league season.

He'll probably get offers for the 2016 season, despite heading into his age-43 season, after winning 14 games for Terry Collins' club this year, pitching to a 5.67 strikeoutto-walk ratio, 1.1 BB/9 and 3.84 FIP across 194 2/3 innings of regular season work. But that's not what we're here to discuss. We're here to look back on a career that has been filled with countless ups-and-downs, bumps in the roads and moments of triumph.

And truly, what a ride it has been.

Twenty-two years ago, Colon was signed by the Cleveland Indians as an amateur free agent and four years later, he broke onto the scene for the Tribe, pitching 94 innings of 5.00-plus ERA ball – hardly enough to turn heads around the game. The next season, though, he earned the first All-Star selection of his career, winning 14 games and lowering his earned run average almost two whole runs from the '97 campaign.

In 1998, when the entire baseball world was focused on the Home Run Race between Sammy Sosa, Mark McGwire and Ken Griffey, Jr., Colon was making a very legitimate case for American League Cy Young honors – but it definitely wasn't because of the work he turned in during the first-half.

Prior to the All-Star Break, the 26-year-old right-hander once-again struggled to keep opponents off the board. In 17 first-half starts, Colon posted a 5.35 ERA before figuring things out down the stretch, winning 11 of his final 15 starts, doing little different apart from just missing bats more regularly.

His WHIP declined (barely), while his SO/9 mark actually declined along with his strikeout-to-walk ratio.

After a couple more seasons with Cleveland, he was eventually traded to the Montreal Expos in a deal that featured several future All-Stars in Cliff Lee and Brandon Phillips, not to mention Grady Sizemore, who became a staple for the Indians in the early 2000s before he started to fall victim to injury.

Ahead of the 2003 season, after one yearplus with the Expos, the Montreal front office sent Colon to the South Side of Chicago for a package highlighted by Orlando Hernandez. That year, Colon tossed nine complete games, totaling 242 innings pitched on the season, before he was once again on the move.

It was then he joined the Anaheim Angels, now more commonly known as the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, where he

put together some of the best seasons of his two-decade-plus career, including a 2005 campaign that culminated in the first – and only – Cy Young Award for Colon.

Winning 21 games and pitching over 220 frames, the righty topped New York Yankees' closer Mariano Rivera, who finished second in the voting after closing out 67 games and earning 43 saves, and Johan Santana, who, in my mind, probably should have gotten more first-place votes than he did after striking out 238 batters in 231 2/3 innings – both marks topped Colon's 220 innings and 157 punch-outs). But, when the dust settled, it was Colon who brought home the hardware.

By Jacob Misener

ending a season that was successful by virtually all measures: he had kept his earned run average in the mid-3.00 range, was on-pace for 200 innings pitched again and had helped solidify a suddenly-competitive Oakland ball club.

Billy Beane and the Athletics' front office took a gamble in 2013, bringing Colon back despite his suspension – and boy, did it pay off. The hefty, soft-tossing right-hander won 18 games, tossed three shutouts and pitched to a 2.65 ERA, finishing sixth in AL Cy Young voting and earning the third All-Star selection of his career.

Despite his success with the A's, the team ultimately decided not to tender him a deal

Photo Courtesy: bloggingmets.com

And that's when the wheels came off this big train. Over the course of the next two seasons combined, Colon tallied just 155 innings pitched, in which he compiled a dismal 5.90 ERA, 1.561 WHIP and 11.7 H/9. It looked as if he might be running out of gas, which would have surprised no one. He was 34 years old and already had nearly 2,000 innings on his right arm.

After a season with the Boston Red Sox and a brief stint in which he returned to the White Sox, Colon missed the 2010 season because of surgery needed to repair damage in his right shoulder and elbow, stemming from damage to his rotator cuff, as well as multiple ligaments and tendons. Now, the procedure, which included a transplant of stem cells into his shoulder, drew criticism from Major League Baseball, but with his recovery near-complete, he turned his attention to the 2011 season.

That season, he re-established his value, to a degree, with the New York Yankees, pitching to a 4.00 ERA while surpassing 160 innings for the first time in five years. Given that's where his value comes from (his ability to eat innings), this was good news for the right-hander, who, after the season, inked a deal with the Oakland Athletics.

Another low came that year for Colon, who was suspended for 50 games after testing positive for synthetic testosterone, 8

– which you can hardly blame them for given Colon was 40 years old and was coming off a year that jacked his price through the roof.

In steps the New York Mets, who were looking for a veteran presence in their rotation. New York tendered Colon a two-year, $20 million deal – and he's defied the odds for the duration of that deal, winning 29 regular-season games and becoming an invaluable member of Collins' bullpen during this season's run to the World Series.

From a fire-throwing ace back in his Cleveland Indians days to a finesse pitcher biting the edges and relying on soft contact, Bartolo Colon has weathered suspensions, injuries and more zip code changes than he'd like to count to become one of baseball's most beloved characters – all he has left to do now is bring home what has evaded him for 18 years: a World Series ring.

Jacob Misener is a die-hard Cubs fan who grew up in the Steroid Era, which, believe it or not, he loves to reminisce about often. Favorite players include Randy Johnson and Craig Biggio.

Believes that Wrigley Field is the greatest place on earth.

You can follow Jacob on Twitter: @jacobrmisener

Mets World Series Futility Longer Than You Might Think The 2015 World Series has come and gone. The New York Mets, this season's National League pennant winners, were looking for their first title since 1986. We know this season's appearance in the Fall Classic, was the team's first in 15 years, and they lost that season to their crosstown rivals, the New York Yankees. Fans of the Mets, look back on that '86 team, along with the Amazin' Mets of the 1969 season with passion and pride.

But what many fans of the Metropolitans might not be aware of, is that aside from 2000, 2015, and all the way back in 1973, the Mets actually lost the very first "World Series". Huh? Didn't the Mets come into being during the 1962 season, as a National League replacement and expansion team for the Dodgers and Giants, both of whom bolted New York for sunnier skies on the west coast? Yes, technically, but...

Back in 1884, there was once a rival league to the National League, called the American Association, and better known simply as "The Association" or the "AA". The league operated from 1882 through the 1891 season, before ceasing operation. By the end of the American Association's run, there was a third major league (The Players' League) along

managing big league clubs. Along with the pennant with the Mets, he would go on to win two National League pennants and a pair of World Series championships with the New York Giants in 1888 and 1889. He only managed a total of nine seasons, while posting a career record of 658-419.

That's good enough for a .611 winning percentage, yet Cooperstown has yet to induct him for his dugout prowess.

The '84 Mets posted a run differential of plus311. Pretty solid for a dead ball era team in which home runs were few and far between. The team leader in bombs that season was in fact Orr, who led the team with nine. He also drove in 112 runs, and batted .354. On the pitching side of the ledger, the Mets ran with a two-man rotation. Yes, you read that correctly. A TWO-MAN pitching rotation, consisting of Keefe, and Jack Lynch. The pair started 55 and 58 games, respectively, while Buck Becannon started one whole game. Keefe's record was 37-17, with a 2.25 ERA, 56 complete games, 334 strikeouts, and an ERA+ of 138. His partner in crime, Lynch, also won 37 games, while dropping 15, posting an ERA of 2.67, and allowing for the time, an eye-popping 10 long balls.

Photo Courtesy: Wikipedia.com

with the richest and most well-established, National League. Guess who was a member of the American Association? The New York Metropolitans.

The team operated in the American Association from 1884 through the end of the 1887 season.

Are you saying Mets' fans might not be as familiar with names such as Tim Keefe, Dave Orr, Candy Nelson, and Jack Lynch as they are with Darryl Strawberry, Gary Carter, Dwight Gooden, Mike Piazza and David Wright? The first four are the original New York Mets all-time leaders in WAR, with Keefe posting a 28 WAR, while recording a two-season stint in which he had a 78-44 pitching mark, and an ERA of 2.34.

Before anyone had ever heard of Keith Hernandez, there was Orr, who was the Mets' first baseman during their "original" glory years. In half a decade with New York, Orr had one 100+ RBI season, slammed 26 home runs, along with a .348 batting average. He also has a career 19 WAR. These were two of the first heroes in Mets' lore, yet are mostly forgotten, as was the team's first run to a pennant and World Series.

The 1884 New York Mets were managed by Jim Mutrie, whose nickname was "Truthful Jim" for his handling of player and business affairs. Mutrie one could argue, was one of the early successes in

Unlike the current version of the major league regular season, the American Association played a 112-game schedule. The '84 Mets' never lost more than three games in a row, while posting an eleven-game winning streak. The 1884 Mets were dominant from the start of the season, finishing 43 games over .500, and securing the American Association pennant by a comfortable 6 1/2 games. While the 2015 Mets surprised everyone over the heavily-favored Washington Nationals, and winning both the division and the pennant, the Washington Nationals of 1884 managed to win only 12 games the ENTIRE season, and finished 41 games behind the Mets, and completing only 63 of the scheduled 112 games on the slate.

For their season success, the champions of the American Association, met the champions of the National League, the Providence Grays, in a bestof-three series, to be played in the Polo Grounds in New York City. Major League Baseball "officially" recognizes the 1903 World Series as the formal first version of the Fall Classic, this series between Providence and New York was the first-ever to be referred to as a "World Series". The stakes, besides bragging rights, were financial for this first Fall Classic. Mets' skipper Jim Mutrie suggested that each club put up one-thousand dollars, with the winner getting all of the proceeds.

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By Billy Brost

Grays' manager Frank Bancroft agreed to the wager, and the series was on. The series opened on Thursday, October 23rd, 1884 in New York City at the Polo Grounds. What makes the World Series such an exciting event for baseball fans, is that each team usually has an ace to open the series.

For the Grays, Old Hoss Radbourn, who by the way, was a career 309-game winner. He faced-off against the Mets' ace, Tim Keefe, who by the time his career was over, had notched 342 career wins himself. 1884 was a magical season for Radbourn, who blew Keefe and Lynch away, winning 59 games on the campaign.

In Game One, Radbourn shut the Mets completely down, scattering two hits over the only nine-inning game of the series. The Grays knocked around Keefe, book-ending a single run in the third inning, with a pair to open the home half of the first, and three to close out the eighth and final at-bat of the game for the Grays. 2500 spectators would witness Game One, and it would be the highest total of fans for the entire series. Over the next two games, the contests were called due to extreme cold weather and darkness. In Game Two, the Grays clinched the series and title of "World Champion" with a 3-1 victory over New York, with Radbourn once again twirling a gem. Keefe also manned the mound for the Mets, and although he was pitching through a sore arm, he limited the Grays to only three runs. It was too little, too late, and 40-degree weather limited the attendance to a mere 1,000 spectators.

So why play the third contest of the series if the Grays had won the first two to clinch? While professional baseball was still in its infancy and development, there was still money to be made.

Or hoped to be made. With the poor attendance during the first two contests, both teams agreed prior to the start of the series, that the third game would be played no matter how the first two games turned out. The Grays' players were less than thrilled with having to hold up their end of the agreement with the Mets, but they gave in.

Three-hundred or so people turned out for the "meaningless" game of the series. Rather than go with Jack Lynch, the Mets used the only other pitcher to toss an inning for them during the season, Buck Becannon. Radbourn returned to the mound for the Grays, and the game was never in doubt. Keefe however, was involved in the playby-play of the game, having been agreed upon by both teams, to work as the home plate umpire for the final stanza of the series. A Grays' offensive explosion, and a 12-2 final, cemented the Providence Grays as the first-ever World Series champions.

The celebration was short-lived, as Providence would cease as a big league city only one year later.

The Mets weren't too far behind, closing their doors after the 1887 campaign, never coming close to another pennant again. The year after their "first" World Series appearance, the team finished seventh, and would replicate the feat their final two seasons of existence. It wouldn't be until 1962 that the New York Mets would reappear, as one of the worst teams in single-season big league history.

Billy Brost resides in Riverton, Wyoming with his wife and two children.

In his spare time, he coaches youth baseball at the Little League and American Legion levels, and serves on his county’s historical preservation commission.

You can follow Billy on Twitter: @Billy_Brost

Baseball Magazine presents: The Art of John D’Acquisto I've been fortunate enough over the past couple of years, to get to know former big league relief pitcher, John D'Acquisto. John pitched in the big leagues for a decade, and was considered one of the better set-up men of his era. A flamethrower, he played for the likes of Roger Craig and Billy Martin. The native San Diegan spent his first four seasons with the Giants, before a brief stop in St. Louis, and then spending the next four seasons with his hometown Padres.

From San Diego, John made stops in Montreal, California with the Angels, Atlanta very briefly, before finishing up in Oakland with the Athletics. One final voyage to Chicago with the White Sox,

The great number 19 Tony Gwynn (above)

and a season of injuries, a surgery and playing in Denver for the American Association Bears, he decided it was time to hang up the spikes. John returned to the diamond in 1989, as a member of both the Bradenton Explorers and St. Lucie Legends of the Senior Professional Baseball Association, posting a record of 5-4, and notching four saves.

After baseball, John worked as a registered financial adviser, before returning to the game, coaching at several Division I schools, as well as working as the pitching coach for the Naval Baseball travelling team. John was the 1974 National League Rookie Pitcher of the Year, and he currently works for Major

League Baseball as a Field Timing Coordinator, which he explains as "It is specific to bring in commercial breaks for the network and taking them back to the game each inning. I am also responsible for letting the crew in New York know when there is a potential for a play review."

In his spare time, John picked up the creative bug, and learned his craft from many different people. He lists his inspirations to include former NFL football player Ed White, along with Gene Locklear and Christopher Peluso. I asked him specifically to explain his medium and technique, and this is what he shared: "I was taught by some of the greatest

This piece (right) is of Bryce Harper, which is my very first piece approved by the MLBPA and MLB for publishing to the public. Done the same way with color pencil.

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pencil sketchers I have ever seen. They taught me how to line and shade-prep my subjects...it was amazing what these guys could do."

"I dabbled with it and got better as time went by. I started doing collages with a beta program from Microsoft that I was testing out, and then started to sketch subject matter on my iPad through a medium called ink and slide and Adobe sketch, illustrator, line, and Photoshop.

It takes me about five to six combinations of sketching before I conclude a piece. It is a very complex, but enjoyable hobby that has turn into an art form" Let's get right to it, and share the wonderful art of Dr. John D'Acquisto!

(Above L-R): This piece is great closer and friend Goose Gossage when he was with San Diego; Cy Young award winner Randy Jones when with the Padres; This is of me in my first Major League start at Candlestick Park against the Braves. 9-2-73. It is done in color pencil with a stylus called Adonit Ink and Slide. Which all of the pieces have been done with.

(Above L-R): This piece is of the great Bob Gibson. Color pencil digital iPad adobe sketch and ink and slide; The next piece is of the great home run hitter Dave Kingman, in honor of the Mets. Same process.

(Above L-R): This piece is of the great Dave Winfield, when he was with the Padres. Ink and Slide digital color pencil; This last piece is Matt Harvey in color pencil digital art Ink and Slide.

To shop for or view John's work, you can find him at Artwork By John D'Acquisto and at Legendary Sports Prints.

We wish to thank John for taking the time to speak with us, and for being kind enough to share his artwork with us.

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What We Can Learn From the 1982 Little League Champions To me, the Little League World Series, held every year in Williamsport, Pennsylvania and featuring the best children's baseball teams from around the world, is one of the cooler things in all of sports.

That may seem odd, seeing as we are talking about a bunch of 10-12 year olds playing baseball, and that doesn't sound nearly as exciting as a bunch of world class, professional athletes playing baseball. And it isn't in terms of the kind of raw talent and skill you witness, obviously. Again, kids versus adults.

But at the same time, the kids are what make it special. There is something about young people having fun, giving it their all, and showing passion that is very compelling and entertaining. Perhaps it is because we know (or can be pretty sure) they are doing it because they genuinely love the game, and are living their dream; there are no concerns about greed or anything else, it's just young men (and women) having fun and competing. We won't see anything from the vast majority of the players once their run is over, and most of us didn't know any of them to begin with, and yet the tournament is appointment television for many.

That's what it is like now, but from what I have heard, it has been that way for a while. This is evidenced by the fact that ESPN produced a 30 for 30 on the 1982 Little League World Series Champions from Kirkland, Washington who managed to upset the international powerhouse that was Taiwan.

The short documentary, called "Little Big Men" suggests there was a lot of excitement surrounding the 1982 tourney. Taiwan had won it all five years in a row, but there seemed to be a feeling that Kirkland had a chance to break their streak.

This buzz stemmed, at least in part, from the presence of Cody Webster, both on the mound and at the plate. Cody had a fastball in the mid-70s, could hit massive homers, and was 5'7" and 175 pounds at just 12 years old. He was the star of that team, one of the few players you might expect to see more of in the future.

I don't know that he garnered Mo'ne Davis level fame, seeing as he didn't break the mold for an entire gender, but he may have been the better player, and had even higher expectations placed upon him.

But the LLWS is more than just the finals, in which the U.S. champs take on the international champs. Kirkland had to face other U.S. teams on their way to the title, which means they didn't have the whole country behind them for a large chunk of the time. Webster noted in the documentary that the parents of his opponents would constantly insult him, call him fat, and one even went as far as to spit on him. They had no reason to do this, of course, expect out of jealousy and spite, but those kinds of things can, and did, really get to a kid, and that may make his performance that much more impressive. At times, it was as though everyone was against him -- not even his team, but him alone -- and yet he managed to dominate throughout.

In the championship game, which Kirk-

land won 6-0, Cody tossed a two-hit shutout and mashed a 280-foot bomb, cementing himself in the minds of many, but also adding an enormous amount of pressure, as if there wasn't enough already. He never lived up to the lofty expectations, partly because they were too lofty. He was still a good player in high school, and managed to get a chance to play college ball before injuries set in.

All of this can probably teach us a lesson or about how we watch the LLWS. My uncle, Dave Keller, was the third baseman for the team, and that has allowed me to meet a lot of his teammates (Cody included).

They are all just normal guys, most of whom have, or had, a passion for the game. They put in a lot of time and work to do what they did as kids, but they will ultimately live normal lives like the rest of us, albeit perhaps more baseball-centric than most. Cody has coached local teams for years. My uncle was the head baseball coach at Spokane Falls Community College. Mark Peterson, the team's first baseman, coaches baseball at Juanita High 12

By JJ Keller

School in Kirkland.

Perhaps we can learn something about how we ought to take in the Little League World Series. We should appreciate what the talented young kids have done, and the work they put in, and enjoy watching them give it their all. But we should also refrain from placing heavy expectations on them, or giving them (unwanted?) attention and fame.

These are kids 12 and younger, and some of the biggest moments of their lives are happening on TV for the entire world to see. Then, the best or most influential of this bunch is plastered all over the media.

You risk burning these kids out and saddling them with unfair expectations before they even reach their teenage years. It's what happened to Cody Webster, and that just isn't right.

This isn't to say we can't appreciate the kids we love to watch. We absolutely can and should. As I said at the start, it is a great event, and the kids are clearly having the times of their lives out there. But maybe we should leave it at that, at least until they are older. I was able to be in the Kirkland, Washington parade a few years back with my uncle, and it was clear that plenty -- the Photo Courtesy: Bleacher Report players who made it back for the parade, and those watching it -- were excited, and had memories of 1982.

We shouldn't risk turning those into unhappy memories by exploiting them.

My uncle seems to have nothing but fond memories about the time, and my dad, who watched his little brother from the stands, would say the same thing: this is supposed to be fun, and for most of them it was.

But these aren't professionals, they are children trying to play baseball with their friends, and ideally win a championship.

For some, it will be the height of their baseball careers. Let's let them enjoy it, and we can do the same, just from a respectful distance.

JJ Keller is currently in college on his way to earning a degree in History Education with the hopes of becoming a high school teacher, but writing of all sorts has become a passion over the years.

Follow JJ on Twitter: @KJ_Jeller

RECALLING BASEBALL MAGAZINE: A FRIEND FROM THE PAST A featured exclusive

By Fred Claire

Editor’s Note: Fred Claire began his professional sports career as a writer and editor for such publications as Whittier Daily News, the Pamona Progress-Bulletin, and the Long Beach Independent Press-Telegram. While covering the Dodgers in 1969, and opportunity to join the organization presented itself, and soon, Fred joined the Dodgers in their public relations department. In 1975, Fred was promoted to Vice President of Public Relations.

One of his key contributions in that role was developing the “Think Blue” campaign.

Upon the controversial appearance and eventual dismissal of Dodgers’ General Manager Al Campanis on the ABC show Nightline, team President Peter O’Malley promoted Fred into the position of GM in 1987. After a poor showing in 1987, Fred rebuilt the Dodgers into immediate contenders heading into the 1988 campaign, led by the signing of outfielder Kirk Gibson. Fred’s Dodgers would go on to defeat the heavily-favored New York Mets in the National League Championship Series, and then the Oakland Athletics in that season’s World Series. To date, it remains the last crown the Dodgers have won. Fred was named The Sporting News Major League Baseball Executive of the Year for his work with the 1988 Dodgers.

During the remainder of Fred’s tenure leading the Dodgers front office, the team reached the playoffs twice more, in 1995 and 1996. His run as the team’s general manager ended on June 21st, 1998.

Some of the excellent players that Fred’s front office produced during his run as Dodgers’ GM, included Mike Piazza, Eric Karros, Raul Mondesi, and Hideo Nomo.

Since retiring from baseball, Fred now lectures at Cal Tech in sports business, has authored a book, published in 2004, and is a partner in the new baseball analytics site, Ariball.com.~BB (This article was written by Fred Claire, former general manager and Executive Vice-President of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

He is the author of: “Fred Claire: My 30 Years in Dodger Blue.”)

The magazine was a vehicle to be connected to the game. There were no televised games available in our area of the country, and the Internet was as far removed as outer space.

Little did we know.

As a fan of the game, I was fortunate that my parents recognized the interest that my brother Doug and I had in playing baseball, and following Major League Baseball, which resulted in occasional trips to Crosley Field in Cincinnati, home of the Reds.

My brother was a Cardinal fan and since we always seemed to be on the opposite side of things (even in our throwing, he was a lefty) I pulled for the Reds.

It always seemed to be somewhat of a mismatch when my Reds went up against the likes of Stan Musial, Enos Slaughter, Marty Marion and Red Schoendienst, but I didn’t

player, where my top level of high school competition was being on the junior varsity team.

In my first year of college, I was fortunate to attend El Camino College and come into contact with a wonderful journalism instructor, Mr. William Kamrath.

In addition to being on the school newspaper, I took a feature writing class from Mr. Kamrath, and one of the assignments to pass was to fail three times at getting a piece picked up for publication.

That’s right—three rejection slips were needed to pass the class. The assignment gave a student the opportunity to write, to learn how to submit a story for publication and, normally, understand failure in the form of a rejection slip.

I submitted three stories for publication, and one to my old friend, Baseball Magazine.

The story was titled “Make Way for the Coast League” in that I felt that cities like Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, Oakland and Seattle—among others (Sacramento, Portland) could support Major League Baseball.

I was a 17-year-old writer, and as it turned out, well ahead of my time, because this was five years before Major League Baseball was to arrive in California with the Dodgers moving to Los Angeles and the Giants to San Francisco for the 1958 season.

With the semester drawing to a close, Mr. Kamrath called upon the students in the feature writing class to produce their three rejection slips.

I explained to Mr. Kamrath that I had only two rejection slips. He then asked for a copy of the story I had submitted, but for the life of me I couldn’t locate a copy.

Photo Courtesy: Fred Claire “Fred, I’m afraid I can’t give you the grade you deserve because you failed to meet care because my favorite guys were wearing the requirements,” said Mr. Kamrath. their home white uniforms, and there was an I told him I understood, but again I tried to unforgettable magic to Crosley Field with the assure him that I had submitted the story. beautiful grass terrace running up to the left A few weeks after the class concluded, I was field wall. excited to receive a letter from Baseball MagHaving had the opportunity to attend a few azine. My story had been accepted and would games in Cincinnati, and intrigued by the I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw be published, and a check was included with game through Baseball Magazine and The Baseball Magazine was appearing on the web the letter.

Sporting News (almost exclusive to baseball and on Twitter.

When I told Mr. Kamrath, I’m not sure who at the time), I knew that somehow, someIt was like a long lost friend had emerged was more excited; the instructor or the stuway, I wanted to stay connected to the game after being buried nearly 60 years ago. dent. throughout my life.

How was it possible that a part of my past In later years during my time with the DodgMy family moved from Ohio to California in was suddenly showing up in the social media ers, I was to meet many of the players who had the summer of 1950, and I discovered we had of today’s world? played in the PCL, including a few who beleft Major League Baseball in our past.

As a youngster growing up in a small town came members of the Dodger organization— I also discovered there was an interesting in Ohio, Baseball Magazine had been a big the great coaches Red Adams and Monty brand of baseball being placed on the West part of my connection to the sport I loved. I Basgall; scouting director Ben Wade; and the Coast—the Pacific Coast League—and when was fortunate in the fact that my Dad owned legendary scout, George Genovese. the corner drug store in Jamestown, Ohio, and we settled in Southern California, I quickly It has been quite a journey from Jamestown, the store had a section where magazines were became a fan of the PCL with a rooting interOhio, to a 30-year career with the Los Angeles est in the Hollywood Stars. sold.

Dodgers and continued opportunities in the When I was graduated from Torrance I could hardly await for the monthly arrival business world of sports.

High School in 1953, I still had a passion for of Baseball Magazine. The players I idolized We need to remember our friends and assobaseball and all sports, and decided my best would come to life in looking at the pictures ciations that we have made during our travels. chance to stay active in sports was to study and in reading the stories. Besides that, the The very look and memories of Baseball magazine contained a section where you could journalism and become a writer. send off and buy pictures of players.

I certainly knew I didn’t have a future as a Magazine always will be important to me.

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Why Ty Cobb Shouldn’t Go To Cobb County Years ago, I worked on a monthly sports magazine that focused on Oregon sports. At the end of every issue was an opinion column I titled "The Karmic Boomerang". You see, I believe that karma acts like a boomerang. Every action, whether good or bad, always comes back to you in some way. The good karma is when you catch the boomerang. The bad karma is when it smacks you right in the back of the head.

I bring this up only because this piece will be more of an editorial. An opinion piece on a topic I believe is heading towards a karmic climatic conclusion.

The topic at hand, is the Atlanta Braves and their new ballpark, SunTrust Park, being built in Cobb County, set to open in 2017. The Braves have four statues currently at Turner Field in a section known as Monument Grove. Those four statues are of Warren Spahn, Phil Niekro, Hank Aaron and Ty Cobb. It was announced earlier this year that the Braves will be taking all of the statues with them to the new park, all except Cobb's.

On the surface, that seems ridiculous. Cobb is arguably the most famous Georgian to ever play baseball and the new park is in COBB County - which I know wasn't named for Ty Cobb, but it does seem oddly fitting.

On the other hand, Cobb had absolutely no ties to the Braves organization whatsoever, having played 22 of his 24 seasons with the Detroit Tigers before finishing with the Philadelphia Athletics.

The Braves say that the reason they aren't taking the Cobb statue with them is that they don't actually own it. But some believe that the real reason behind the team not wanting the statue is because of Cobb's supposed reputation. I only say supposed because according to a new book by Charles Leehrsen titled "Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty", most of the stories surrounding Cobb's surly demeanor and racism are vastly blown out of proportion.

Leehrsen even points out a quote by Cobb in the 1950's indicating Cobb's belief that, "The Negro should be accepted wholeheartedly and not grudg-

ingly into baseball. The Negro has the right to play professional sports, and who's to say he has not?"

Whether that one statement alone is enough to change decades of belief by many that Cobb was a racist, I think the more important issue, at least to

By Dan Hughes

the time to move draws nearer, we'll see how serious the Braves are about fighting for the statue. Will the team really fight for it? Indicating that they were telling the truth about why they aren't planning on taking it. Or will they not push for it? Most likely in-

Photo Courtesy: stage.mapquest.com

me, is that Cobb has no significant history with the Braves. So why would the Braves have a statue at their stadium honoring him?

At Safeco Field in Seattle, there is one statue, honoring longtime broadcaster Dave Niehaus, who passed away in 2010. At Yankee Stadium, there is only one monument in Monument Park that is not in honor of a former Yankee, and that is the one for Jackie Robinson.

I have not been to every stadium in the country, but I am hard-pressed to find ANY stadium that has a statue of a player who never once donned the uniform of its tenant. The only exception I find is that of Robinson, who is honored across baseball with his number 42 being retired.

Again, I understand that Cobb is the state of Georgia's most famous connection to professional baseball, but there are plenty of former Braves that should be immortalized by the club before they consider keeping the Cobb statue.

Dale Murphy, Chipper Jones, Eddie Mathews, Tom Glavine, John Smoltz and Greg Maddux just to name a few. But the fact remains, the statue of Cobb already exists. I suppose as

dicating that they don't want to associate his "attitude" with the team any longer, especially when they have no obligation to do so.

Personally, I believe the Braves should just cut ties with the statue and open up their new beautiful ballpark without the cloud of suspicion hanging over the organization, with people having to wonder what the real reason was behind not taking it. Just come out, say that the team is choosing to head down a path where they honor former Braves and that while they recognize Cobb's importance to the history of Georgia baseball, they choose to use the new Monument Grove to honor those who wore the Braves uniform.

Which ending will the boomerang choose? Will the organization stick to the truth, be completely honest in their reasoning in why they don't want the statue with the team catching the boomerang? Or will we hear later that the Braves weren't being honest and don't want it because of what Cobb's presumed legacy is and have to face the music from a disgruntled fanbase, with the boomerang smacking them square in the back of the head?

I guess we can only sit back and wait.

After the First Time: When Managers Have Gone From Average To Great Baseball is one of those rare industries, as is professional, college and high school sports, where a lack of performance, can often get a manager or a head coach multiple chances to prove the last time wasn’t indicative of a field leader’s true abilities and talents. More recently in baseball, we are seeing no-experience managers get a chance to lead big league teams. These men don’t have as much as a season of minor league coaching experience, but yet have gained the confidence of an ownership group and general manager, to lead a multi-million dollar franchise towards the ultimate prize: World Series glory.

Many of the greatest managers in the history of our national pastime, weren’t so great during their first, or even second stints as skippers at the major league level.

Every once in awhile, you do come across a former player, who was always a cerebral player, and showed the tools during their playing career, that projected to future big league success in the dugout. The St. Louis Cardinals’ Mike Matheny is one of those managers. After twelve seasons, and four big league stops, Matheny who retired as a career .239 hitter, with very little power, but was a winner of four Gold Glove awards for his work behind the dish as a catcher, is one of these examples. Following his playing career, he worked at an Arizona baseball academy, mentoring young players in the finer points of the game.

From there, he found himself back with the Cardinals as a special adviser, where he spent a couple of years until the retirement of Hall of Fame manager, Tony La Russa. Without a single inning as a member of a big league coaching staff, Matheny took over the Cardinals as their manager in 2012. Matheny was taking over a World Series-winning roster, and had big shoes to fill in La Russa. While some at the time questioned the move, Matheny has proven to be a solid leader, one that has kept the “Cardinal Way” intact, He has Mandatory Credit: whitesoxpride.mlblogs.com

led the Redbirds to the postseason in each of his seasons at the helm, highlighted by a National League pennant in 2013, before falling to the Boston Red Sox. But for the special case of success for Matheny, many others have struggled mightily. There have been many a great

By Billy Brost

sons, and an overall winning record in the strike-shortened 1981 season), but posted an overall record of just 522-510--or 12 games over .500. Not Hall of Fame-caliber by any stretch of the imagination.

Once he landed in Oakland with the Athletics, he revolutionized the modern Mandatory Credit: espn.com

baseball mind or student, who simply did not have the talent or resources available to make an impact on that franchise. Take the case of one Charles Dillon “Casey” Stengel. A solid, but not spectacular big league player, Stengel spent his playing career learning the intricacies of the game from none other than the great John McGraw. Stengel scuffled in his first two runs as a big league skipper, posting sub par records with both the Brooklyn Dodgers (208- 251) and the Boston Bees/Braves (373-491).

It wasn’t until his third opportunity as a manager in the Bronx (although the Yankees had been successful for many seasons prior to his arrival), that the “Old Professor” earned his keep and was viewed as one of the great baseball minds of all-time. He instituted the platoon system, winter programs for his players, and the use of farm teams to stockpile talent.

While the first two ideas were McGraw’s, and the last was Branch Rickey’s, Stengel exploited the resources at his disposal to build the greatest dynasty in baseball history. Even after he was dismissed from the Yankees, he brought personality and character to a struggling expansion franchise, and helped set the tone for what would be several competitive teams in Queens, with the New York Mets.

In parts of eight seasons with the Chicago White Sox, the aforementioned Tony La Russa didn’t experience great success in his first big league opportunity as a manager. From 1979 through partway through the 1986 season, LaRussa enjoyed only three winning seasons (2 complete sea15

bullpen, and used pitchers in new roles, such as the left-handed specialist, the setup man, and the ninth-inning closer. La Russa rode big bats and stealth pitching from both starters and relievers, to three American League pennants and a World Series title in Oakland. But again, the players who made La Russa look like a genius in his early years with the A’s, quickly disappeared at the end of his run, and in his final three seasons, he posted only a 186-234 record to close out his tenure by the Bay. La Russa then replaced a man we’ll talk about in a bit with the St. Louis Cardinals in Joe Torre, and in sixteen years in the Redbirds dugout, he finished with a losing record only three times, while posting a career record of 1408-1182, which included three more pennants, and a pair of World Series titles to secure his place among the all-time greats. What if Oakland or St. Louis hadn’t given him a chance to manage by just examining his time in Chicago? We would’ve missed one of the great managing careers of all-time.

In 220 career games, Bobby Cox posted a meager .225 career batting average over two big league seasons in pinstripes.

While Cox’s big league experience was minimal, he learned a great deal about the game from “The Major”, Ralph Houk.

These experiences on the Yankees’ bench helped shape his fiery dugout personality, and would provide some insight into how to handle players of all backgrounds, skill levels and personalities. Cox received his first opportunity to manage in the bigs at the tender age of 37, landing in Atlanta

for his “first stint” with the Braves. While many in recent baseball lore, only think of all of the division titles, the pennants, and the home grown players Cox helped produce, his run in Atlanta from 1978 through 1981 are forgettable at best. A 291-323 record during that time, ousted Cox from the Braves’ dugout for...Joe Torre.

Cox wasn’t out of work long however, as the Toronto Blue Jays quickly snatched Cox up, and he helped build the foundation of what would be a highly-competitive Jays’ franchise throughout the midto-late 1980s. Cox completed his four-year run north of the border with a division title, and a record of 355-292 record. A collapse in the 1985 American League Championship Series to the eventual World Series champion Royals, left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth, and Cox looked for bigger opportunities in which to make an impact on a franchise.

Over the next two decades, Cox immersed himself in everything Atlanta Braves, first serving as the team’s general manager, and then returning to the dugout for his second stint as skipper. During that time, Cox would build a National League dynasty, winning fourteen division championships, four National League pennants, and the 1995 World Series title.

When all was said and done, Cox was a four-time Manager of the Year, and had more than 2500 career victories. What if Toronto hadn’t given him a chance after his failures in Atlanta the first time, and what if Ted Turner hadn’t hired him to rebuild a struggling Braves’ franchise?

When Turner fired Cox after a disastrous second half of the 1981 season, he was asked who was on his shortlist to be the Braves new manager. Turner responded “It would be Bobby Cox if I hadn’t just fired him.”

Finally, there is the tale of Joseph Paul Torre. Major League Baseball’s current Chief Officer of Baseball, found a long and winding road to big league managerial success. A former National League Most Valuable Player, Torre once hit .373 in 1971, but never reached the World Series as a player. Torre is one of the last people to serve in the capacity of player-manager, having pulled double-duty for the New York Mets for only 18 games before deciding to retire and manage full-time.

Like Cox, Torre struggled in his first big league managing opportunity, as the Mets continued to flounder under his leadership, and like Cox, was fired at the end of the strike-shortened 1981 season.

He wasn’t out of work long though, as he replaced Cox in the Braves dugout in 1982. Torre secured his first success as a manager, leading the Braves to the ‘82 NL Western Division crown, where they would fall to the St. Louis Cardinals. Torre accomplished something special in 1983, posting the first back-to-back winning seasons for the Braves in their history since moving to Atlanta, and the first as a

franchise since 1966 while located in Milwaukee. Although Torre’s Braves finished second to the Astros in 1984, Turner once again pulled the trigger, giving Torre his walking papers after an 80-82 record.

Unlike Stengel, La Russa and Cox, Torre was not immediately given another opportunity to manage in the big leagues.

For the next half decade, he served as a color commentator for the then-California Angels. Torre had the knack for being in the right place at the right time, when in 1990, Torre replaced the manager who kept him from reaching the World Series in 1982, the Cardinals’ Whitey Herzog.

Torre’s third stint as a big league skipper mirrored his days with the Mets, finishing three games under .500 at 351-354. He failed to reach the postseason in any of his years in St. Louis, and was at the helm when the Cardinals prepared for a team sale, dealing off many of their solid AllStar caliber players. He was fired at the end of the 1995 season, and replaced by Tony La Russa.

At the time of his dismissal, Torre believed his days as a big league manager were over for good. It’s not often that a manager, who has no World Series rings to show for his labors, is given a fourth shot to take on a major league roster. Then came George Steinbrenner. The Yankees had just blown a 2-games-to-none lead to the Seattle Mariners in the ‘95 AL Division Series, and the Boss wasn’t excited to renew Buck Showalter’s contract.

Enter what the New York media deemed “Clueless Joe”. They openly questioned why Steinbrenner would hire a manager with no World Series pedigree, but what few people knew, was that Torre was the calming force to unite a young Yankees’ squad, that had grown tired of Showalter’s iron-fisted ways.

Serving Steinbrenner for the next twelve seasons, Torre would lead the most recent Yankees’ dynasty, winning six American League pennants, four World Series championships--including the run of three in a row from 1998-2000, and was within a pair of outs away from winning four in a row. His last World Series appearance came against the Cinderella Florida Marlins in 2003, and the Yankees lost that series in six games. The infamous 2004 collapse, and several early round exits,

Mandatory Credit: bloggingmets.com

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ended Torre’s tenure in the Bronx at the end of the 2007 season.

Torre parlayed his Bronx success into one more managerial job, this time in Los Angeles. Torre brought longtime Yankees’ fan favorite Don Mattingly with him, and had it spelled out in his contract, that Mattingly would succeed him upon his retirement three years later. Torre led the Dodgers to an NL West crown his first season in the dugout, but the Dodgers would fall to the eventual World Series champion Phillies. A repeat would occur the following season, as the Dodgers had the best record in the National League, only to lose once again to the Phillies (who would go on to lose to Torre’s former club, the Yankees in six games in the 2009 World Series). Torre’s final season as a manager would be similar to his first: a losing season, but he would record his final victory on the last day of the season, beating the Arizona Diamonbacks 3-1.

The victory would mark Torre’s 2326th as a big league skipper. His record places him in the all-time top ten among major league managers.

Now that Ned Yost has quieted all the naysayers, by leading the Kansas City Royals to a pair of pennants and most recently, the team’s first World Series title in 30 years, he might be well on his way to a spectacular, and perhaps, a Hall of Fame managing career. It’s too early to tell, but he too was given a second chance to manage after a failed first stint in Milwaukee with the Brewers. Dusty Baker, who has managed in San Francisco, Chicago and Cincinnati, will begin his fourth stint as a major league manager, taking over an under-performing Washington Nationals’ team that has World Series aspirations.

Baker, unlike many of the aforementioned field leaders, has been successful in each of his previous stops, leading all three franchises to the postseason. His only appearance in the World Series, came in his first stop with the Giants, where they were within a handful of outs away from winning it all, before falling to the Anaheim Angels in 2002.

The point is, we cannot judge the future success of big league managers based solely on their first runs as leaders. Coincidentally, La Russa, Cox, and Torre all entered Cooperstown together in the same class. Sure, Mattingly led the Dodgers to the postseason three years in a row, but it wasn’t enough to keep his job. He’s now the new manager of an underfunded, Miami Marlins team that has seen multiple managers come and go since their last World Series title in 2003. Will Andy Green, in his first-ever big league managing opportunity, find the success that has eluded the Padres’ franchise since the departure of Bruce Bochy, who by the way, had extended success in San Diego, but became a Hall of Fame manager up the coast in his second stint as a skipper with the San Francisco Giants? History will be the ultimate judge.

Changing the One-Game Wild Card Format to a Best-of-Three Series I have not heard back from Rob Manfred about my article about why I don’t like the current Wild Card format; imagine that, he is not yet reading Baseball Magazine! We will have to do something about that. However, I said then, that I would give my suggestions for how to change the one-game, winner go home contest. I don’t mean

By Eric Gray

introducing new levels for comparison.

Players would have fewer complete games, fewer wins, fewer home runs and RBI. It would be hard to compare players of different eras and, of course, the “automatic” HOF milestones, like 500 home runs, which are already starting to erode, would become much harder to reach. Of course there is also that other factor: money. Owners would lose approximately 5 percent of their revenue. Day of game employees would make less, restaurants and drinking establishments and team stores near the parks would lose revenue. And, of course, players would be paid less. Or would they? That is not really something we need to discuss here.

Let’s move on Mandatory Credit: Bleacher Report to the calendar.

The season is simply that we should change it to a length of the calendar season and the already too long, it is often complained. best-of-three series, although this would effects of climate, the number of games Six weeks of spring training followed hardly be a creative idea and it is exactly that comprise the regular season, and by six months for the regular season, where I am headed. I mean how to deal how finances come into play with all of sometimes bleeding over into Octowith all the objections to making this this. Let’s tackle these issues. ber. Do we really want to make it lonthe way to go.

The first point that is called into ques- ger, even by a few days? And if we did, tion is whether to keep a 162-game I ended my last piece on this subject which way? schedule. There have been calls to short- Start games at the end of March, or with the point that there is no reward en the season back to 154 games, to ad- move them further into October? Eifor home fans whose team has the second wild card seed, and loses the onedress the weather issues and just simply ther way, you are running up against game playoff on the road. Well, hmm, shorten the season. This would necespotentially bad weather in virtually sitate a complete re-configuration of a let’s see, it did not work out that way every city in which teams are located generally simple and equivalent formula with the few exceptions of the teams in this year, did it? regarding division play (now 18 or 19 The Cubs beat the Pirates and the the south and west. This isn’t football; games against your division opponents), we don’t need to play in freezing cold or Astros beat the Yankees, both on the road. Well, hmm, it did not partly work league play against all the other teams the snow. out that way last year either, did it? The in the same league (generally 3 each, This leads to the next factor that has Giants beat the Pirates as visitors, while home and away) and then an assorted been essentially off the table for denumber of interleague games. the Royals beat the A’s at home. So, cades: double headers. There have been doomsday predictions, a one-and-done, Well, this would not be so hard for virtually no scheduled double heada computer programmer to do, and I no celebratory playoff home game for ers in twenty or so years; when douthe second wild card team generally, did am not sure there would be that much ble headers are forced because of rain objection to it, as long as play was con- outs, they are almost inevitably done not come true during these years.

Great. I was not predicting THAT this centrated against division rivals. Argu- as separate admission, day then night would be the case, but what if. What if ments against doing this might include affairs. Why? Well, owners obviously don’t want to lose the revenue from the the Cubs and the Astros had lost? Two how it would affect statistics, thereby long suffering fan bases would have no joy of watching their teams in their own sacred cathedrals.

So, let’s just say that the premise holds in theory, if not in recent reality. What can be done about this? I think that the most common reasons for the onegame playoff, and conversely against lengthening the series, include the

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full complement of 162 games.

This is not a value judgment on my part; I am just stating the facts.

There is also the issue about starting rotations.

The occasional extra game now wreaks havoc with the normal rest for starting pitchers. Most teams have the “long man” (Yusmeiro Petit filled that role admirably for the Giants in 2014) who can go five innings or so. Sometimes it becomes a complete “bullpen game”. Most often, though, teams will bring up a minor league hurler for one game, send down a fifth outfielder or leastused reliever. This results in all kinds of roster manipulations regarding options and how long until someone can be recalled.

It is tricky.

So, what can be done?

How can the schedule remain at 162 (individual attendance) games, stop screwing around with roster manipulation, not force pitchers to pitch on short rest and even shorten the calendar with minimal cost? Scheduling day-night double headers every other week, say on Saturday, which would provide for optimum attendance at both games, and would shorten the season by almost two weeks, but even that does not answer the question about starting pitching. So here is the suggestion I make to MLB. If you follow the NBA, you see that during the last few years, teams have a roster of 15 players, but designate 12 active players before each game. I suggest that the same strategy apply to baseball, have a roster of, say, 27 players, and before each series, (not game, series), designate the 25 players who will be active. This way, teams can keep an extra starting pitcher available for these double headers without having to overwork relief pitchers, have starters go on short rest (reducing arm injuries), or navigate the quick one-game trips to the majors for minor leaguers.

Using examples of the teams I am most familiar with, if the Giants’ Madison Bumgarner pitches on Thursday, (unless it is in the World Series) he is not going to pitch during the upcoming weekend series. The need for arms will be exacerbated if there is a double header in

Mandatory Credit: espn.com

there. So, Ryan Vogelsong, who was a very important member of the Giants pitching staff for a few years, but has become somewhat ineffective, might be the perfect person to fill the role of 26th or 27th man. He is a proven, although diminishing, major leaguer, he would not command a steep salary, and would be the perfect improvement on the one day freeway call up.

As Dillon Gee was fading from the stellar Mets rotation this year, he, too, might have been an ideal candidate.

Having a 27th man would also allow teams to temporarily replace a player who has an injury that is not severe enough to place him on the 15-day disabled list and still be at full strength.

Some folks will object to this, saying roster management, including a DL decision, is the role of the manager and general manager and I completely understand that perspective. I am just tossing this in as an option. You can even have the 27th player eligible to play in the minor leagues to keep sharp or continue to develop skills, as would be the case with upcoming minor leaguers.

There would be details to be worked out. Do you make the roster 26 or 27 18

players? Do you allow the extra men to continue to play in the minors? The key issue that needs to be determined first is whether this concept, having the extra men, is one that is desired to help shorten the length of the season, keep the same number of games (and perhaps even allow for an extra couple of off days) and maintain team revenue, all at reasonably low cost.

I think it is an idea that benefits everyone with little downside that I can see.

Even the players union might be happy with this as it would provide 30-60 additional jobs.

Anyone have a connection to the MLB Commissioner?

Eric Gray is from Plainview, New York, and got his BA from SUNY New Paltz. He moved to San Francisco and spent his career with the Department of Labor overseeing job training programs for disadvantaged youth. He has been married for 36 years to Lynn, and their two children, Rachel and David.

They are huge Giants fans.

He can be followed on Twitter, if he ever decides to post something, @ericcgray1

General Managers Getting Axed More Often in Era of Analytics

Doug Melvin had been the Milwaukee Brewers general manager since 2002. But in 2015, with the Brewers mired in a disappointing season, Melvin’s role within the front office was reduced, and Astros assistant GM David Stearns was hired in his place.

Melvin was one of eleven GMs whose role changed in 2015, and one of six to be fired or demoted. Both of those are yearly highs for the last decade. Melvin joined the likes of Jack Zduriencik, Ruben Amaro Jr. and

By Patrick Leary

manager changes are created equal. I considered Ben Cherington to have been fired/ demoted by the Red Sox, even though he technically resigned in reaction to the hiring of Dave Dombrowski. On the flip side, I considered Jerry Dipoto to have resigned from his role with the Angels in 2015, even though it reportedly happened because of a power struggle.

Still, baseball, a sport known for its impulsive firing of skippers, has seen more turnover in the typically more long term

of incredibly disciplined and smart front offices. Dayton Moore and Theo Epstein are almost universally viewed as innovative baseball minds. While Sandy Alderson and Alex Anthopolous don’t fall into that same category, both made incredibly important deadline acquisitions, with Alderson getting Yoenis Cespedes and Anthopolous landing David Price, that transformed their teams’ seasons.

As for the managers? Ned Yost and Terry Collins seemed to make mistake after mis-

position at the head of its front offices in recent years.

What has changed? Credit has to be given to the increasing importance of general managers over managers to a team’s success, both in theory and in practice.

In 2010, legendary managers like Bobby Cox, Joe Torre and Lou Piniella managed their final games. Tony La Russa followed suit a year later. Meanwhile, mainstay executives like Brian Cashman, Brian Sabean and John Mozeliak were winning titles.

Perception of the importance of a good general manager was on the rise.

That perception reached new heights in 2014, when the Dodgers, like the Cubs had two years earlier, broke the bank (although knowing the Dodgers, there’s still plenty of cash lying around) to poach Andrew Friedman from the Rays and Farhan Zaidi from the A’s to helm their front office and replace Ned Colletti. Executives have just become more important to owners in today’s game.

If anything, the 2015 playoffs only raised the importance of executives, especially at the expense of managers. Just look at the final four teams.

The Royals and Cubs succeed because

take in the World Series, with the resilience of the Royals’ players willing them to the title. Joe Maddon was highly sought after, and is probably the best manager in the game today, but his championship series runner-up counterpart John Gibbons was actually fired by his current team just seven years ago.

With analytics and player development making it possible for smaller market teams to win with smaller payrolls in the modern game, front office roles are the highest priorities for franchises trying to win championships. Losing years to executives that are behind the curve is becoming too costly for teams, and as such, the axe is coming faster than ever for general managers.

Photo Courtesy: salutemag.com

Dave Dombrowski, as long-tenured GMs finding new roles for the upcoming season.

The wave of GM openings is part of a trend that began last season. At the beginning of next season, 18 of the 30 MLB teams will have had a change at GM, and ten of those came via demotions or firings.

By comparison, only two general manager positions came open in 2012 and 2013 (one each) and both opened via promotion, when the White Sox made Kenny Williams their president and the Marlins did the same with Michael Hill. Only sixteen GMs changed roles or were fired from 2008 through 2013.

In fact, general manager positions are turning over even faster than managers are in recent years.

At least five managerial jobs have changed hands in each year since 2009. Besides an unusually high 12 in 2010, the other five years in that span saw between five and seven managers resign or get fired.

But since 2005, only 2014 and 2015 have seen more general manager jobs change hands than manager jobs.

It’s important to note that unlike most manager replacements, not all general

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Patrick Leary graduated from Marquette University, past home of such luminaries as Dwyane Wade, Chris Farley and the dad from That’s So Raven, in 2015 with a B.A. in journalism and writes for The Journal Times in Racine, Wisconsin.

You can follow Patrick on Twitter: @patrickkleary

Brooklyn’s Secular Cathedral: Brooklyn’s Effect on the Mythology of the Dodgers (Part 2) This is the second part of a five-part series exclusive to Baseball Magazine by guest contributor Christine Sisto.

and reporters who ridiculed him, which was easy to do because of his boisterous personality. He was one of the highest paid baseball players of the time. He played for The Brooklyn Dodgers many teams before coming to Brooklyn in Perfect the Art of Losing 1926 and for many more teams after he left Brooklyn in 1932, only to return in 1945.

A former Brooklyn Dodgers fan once Despite his consistent high batting averagdeclared, “No one screwed up like us.” The es, often in the .400s, owners were prone to history of the Dodgers’ almost theatrical firing him because of his actions on and off “screw-ups” began as early as 1920. This was the field. the year that the Dodgers (at the time, called For example, he was fired from the Omathe Robins) played the longest game in ma- ha club in 1922, despite the fact that he was jor league history at 26 innings. batting .416, because a pop fly hit him on The final score was 1-to-1, when the umpire called the game. In the World Series that same year, was the last time for nearly two decades that the Dodgers would win the pennant, Cleveland’s second baseman succeeded in making an unassisted triple play.

Most baseball fans have never seen a triple play in their lives. An unassisted triple play is a once in a generation occurrence; one in a World Series is nearly unheard of, and in fact, the triple play in question was the first recorded in a World Series. Six years later, on August 15, 1926, the Dodgers took part in “the dizziest play in all of baseball history:” Brooklyn…was playing Boston at Ebbets Field. In the seventh inning… The bases were filled when [Brooklyn’s] Fewster was hit by a pitched ball. The next man was out the head during a game. During a stint in on a pop fly… When Herman, great player Nashville, Herman got hits his first four and greater screwball, cracked a hit to right times at bat, and on his fifth hit, an outfieldfield, DeBerry scored; but Vance, fearing er made an amazing catch. Nashville’s manthat the ball might be caught, held up until ager made a positive comment to Herman he saw that it would fall safely. Puffing into that they would have won if the outfielder third, he rounded the sack, but then believ- had not made that catch. The Babe took this ing that he could not reach home before the statement the wrong way and started a heatball, dived back to third. Fewster, seeing that ed argument with the manager and he was Herman’s drive would be at least a double, promptly fired. sped around second and headed to third, The Babe came to Brooklyn, called the with Herman, determined to stretch his hit Robins at the time, for $15,000. While in into a triple, hard on his heels. All three— Brooklyn, Herman became famous, accordVance, Fewster, and Herman— found theming to him, for hitting so many homeruns selves piled up at the same base. over the right-field wall and breaking so Dodgers fans, who never forgot this play, many windows on Bedford Avenue that the referred to it for decades afterward. It is owners of Ebbets Field had to install a fence. recorded that one day, when a Dodgers He continued to play magnificently, hitting fan was told that “The Bums are leading, for averages in the high .300s and low .400s and they have three men on base,” the fan every season. asked, without a smile, “Which base?” One In 1932, Brooklyn got a new manager of the players in this situation, the aforewho traded Herman away because, in his mentioned, Herman, the “great player and increasing age, he was no longer hitting as greater screwball” was famous for his onwell as he had in his youth. It was a logical field antics. move that any smart manager would have Floyd Caves “Babe” Herman was the executed. Brooklynites were enraged at epitome of Brooklyn’s unique mix of skill the new manager because “they didn’t care and “daffiness” in the 1920s and 30s. “He about being practical. They wanted salt in spent the best part of his life upholding the their stew.” However, the Babe came back to mighty tradition that anything can happen Brooklyn in 1945 as one of the many brilat Ebbets Field, the mother temple of dafliant ideas of owner Branch Rickey, who will finess in the national game.” A legendarily be discussed later. skilled player, the Babe, not to be confused Brooklynites were angry about Herman with George Herman Ruth, had a quick being traded because of what he repretemper that he often took out on players 20

By Christine Sisto

sented. In general, the Brooklyn team of the 1920s and 30s was not a great team, especially compared to the Dodgers of the late 1940s and early 50s, but the borough loved them anyway. They took pride in the fact that their team fumbled so beautifully.

Brooklynites saw an event like the 26-inning game, as a symbol of the persistence of the residents of the borough.

They viewed other hijinks on the field as the personification of Brooklynites’ hard work ethic; no matter how badly one failed, one picked up and tried again. Even though Brooklyn’s team elevated mistakes into an

Photo Courtesy: Fox News

art form, those mistakes gave the team character and made Brooklyn love them even more.

The Brooklyn Motto: Wait ‘Till Next Year Just before Leland Stanford (Larry) MacPhail came to Brooklyn from Cincinnati in 1938, the Dodgers were doing poorly, so much so that the president of the National League persuaded the board to hire a new, extraordinary manager. Larry MacPhail was the perfect choice. He “was not a breath of fresh air. He was a hurricane.” He was dynamic and thought differently. While managing Cincinnati’s team, he had introduced night games to baseball and began broadcasting their games using a Southerner named Walter “Red” Barber.

When he came to Brooklyn with Red Barber in tow, MacPhail spent thousands of dollars refurbishing Ebbets Field. Attendance jumped by 200,000 people, thanks to MacPhail’s night games. He also purchased many star players from other teams. Although in his first year in Brooklyn, the Dodgers came in seventh, “there was a new air of optimism and excitement about the ball club now, because of MacPhail’s changes. In 1939, the Brooklyn Dodgers finished in third place, and attendance reached one million. In 1940, Brooklyn acquired two of the most important players to ever wear

a Dodgers’ uniform: “Pistol Pete” Reiser and Harold “Pee Wee” Reese. That year, the Dodgers finished in second place, which was “their highest notch since 1924.” The 1940 season was a tough, but exciting season for Brooklyn. There were many instances of screaming matches on the field, pitches thrown at Dodgers’ heads, and other physical violence between players. “Brooklyn was the most hated team in the league… It was a glorious summer to live in Brooklyn, be a Dodger fan, and have fifty-five cents for a bleacher seat.”

Finally, in 1941, still under MacPhail’s management, the Dodgers won the pennant and met the New York Yankees in the World Series. This championship season was the first of seven World Series meetings between the Yankees and the Dodgers over the next fifteen years. Pee Wee Reese would play in all seven of these meetings. A cover photo from the Daily Mirror newspaper depicts an aerial view from the parade for the Dodgers’ winning of the pennant that can only be compared to Times Square on New Years Eve. At right, the picture is the headline, “1,000,000 See Boro Parade!” A New York Times article describing the feeling in Brooklyn notes, “hysteria spread and crackled like wildfire.”

However, despite the fanfare, the Dodgers lost the Series, once again, spectacularly. In the top of the ninth of the deciding game, Brooklyn led 4-to-3. After the pitcher, Hugh Casey, struck out the first two batters of the inning, the tying run, Tommy Henrich went to first because of a passed ball. The next batter, Joe DiMaggio, hit a line drive to left field, and the batter after him drove in two runs. The next batter walked and the batter after him doubled for two more runs. The final score was 7-to-4 and a new phrase, “Wait ‘till next year” was born.

and the owner and general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers from 1943 to 1950.

He came to the Dodgers after a twenty- year stint with the St. Louis Cardinals. He was already infamous during his lifetime for perfecting the farm system, realizing that if teams trained young athletes well before they played for a major league salary, the ball clubs could save money. Once in Brooklyn, he became even more famous for normalizing pitching machines and batting helmets, which are now commonplace in major league baseball. A devout Methodist, his first official act in Brooklyn was to ban high-stakes gambling among the players, an act which sent team manager Leo Durocher into a fury. Rickey was unmatched when it came to turning a profit. “He would Mandatory Credit: Brooklyn Public Library go into the vault to give you Most sports rivalries are created by fans. change for a nickel”… but his “method was However, the rivalry between the Brookto sign any kid who showed a glimmer of lyn Dodgers and the New York Giants was talent.” Rickey received a huge income for personal. Carl Erskine, in his later years, the time. During the war, his salary was would say that when playing the Giants, $25,000 a year and when the war ended, it “your manhood seemed to be on the line.” increased to $50,000; these incomes were in The hatred was caused by a combination of addition to 15% of Ebbets Field’s profits. the Giants being Manhattan’s team and Leo In the early years of Rickey’s manageDurocher, who was suspended for the entire ment, though, the team did not play well, 1947 season, defecting to the Giants in 1948. mostly due to war-time restrictions. Most The rivalry is explained perfectly in the of the good players were fighting abroad, following: “It seemed inconceivable that Leo and the team did not have money to afford could become a Giant. It was like oil and the talented players that were left. In one of water. There was Manhattan and there was his many brilliant moves, Rickey re-signed Brooklyn. There were the Dodgers and there the infamous Babe Herman, who played were the Giants. But what there could never well for a 42-year old, batting .265 in 1945. be was a manager of the Dodgers managing Branch Rickey Helps The In 1943, the Brooklyn Dodgers finished in the Giants.” Pee Wee Reese, recalling DuDodgers Through WWII third place; in 1944, they were seventh and rocher’s move, said: in 1945, they were third.

That was a little hard to believe. The skirThe 1942 season, played against the backIn 1947, though, the Dodgers won the mishes we had with the Giants—a lot of drop of World War II, saw great changes for pennant and once again, faced the Yantimes it was war. If you could play well Brooklyn and America. Although the team kees in the World Series. This series tested against the Giants, and you had a good year continued to play great, it came in second.

Rickey’s managerial skills because Larry against the Giants, you were successful, The pennant was lost on July 19 of that year MacPhail had traitorously defected to the whatever the ball club did. They’ll never in true Dodgers’ form. With the score tied Yankees. After initially being behind two be another rivalry like the Giants and the in the eleventh inning of the second game of games-to-one, in the top of the ninth, yet a double header, Pistol Pete Reiser dropped another record was set when Yankees pitch- Dodgers.

It was with this mindset, that the Dodgers a shot by Enos Slaughter in center field after er Bill Bevens came within one out of the faced the Giants in the race for the penrunning full force and crashing into the cen- only World Series no-hitter. nant in 1951. The two teams had ended the ter field wall.

However, this was ruined when, after season in a dead tie and had to play a bestHe suffered a severe concussion, but man- Bevens intentionally walked the tying run of-three series to determine who would face agement insisted Reiser continue to play to first, the Dodgers’ Cookie Lavagetto the Yankees in the World Series. In the final for the rest of the season. His poor playing, smacked a line drive to right field, winning game, Brooklyn was leading 4-to-1 in the enhanced by his untreated physical injury, the game for Brooklyn and tying the series bottom of the ninth. The Giants managed to cost the Dodgers the pennant. At the close two- all. Red Barber, the announcer for the get in one run and then two more on base of the 1942 season, the Brooklyn Dodgers, Dodgers, would later describe this day as when Bobby Thompson stepped up to bat. like the rest of America, fought in World the most exciting baseball game he ever The Dodgers’ pitching coach decided to War II. Pete Reiser, Pee Wee Reese, and Lar- saw. The Dodgers and Yankees played seven put in pitcher Ralph Branca, even though ry MacPhail all accepted their commission games that year, and the Yankees walked he had given up home runs to Thompson in the Army and the man chosen to replace away as champions. Dodgers’ fans would recently. On Branca’s pitch—a pitch that MacPhail, was at 66-years old, too old to be have to wait until next year. The Brooklyn Branca said was “nowhere near a strike-enlisted.

Dodgers made it to the World Series again Thompson smacked the ball over the left “Mediocrity never won a pennant for in 1949 and again, lost to the Yankees. The anybody, and if I can help it I will not put Yankees won the next two championships in field wall, winning the game and the pennant for the Giants. The home run became up with mediocrity on any ball club of mine 1950 and 1951. However, the pennant race known as “the shot heard ‘round the world,” because we’re in business to win.” Such was between the Dodgers and the hated New the maxim of Branch Rickey, one of the York Giants that year would make sports and has topped many “best plays in sports” most brilliant managers in baseball history, history. lists.

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