Wednesday, September 13, 2006 |
Pickoff Moves
Today's Birthdays
Morrie Aderholt BRO b. 1915, played 1944-1945, d. 1955-03-18
Erik Bennett CAL b. 1968, played 1995
Rod Correia CAL b. 1967, played 1993-1995
Sam Crane BRO b. 1894, played 1922, d. 1955-11-12. In Major League, there was an exchange that went like this:
Willie Mays Hayes: What the hell league you been playing in?That was Crane, except that he killed his girlfriend to get in, and unlike Vaughn, he was a shortstop. Nicknamed, appropriately and ironically, "Lucky" and "Red". Brooklyn was his last stop in the majors.
Rick Vaughn: California Penal...
Willie Mays Hayes: Never heard of it. How'd you end up playing there?
Rick Vaughn: Stole a car.
Rick Dempsey LAN b. 1949, played 1988-1990. A hero of the 1983 World Series for Baltimore, he drove in a game-winning run in Game 2 and homered and doubled in the deciding Game 5; his postseason heroics earned him a World Series MVP title. With the Dodgers, he was a reserve catcher for three years starting in 1988. He went 2-4 with a double in Game 5 of the 1988 NLCS and drove in the final run of the Dodgers 5-2 victory in Game 5 of the World Series.
Like Jay Johnstone, he was known as a character; one of his schticks involved stuffing his uniform jersey with a beach ball or towels and doing an invisible Babe Ruth imitation on the tarp during rain delays. Incredibly durable, he was only one of three catchers to play behind the dish in four different decades over a 24-year career. After his playing career, he coached for both the Orioles and Dodgers.
John Harris CAL b. 1954, played 1979-1981
Bob Heffner CAL b. 1938, played 1968
John Kelleher BRO b. 1893, played 1916, d. 1960-08-21
Otho Nitcholas BRO b. 1908, played 1945, d. 1986-09-11
Harry Redmond BRO b. 1887, played 1909, d. 1960-07-10
Dutch Ruether BRO b. 1893, played 1921-1924, d. 1970-05-16
Number One With A Bullet
- Howie Kendrick can't hit curveballs? Again? What is this, Groundhog Day?
- The Angels want to long-term Frankie Rodriguez, making their top offseason priority the buyout of his arbitration years on a four-year deal or three-year deal with an option year.
- Grady Little "said he would have no problem starting left-hander Eric Stults" in the event the Dodgers can't get Chad Billingsley on the mound.
- Greg Maddux doesn't know what 2007 holds. Do any of us?
Asked if it's easier to go to the ballpark now that he's with a winner again, Maddux said not really.
"It's the same, to be honest with you. It really is," he said. "I said a lot of times you don't have to win in this game to enjoy it. And I mean that. Is it better winning? Absolutely.
"But I loved getting up, coming here at 9 o'clock in the morning, and I love going to Dodger Stadium at 3 in the afternoon. ... It's cool."
- In the land of the Giants, they're celebrating, because both of the teams ahead of them lost. The Giants are only three games back of the Dodgers for the division and a game and a half back of the Padres in the Wild Card. Incidentally, isn't it pathetic that the two-games-over-.500 Giants are in second place? It certainly speaks to the weakness of the National League...
- Speaking of the Dodgers and the postseason, Brian Kamenetzky likes the Blue in any matchup versus the Cards:
Initially considered one of baseball's better teams, the Cardinals have struggled big during the second half just to be a .500 team (they were 11 games over .500 at the break, they're 11 over now), mostly because of a pitching staff that once you get past Chris Carpenter could be the worst thing the world has seen since Kevin Federline put out "PopoZao."
And they're banged up. Jim Edmonds could very well be done for the year after suffering a concussion in June. He's played once since Aug. 15. Mark Mulder is kaput as well, not that his ERA, hovering somewhere around nine billion, was helping all that much. The same can be said for Jason Isringhausen, out until at least the weekend with a bum hip, and his league-leading 10 blown saves. Now St. Louis and L.A. are like record buddies, both 76-67. More importantly, the Cardinals share another important performance trait with the Dodgers — they're bad away from home, to the tune of eight games under. There aren't two other teams with realistic playoff aspirations who are that bad when sleeping in hotel beds. Even the Marlins are better, and most of those guys aren't old enough to travel without a legal guardian.
- The last time the Dodgers gave up as large a lead as in yesterday's 9-8 fiasco against the Cubs was exactly eight years ago in an 8-7 loss to the Padres on September 12, 1998. The last time a team won with six errors was in a 6-5 Giants win over Montreal on April 29, 1999; one of the errormakers? Jeff Kent, with two...
- The Mets eliminated the Braves with a 6-4 win over the Marlins last night, officially ending their 14-year stretch of division titles.
- Derek Jeter followed in Hee Seop Choi's footsteps, by scoring three runs on three walks and no official at-bats in yesterday's 12-4 blowout of the Devil Rays. Choi did it in a May 24, 2004 13-5 crushing of the Diamondbacks by his old team, the Marlins.
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