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Post by Deleted on Sept 3, 2015 12:17:43 GMT -5
Speaking of baseball history, I am going to be attending a game Sunday in a park that once hosted Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth. Meiji-Jingu Stadium in Tokyo. Homestanding Yakult Swallows vs the Hiroshima Carp. This stadium is also famous for attractive female beer vendors equipped with backpack kegs distributing draft beer to you at your seat. www.jingu-stadium.com/english/
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 3, 2015 14:28:29 GMT -5
"To Hell With Babe Ruth," Yell Charging Japanese New York Times/Associated Press, March 3, 1944
CAPE GLOUCESTER, New Britain (Delayed) – Staff Sgt. Jeremiah A. O’Leary, a Marine Corps combat correspondent, reports that Japanese troops charged the Marine lines here shouting the strange Japanese battle cry:
"To hell with Babe Ruth!"
The charge was scored as an error. Thirty Japanese were struck out for good. In New York Babe Ruth replied: "I hope every Jap that mentions my name gets shot – and to hell with all Japs anyway."
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 11, 2015 7:13:08 GMT -5
Odd intersection of social class, exclusivity, and the baseball nostalgia business in a Cincinnati museum... This Baseball Museum's a Passion Playby Rob Neyer, Just a Bit Outside, 8/18/2015 www.foxsports.com/mlb/just-a-bit-outside/story/green-diamond-gallery-cincinnati-baseball-museum-bob-crotty-081715So here’s a question for you: Let’s say you’ve built a tremendous collection of baseball memorabilia, maybe filling your entire (spacious!) basement, and it’s beginning to feel a little lonely down there sometimes. It’s a difficult thing, but you begin to wonder if maybe it’s time to share your treasures with the world. So what do you do next? Sure, you could donate your finest items to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown. But most of those items would wind up in the basement, there, too. Even more spacious, yes, and perfectly climate-controlled. But still locked away most of the time, enjoyed by only the very lucky few. You could piece out your collection – here a bat to the Negro Leagues Museum in Kansas City, there a signed photograph to the Ty Cobb Museum in Georgia – but as wonderful as that might feel, a few targeted donations will get you only so far. There are only so many museums, with only so much space. Finally, you could just open your own museum. Except there’s really no model for such a thing; nearly every baseball museum outside of Cooperstown is both limited in scope and financially subsidized by a professional team or a municipality. About 10 years ago in Cincinnati, a collector named Bob Crotty had another idea. “I really wanted to share everything,” he recently told me, “but on my terms and conditions. There was no model. It was purely a passion play.” What Crotty came up with was what just might have been an original idea: a private baseball museum, open only to subscribing members. And thus was born, at the northern edge of Cincinnati eight years ago, the Green Diamond Gallery, a 5,000-square-foot space on the ground floor of a commercial building, housing what’s been recently described as “one of the cleaner private collections” anywhere. The day after the All-Star Game, Crotty showed a couple of visiting baseball writers around while telling his story... ************* There’s no catalogue listing every artifact in the gallery, and one can take notes only so fast. There are game-used bats from every major leaguer with at least 500 home runs, walls devoted to the 1919 Black Sox and the 1950s “Boys of Summer” Dodgers and of course the great Yankees dynasties, and Carl Hubbell’s Hall of Fame ring, which mysteriously went missing shortly after Hubbell was killed in an auto accident. There are seats from Ebbets Field, and a set of baseballs autographed by the players Bill James once anointed the 10 greatest of all time, and Tommy Helms’ suitcase, and a 1969 Seattle Pilots road jersey, and Joe Cronin’s Washington Senators road jersey (with a W on both sleeves), and more signed baseballs than you’ve ever seen before, and (in the men’s john) Eddie Vedder’s Evel Knievel-themed cigarette lighter. There’s a “3,000 Hit Club” display. Pete Rose has visited the museum a few times. “When he saw that,” Crotty recalls, “he said, ‘Where’s the 4,000 Hit Club?’ So we built that, and just happened to put his name at the bottom. Next time he came in, went straight to the exhibit, looked at the names and said, ‘You got ‘em backwards.' ” So now the Hit King’s on top. There are game-used jerseys from 105 Hall of Famers, and team-signed Reds baseball from 1940 through 2014 (except for a few recent years; oddly, Crotty says, it’s actually harder to find those balls now than in the old days). Crotty got started early. Born in 1958 and raised in Dayton, he remembers that the collecting bug bit him early. “I was just a tyke, five or six years old, the first time my dad took me to a Reds game at Crosley Field. My grandfather was a big baseball fan, and he would take me to games, too. On the way out, I always wanted to stop at the souvenir stand for the trinkets.” The Green Diamond Gallery is hardly a money-making proposition; Crotty’s goal is simply to avoid losing much money (he can afford some losses, as he and his brothers sold their uniform company for a goodly sum in 2006). “After years of this, and significant losses at start-up, break-even would be a home run,” he says. “I have figured out a pretty good formula, predicated on square footage, that’s covering about 90 percent of my operating costs. This stuff needs a home anyway. If I wasn’t doing this, I’d be spending x dollars on a climate-controlled space somewhere. If somebody else wants to do this, I can tell them what not to do.” So here’s what Crotty does: Every month, he hosts an event, usually featuring a well-known baseball personality (but sometimes an ink-stained baseball scribe). By now the list of featured speakers is quite long and includes 32 Hall of Famers, and two more – Reggie Jackson and Dave Winfield – will be visiting this fall. If you’re in the gallery for one of these, sometimes you’ll leave with an autographed baseball and sometimes you won’t, just depends on the speaker’s fee and willingness to sign. Oh, and here’s the catch: To attend one of these monthly baseball soirées, you’ll need to pony up $2,400 for an annual individual membership ... or know someone with a corporate membership, because those come with three tickets per event. Half of the events are members-only; the other half, you can bring a friend. Who’s got $2,400 just laying around for this sort of thing? I don’t, and you probably don’t. But Crotty caps membership at 150 – mostly because there’s only so much open space in the gallery – and he says he’s currently near that number, despite an average turnover of around 20 percent per year. And what do members (and their guests) get for that $2,400? “We’ve got a no-autograph policy during the actual event,” he says. “A lot of our speakers come in, and they’ve done the rubber-chicken speeches and the signings. But all our people want is to hear stories, and ask questions. We don’t record anything, and about halfway through you can see the wall coming down, and they start having fun. Usually the speaker will tell stories for 20 minutes, and then 40 minutes of Q&A.” And somehow it all works. “What attracts our members is the venue,” Crotty says. “The environment does something psychologically; the history surrounds them. But what keeps them is the programming.” What also attracts members, and keeps them, we might guess, is Crotty himself. Especially his passion. “When you’re a collector,” he says, “it’s a lonely journey. When I was a kid, I never imagined that Johnny Bench would come over and hang out! We’re all human, and I live in this community. This is my identity here.” Shortly after the All-Star Game, Crotty headed to Cooperstown for the annual induction ceremonies, as he does every year. To get there, he borrowed an airplane that’s in the family. Oh, and Joe Morgan came along. And at the museum in Cooperstown, Crotty visited the “Character and Courage” statues – Roberto Clemente, Lou Gehrig, and Jackie Robinson – that Crotty himself commissioned and donated to the museum, where they’ve stood watch over the main lobby since 2008. When asked which single item he would save if (God forbid) his museum were on fire, Crotty first responds that the firefighters will “have to pull me out of there, but it’s really the memories of the venue and all the people.” When pressed, though, he says he would try to grab the artist’s casts of those three statues in Cooperstown. But it “couldn’t be just one of those guys; it’s all or nothing.” So might we someday see other versions of Crotty’s Green Diamond Gallery, elsewhere in America? “If somebody else wants to do it,” Crotty says, “I can tell them what not to do.”
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 11, 2015 7:20:47 GMT -5
Tours for baseball and military history enthusiasts... Baseball Goes to Warstephenambrosetours.com/tour/wwii-baseball-tour/When I was a small boy in Kansas, a friend of mine and I went fishing and as we sat there in the warmth of the summer afternoon on a river bank, we talked about what we wanted to do when we grew up. I told him that I wanted to be a real major league baseball player, a genuine professional like Honus Wagner. My friend said that he’d like to be President of the United States. Neither of us got our wish.– Dwight D. Eisenhower, 34th U.S. President & Supreme Commander Allied Forces in Europe, WWII Baseball Goes to War is a WWII Baseball Tour that tells the amazing story of the sport and its players during this time in our nation’s history. No professional sport in America contributed more to victory than baseball. Nearly 4,500 major leaguers and minor leaguers served Uncle Sam during World War II. Back in the 1940s, there was an adage common in America: “We are all in this together,” and for baseball that was true. Players never would have thought about avoiding the draft. They willingly served, sacrificed, and some gave their lives for victory. Nearly 90 percent of those who played in the 1941 season served, in some capacity, in the war effort. We may know the movements of great armies, study the great battles, and know the great leaders, but the common GI was the key to winning the war. Some of those GIs were, or were about to become, household names on the diamond. Seaman Yogi Berra saw combat at Utah Beach. Warren Spahn and Cecil Travis fought at the Battle of the Bulge. Morrie Martin landed on Omaha Beach and fought all the way through the Battle of the Bulge as well. Moe Berg, a catcher who spoke seven languages “and couldn’t hit in any of them,” was an effective spy for the Office of Strategic Services (the OSS). Pitcher Bert Shepard flew his P-38 from southern England into the heart of Europe only to be shot down and survive the amputation of his leg during his POW experience at the hands of the Germans—and yet he still returned to pitch for the Washington Senators in 1945. Band of Brothers’ “Buck” Compton of Easy Company of the 101st Airborne was a star catcher at UCLA and seemed destined for the majors. “Lefty” Brewer and Arthur “Dutch” Schultz of the “All American” 82nd Airborne helped hold back the German counterattack at the La Fiere Bridge outside of Ste. Mere Eglise, France on D-Day. It cost Dutch his spot on the Phillies and cost “Lefty” his life. Indeed, they were common men who provided extraordinary valor. Join us for this unique journey to an era where American boys not only brought liberation and democracy but also a bat, a ball, and their homegrown optimism. HighlightsLondon: Churchill War Rooms, Imperial War Museum, and other key WWII sites Portsmouth: Staging center of men and flotilla for the D-Day invasion and where Yogi Berra crossed English Channel Normandy: Among the sites included are Sainte-Mère- Église; La Fiere Bridge; honors ceremony for “Lefty” Brewer and Dutch Schultz; Brécourt Manor, where Lt. Richard Winters with members of Easy Company, such as UCLA baseball great Buck Compton, silenced German artillery firing on American troops landing at Utah Beach; Sainte-Marie-du-Mont; Carentan; Pointe-du-Hoc; Omaha beach where major league baseball legend Morrie Martin served as combat engineer; American Cemetery (we pay our respects to minor league pitcher Joe Pinder); and Pegasus Bridge Paris: Drive through the lush, scenic countryside of Normandy and northern France on the way to Paris where you may explore the city on your own Luxembourg: Bastogne, where Americans rallied and stopped the German attack; recognize players Cecil Travis (Washington Senators), Arthur “Dutch” Schultz and Morrie Martin, and baseball surgeon, Dr. Frank Jobe, who honed his surgical talents during the Battle of the Bulge Frankfurt: American Cemetery at Hamm, site of General George Patton’s grave, the Siegfried Line; and a review of Gen. Patton’s Third Army Championship Series which was won by the 71st Infantry Division Berchtesgaden: Dachau (Jewish athletes, often discriminated against in the game, fought valiantly for the USA: two of those include Moe Berg, catcher and Allied spy, and Hank Greenberg, slugger and Army Air Corps veteran); city tour of Berchtesgaden and Obersalzberg to visit the Eagle’s Nest and remains of vast Nazi Party complex Day-By-Day ItineraryDAY 1 Flight to LondonBook your overnight flight to London the day before you want to arrive. If you would like to arrive before the start-of-tour to visit London, we can offer the group rate at the London hotel. Call for more information. DAY 2 LondonCheck into the hotel where the entire group will gather for an evening welcome reception. Our historian will treat us to our first lecture, with introductions all around. DAY 3 LondonThe morning will feature key sites in London that figured prominently in the War. We then proceed to the Churchill War Rooms, the underground nerve center for Britain’s war effort. We will also visit the Imperial War Museum, which houses authentic examples of World War II weaponry, tanks and aircraft and an exhibit of WWI trench warfare. We will have free time to enjoy London in the evening. DAY 4 PortsmouthDepart for Portsmouth, the seaside town that became the staging center for the D-Day invasion. Here the Allies assembled the armies and equipment for the massive undertaking. Besides the hundreds of thousands of men, there were thousands of armored vehicles and the assemblage of sea vessels: landing craft of all kinds in addition to warships that made up the flotilla for the English Channel crossing— including Yogi Berra’s. Nearby, General Dwight D. Eisenhower set up the advance command post of Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force, where he, Naval Commander Bertram Ramsay, Army Commander Bernard Montgomery and staff met to plan the invasion. DAY 5 NormandyFollowing breakfast, we will board the cross-channel ferry and embark for Normandy as the troops did in 1944. In the afternoon, we will begin our visit to Normandy at Sainte-Mère-Église, one of the villages where the American Airborne descended on D-Day. Here we will view and explore the iconic church where John Steele and his landing on the steeple are memorialized. We also visit La Fiere Bridge where the 82nd Airborne successfully delayed a German Panzer counter-attack against the Allied landing forces. Here we will hold an honors ceremony for “Lefty” Brewer and Dutch Schultz. DAY 6 NormandyWe will begin “The Longest Day” at Brécourt Manor where Lt. candlestick Winters with members of Easy Company, such as UCLA baseball great Buck Compton, successfully silenced German artillery firing on American troops landing at Utah Beach. From there we will visit Utah Beach itself, where the 4th Division landed, and the Invasion Museum that depicts their heroics. Next we will stop at Sainte-Marie-du-Mont, where still stands the unique Renaissance-style steeple used as an observation post by the Germans. From there, we will proceed to the town of Carentan where we will follow the exact steps taken by American Paratroopers during the Battle of Normandy. Finally, the day will conclude with a visit to Pointe-du-Hoc, where Rudders’ Rangers scaled the cliffs to neutralize heavy German guns defending the expanse of beaches on D-Day. DAY 7 NormandyWe’ll spend the morning at Omaha Beach where the Americans landed and faced the strongest German resistance of the day and incurred the greatest losses. We will walk the beach where major league baseball legend Morrie Martin served as combat engineer, and visit some of the German defense fortifications. We explore these sands from the tide’s ebb to the distant dunes to understand the emotions of the young soldiers of the 1st and 29th Divisions as they approached the “gates of hell.” We will pay our respects at the American Cemetery with its 9,387 American soldiers’ graves stretching along the top of the bluff overlooking the beach. We will also pay our respects to minor league pitcher Joe Pinder, who was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor for making the ultimate sacrifice while helping establish vital radio communication on Omaha Beach. In the afternoon we will view the battery at Longues-sur-Mer, a fine example of the great defenses that made up Hitler’s Atlantic Wall. We will proceed along the British beaches from there to Pegasus Bridge where the first shots were fired on D-Day. DAY 8 ParisWe drive through the lush, scenic countryside of Normandy and northern France on the way to Paris, the City of Light. We arrive in Paris this afternoon. The Allies, preceded by Free French troops, symbolically reclaimed the French capital from the Nazis in August 1944. As did the American troops on leave, you may explore the city on your own: there is the Eiffel Tower, Les Invalides, which houses Napoleon’s tomb, Notre Dame cathedral, the Tuileries, the Louvre, a Seine River dinner cruise or a stroll down the Champs-Élysées past the Arc de Triomphe. Talk to your logistic escort and/or the hotel concierge desk to schedule your free evening. DAY 9 LuxembourgWe’ll drive to Bastogne where the Americans rallied and stopped the German attack. Here we’ll view the route of the initial American retreat and the place where the 101st Airborne and elements of the 10th Armored held off fifteen German divisions for six days. Our group will visit key sites in and around this historic crossroads town, and honor the veterans of the campaign in the center square. We’ll also go to General McAuliffe’s HQ where he replied to German surrender demands with one word: “NUTS.” After our visit, it’s a short ride to Luxembourg. This afternoon affords some relaxing free time in the center of this bustling but charming old world city. Players Cecil Travis (Washington Senators), Arthur “Dutch” Schultz and Morrie Martin, along with baseball surgeon, Dr. Frank Jobe, who honed his surgical talents during the Battle of the Bulge, will be among those recognized in Luxembourg. DAY 10 FrankfurtWe will drive to nearby Hamm and visit the American Cemetery and the site of General George Patton’s grave. America’s foremost WWII field general rests here among his men. Then we will visit the Siegfried Line to see remnants of the German communication trenches, pillboxes and dragon’s teeth that American GI’s fought so hard to take in late 1944. Highlights will be a review of Gen. Patton’s Third Army Championship Series which was won by the 71st Infantry Division. DAY 11 BerchtesgadenWe continue our journey toward the Bavarian Alps. We will visit Dachau, site of some of the most nefarious acts of and against humankind during the war, as we travel south through Bavaria. In total, over 200,000 prisoners from more than 30 countries were housed in Dachau: notably Jews, resistance fighters, clergymen, politicians, communists, writers, artists and royalty. The second camp liberated by British or American forces, Dachau was one of the first places where the west was exposed to Nazi brutality. Jewish athletes, often discriminated against in the game, fought valiantly for the USA: two of those include Moe Berg, catcher and Allied spy, and Hank Greenberg, slugger and Army Air Corps veteran. DAY 12 BerchtesgadenThe morning begins with a city tour of Berchtesgaden and Obersalzberg where we will visit the Eagle’s Nest and the remains of the vast Nazi Party complex liberated by the Allies in May 1945. Eagle’s Nest was built as a 50th birthday present to Hitler from the Nazi party. Perched at 6,017 feet, the complex and the road network leading to it were considered feats of engineering as they were completed in only 13 months time in 1937-38. This evening we gather for a farewell dinner and shared memories after an enriching campaign into history. P-38 fighter pilot and future baseball pitcher Bert Shepard was shot down over Berlin. His foot was caught in the plane wreckage. Hostile Germans approached the plane, but a single German solider, Dr. Ladislaus Loidl, defended the unconscious Shepard, partly to gain intelligence and partly out of a sense of honor. Shepard’s was taken to a German hospital. Upon awakening, he discovered his right leg had been amputated, but he thanked the hospital and Loidl for saving his life. He was transferred to a POW camp. In February of 1945, Shepard was involved in a prisoner exchange and by July of the same year, was on the mound as the starting pitcher for the Washington Senators against the Brooklyn Dodgers in an exhibition game for War Relief. DAY 13 BerchtesgadenGuests are free to enjoy the day as they please. You may choose to explore the charming town of Berchtesgaden which is easily walkable. Some guests take advantage of an hour train ride to Salzburg, Austria, birthplace of Mozart. In Salzburg and its picturesque environs, The Sound of Music was filmed. The old city features marketplaces, buildings and churches from the Romanesque, Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque periods as well as many museums and cafés. DAY 14 Flights HomeDepart our hotel in Berchtesgaden for Munich and our flight back home. Please do not schedule a return flight until after 11 a.m.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2015 4:24:52 GMT -5
I did manage to squeeze in a ballgame at the venerable old Meiji Jingu stadium and I will post a pic or two when I get a chance to download some from my phone. Great experience. The Japanese fans alone made it a memorable day with their enthusiastic chants(unique to each player on the home team) and the college football-esque atmosphere of the game from start to finish. Each team went through a full pregame workout of stretching, infield and batting practice. It is no wonder the players that come to MLB are so much more fundamentally sound. Hiroshima Carp(complete with their Cincinnati Reds look alike logo) versus the home Yakult Swallows. The home team had some really sweet looking jerseys in the team store and compared to MLB they were quite cheap, in the neighborhood of $60, but as a heterosexual american male I was not going to wear a jersey that says "Swallows" on it regardless of how cool it looked.
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 19, 2015 9:32:58 GMT -5
Article on the organized cheering characteristic of the Asian baseball tradition. This traces all the way back to school support groups that formed during the 1870s after baseball became part of the new academic curriculum in Meiji Japan. Link includes slide show... Where the Dugout Is a Stage and Baseball Is a Reason to Singby Andrew Keh, NY Times, 9/18/2015 www.nytimes.com/2015/09/18/sports/baseball/where-the-dugout-is-a-stage-and-baseball-is-a-reason-to-sing.htmlSEOUL, South Korea — It was halfway through the first inning of a recent Doosan Bears home game when Han Jae-kwon first climbed onto the performance stage just above the first-base line at Jamsil Baseball Stadium. He had watched the first three outs from the stands, nervously tapping his foot. But now, having tied a traditional Korean robe over his baseball uniform, he looked confident, almost solemn, as he performed a sequence of bows on his hands and knees toward the spectators. After the formal introduction, Han popped back to his feet and grabbed a microphone. Cavorting on the platform, stretching his arms into operatic poses, he yelled, again and again, “Doosan!” Each time, fans chirped back, “Fighting!” Drums thundered nearby. “And one last time, from the very bottom of your hearts: Doosan!” he said, before throwing off the flowing white garment. Han’s job does not have an exact equivalent in the English-speaking baseball world and therefore does not have a widely accepted English-language name. The Korean name, eungwondanjang, translates basically to “cheer leader,” which, of course, connotes something different. Some English speakers and writers use “cheermaster,” though Koreans tend to be unfamiliar with that term. Regardless of what they are called, the people who play Han’s role are the individuals most responsible for creating the dizzying atmospheres inside East Asian baseball stadiums, where songs and chants rarely cease over several hours of play. Even in a 1-2-3 inning, a home crowd might stand and sing numerous songs with accompanying hand motions. Over the course of this game, Han led fans through dozens of songs with his booming voice, a flick of his hand or foot, or even just a facial expression. “It’s almost like conducting an orchestra,” Han said, in Korean. “When I raise a hand, everyone raises that same hand. If I say something, everyone repeats it in unison.” In the second inning, the stands were already pulsating. Every player in the league has at least one personalized song featuring simple lyrics — his name and perhaps a phrase of encouragement — set to the melody of a piece of popular music. For each hitter, sound engineers cue up a backing track, drummers bang out the beat and cheerleaders pantomime the motions. Facing them, the cheermaster gesticulates like a dance instructor teaching a gigantic class. It helps that Korean names — generally with three or, less commonly, two syllables — are exceptionally easy to bend into sports chants. Han’s favorite song belongs to Jung Soo-bin, the Bears’ boyish-looking center fielder. Borrowing the melody of the Beach Boys’ “Surfin’ U.S.A.,” it features separate, intertwining parts for the male and female fans. When designated hitter Hong Sung-heon, 38, came up to bat for the first time, the Doosan fans sang his name to the melody of “What’s Up?” a 1993 hit by 4 Non Blondes. Hong loves the song when he is playing well; when he slumps, he hates it. “Korean stadiums are like karaoke parlors,” Hong said. “American stadiums feel like parks where you go for a quiet picnic with your kids.” In the third inning, a boy wearing glasses walked over and handed Han a bag of Honey Butter Chip, a trendy but hard-to-find snack in South Korea. Han added it to the gifts he had already received: a pack of throat lozenges, a soda and a woven bracelet. Later, a woman brought over 10 iced coffees for Han and his co-workers; less than five minutes after that, an older man walked over with eight more coffees, making Han laugh. Cheermasters in South Korea are minor celebrities, and Han, 36, has felt his life change since starting the job last season. Baseball has experienced a renaissance in South Korea over the last decade, and the profile of cheermasters has risen accordingly. Han is recognized outside the ballpark, and he joked that he feels self-conscious now when drinking in bars. But fans can be fickle with their affection. Heo Ji-wook, the stadium announcer for the slumping LG Twins, said he had seen fans take out their frustrations on Choi Dong-hoon, the team’s first-year cheermaster, aiming sarcastic jeers at him when he asked them to sing. LG shares Jamsil stadium with Doosan, and Choi, 27, offers a smaller, gentler counterpoint to Han’s more physical, thumping style. “I’m obsessed with getting better,” said Choi, who reviews film of every game the next morning. In the bottom of fourth inning, after left fielder Kim Hyun-soo pounded a three-run homer, Han started doing forward rolls across the stage. Confetti shot into the air as the cheerleaders hopped onto the platform to dance. It was Doosan’s first rally, and when it was over, Han plopped back into his seat. Sweat poured down his face. As the fifth inning got underway, on the other side of the stands, Cho Ji-hoon, the cheermaster for the Lotte Giants, was dancing before a drove of visiting fans. Cho is admired among his peers for his cheering skills and his business acumen. Cheermasters in South Korea work for agencies that sign contracts with clubs to provide in-game entertainment services. But Cho, who has been with Lotte for a decade, heads his own agency. He has his own following and can draw a big crowd when he has an autograph event. “He’s the best,” said Han, gesturing across the diamond. By the sixth inning, the cheering had been reverberating relentlessly for hours. Most players enjoyed the songs, Hong said later, but a few occasionally asked for the volume to be lowered. Foreign players, in particular, can take a few weeks to adjust to the noise. “With the songs and atmosphere, I would get so amped up that people were finally like, ‘Hey, you need to calm down,’ ” said Jim Adduci, a Canadian outfielder in his first season with Lotte. Adduci’s song, which interpolates the frenzied theme of a 1990s children’s cartoon called “Duchi and Puku,” is one of the quirkier ones in the league. Songwriting tends to be a collaborative effort between the cheermasters and the agencies, with the clubs having final approval over what is used. When a player joins a new team, the clubs may negotiate the transfer of the song. If not, the melody might get recycled. In the seventh inning, Han was massaging his neck and grimacing. He had done a sprinting and jumping routine, and one hard landing seemed to aggravate a herniated disk. A while back, he ruptured his left Achilles’ tendon. Han was hurting, but the game, and his job, were heating up. In the eighth, Han asked fans to turn on their cellphone lights and wave them for a slow song, and as the top of the ninth began, he remained on the stage as Doosan tried to get the game’s last three outs. When the Bears did, securing a 5-3 win, he led the crowd through a rousing victory song that he was proud to have helped compose. As he walked off the stage, fans surrounded him. Several yelled out that he had done a good job, and a flock of them lined up to have photographs taken with him. “You might say he has a nuanced appeal,” Yoo Chang-geun, the Doosan stadium announcer, said with a smile. “He is not particularly good-looking. He has a bit of a Shrek vibe. And yet, everyone likes him.” Han’s face betrayed some anxiety as he viewed the logjam of fans. But then he lingered for several minutes, posing for pictures with each one.
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 25, 2015 0:14:12 GMT -5
Yogi Berra, Yankee Who Built His Stardom 90 Percent on Skill and Half on Wit, Dies at 90By Bruce Weber, NY Times, 9/23/2015 www.nytimes.com/2015/09/24/sports/baseball/yogi-berra-dies-at-90-yankees-baseball-catcher.htmlYogi Berra, one of baseball’s greatest catchers and characters, who as a player was a mainstay of 10 Yankees championship teams and as a manager led both the Yankees and the Mets to the World Series — but who may be more widely known as an ungainly but lovable cultural figure, inspiring a cartoon character and issuing a seemingly limitless supply of unwittingly witty epigrams known as Yogi-isms — died on Tuesday. He was 90. The Yankees and the Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center in Little Falls, N.J., announced his death. Before moving to an assisted living facility in nearby West Caldwell, in 2012, Berra had lived for many years in neighboring Montclair. In 1949, early in Berra’s Yankees career, his manager assessed him this way in an interview in The Sporting News: “Mr. Berra,” Casey Stengel said, “is a very strange fellow of very remarkable abilities.” And so he was, and so he proved to be. Universally known simply as Yogi, probably the second most recognizable nickname in sports — even Yogi was not the Babe — Berra was not exactly an unlikely hero, but he was often portrayed as one: an All-Star for 15 consecutive seasons whose skills were routinely underestimated; a well-built, appealingly open-faced man whose physical appearance was often belittled; and a prolific winner, not to mention a successful leader, whose intellect was a target of humor if not outright derision. That he triumphed on the diamond again and again in spite of his perceived shortcomings was certainly a source of his popularity. So was the delight with which his famous, if not always documentable, pronouncements — somehow both nonsensical and sagacious — were received. “You can observe a lot just by watching,” he is reputed to have declared once, describing his strategy as a manager. “If you can’t imitate him,” he advised a young player who was mimicking the batting stance of the great slugger Frank Robinson, “don’t copy him.” “When you come to a fork in the road, take it,” he said, giving directions to his house. Either path, it turned out, got you there. “Nobody goes there anymore,” he said of a popular restaurant. “It’s too crowded.” Whether Berra actually uttered the many things attributed to him, or was the first to say them, or phrased them precisely the way they were reported, has long been a matter of speculation. Berra himself published a book in 1998 called “The Yogi Book: I Really Didn’t Say Everything I Said!” But the Yogi-isms testified to a character — goofy and philosophical, flighty and down to earth — that came to define the man. Berra’s Yogi-ness was exploited in advertisements for myriad products, among them Puss ’n Boots cat food and Miller Lite beer but perhaps most famously Yoo-Hoo chocolate drink. Asked if Yoo-Hoo was hyphenated, he is said to have replied, “No, ma’am, it isn’t even carbonated.” If not exactly a Yogi-ism, it was the kind of response that might have come from Berra’s ursine namesake, the affable animated character Yogi Bear, who made his debut in 1958. An Impressive RésuméThe character Yogi Berra may even have overshadowed the Hall of Fame ballplayer Yogi Berra, obscuring what a remarkable athlete he was. A notorious bad-ball hitter — he swung at a lot of pitches that were not strikes but mashed them anyway — he was fearsome in the clutch and the most durable and consistently productive Yankee during the period of the team’s most relentless success. In addition, as a catcher, he played the most grueling position on the field. (For a respite from the chores and challenges of crouching behind the plate, Berra, who played before the designated hitter rule took effect in the American League in 1973, occasionally played the outfield.) Stengel, a Hall of Fame manager whose shrewdness and talent were also often underestimated, recognized Berra’s gifts. He referred to Berra, even as a young player, as his assistant manager and compared him favorably to star catchers of previous eras like Mickey Cochrane, Gabby Hartnett and Bill Dickey. “You could look it up” was Stengel’s catchphrase, and indeed the record book declares that Berra was among the greatest catchers in the history of the game — some say the greatest of all. Berra’s career batting average, .285, was not as high as that of his Yankees predecessor, Dickey (.313), but Berra hit more home runs (358 in all) and drove in more runs (1,430). Praised by pitchers for his astute pitch-calling, Berra led the American League in assists five times and from 1957 through 1959 went 148 consecutive games behind the plate without making an error, a major league record at the time. He was not a defensive wizard from the start, though. Dickey, Berra explained, “learned me all his experience.” On defense, he certainly surpassed Mike Piazza, the best-hitting catcher of recent vintage, and maybe ever. On offense, Berra and Johnny Bench, whose Cincinnati Reds teams of the 1970s were known as the Big Red Machine, were comparable, except that Bench struck out three times as often. Berra whiffed a mere 414 times in more than 8,300 plate appearances over 19 seasons — an astonishingly small ratio for a power hitter. Others — Carlton Fisk, Gary Carter and Ivan Rodriguez among them — also deserve consideration in a discussion of great catchers, but none was clearly superior to Berra on offense or defense. Only Roy Campanella, a contemporary rival who played for the Brooklyn Dodgers and faced Berra in the World Series six times before his career was ended by a car accident, equaled Berra’s total of three Most Valuable Player Awards. And although Berra did not win the award in 1950 — his teammate Phil Rizzuto did — he gave one of the greatest season-long performances by a catcher that year, hitting .322, smacking 28 home runs and driving in 124 runs. Big MomentsBerra’s career was punctuated by storied episodes. In Game 3 of the 1947 World Series, against the Dodgers, he hit the first pinch-hit home run in Series history, and in Game 4 he was behind the plate for what was almost the first no-hitter and was instead a stunning loss. With two outs in the ninth inning and two men on base after walks, the Yankees’ starter, Bill Bevens, gave up a double to Cookie Lavagetto that cleared the bases and won the game. In September 1951, once again on the brink of a no-hitter, this one by Allie Reynolds against the Boston Red Sox, Berra made one of baseball’s famous errors. With two outs in the ninth inning, Ted Williams hit a towering foul ball between home plate and the Yankees’ dugout. It looked like the end of the game, which would seal Reynolds’s second no-hitter of the season and make him the first American League pitcher to accomplish that feat. But as the ball plummeted, it was caught in a gust of wind; Berra lunged backward, and it deflected off his glove as he went sprawling. Amazingly, on the next pitch, Williams hit an almost identical pop-up, and this time Berra caught it. In the first game of the 1955 World Series against the Dodgers, the Yankees were ahead, 6-4, in the top of the eighth when the Dodgers’ Jackie Robinson stole home. The plate umpire, Bill Summers, called him safe, and Berra went berserk, gesticulating in Summers’s face and creating one of the enduring images of an on-the-field tantrum. The Yankees won the game although not the Series — it was the only time Brooklyn got the better of Berra’s Yankees — but Berra never forgot the moment. More than 50 years later, he signed a photograph of the play for President Obama, writing, “Dear Mr. President, He was out!” During the 1956 Series, again against the Dodgers, Berra was at the center of another indelible image, this one of sheer joy, when he leapt into the arms of Don Larsen, who had just struck out Dale Mitchell to end Game 5 and complete the only perfect game (and only no-hitter) in World Series history. When reporters gathered at Berra’s locker after the game, he greeted them mischievously. “So,” he said, “what’s new?” Beyond the historic moments and individual accomplishments, what most distinguished Berra’s career was how often he won. From 1946 to 1985, as a player, coach and manager, Berra appeared in a remarkable 21 World Series. Playing on powerful Yankees teams with teammates like Rizzuto and Joe DiMaggio early on and then Whitey Ford and Mickey Mantle, Berra starred on World Series winners in 1947, ’49, ’50, ’51, ’52, ’53, ’56 and ’58. He was a backup catcher and part-time outfielder on the championship teams of 1961 and ’62. (He also played on World Series losers in 1955, ’57, ’60 and ’63.) All told, his Yankees teams won the American League pennant 14 out of 17 years. He still holds Series records for games played, plate appearances, hits and doubles. No other player has been a champion so often. Lawrence Peter Berra was born on May 12, 1925, in the Italian enclave of St. Louis known as the Hill, which also fostered the baseball career of his boyhood friend Joe Garagiola. Berra was the fourth of five children. His father, Pietro, a construction worker and bricklayer, and his mother, Paulina, were immigrants from Malvaglio, a northern Italian village near Milan. (As an adult, on a visit to his ancestral home, Berra took in a performance of “Tosca” at La Scala. “It was pretty good,” he said. “Even the music was nice.”) As a boy, Berra was known as Larry, or Lawdie, as his mother pronounced it. As recounted in “Yogi Berra: Eternal Yankee,” a 2009 biography by Allen Barra, one day in his early teens, young Larry and some friends went to the movies and were watching a travelogue about India when a Hindu yogi appeared on the screen sitting cross-legged. His posture struck one of the friends as precisely the way Berra sat on the ground as he waited his turn at bat. From that day on, he was Yogi Berra. An ardent athlete but an indifferent student, Berra dropped out of school after the eighth grade. He played American Legion ball and worked odd jobs. As teenagers, he and Garagiola tried out with the St. Louis Cardinals and were offered contracts by the Cardinals’ general manager, Branch Rickey. But Garagiola’s came with a $500 signing bonus and Berra’s just $250, so Berra declined to sign. (This was a harbinger of deals to come. Berra, whose salary as a player reached $65,000 in 1961, substantial for that era, proved to be a canny contract negotiator, almost always extracting concessions from the Yankees’ penurious general manager, George Weiss.) In the meantime, the St. Louis Browns — they later moved to Baltimore and became the Orioles — also wanted to sign Berra but were not willing to pay any bonus at all. Then, the day after the 1942 World Series, in which the Cardinals beat the Yankees, a Yankees coach showed up at Berra’s parents’ house and offered him a minor league contract — along with the elusive $500. A Fan FavoriteBerra’s professional baseball life began in Virginia in 1943 with the Norfolk Tars of the Class B Piedmont League. In 111 games he hit .253 and led the league’s catchers in errors, but he reportedly once had 12 hits and drove in 23 runs over two consecutive games. It was a promising start, but World War II put his career on hold. Berra joined the Navy. He took part in the invasion of Normandy and, two months later, in Operation Dragoon, an Allied assault on Marseilles in which he was bloodied by a bullet and earned a Purple Heart. In 1946, after his discharge, he was assigned to the Newark Bears, then the Yankees’ top farm team. He played outfield and catcher and hit .314 with 15 home runs and 59 R.B.I. in 77 games, although his fielding still lacked polish; in one instance he hit an umpire with a throw from behind the plate meant for second base. But the Yankees still summoned him in September. In his first big league game, he had two hits, including a home run. As a Yankee, Berra became a fan favorite, partly because of his superior play — he batted .305 and drove in 98 runs in 1948, his second full season — and partly because of his humility and guilelessness. In 1947, honored at Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis, a nervous Berra told the hometown crowd, “I want to thank everyone for making this night necessary.” Berra was a hit with sportswriters, too, although they often portrayed him as a baseball idiot savant, an apelike, barely literate devotee of comic books and movies who spoke fractured English. So was born the Yogi caricature, of the triumphant rube. “Even today,” Life magazine wrote in July 1949, “he has only pity for people who clutter their brains with such unnecessary and frivolous matters as literature and the sciences, not to mention grammar and orthography.” Collier’s magazine declared, “With a body that only an anthropologist could love, the 185-pound Berra could pass easily as a member of the Neanderthal A.C.” Berra tended to take the gibes in stride. If he was ugly, he was said to have remarked, it did not matter at the plate. “I never saw nobody hit one with his face,” he was quoted as saying. But when writers chided him about his girlfriend, Carmen Short, saying he was too unattractive to marry her, he responded, according to Colliers, “I’m human, ain’t I?” Berra outlasted the ridicule. He married Short in 1949, and the marriage endured until her death in 2014. He is survived by their three sons — Tim, who played professional football for the Baltimore Colts; Dale, a former infielder for the Yankees, the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Houston Astros; and Lawrence Jr. — as well as 11 grandchildren and a great-grandson. Certainly, assessments of Berra changed over the years. “He has continued to allow people to regard him as an amiable clown because it brings him quick acceptance, despite ample proof, on field and off, that he is intelligent, shrewd and opportunistic,” Robert Lipsyte wrote in The New York Times in October 1963. Success as a ManagerAt the time, Berra had just concluded his career as a Yankees player, and the team had named him manager, a role in which he continued to find success, although not with the same regularity he enjoyed as a player and not without drama and disappointment. Indeed, things began badly. The Yankees, an aging team in 1964, played listless ball through much of the summer, and in mid-August they lost four straight games in Chicago to the first-place White Sox, leading to one of the kookier episodes of Berra’s career. On the team bus to O’Hare Airport, the reserve infielder Phil Linz began playing “Mary Had a Little Lamb” on the harmonica. Berra, in a foul mood over the losing streak, told him to knock it off, but Linz did not. (In another version of the story, Linz asked Mickey Mantle what Berra had said, and Mantle responded, “He said, ‘Play it louder.’ ”) Suddenly the harmonica went flying, having been either knocked out of Linz’s hands by Berra or thrown at Berra by Linz. (Players on the bus had different recollections.) News reports of the incident made it sound as if Berra had lost control of the team, and although the Yankees caught and passed the White Sox in September, winning the pennant, Ralph Houk, the general manager, fired Berra after the team lost a seven-game World Series to St. Louis. In a bizarre move, Houk replaced him with the Cardinals’ manager, Johnny Keane. Keane’s Yankees finished sixth in 1965. Berra, meanwhile, moved across town, taking a job as a coach for the famously awful Mets under Stengel, who was finishing his career in Flushing. The team continued its mythic floundering until 1969, when the so-called Miracle Mets, with Gil Hodges as manager — and Berra coaching first base — won the World Series. After Hodges died, before the start of the 1972 season, Berra replaced him. That summer, Berra was inducted into the Hall of Fame. The Mets team he inherited, however, faltered, finishing third, and for most of the 1973 season they were worse. In mid-August, the Mets were well under .500 and in sixth place when Berra supposedly uttered perhaps the most famous Yogi-ism of all. “It ain’t over till it’s over,” he said (or words to that effect), and lo and behold, the Mets got hot, squeaking by the Cardinals to win the National League’s Eastern Division title. They then beat the Reds in the League Championship Series before losing to the Oakland Athletics in the World Series. Berra was rewarded for the resurgence with a three-year contract, but the Mets were dreadful in 1974, finishing fifth, and the next year, on Aug. 6, with the team in third place and having lost five straight games, Berra was fired. Once again he switched leagues and city boroughs, returning to the Bronx as a Yankees coach, and in 1984 the owner, George Steinbrenner, named him to replace the volatile Billy Martin as manager. The team finished third that year, but during spring training in 1985, Steinbrenner promised him that he would finish the season as Yankees manager no matter what. After just 16 games, however, the Yankees were 6-10, and the impatient and imperious Steinbrenner fired Berra anyway, bringing back Martin. Perhaps worse than breaking his word, Steinbrenner sent an underling to deliver the bad news. The firing, which had an added sting because Berra’s son Dale had recently joined the Yankees, provoked one of baseball’s legendary feuds, and for 14 years Berra refused to set foot in Yankee Stadium, a period during which he coached four seasons for the Houston Astros. In the meantime private donors helped establish the Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center on the New Jersey campus of Montclair State University, which awarded Berra an honorary doctorate of humanities in 1996. A minor league ballpark, Yogi Berra Stadium, opened there in 1998. The museum, a tribute to Berra with exhibits on his career, runs programs for children dealing with baseball history. In January 1999, Steinbrenner, who died in 2010, went there to make amends. “I know I made a mistake by not letting you go personally,” he told Berra. “It’s the worst mistake I ever made in baseball.” Berra chose not to quibble with the semi-apology. To welcome him back into the Yankees fold, the team held a Yogi Berra Day on July 18, 1999. Also invited was Larsen, who threw out the ceremonial first pitch, which Berra caught. Incredibly, in the game that day, David Cone of the Yankees pitched a perfect game. It was, as Berra may or may not have said in another context, “déjà vu all over again,” a fittingly climactic episode for a wondrous baseball life.
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 26, 2015 9:45:42 GMT -5
SABR Biography of Junior "Gene" Thompson, a good middle-of-the-rotation sp for the 1939/1940 Reds pennant-winners. Interesting comment about ML teams as "families" during the 1930s and 1940s, as the owners consistently used this type of sentimental language in their defense of the reserve clause and in their attacks on early efforts to unionize baseball players... Junior Thompsonby Charles F. Faber, SABR Baseball Biography Project, 9/25/2015 sabr.org/bioproj/person/66727344Do we call him Junior or Gene? Was Junior his given name or a nickname? Could it be both? No matter. As a fresh-faced youngster Junior Thompson helped the Cincinnati Reds win two consecutive National League pennants. As a mature veteran Gene Thompson impacted the game of baseball for half a century. Junior Eugene Thompson was born June 7, 1917, in Latham, Illinois, a tiny village in Logan County in the geographic center of the state. He was the second of the six children and the eldest son of Grace Allison Thompson and Earl B. Thompson. Junior grew up in near-by Decatur, where his father for many years was a truck driver for Decatur Township. Baseball reference books agree that Junior’s name was Eugene Earl Thompson, but they are mistaken. His mother wanted to name him Earl after his father, but his grandmother thought that would be too confusing, so they named him Junior Eugene.1 He preferred to be called Gene, but he never changed his name officially, so he is still Junior Thompson in the records of the Navy, Veterans’ Affairs, and Social Security. After graduating from high school in 1934, the 17-year-old pitcher was signed by Chuck Dressen of the Cincinnati Reds. He started his professional career with the Monessen Reds in the Class D Pennsylvania State Association in 1935. The following season he was still in Class D ball with the Paducah Indians of the Kentucky-Illinois-Tennessee (Kitty) League. In 1936 Thompson married Dorothy Jean Thornell of Decatur. In 1937 he began moving up the ladder quickly. He started with the Peoria Reds in the Class B Illinois-Indiana-Iowa (Three-I) League. Years later he said his greatest thrill as a player came when he retired 27 consecutive batters for Peoria.2 After Peoria it was the Waterloo Reds in the Class A Western League. Then it was to the top of the minor-league chain with the Syracuse Chiefs of the Class AA International League. In 1937 a Social Security card was issued to Junior Eugene Thompson. Thompson did not get off to a good start with Syracuse in 1937, so he spent most of the season with the Columbus Reds of the Class B South Atlantic (Sally) League. He had a fine record in Columbus (16-9 .640) with an ERA of 2.81, earning promotion to the majors. That was quite a jump from Class B to the big leagues, but Thompson had previously had experience in the high minors. When he reached the majors he was 21, but he looked even younger. It has been said that he was dubbed Junior by his teammates because of his youth.3 If that story is true, Junior was both his given name and his nickname. The right-handed young pitcher stood 6-foot-1 and weighed 185 pounds. Thompson made his major-league debut on April 26, 1939, at Busch Stadium in St. Louis. He entered the game in the eighth inning and faced a formidable lineup. First up was the cleanup hitter, future Hall of Famer Joe Medwick. Thompson retired him on a grounder, second to first. Next up was another future Hall of Famer Johnny Mize, who flied out to center field. Mize was followed by four-time All-Star Terry Moore, who hit an easy popup to the third baseman. Thompson had retired the side in order, an auspicious beginning to his big-league career. He continued pitching well throughout the year, as a starter and reliever. His record was 13-5, with an ERA of 2.54. He threw three shutouts and collected two saves. During his rookie season Thompson was fortunate to have Deacon Bill McKechnie as his manager. McKechine had taken the helm of the Reds in 1938 and immediately led the club to their first first-division finish in more than a decade. He would soon lead them to their first National League pennant and World Series championship since 1919. Not only was McKechnie an astute manager, but he was a fair and decent man, a father-figure to some of the younger players. Thompson said, “I couldn’t have had a better manager than McKechnie. He and his wife were like parents to me.”4 On another occasion he said, “I spent most of my time in the major leagues under one of the greatest managers in the game, Bill McKechnie.”5 Cincinnati faced the powerful New York Yankees in the 1939 World Series. The Bronx Bombers defeated Cincinnati’s aces Paul Derringer and Bucky Walters in the first two games of the Series. McKechnie called upon Thompson to start Game Three. It was a disaster. Charlie Keller hit a two-run homer for the Yankees in the first inning. Joe DiMaggio followed with another two-run blast in the third. In the fifth inning Keller connected for his second two-run homer of the game, and Bill Dickey knocked Thompson out of the box with a base-empty dinger. The rookie had given up seven earned runs in 4 2/3 innings. He was the losing pitcher as New York prevailed, 7-3. The Yankees also took Game Four to sweep the Series and win their fourth consecutive world championship, the first time that feat had ever been accomplished. Thompson expressed the view that he had lost to a better team. “One of the things about the game of baseball is, when you’re overmatched, you’ve got to admit it,” he said. “That’s the way the 1939 World Series was. I don’t believe anyone was more overmatched than we were playing the New York Yankees. Those guys were absolutely awesome.”6 Many baseball experts would agree with Thompson’s assessment. The 1939 Yankees are often regarded as one of the greatest teams of all time. In the 1940 United States census Gene Thompson and his wife Dorothy were listed as living in Decatur, Illinois, in the household of Dorothy’s father, Emery Thornell, the Macon County Treasurer. In 1940 Thompson had an excellent season. He won 16 games, lost 9, for a winning percentage of .640, fifth best in the league, and posted an ERA of 3.32. He was used almost exclusively as a starting pitcher, the number three man in the rotation behind Derringer and Walters. With strong pitching and defense (Cincinnati set a National League fielding record with a percentage of .981), the Reds survived an injury to catcher Ernie Lombardi and the suicide of his backup, Willard Hershberger. For the first time in their long history the Reds won 100 games, as they cruised to their second straight pennant with a 12-game margin over the Brooklyn Dodgers. In the American League the long reign of the New York Yankees came to a temporary halt. The Detroit Tigers beat out the Yankees and the Cleveland Indians in a tight race for the pennant. Led by the slugging of Hank Greenberg and Rudy York, the Tigers were a much stronger offensive club than Cincinnati, but the Reds were vastly superior in pitching and defense. No four-game sweep was expected this time; a six- or seven- game Series was anticipated. The Series lived up to expectations. The Baseball Encyclopedia proclaimed it one of the best World Series in years.7 Detroit’s veteran pitcher Bobo Newsom defeated Derringer, 7-2, in Game One. This gave American League clubs ten successive wins in World Series games. (The Yankees had won the final game of the 1937 Series and swept both the 1938 and 1939 classics.) Newsom’s father had traveled up from South Carolina to see his son pitch in the World Series. The next morning he died of a heart attack in a Cincinnati hotel room. While Newsom was attending his father’s funeral, the Reds countered with Walters in Game Two, and he bested Schoolboy Rowe to even the Series at one game apiece. Detroit gained an edge when Tommy Bridges beat Jim Turner in Game Three, 7-4. Cincinnati came back with Derringer in Game Four and this time he came through for them, defeating Dizzy Trout, 5-2. Once again the Series was knotted at two wins each. It was widely anticipated that Cincinnati would bring back their ace, Walters, for Game Five, but McKechnie had other ideas. The night before the pivotal game, he decided to go with Thompson. As he wanted to spare the youngster pressure and let him get a good night’s rest, he kept his decision secret and didn’t announce it until just before game time on the morrow. Seated among the wives of Reds players in the box seats was Thompson’s young wife.8 Dorothy had not expected her husband to be called upon to pitch in such a pressure situation. When she heard the announcement over the stadium’s amplifier that Junior Thompson was pitching for Cincinnati, she gasped, “Oh, my God,” and passed out in her seat. Although the Tigers got three hits off Thompson in the first inning, they were unable to score. candlestick Bartell led off the frame with a single to center field and went to second on a groundout by Barney McCosky. Charlie Gehringer followed with a single to shallow center, and Bartell was thrown out at the plate trying to score. Greenberg followed with a single to left field. With runners on first and second and two men out, York ended the threat with a fly to center. In the second inning Thompson gave up a base on balls and another single, but again Detroit failed to score. In the third inning Thompson was unable to escape. After McCosky and Gehringer led off with singles, Greenberg unloaded a home run into the left field stands, and the Reds were down, 3-0. Thompson was unable to survive the fourth inning. Two walks, a sacrifice, and a two-base hit did him in. Whitey Moore relieved and fared no better. Detroit scored four runs in the frame to take a 7-0 lead. Meanwhile, Newsom, vowing to win the game for his late father, was hurling a masterpiece. He gave up only three hits as the Tigers won the game, 8-0, and took a three games to two lead in the Series. The teams had been alternating wins in the Series, and it was Cincinnati’s turn to win Game Six. Sure enough, they did it. Walters pitched a 2-0 shutout and hit a home run as the Reds tied the Series at three games each. Pitching on only one day’s rest Newsom faced Derringer in the deciding game. Dedicated Cincinnati and Detroit fans were pulling hard for their respective teams. Fans unattached to either contender were probably rooting for the venerable Bobo to win one more for his father and assuage his grief somewhat. It was not to be. Derringer outpitched his rival in a real pitchers’ battle, 2-1. Cincinnati won its first world championship since the tainted victory over the Black Sox in 1919. The season of 1940 was the high water mark of Thompson’s career. Relegated to duty as a spot starter and reliever, he never again won more than six games in a season. On July 13, 1943, Junior Eugene Thompson of Decatur, Illinois, enlisted in the United States Navy. Japan surrendered on September 2, 1945, ending World War II. Shortly thereafter on October 10, Thompson was discharged from the Navy, having served not quite 27 months. After the war, the Reds granted Thompson free agency. He signed with the New York Giants on May 14, 1946. The Giants used him almost exclusively as a relief pitcher. In 1946 he won four games and saved an equal number. In 1947 he again won four games, but had no saves. His last major-league game came at the age of 30 on the Fourth of July, 1947, in the first game of a holiday doubleheader at Ebbets Field. Thompson’s big-league career did not end on a happy note, as the Dodgers got to him for six runs (three earned) in two innings on two hits, six walks, and two Giant errors. After this debacle the Giants sent him across the river to Jersey City, their affiliate in the Class AAA International League. Although he pitched well in Jersey, going 3-0, with a 1.45 ERA, the Giants released him on December 19, 1947. In 1948 and 1949 Thompson pitched for the San Diego Padres in the Class AA Pacific Coast League, going 8-3, with a 2.00 ERA in 1948, but slipping in 1949. His final year as a player in Organized Baseball came in 1950 when he pitched for the Sacramento Solons, the PCL affiliate of the Chicago White Sox. In 1952 Carl Hubbell, director of scouting for the San Francisco Giants, hired Thompson as a scout, a position he held for most of the rest of his life. Gene Thompson (no longer known as Junior) scouted for the Giants for 40 years. He worked briefly for the Cleveland Indians and the Chicago Cubs before joining the San Diego Padres in 1998. He finally retired in 2005 at the age of 88. In 1995 Thompson indulged in the old man’s privilege of saying things were better in the good old days. “ In the ’30s and ‘40s, teams really were like a family. We were together nearly all the time on and off the field. We had a lot more togetherness than they have today. Players today make a lot of money, but I don’t think they have the fun we had. In my day teams were more defensive minded. Today all it seems they think of is offense. Coaches do try to teach fundamentals to today’s players, but a lot of them are so headstrong they don’t want to listen; they just want to swing from the heels and end up hitting .210 and think they’re a hell of a hitter.”9 Thompson got more accolades as a scout that he ever did as a pitcher. Eddie Bane, director of scouting for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim said, “It was a given that when you started scouting, you just spent a few days around Gene. If you followed him around and you shut up, he’d show you all you needed to know.”10 Gene and Dorothy Thompson lived in Arizona during most of the time Gene was scouting for San Diego. He had a front-row seat at Chase Field, the home of the Arizona Diamondbacks. That club paid Thompson an honor that is surely unique in the annals of baseball. They dedicated a plaque to a scout for an opposing team. The bronze plaque is located on the wall directly behind home plate. Junior Eugene Thompson died in Scottsdale, Arizona, on August 24, 2006, at the age of 89. He is buried in Green Acres Memorial Park in Scottsdale. His tombstone is engraved J. E. “Gene” Thompson. Dorothy, his wife for nearly 70 years, died on December 30, 2005, and lies beside him in Green Acres. Six years in the majors, eight years in the minors, two World Series, and more than 50 years as a scout adds up to quite a baseball life for Thompson, whether we call him Junior or Gene. Notes1 Rick Van Blair, Dugout to Foxhole: Interviews with Baseball Players Whose Careers Were Affected by World War II (Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 1994), 106. 2 Ibid. 3 Ibid. 4 Talmage Boston, 1939: Baseball’s Pivotal Year (Fort Worth: Summit, 1990), 78. 5 Van Blair, 108. 6 Boston, 82. 7 Pete Palmer and Gary Gillette, eds. Baseball Encyclopedia (New York: Barnes and Noble, 2004), 1481. 8 Van Blair, 106. 9 Rick Van Blair, “What Some Old-Timers think of the Major Leagues Today,” Baseball Digest, November 1995, 50. 10 Arizona Republic, August 25, 2006, cited by baseball-almanac.com.
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 28, 2015 7:49:28 GMT -5
News about the Crosley Field Memorial... Crosley Field Memorial Site to Start Mural Before Opening Day 2016by Mike Dyer, Enquirer, 9/21/2015 www.cincinnati.com/story/sports/2015/09/21/crosley-field-memorial-site-to-start-mural-before-opening-day-2016/72562112/The Crosley Field memorial site is tentatively scheduled to begin work on a mural at its location the week before Reds' Opening Day 2016. The Reds host the Phillies on Opening Day 2016, which is scheduled for April 4 at Great American Ball Park. The campus of the City Gospel Mission in Queensgate is on the site of the former Reds ballpark. The campus has a replica light standard and foul poles. Tim Curtis, spokesman for the City Gospel Mission, said the Crosley Field mural will be painted on the backside of the second building on the corner of York Street and Dalton Avenue and is tentatively scheduled to be completed by the end of May 2016. The original plan this spring called for the mural to be painted on the backside of the homeless services building at the corner of Findlay and Dalton. But, the new plan will eliminate foot traffic in the alley the City Gospel Mission shares with Phillips Supply. "It's very important that there be no Crosley Field Historic Site foot traffic in that alley for safety reasons as trucks need to be able to use that alley freely," Curtis told Cincinnati.com. "So we're moving the mural to our second building." Details for the kickoff painting event and mural reveal event are being worked out. The City Gospel Mission and Reds Hall of Fame and Museum partnered on the Crosley Field memorial site starting in August 2014. The Enquirer wrote a series of stories about Crosley Field and its remnants this spring. [Posted below] The City Gospel Mission and Reds Hall of Fame and Museum are still working on designs for the base markers and plaza in front of the homeless services building which will feature a monument/sign and commemorative bricks. Rick Walls, Executive Director of the Reds Hall of Fame and Museum, said the bricks may be started before the holidays. Baseball had been played at the corner of Findlay Street and Western Avenue since 1884. Redland Field opened in 1912 and was renamed Crosley Field in 1934. The Reds played their final game at Crosley on June 24, 1970. Demolition started on the ballpark on April 19, 1972.
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Post by psuhistory on Sept 28, 2015 8:09:08 GMT -5
Using the search function, there are a couple of good articles and discussions of Crosley Field scattered around this site. The links below include lots of photos and video of Bench and Rose remembering Crosley... Crosley Field: A Chapter in Our Historyby Mike Dyer, Enquirer, 6/2015 www.cincinnati.com/story/sports/2015/05/28/crosley-field-chapter-history/28035841/www.cincinnati.com/topic/2a2dc7c1-cb10-44d2-956f-c11a50732b37/crosley-field/This is part of a series about the final days of Crosley Field and the way it lives on in bits and pieces strewn throughout Greater Cincinnati. Miss something? Check out all of our Crosley Field stories here. [Second link above] Baseball had been played at the corner of Findlay Street and Western Avenue since 1884. By mid-April 1972, Riverfront Stadium entered its second full season as the Reds' home. With its fate sealed years before, Crosley Field would shatter to pieces that spring. The complete obliteration of Crosley Field is a difficult reality to grasp today. So complete was its annihilation that, in the aftermath of its demolition, very few reminders of the ballpark were left. All that was left was history. Cincinnati had hosted the first professional baseball team in 1869 and three ballfields were used until the Cincinnati Base Ball Club announced plans to build a new park in the winter of 1883, according to Reds historians Greg Rhodes and John Erardi. The Cincinnati Base Ball Club Park opened in 1884 and was later named American Park and then League Park. Palace of the Fans opened in 1902 and was torn down in 1911. Redland Field opened in 1912 and was renamed Crosley Field in 1934. Preserving Crosley Field wasn't at the forefront in the 1970s. Instead, Crosley Field hosted an impound lot – complete with cars, weeds and oil stains – during its last months before demolition. Think about that for a moment. At 1200 Findlay St. in the West End, there were countless memories: • Four games, including Game 1, of the 1919 World Series were there. • The first Major League Baseball night game ever occurred 80 years ago there this May 24. • The Reds won the deciding game of the World Series against the Tigers 75 years ago this October. • It was the site of the first of Johnny Vander Meer's back-to-back no-hitters on June 11, 1938. • It hosted the 1938 and 1953 Major League Baseball All-Star Games. • Joe Nuxhall made his debut as a 15-year-old on June 10, 1944 there, to become the youngest player in modern Major League Baseball history. • The 1961 "Ragamuffin Reds" that faced the Yankees of Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris in the World Series. • Pete Rose happily emerged from the Crosley Field dugout in front of a hometown crowd, just a few hours removed from signing his contract on Opening Day 1963. • The Beatles concert on Aug. 21, 1966. • It was the site of Hank Aaron's 3,000th hit on May 17, 1970. Though an entirely different era for memorabilia, a few souvenir collectors in the 1970s recognized the importance of the ballpark even before the wrecking ball hit the right-field wall. Now, of course, we all do. Nearly 45 years after the Reds last played at Crosley Field, a memorial site will rise this summer. Reds fans say the time is long overdue. Johnny Bench and Pete Rose have fond memories of Crosley Field. "The history was just terrific," Bench said. "I thought it was just such a great ballpark." As a youngster, Rose met Jackie Robinson and other Brooklyn Dodgers while watching family friend Don Zimmer play at the ballpark. Rose's favorite player in the 1950s was Reds first baseman Ted Kluszewski. "The one night Kluszewski hit a home run to straightaway center field and it went into a train car coming by and ended up in Louisville. That was the longest home run ever hit in baseball," Rose said with a smile. "A hundred-mile home run." Rose started at second base during his debut at the ballpark on April 8, 1963. It was a field he enjoyed and really understood like few others. "It was a great atmosphere," Rose said. "The terrace out there (in the outfield). ... What you do is you play on the bottom of the terrace. Too many guys played where they took three or four steps and hit the terrace and fall down. You played right on the bottom of the terrace where your first step is on the hill and you won't fall down." As the city prepares to host Major League Baseball's All-Star Game at Great American Ball Park on July 14, there is a renewed interest in Crosley Field. City Gospel Mission and the Reds Hall of Fame and Museum have partnered on a project that will feature several additions to the site that once occupied the ballpark. The memorial site is scheduled to have a self-guided tour in time for the All-Star Game. The site of second base is marked inside the City Gospel Mission dining area. The site of first base is in the hallway. The tour will mark all the significant areas of interest. Officials are working on plans for: Replica left-field and right-field foul poles, a light standard replicating the original lights used at Crosley, base markers and photos provided by the Reds Hall of Fame and Museum. This Enquirer special section won't attempt to provide the complete history of Crosley Field. There are plenty of worthy sources out there that do that. Start with Greg Rhodes and John Erardi's book, "Crosley Field: The Illustrated History of a Classic Ballpark," available at the Reds Hall of Fame and Museum. All that thorough information and, still, we wanted to know about something few have explored: Crosley Field's final days. We sought to learn about the remnants that have been discovered – or disappeared – and how the ballpark shaped lives. Crosley Field/Redland Field didn't just host 4,557 Major League games, according to Major League Baseball, it was a memorable ballpark woven into the lives of countless Reds fans. The sights and sounds of that ballpark are forever with them. The memories never strike out. Enjoy.
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Post by psuhistory on Oct 6, 2015 10:43:32 GMT -5
Interesting because it involves the iconic NPB franchise--analogous to the Yankees--and because historically gambling has not figured in Japanese baseball in the ways it has in the United States and in Cuba. Of the major baseball traditions, Japan records the longest period of time in which the amateur game defined the national meaning of the sport, from the 1870s to the discrediting of the imperial regime after the Second World War. Before the late 1940s, Japanese baseball meant the "purity" of amateur competition, and since 1950 even NPB has had little experience of the distinction between the National Pastime and "ballplaying" [gamblin, cheatin, fightin, cussin, &c.] that has characterized the sport's professional history in the US...
Yomiuri Giants Pitcher Satoshi Fukuda Banned for Betting on Baseball Associated Press, 10/6/2015
TOKYO -- A pitcher for the Yomiuri Giants, Japan's most popular baseball team, has been suspended for betting on games, including those involving his own team.
Satoshi Fukuda bet on 10 Nippon Professional Baseball games and 10 major league games in an attempt to win back money he lost gambling on high school baseball games in August.
The NPB games included three or four involving Yomiuri. In all, Fukuda is said to have lost more than $8,000.
The 32-year-old pitcher did not appear for the top team this season, so there is no suspicion that he fixed games, but gambling is a violation of NPB's charter.
In light of the revelations, team president Hiroshi Kubo on Tuesday launched an investigation involving all players and staff.
The Giants also have suspended pitcher Shoki Kasahara, who introduced Fukuda to an employee at a tax accounting firm who enticed him to bet on games.
The suspensions come as the Giants are preparing for their first game of the postseason on Saturday.
Owner Kojiro Shiraishi met with the team Tuesday, calling the situation "disgraceful and extremely disappointing."
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Post by psuhistory on Oct 10, 2015 8:30:04 GMT -5
Account of the 1964 game against the Phillies in which Chico Ruiz stole home with two outs in the sixth and Frank Robinson batting, the only run in a 1-0 Reds win... September 21, 1964: Chico Ruiz Steals Home to Begin Phillies' CollapseBy Tony Valley, SABR Baseball Games Project, 10/2015. The 1964 Philadelphia Phillies were a formidable team. As the team developed during the early 1960s (climbing from eighth in the National League to seventh to fourth over the 1961, 1962, and 1963 seasons), the Phillies now presented a solid top-to-bottom lineup. Led by manager Gene Mauch, the team featured All-Star right fielder Johnny Callison (having a career year highlighted by a walk-off home run in the All-Star Game), All-Star pitchers Jim Bunning (who had pitched a perfect game in June vs. the New York Mets), Chris Short, and Rookie of the Year third baseman candlestick Allen. As the season went along, the Phillies were generally near or in first place, but beginning in early August, they built a substantial lead over a two-week period, going from 1½ games ahead on August 6 to 7½ games ahead on the 20th. (The Phillies went 12-4 during that stretch.) The GameAs play began on Monday, September 21, 1964, the Phillies at 90-60 had a seemingly insurmountable 6½-game league lead with 12 games to play. On this Monday evening in Philadelphia, the Phillies faced off against the Cincinnati Reds in front of a crowd of 20,067. The Reds were having an excellent season themselves, currently standing at 83-66, 17 games over .500. Led by manager candlestick Sisler (who had taken over for the terminally ill Fred Hutchinson), the Reds featured right fielder Frank Robinson, center fielder Vada Pinson, second baseman Pete Rose, and pitchers Jim O’Toole and Jim Maloney. On this evening, the Reds pitted journeyman right-hander John Tsitouris against the Phillies’ Art Mahaffey. The game was tightly played – the Reds had seven hits, the Phillies six; the Reds left seven men on base, the Phillies eight (going 0-for-8 with runners in scoring position). Only one Phillies runner advanced as far as third base in the game. The game turned the Reds’ way on a key play in the top of the sixth inning. After Pete Rose grounded out to second baseman Tony Taylor, Reds third baseman Chico Ruiz singled to right field. Center fielder Vada Pinson hit a long single to right field, with Ruiz advancing to third as Johnny Callison threw out Pinson trying to stretch his single into a double. Now the Reds’ best hitter, Frank Robinson, was at the plate. Robinson, currently hitting .306 with 27 home runs, stood in against Mahaffey. With two outs, Robinson needed a base hit to put the Reds ahead. Chico Ruiz had other ideas. As Mahaffey went into his windup against Robinson, Ruiz broke for home. From the moment Ruiz took off with his team’s best hitter at the plate, the Phillies were never the same. Mahaffey threw a wild pitch, Ruiz scored, and the Reds won 1-0. Ray Kelly of the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin wrote, “It’s one of those things that simply isn’t done. Nobody tries to steal home with a slugging great like Frank Robinson at the plate. Not in the sixth inning of a scoreless game.”1 Art Mahaffey was incredulous. Years later, he would say “Chico Ruiz stole home with two outs and two strikes on Frank Robinson. Now you must realize that with two outs and two strikes, if you throw a strike Frank Robinson swings and knocks Chico Ruiz’s head off. It was just so stupid. Ruiz wasn’t even thinking. Robinson was so upset because he was one of the league’s leading hitters and near the lead in RBI and this guy’s stealing home with him hitting. It was just such a crazy thing. We didn’t know it was going to start a 10-game losing streak, but it couldn’t have started in more ridiculous way.”2 After the game, Phillies manager Mauch had the last word (or words): “Chico %$#@! Ruiz beats us on a bonehead play of the year. Chico %$#@! Ruiz steals home with Frank Robinson up! Can you believe it?”3 The game ended with the Phillies advancing the tying run to third base with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, but Shortstop Ruben Amaro struck out to end the game. Post-Game WrapThe Phillies still had a 5½-game lead, with only 11 games to play. At the time, it may have seemed like one of those things that the Phillies could look back on and laugh about later. Except that it wasn’t. Famously, the Phillies now went into a 10-game tailspin. Their lead over the Reds and St. Louis Cardinals dwindled. By Sunday, September 27, the lead had vanished as their losing streak had reached six games. They then lost three additional games before winning their final two games against the Reds. Over the final 12 games of the season, the Phillies were 2-10, while the Reds were 8-4 and the Cardinals were 9-3. The Cardinals won the pennant on the season’s final day, defeating the New York Mets 11-5, while the Phillies were defeating the Reds 10-0. For the Phillies, that 10-0 win was too little, too late. Now all the Phillies and their fans had were dreams of what could have been. Author’s noteThe 1964 baseball season was the first I paid much attention to as a young fan. I can recall eagerly awaiting the afternoon delivery of the Bremerton (Washington) Sun to read the brief game stories, line scores and standings. And it amazed me then (as it does now) that so many games could be played and still have only a tissue-thin difference among teams in the standings at the end of a long season. Notes1. Bill Chuck and Jim Kaplan, Walkoffs, Last Licks, and Final Outs: Baseball’s Grand (and Not So Grand) Finales. (Chicago: Acta Sports, 2007). 2. Bob Hertzel, “Another Look: Remembering Chico Ruiz,” Baseball Prospectus, April 20, 2010. As a side note here, Art Mahaffey’s recollection is not quite accurate. At that time, Robinson trailed the Cardinals’ third baseman Ken Boyer in the RBI race by 26 RBIs. Boyer went on to win the 1964 National League Most Valuable Player Award. 3. David Halberstam, October 1964. (New York: Ballantine Books, 1994), 305.
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Post by psuhistory on Oct 24, 2015 10:39:36 GMT -5
Interesting memorial project, in this case commemorating the experience of baseball in a city where most of its history hasn't involved a Major League team. Part of the funding for the Rockford memorial came from the proceeds of the collectively authored SABR book Base Ball Pioneers, 1850-1870 (McFarland, 2012), which have been used to create a permanent endowment for this kind of commemoration... The idea of promoting Ross Barnes for the Hall of Fame is an interesting one because it raises unresolved questions about how to evaluate nineteenth-century baseball. Barnes was a batting champion, one of the premier hitters of his generation, many of whose hits were of the fair/foul variety allowed within the rules of the time. There's no question that this was a difficult skill to master--many fine current hitters struggle even to foul off difficult pitches, never mind putting spin on the ball to send it foul after landing fair. By the 1870s, when Barnes played as a pro, pitchers threw hard and used a variety of offspeed pitches. Considering him for the Hall means determining the value of an offensive skill that became obsolete in 1877 and of a short career in the time before the DL... Baseball Monuments Unveiled for Rockford’s Forest City Team and Peaches Team and LeagueBy David Stalker, Seamheads.com, 10/21/15 seamheads.com/2015/10/21/baseball-monuments-unveiled-for-rockfords-forest-city-team-and-peaches-team-and-league/August 29, 2015 Rockford, Illinois celebrated the grand re-opening of Beyer Stadium Park, which was the home of the Rockford Peaches of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League from 1943 to 1954. But on this day, two of Rockford’s teams were honored, with hundreds in attendance. Mike Garrigan, an evening anchor at WIFR in Rockford was master of ceremonies. Okeyma Lundeen, a baseball player of the Rockford Starfires led the event off by singing the National Anthem. Various city and park officials spoke, along with past players from the Rockford Peaches. The Rockford Barbershop Chorus provided entertainment. Ann Cusac, from the movie A League of Their Own, was unable to attend, but sent a video message. When the ceremony concluded all were asked to gather at the entrance of the new historic walkway, where a ribbon was cut. As the crowd proceeded down the walkway to the first attraction just inside the entrance, I was given the honor to speak a few words and then unveil the Rockford Forest City Base Ball Club of 1865-1871 monument. I spoke about it being part of my monument series that began in 2005, for player Fred Merkle. Until this year I only honored players and teams from the Deadball Era, 1901-1919, and now I decided to expand the series into the earlier years of baseball. I received funding from royalties of a SABR book titled “Pioneers of Base Ball 1850 to 1870”, that would help pay for a good percentage of a monument. The funds could be used to honor any player or team I wanted, any where in the country. It became obvious and appropriate to honor the Forest City Club. The Forest City Club of Rockford was a member of major league baseball’s inaugural season in 1871. This was due to their play leading up to 1871. The team was established in 1865 as the boys returned home from the Civil War, and put Rockford on the map. The city prospered from the game of baseball and 2015 marked the 150th anniversary of the teams beginning and marked the100th anniversary of the passing of team legends Albert Goodwill Spalding and Roscoe Barnes. Rockford is the only city that may claim to have teams in both the inaugural seasons of Major League Baseball and The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. So the first monument in the series honoring the earlier years should be in Rockford, a city that has been referred to as “The Cradle of Baseball.” The front of the monument reads: IN HONOR OF THE ROCKFORD FOREST CITY BASE BALL CLUB of 1865-1871 Established in 1865, the Forest City Club of Rockford, Illinois was known for defeating clubs from larger cities, producing several stars, and making a successful transition from amateurism to professionalism. In 1867, Rockford put itself on the baseball map with a 29-23 victory over the famous Nationals of Washington. Pitching for the Forest City Club and gaining national acclaim was 16-year old Albert Goodwill Spalding. His teammates Bob Addy, Roscoe Barnes, Alfred Barker, Fred Cone and Scott Hastings also went on to play in the major leagues. In 1871, Rockford joined the National Association, becoming one of none teams in major league baseball’s inaugural season. The team played at the Agricultural Fair Grounds, but dropped out after one year as an indirect result of the Great Chicago Fire. Hiram Waldo assembled the team and Scott Hastings served as captain. The leading hitter was Adrian “Cap” Anson. Both Anson and Spalding are members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame. The back of the monument reads: 1871 Rockford Forest City Club Of The National Association Bob Addy Ralph Ham Adrian Anson Scott Hastings Alfred Barker Denny Mack George Bird Samuel Sager William Fisher Garret Stires Charles Fulmer Spalding and Barnes played for Boston in the National Association from 1871-1875, bringing championships in the years 1872-1875. Cone was with them in 1871, Addy in 1873. In 1876, the first season of the National League, Anson, Spalding, Barnes and Addy helped bring the Chicago White Stockings, now known as the Cubs, their first pennant. Donated August 29, 2015 by SABR Book Base Ball Pioneers 1850-1870 Peter Morris, David J. Stalker and Archie Monuments As we continued walking along the historic walkway, a second monument was unveiled for the Rockford Peaches and the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. A very nice donation was made by the AAGPBL. The front reads: WELCOME TO THE PEACH ORCHARD HOME OF THE ROCKFORD PEACHES ALL-AMERICAN GIRLS BASEBALL LEAGUE CHAMPIONS 1945, 1948, 1949 AND 1950 The backside lists the fifteen teams that played in the league, along with the years. Rockford, South Bend, Racine and Kenosha were the four teams in the inaugural season. Rockford and South Bend were the only two teams that played the full duration of the league’s existence, from 1943-1954. Rockford Peaches 1943-1954 South Bend Blue Sox 1943-1954 Racine Belles 1943-1951 Kenosha Comets 1943-1950 Milwaukee Chicks 1944 Minneapolis Millerettes 1944 Fort Wayne Daisies 1945-1954 Grand Rapids Chicks 1945-1954 Muskegon Lassies 1946-1950 Peoria Redwings 1946-1951 Chicago Colleens 1948-1950* Springfield Sallies 1948-1950* Kalamazoo Lassies 1950-1954 Battle Creek Belles 1951-1952 Muskegon Belles 1953 *Colleens and Sallies were rookie touring teams in1949 and 1950 Plaques around the monument were then unveiled, honoring the players. Former player Helen “Sis” Waddell-Wyatt unveiled one of herself, as did Lou “Erickson” Sauer. The daughter of Dorothy “Dottie” Ferguson Key unveiled her mother’s plaque and Charlene Hawes (O’Brien) unveiled one for the Peaches batgirls. Moving along and onto the field both dugouts were unveiled with murals commemorating the Peaches and their history. At this time Greg Schwanke announced Peaches names and positions and the Starfire players took signs with the players name on and placed them according to the position they played in the field. The afternoon concluded with food and entertainment for the kids and Peaches players signing autographs. Petitions were being signed for Ross Barnes election into the baseball Hall of Fame and baseball cards of Barnes were given away, courtesy of Gary Passamonte who lives in Barnes birth town of Mount Morris, New York. The original Beyer Stadium was torn down in the 1990’s except for the ticket booth entrance. Led by a dream, and followed by the efforts of Greg Schwanke and Steve McIntosh of Friends of Beyer Stadium, this real life “Field of Dreams” is thriving again. They continue to build, and more and more people continue to come. Since 2012, Beyer Stadium Park has been home to the Women’s Baseball Team, the Rockford Starfires. Great pride may be taken having the Peaches and three of the greatest nineteenth century players in Anson, Barnes and Spalding, all playing for Rockford. Both Barnes and Spalding grew up in Rockford, with Barnes being buried at Greenwood Cemetery. David Stalker’s Baseball Memorial Series is very pleased to have helped this great baseball city honor and remember their unique baseball history in stone, forever.
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Post by psuhistory on Nov 8, 2015 8:18:02 GMT -5
Travel article about the Dominican Republic that engages with the history of baseball there, including its introduction by Cuban refugees and recent controversies about working conditions at the MLB academies... The Lure of Baseball in the Dominican RepublicBy Steve Knopper, NY Times, 10/29/2015 www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/travel/dominican-republic-baseball.htmlOn the way to Tamboril, Dominican Republic, a famous cigar-making suburb east of Santiago, our rented Hyundai Grand i10 dropped into every dirt pothole with a disturbing thunk. Frankly, we’d been terrible at sightseeing. Our maps and apps consistently let us down, our walking routes took us past hospitals and funeral homes and we never once made it to the beach. We were about to give up and drive to the airport early when my niece Aurora, 25, looked out the rear window and asked, “Isn’t that a baseball field?” And that was the way it went in the Dominican Republic: Baseball found us. Four days earlier, the week before Christmas, we had traveled there not for the 82-degree temperatures, cathedrals built by popes and bishops, merengue music, paella Valenciana and street-side ice cream parlors that seem to appear exactly when you need them — although those were nice. We were there to stave off seasonal depression. “As soon as the chill rains come,” A. Bartlett Giamatti, baseball’s former commissioner, once wrote, “It stops and leaves you to face the fall all alone.” I located the world’s best winter baseball — the Liga de Beisbol Dominicano — and dragged Aurora and my brother, Mark, to this island of banana plants and death-defying motorcyclists. Baseball players in the Dominican Republic are like musicians — or, more recently, sprinters — in nearby Jamaica: so much talent for such a tiny island. Juan Marichal, David Ortiz, Robinson Canó, Sammy Sosa and Albert Pujols are from here. As of opening day 2015, Dominicans made up 83 of baseball’s 868 players. “If you reverse time back 15 years ago, I was sitting under a mango tree without 50 cents to actually pay for a bus,” Pedro Martinez, the Hall of Fame pitcher, once told reporters. Baseball arrived on the island by sea in the 1860s, via Cubans fleeing the Ten Years’ War, according to “The Tropic of Baseball: Baseball in the Dominican Republic” by Rob L. Ruck. By the 1930s, it had grown into a big-money sport where owners mined the country for talented youths whose parents often worked at sugar refineries. In 1937 a team, run in part by the dictator Rafael Trujillo, hired Negro League stars from the United States, including Satchel Paige. Mr. Trujillo built the first modern stadium, complete with lights, in the mid-’50s. That was when star Dominican players first graduated to the majors, beginning with the utility infielder Ozzie Virgil. I decided to adopt a team in the Dominican’s winter league, which begins every October, then peaks with a round robin playoff in January. (Winner goes to the Caribbean Series, in February, to compete against Puerto Rico, Mexico, Cuba and Venezuela.) I wanted a winner, and Santiago’s 79-year-old Águilas Cibaeñas, or Eagles of Cibao, had the high-profile names to go with gaudy statistics. Their cleanup hitter was Manny Ramirez, the former Red Sox postseason hero. The sure-handed Jonathan Villar of the Houston Astros played shortstop; Frank Batista, now a Chicago Cubs pitching prospect, was their ace. They played at the Estadio Cibao, the island’s biggest stadium, an 18,000-capacity, old-school ballpark. I speak no Spanish, so my plan was to bond with local fans over baseball passion; we’d share the universal language of E.R.A. and R.B.I. But on the plane to Santo Domingo, for the Águilas’ away game against Los Leones del Escogido, or Lions of the Chosen One, a friendly Dominican engineering student at the University of Illinois did not react well. She scoffed at the idea of an American striding into Dominican stadiums without even a “cómo estás.” She translated my plan to her countrymen. “Try not to speak English,” one advised. Mark, Aurora and I had a few hours to kill on game day, so we took off on foot from our hotel, El Embajador, built in 1956 as an opulent island getaway, which once drew American stars, from Rock Hudson to William Holden, to its Art Deco lobby. As we walked down Avenida Bolívar in the thick humidity, we noticed men seated outside banks and businesses on folding chairs with rifles displayed on their laps. Dodging guides-for-hire, we reached Zona Colonial, a district of narrow cobblestone streets full of museums and restaurants. At the center, the Parque Colón, a wide square containing a statue of Christopher Columbus, we watched children kick soccer balls and tourists consult guidebooks to confirm that a large sandstone building was actually the Basílica Catedral Metropolitan Santa María de la Encarnación, built by the Vatican in 1540 to co-opt the religion of the native people. Finally, it was game time. Estadio Quisqueya, built with Mr. Trujillo’s support in 1955, has the small, warm feel of a minor league stadium, and at times we felt as if we were watching the Lansing Lugnuts. The pumped-up music between innings was relentless, from Wiz Khalifa’s “We Dem Boyz” to the booming merengue that backed male and female dancers in tight shorts. Vendors in chicken helmets sold chicken fingers; vendors in hot-dog hats sold hot dogs. Our Águilas put up a fight: Mr. Ramirez, showing a flash of the imperious “Manny being Manny” mode, glared at the umpire before lancing an R.B.I. double to right. But Escogido won, 5-4, knocking the visitors out of first-place contention. The next day, we rented our Hyundai and drove about 93 miles north along DR-1, a narrow highway where motorcyclists zip between cars and pedestrians drag bicycles and bundles into the road. At one point, two huge trucks encroached into my lane on both sides, and as Mark and Aurora screamed, I accelerated to avoid being crushed. It was dark when we drove past a patch of trees to Estadio Cibao, in the middle of a concrete barrio not known for its Saturday-night safety. The stadium was the only light in the area, with its giant yellow “A” over the entrance. As we lined up to buy tickets from a woman in a green metal cage, scalpers bunched around us, refusing to leave even when we shook our heads. “Don’t you trust me?” one kept asking. Far more than Estadio Quisqueya, Estadio Cibao resembles a major league ballpark: flags everywhere, TV broadcasters speaking to cameras out front, wall-size baseball cards depicting the star hitters Miguel Tejada and Zoilo Almonte. Perhaps because the Águilas were out of contention for first place (Mr. Ramirez wasn’t even in the starting lineup) the stadium was only half-full. But the crowd made up for it with volume. Near our seats along the first-base line (1,000 pesos apiece, or about $21 at 43 pesos to the dollar), college-age youths filled a section in their bright-yellow Águilas gear, pounding on snare drums, a marching band without the marching. Children threw candy to the players, who snagged it with their gloves and nodded their thanks. The elaborate center-field scoreboard wasn’t working, perhaps owing to a huge stadium fire the previous month, and it was only by keeping score in a small notebook that I was able to follow the game. I silently befriended an older gentleman in our row by flashing fingers to confirm runs and outs. With first place out of reach, the Águilas put on a power show against the Estrellas Orientales, scoring 10 runs on 16 hits, including a home run by the Kansas City Royals catching prospect Francisco Peña. The biggest drama came in the seventh inning, when the stadium lights abruptly shut off. For half an hour, security men in camouflage with guns surrounded the field, while players stretched in the outfield and dancers danced on the dugout. Then the lights returned and the Águilas won, 10-3. On Sunday evening, the last game of the regular season, Estadio Cibao was more crowded but less rowdy, wide-eyed children in baseball caps in lieu of percussive students. I sat with a man who grew up in the Dominican Republic but now works as a plumber in the Bronx. He had returned to visit family. In illustrating the country’s rich baseball history, he demonstrated Juan Marichal’s high leg kick; I told him the English term for a runner getting trapped between bases is a “pickle,” which made him laugh. Later, a man with a wife and young daughter asked to borrow my pen, which he tossed to the visiting Gigantes’ dugout 20 rows below us. His young son had been sitting in the dugout for the entire game, and the players needed my pen so they could sign autographs on the boy’s birthday. The Águilas won the game, 5-3, solidifying second place, and our three-game Dominican series came to an end. We hadn’t exactly been good luck. A month after we left, the Águilas collapsed in the playoffs, firing their manager, Andy Barkett, and replacing him with the popular former major leaguer Miguel Tejada. I’d bet on the wrong team. After one of the games, we ordered room service and queued up a 2008 movie download called “Sugar,” about a young, hard-throwing Dominican pitcher who grows up in poverty and uses baseball in an attempt to achieve the American dream. But his dream disintegrates one bad day in Iowa, when he injures his leg, develops a bad attitude and takes off to try to build furniture in New York. The movie suggests a different interpretation of Dominican baseball culture, one of exploitation, where children who fail to follow the Pedro Martinez path from the mango tree to the majors wind up with nothing. Over the decades, unregulated talent factories known as academies have multiplied throughout the island to make money off giant baseball contracts. Critics such as Arturo Marcano, a Venezuelan-born lawyer and ESPN Deportes columnist, have accused the academies of hauling kids away from their families, keeping them out of school and occasionally manipulating them out of bonus money or into steroid use. Today, every American professional baseball team operates its own Dominican academy, and Mr. Marcano acknowledges they’re “getting a little bit better.” The newer problem is unregulated local middlemen who, he argues, “want to accelerate the growing process.” The baseball field Aurora discovered from the back seat of our rental car belongs to the MB Academy, run by Micalo Bermúdez, a shoe exporter sidestepping into the business of manufacturing players. As we watched from our woodsy spot beyond the outfield fence, Mr. Bermúdez’s son, Marcelo, 21, a Florida college student who played high school ball, spotted the rare visitors and sent over a coach to invite us to watch the practice. Marcelo Bermúdez explained how the academy system works, as we watched teenage prospects in the academy’s uniforms field grounders and fire them to first base. Once a player turns 13, an academy can sign him to a contract. If that player winds up with a major league deal, the academy takes roughly 30 percent. MB Academy has signed 10 prospects this way, including Onil Peña, a catcher who received $385,000 from the Seattle Mariners two years ago, when he was 16. Is this exploitative? “Exploitation is part of not being regulated,” Rafael Pérez, baseball’s director of Dominican operations, said in a phone interview. “There’s always the possibility that could happen.” But Mr. Pérez vouched for the MB Academy, calling it a well-run facility that “might be the best, to be honest, when it comes to pure infrastructure.” On this rushed Monday morning, Marcelo Bermúdez gave me a hasty tour of the field, the small clubhouse offices and a messy, dormlike barracks. I asked him why such a small island contains so much baseball talent. “Baseball is the No. 1 sport here in the country,” he said, “by far. We have kids here who will do anything to sign. They see it as a dream. “For a poor kid,” he continued, “seeing all those other players becoming rich and famous, working at what they love, they want it to be the same.” We both fell silent as I achieved my goal: watching baseball underneath a perfect Caribbean sky. If You GoWhere to see baseball in the Dominican Republic:Estadio Cibao, Avenida Imbert, Santiago. aguilas.lidom.com/home Estadio Quisqueya, Avenida Tiradentes, Santo Domingo. facebook.com/estadioquisqueya/info Estadio Julian Javier, Avenida Manolo Tavarez, San Francisco de Macoris. gigantessfm.com Estadio Francisco A. Micheli, La Romana. lostorosdeleste.com/estadio-francisco-micheli.html Estadio Tetelo Vargas, San Pedro de Macorís. estrellasorientales.com.do/statics/20110519-tetelo-vargas.ashx
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Post by psuhistory on Nov 22, 2015 12:42:01 GMT -5
Blog article about black baseball and boxing in Portland during the early 1900s [apologies for light editing for sense in a few places]. In the eastern United States, early baseball and boxing tended to be mutually exclusive, as when club baseball emerged in New York during the 1850s as an alternative to the bareknuckle boxing of the street gangs... Portland and the Hubbard GiantsRyan Whirty, Home Plate Don't Move, 11/12/2015 homeplatedontmove.wordpress.com/2015/11/12/portland-and-the-hubbard-giants/One of biggest and most important lessons my buddy Ron Auther — West Coast Negro Leagues guru extraordinaire — has taught me about blackball out West, it’s that in the first couple decades of the 20th century, the African-American baseball scene frequently intersected with boxing culture. Fisticuffs frequently accompanied — or, in the case of the subject of this blog, supported — hardball on the Left Coast. And the topic of this modest treatise is one Lew Hubbard of Portland, Ore. (Shout out to my brother, Nathan, who’s lived and thrived in that city for nigh a decade). Hubbard was a sporting magnate on the African-American sports landscape in and around Portland in the 1910s. For most of that decade, Hubbard managed/owned/played for a semipro, barnstorming baseball team called the Colored Giants. The formal name of the aggregation seems to have varied from year to year — alternately the Hubbard Giants, the Golden West Giants or just the Colored Giants. The team frequently played at McKenna Park. And once in a while, Hubbard handed over the managerial reins to other guys, like a man named George Ellison (I haven’t had a chance to delve into his background, but, really quickly, he took over the piloting duties for a spell in summer 1912). Before we delve in the tale of the Hubbard Colored Giants and their connection to the boxing world, a little background … Horace Llewelyn Hubbard was born on Sept. 28, 1882, in Illinois. He made his way to Portland, and by 1910, he was working as a mailing clerk at a fire-insurance company and living as a lodger on 13th Street. By the time the 1920 national Census rolled around, Hubbard, his wife Esther and his stepdaughter Jane Bryan were dwelling on E. 58th Street N. Hubbard and his family held an interesting place in Portland society and race relations. Hubbard himself appears to have been mixed-race — the 1910 Census says he’s “mulatto,” while the 1920 document tabs him as black — and at both of his homes, he (and then his family too) were the only African-Americans in an otherwise all-white neighborhood. Now, as far as the geographic setting goes … Portland is located in a quite unique topographical area. The hub of Multnomah County in the Willamette Valley region, rests at the foot of the Cascade Mountains and Mt. Hood, at the confluence of Willamette and Columbia rivers and just east of the Pacific Ocean. Culturally, Portland today is one of the nation’s most socially and politically progressive cities, with a steadily diversifying population in terms of ethnicity, a city-wide love of education and intellectual and spiritual exploration, and an emphasis on environmental appreciation and preservation. But, from what I’ve gleaned from limited historical studying and shooting the breeze with Nathan, Portland wasn’t always so liberal, and it underwent significant growing pains and sociopolitical upheaval during the 19th and 20th centuries. As different ethnic populations, including African Americans and Asian-Americans, started to gravitate toward Portland in search of its booming industry and status as a coastal port, the integration and assimilation processes didn’t always go smoothly. OK, back to the story … With that backdrop, Hubbard steadfastly had overall control of the outfit, which seems to have been a feared one in the Portland area and was constantly looking for opponents with whom to cross bats. Take, for example, this little article in the April 13, 1914, Morning Oregonian: “The Hubbard Giants (colored) want out-of-town games. Manager Lew Hubbard has collected a fast bunch of ballplayers and his roster includes some of the funniest coachers imaginable.” Or this from the June 26, 1910, Oregon Daily Journal: “Lew Hubbard wants to book his colored Portland Giants with out of towners during July and August. His outfit is working nicely now and is an attraction everywhere because of their fast, clean playing and funny coaching.” (The excerpts display one of the ballyhooed attractions of early black baseball — funny base coaches, who jibed opposing players and riled up the fans playfully.) I haven’t been able to pin down much proof that the Hubbard Giants were actually able to drum up a plethora of travel games, but there were a few. In July 1911, for example, Giants came from behind to beat a team called the TFBs despite the fact that the Hubbards were missing six of their regular starters. A brief write-up on the game in the Daily Journal further stated that “[t]he Giants would like to hear from the Portland Business College team concerning next Sunday’s game.” Hubbard was also a solid player, displaying hustle and grit. In August 1910, he tore a few ligaments in his chest when he smacked into a fence chasing down a high fly ball. The muscular affliction kept him out of the lineup for a couple weeks. But … what about boxing? Well, here’s the dope, as sportswriters declared waaaaaaay back in the day: Lew Hubbard himself boxed on the amateur circuit and appears to have been pretty decent at it. In January 1910, Hubbard, fighting on the undercard at welterweight in a six-rounder, overwhelmed another African-American boxer, Casey Rhodes, earning a third-round TKO. A few months later, Hubbard again flashed his fistic skills in another multi-card slate. Reported the April 30, 1910, Oregon Daily Journal: “Referee Richardson stopped the bout between Lew Hubbard, colored, and Jack Farrell, a plump looking middleweight, when the latter was all but out. Hubbard gave away about 15 pounds and made a good impression.” But to others, apparently, Hubbard was but a mediocre pugilist; in November 1910, a columnist at the Daily Journal said thusly, with a healthy dose of early-20th-century snark: “Lew Hubbard (colored) played third base for the Columbia Hardware team yesterday. By the way, that reminds me that Hubbard was a boxer before one of the fight clubs a few months back, and the way he played ball yesterday I would recommend that he keep on playing ball instead of taking beatings in the padded arena.” Whatever Hubbard’s talent as a boxer, he did seem to know the Portland fistiana landscape and economics, and he put that knowledge to good use to raise money for his baseball squad, the Colored Giants. Hubbard frequently threw together large entertainment bashes that included not only boxing bouts but other forms of extravaganza. For example, in spring 1911, he assembled a slew of performers to raise funds to pay for new playing duds for the Giants. Reported the March 7, 1911, Morning Oregonian: “Singing, dancing, rag-time piano playing, wrestling, boxing and pipes and tobacco for all will be the order of the evening at the smoker of the Portland Giants baseball team tonight at Eschles Hall at Second and Yamhill streets. Some of the best amateur buck and wing dancers and comedians of the Northwest are billed to appear to aid in refitting the Giants with baseball uniforms for the coming year.” ([Smoker], it seems, was a term for [an] illicit boxing [match] a century ago. That illegality will be important further down.) Hubbard turned the bash into an annual affair, too. In January 1912, he pulled together another “smoker” fundraiser for the Giants. Several three-round bouts were fought, including one between Hubbard himself and a fighter named George Spring. There was also a singing duet, as well more buck and wing dancing. But here’s the thing — around 1910, the boxing world was going through some sturm and drang for several reasons. One, the “Fight of the Century”: the July 4, 1910, heavyweight showdown between powerful and controversial Jack Johnson, the sport’s first black heavyweight champion, and former titlist Jim Jeffries, who was drawn out of retirement to become the “Great White Hope” to dethrone Johnson. The fight, which was held “out West” in Reno, Nevada, ended up with Johnson pummeling the over-the-hill and woefully under-prepared Jeffries. The result spurred “race riots” across the country as numerous cities banned the film of the fight to be shown in theaters. It was a momentous moment in both the history of sport and the development of racial relations and American society. And two (back to Portland), the sport, which had been technically illegal for decades in the country, was in the infancy of its legality. Leading up to a monumental showdown in 1892 — here in NOLA, as it turns out — between legendary heavyweights John L. Sullivan and Jim Corbett, boxing in America operated in the shadows of sporting society, knitted together by an underground system of enthusiasts (who were sometimes called “sports”) who frequently “encouraged” law enforcement and political authorities to look the other way. (Many boxing historians view the Sullivan-Corbett clash, which saw the solidification of the Queensberry Rules as the accepted guidelines, as the beginning of the sport’s modern era.) And, it seems, in the first couple decades, Oregon — or at least Portland — attempted to outlaw boxing despite the fact that the sport was becoming legal across much of the country. In Portland, authorities seemed to have aggressively gone after not just fighters but also promoters. And one of the guys in the cross hairs? Our own Horace Llewelyn Hubbard. In fact, in late April 1910, Hubbard, along with several other local boxing figures, was arrested by Portland authorities in what area media called a “test case” for the city’s crackdown on the sport. The arrests, on charges of arranging prize fights, were driven by an entity called the Municipal Association (which was also making plans to be joined by the “Ministerial Association.”) Stated the May 1, 1910, Sunday Oregonian: “The war which has been waged fitfully against boxing in this city … came to a climax yesterday when district attorney [George] Cameron, yielding to the pleadings of some of the members of the association, authorized the arrest [of, among others] … “… Lew Hubbard, a colored boxer, was taken into custody … and released after he posted a [$1,000] bond. … “Hubbard says he that he was engaged at a salary to box and appeared for no reward set upon the result of the bout, and that neither he nor his opponent was hurt in any way. …” But here’s the key paragraph in the article: “The complaints … were signed by J.T. Wilson, an auctioneer and member of the Municipal Association. These boxers were selected to make test cases of boxing in this city, as their exhibitions are said to have been the most brutal of those witnessed last Winter. They occurred on January 20.” The article added that several fight clubs existed in the city at the time, and that: “All give exhibitions. There have been few, if any, instances of blood being brought out by the blows in these bouts, and one or two accidental knockouts have occurred, it is said.” How you have an “accidental knockout” is unclear to me. Plus the fighters were under strict rules of the promoter: “The first rule of Fight Club is: You do not talk about Fight Club!” Anyway, the cases were apparently remanded to the district attorney’s office, and Hubbard’s trial in front of Presiding Judge John Bryson Cleland of the circuit court was slated for Sept. 11. The Daily Journal stressed that the charges were, in fact, largely driven by the Municipal Association and one of its attorneys, C.E. Lennon, a situation that reflects just how powerful that group was. Thankfully, though, the DA’s office decided to not prosecute the charges and continued the case indefinitely, with the expectation that the counts would eventually be dismissed, after Hubbard and another boxer, Paddy Maher, “promised to be good hereafter” (per the Daily Journal). Lennon was apparently persuaded to ease up on the pair. Stated the Journal: “Mr. Lennon said it was not the desire of the interests he represents to inflict punishment upon Maher and Hubbard after receiving assurances that no effort will be made to pull off any more ‘scraps.’” So Lew Hubbard was off the hook. But what was amazing was that, while his case was being digested by the legal system, Hubbard continued to manage the Giants — and retain the team’s connection to boxing despite the charges that hung over Lew’s head. Take, for example, the July 10, 1910, Sunday Oregonian: “The Portland Giants (colored) boast of some excellent in their number. Collie Edwards, the catcher; Ellison, pitcher, and Lew Hubbard at second are all first-class performers both on the baseball field and in the ring. Hubbard and Ellison are well-known local fighters …” So there you have it, the multi-sport tale of our Portland pal Lew Hubbard. He soldiered on for several more years as both a baseball kingpin and a boxer. Over the years, Hubbard put together a Colored Giant squad in 1913, when he spent the spring searching for a good pitcher and eventually backed away from his managerial duties; in 1914, when he resumed the job of skipper and organized travel and home games against teams from burgs and locales like Chehalis, Wash.; the St. John’s neighborhood in Portland; Camas, Wash.; Banks, Ore.; Oswego, Ore.; St. Helens, Ore.; and Oregon City, Ore.; and in 1915, when he brought a 16-year-old prodigy, Cal Jackson, at catcher. One more thing worth noting is that Hubbard, throughout his tenure as a team manager, continually recruited players from all over the country, from as far away as Connecticut. Naturally, just like almost every other semipro hardball team of that era, the Hubbards’ roster was a revolving door of personnel. But, significantly, many of his baseballists also doubled as pugilists, just like Hubbard himself. On top of that, perhaps the most intriguing and noteworthy employment coups for Hubbard was the signing, during the 1914 campaign, of a pitcher with the last name of Claxton. That would be the famous Jimmy Claxton, arguably the best player in West Coast African-American baseball during that era. Fellow historians like Ron Auther, Gary Ashwill and John Thorn have been delving in Claxton’s still-mysterious, elusive and legendary background and career. Thus wraps up, at least for now, our exploration of Lew Hubbard, his Portland-based baseball aggregation, his boxing career and his efforts as a promoter. And, just like many black baseball impresarios in the West in the early 20th century, those activities frequently dovetailed with each other, creating a vibrant story of a fascinating man.[/s][/s]
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