Les Expos de Montréal Nostalgia Repository

Jonah Keri's book comes out on the 25th.

http://www.amazon.com/Up-Away-Business-Ill-fated-Unforgettable/dp/0307361357

I guess no one is joining Will M. for the exhib games?

oh god... the only time i could get off work & my gf could get off work to see each other was this weekend/the following week, so i am flying out to vancouver the day of the first game... meaning... none of us are going to the exhibition games!!!! i am upset :( i was really hoping to see a colon vs ohka matchup!

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BiJ6MwXCIAAqHtl.jpg

anyone will be at one of the two games this weekend?

acc to the other thread, no!

maaaaaan :( :( :( picked the worst time to leave montreal for a week! had my tickets and everything. at least i'll have mlbtv when i get back.

What's normally the year's most exciting live baseball in Montreal? Or does one have to go to Quebec City?

The Quebec City team played one game here last year and something over a thousand people showed up, I think... other than that, not really any live baseball. Just wish everyone would get their head out of the clouds re: an MLB team and just get a minor league team. Vancouver has one, Ottawa is getting one, ugh.

If you're in Montreal and for some reason really hurting for live baseball I can send you my beer league's schedule, I guess!

i was looking for the thread where i was going to bring a new york-penn league team to montréal and rrrobyn was going to do all the graphic art and stuff but i couldn't find it and found this instead:

Stade Olympique in Montreal, Quebec

I am so on board with having a minor league team here. I used to go to evening games in Vancouver at nat bailey stadium, which is next to a big park, so the air is fresh and just, well, it was pretty sweet.

Jonah Keri's Expos book is out this week.

i mean i would want a AA team but i'm not picky, i would probably watch a couple games a week of short-A ball (but i am usre the tickets would be massively overpriced -- last time i went to a vermont lake monsters game, i am pretty sure it was under $5!!!)

(vs vanoucver canadians which was around $20!!!)

Quite excited for tonight. I'll be at the game tomorrow.

ergh, many dodgers cap and jersey at the stade.

ergh, many dodgers cap and jersey at the stade.

rude

a fan fell from the bleachers, that's a 16 meters drop. yes meters. hope he's fine. :(

a massive bunch of montrealers singing the olé chant for a toronto team was kinda special.

I caught just a bit of today's game. I take it Pedro wasn't there? (I had to check to see if he was even on the '94 team...)

http://wpmedia.sports.nationalpost.com/2014/03/mets_blue_jays_baseball.jpg?w=620&h=387

Keri interview on book

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=23189

his book tour includes smoked meat at a NYC deli

http://jonahkeri.com/2014/02/14/book-tour/

WDYLL during the summer of 1983 (during your first Tiger Stadium visit)?

https://scontent-b-ord.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-frc1/t1.0-9/5249_113425568633_7952656_n.jpg

May 2, 1987:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4UclkYmr7g

https://i.imgur.com/XyiYhSd.jpg

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2044800323/the-perfect-storm-documentary-on-the-94-montreal-e

"In the past year I have independently Produced three Sport's Documentary's."

Hmm.

anyone read Keri's book?

I just discovered that an acquaintance of mine (someone I met at parties a few times and played online games with) is the son of Joel Youngblood. He's the first player to hit with two different cities, in two games, with two different teams ON THE SAME DAY, the pitchers were Jenkins and Carlton. JENKINS AND CARLTON. He did for it for the Mets and Expos. You guys must know this story by heart already. I am going to try to meet him and report back to ILB.

yeah i remember that trade

Joel was a total babe btw

http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2014/aug/11/1994-major-league-baseball-strike-montreal-expos

Wetteland, who would go on to close for the 1996 World Series champion Yankees, told the Guardian:

It’s never been reconciled in my heart. It’s never been reconciled. In 1994 we had a product on the field that would win a World Series … we understood that that was the beginning of the end in ‘94, and that was tough. I just can’t get over it, we could have had many world championships here because we were all young. But that’s life.

Kinda confused by expos fan (and expos themselves) talking of that championship like a sure thing, how many times the best record in baseball translated into actual championships? The White Sox were also very good, many other teams were. The narrative of 'we should have won the World Series and then things would have been okay' is ridiculous wishful thinking at worst, a romantic story at best. I am not denying the strike had no effect on the expos whatsoever, but there was plenty of factors and one of them was the pure apathy Montreal public towards the sport of baseball.

Agree, and thought so at the time. I'm not convinced they would have even won their division. They were six games up on Atlanta when the strike shut down the season; the Braves were four years into their dynasty, playing .600 baseball, and it was only the year before when they staged one of the great divisional comebacks ever. On the other hand, the Expos had been getting better as the year went on: .565 in April, then .556/.704/.692/.818.

They had about 50 games to play--I wouldn't have been shocked if the Braves had caught them. But at worst, I think they had a (brand-new) wild card locked up, especially as they only had to stay ahead of Cincinnati or Houston, and Bagwell had just gone down for the season.

Got a cheap used copy of the Keri book over the weekend--will probably read that next after Perlstein's book.

Tim Koewn wrote an article about the '94 season being romanticized as whatever you wanted it to be. The Expos would have won the WS, Gwynn would have hit .400, somebody would have hit 62 homers -- as time passes, each of these becomes more of a certainty in the eyes of many people, and you can't really disagree because the season was never finished.

But yeah, winning the WS obviously wasn't a sure thing, but they would have made the playoffs and possibly kicked off a successful run not unlike the '90's Indians or the post '08 Brewers (i.e. two "smaller market" franchises that were transformed by finally getting over the hump and making the playoffs after two decades of losing). Maybe more guys would have stayed with the Expos in '95 and '96 if they'd had a deep playoff run in '94.

And I really need to get the Keri book.

Jays-Reds exhibtion pair at the Big O next spring

http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2014/8/12/5996667/blue-jays-montreal-olympic-stadium-reds

Anyone planning on coming to the Reds- Jays exhibition game?

maaayyyybe

the what?!

oh right - the link from two months ago.

Kinda wish the Quebec chapter of SABR would actually do something about the exhibition game, like a gallery of photos or something to present the history of Quebec baseball to visitors but it seems the whole chapter has been inactive for a while now, internal fights and lack of interest will kill any small organization.

@jonahkeri
Canada! "The Perfect Storm", amazing new @seanmenard documentary on '94 Expos, airs tonight 8:30 pm on TSN1. (I'm lightly involved) Tune in!

Final of the Concacaf Champions League at the Big O right now, there is player called Martinez on the pitch and another called Guerrero on the bench.

I was at that game, I gotta say the expos games had nothing on that crowd... holy fuck

But also for the expos game, they had the "getting people in the doors" game on LOCK (compared to this)... for concacaf I think I was outside for ~35 mins just to get in

http://globalnews.ca/news/2002980/baseball-in-montreal-mayor-denis-coderre-mlb-commissioner-to-meet/?hootPostID=3eb37d12087edc74a154c527df9bfb75

Baseball in Montreal? Mayor Denis Coderre, MLB commissioner to meet

1969 program:

http://c2.staticflickr.com/2/1330/5100890119_2cdc70417d_b.jpg

I want to know what a sandwich spécial is!

Ham, cheese, and little pieces of John Boccabella.

I finally started reading "Up Up and Away" as a spring training present to myself (I bought it a few months ago and finally started reading it this week). I'm about sixty pages in and it's perfect pre-season reading, full of amusing stories and cool factoids (like the English to Quebecois French translation of baseball terms). No bitterness, just a "this was fun while it lasted" vibe throughout (maybe the bitterness comes later though).

I had no idea that MLB awarded a franchise to MTL before there was an ownership group in place! The business of baseball has really changed since the late 60's ...

this is one of my favorite pages in the internet: http://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/French_Baseball_Glossary