things I learned about in baseball this week/how i learned to stop worrying and love baseball

Probably true, but I don't really have a choice in the matter since I wasn't there. I will be watching these games, just fyi!

The background to 2003/2004 Sox/Yanks in my mind is that it’s the modern Yankees not quite in their full pomp but close to it, a young Jeter, Torre at the helm, just a few years removed from “greatest team ever” status (they got that engraved on their 1998 World Series rings). so-called because they set the MLB record for most wins in a season (though not the most regular-season wins iirc). They’ve still got Mariano (greatest closer ever), Bernie, Posada, Soriano, Pettite, Weaver, David Wells for god’s sake, Clemens, Contreras was great that year, they’d just signed Matsui. They were a great team. A-Rod was still playing short in Arlington, Texas.

Boston largely already had the lineup that would win it all a year later. Crazy to realise that Nomar was still playing for them in 2003! Feels like he doesn’t belong in this era of the team but there he was. It was Big Papi’s first year in Boston. Dustin Pedroia was NOT on this team (?!?) Schilling wasn’t either. The starting pitching was hittable apart from Pedro. And no real certified closer. Foulke was busy locking up the American League lead in saves in Oakland.

For a self-contained game, maybe G6, 2011--the David Freese game. Incredible...I think the Rangers were one strike away from winning the series three times.

Last post for a bit, else I'll never shut up...If you're interested in individuals, not just games, I'd suggest Reggie's 3-HR game in the '77 Series, Brooks Robinson in the '70 Series, and Roberto Clemente in the '71 Series. Not sure which specific games to look for with Robinson and Clemente.

5. Buster Posey grew up playing baseball in a purpose-built batting cage on his parents' 50 acre farm.
6. "Soft hands" - this is such a weird term omg?

Can I just point out, I made this thread as a way of giving some relief to the people I was no doubt boring to death about it, so please don't worry. And yes I am interested in individuals too!

G6, 2011--the David Freese game

Maybe this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ypIakgaR2c

The whole game's on YouTube too--almost four hours.

post season baseball is the absolute best and I'm sad I can't really afford bt sport anymore to record the games and watch them during UK friendly hours. at least I got to see the Atlanta baseball team win the WS for the first time since my beloved maddux/glavine/smoltz era.

You could fall down the rabbit hole for weeks with these recommendations, but if I had to pick one game from the last decade it has to be Game 7 of the 2016 WS, Cleveland vs Chicago Cubs. The history and backstory won't ever be repeated (176 combined years between the two teams since their last championship) and the game has at least five or six "WTF did I just see????" moments.

good one

oscar bravo i guess you might cite the 1991 World Series? it comes up a lot in “the best ever played” conversations. the beginning of the Smoltz/Maddux era in Atlanta.

would recommend game five of the 2015 ALDS between toronto and texas

it was toronto’s first playoff appearance in 22 years. the blue jays lost the first two games at home, then won both games in texas to force a decisive fifth game. the seventh inning alone — top and bottom — is among the craziest single frames in history

would also recommend game one of the 1988 world series between the dodgers and a’s. it has a legendary conclusion and the announcer was vin scully, who was peerless

I remember that 2015 game (how did I not think of that first?)...Another insane one with the Jays: G4, 1993. I don't know that it's famous for any one hit or play, but I think it was the longest Series game ever at the time (4:14), and maybe the highest scoring (15-14). Mitch Williams took the loss, a bit of foreshadowing.

I am excited for you to be in a position to watch an entire season next year! Baseball is best when you can let it ambiently drift by for a summer and take in the rhythms by osmosis (“he’s having a good year…” you’ll nod to yourself when your 2B is slashing 240/300/275. “Whaddabum…” you’ll say about your fringey reliever who’s pitched 50 innings of low-leverage ball to the tune of a 2.00 era)

Off the dome shit:

Kerry Wood’s 20K game

A’s at dodgers WS 88 game 1

Any supercut of Pedro Martinez strikeouts

Any supercut of Bonds’ HR in 2001, to see what peak performance looks like

I have also recommended the book “Class A” by Lucas Mann as a contemporary look at the low minors.

The Rhys Hoskins bat spike this weekend was rad

xp on Kerry Wood & Pedro Martinez but I appreciate specific recommendations, tysm!

Also commit this to memory:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bn28Dz4RUxc

gyac, I assume you've seen this classic moment:

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

Fun fact you might enjoy:

Left-handed relief pitcher Billy Wagner (known for his absurd strikeout rate) is actually a natural right hander but after breaking his right arm twice as a kid he learned to throw with his left arm. And now he’s probably going to wind up in the hall of fame for being such a dominant pitcher.

Game 7 of the 2016 series is also my pick. Classic Cleveland clutch comeback to tie it coupled with a classic Aroldis Chapman meltdown, finished off with a determined Cubs team scraping out two runs (and Cleveland making it tense at the end too.)

Ten cent beer night is an event that encapsulates baseball in Cleveland in the 70's

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

I will respond to all these posts in time but I’m watching this alds game atm. However I am nearly finished A Band of Misfits, about the 2010 Giants, and I’ve seriously watched this clip about ten times & also Clark’s homer against Nolan Ryan in his first big league at bat (!)

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

Lmao both at the guy going “you’re overmodulating” and Clark going “HUH??? NO WAY!” And also the guy stepping in from the side to clearly try to calm him down, and Clark shakes his hand instead.

Supposedly he used The Thrill is Gone as his answering machine message as well. Legendary.

smoothest swing of all time

there's also a whole thread about BASEBALL MOVIES that i haven't really paid attention to

would recommend:

BULL DURHAM - it's long since passed into cliche (and tim robbins very obviously cannot pitch) but it presents the cliches in a nice manner, and also i used to live in durham and know where that house is

SUGAR - pretty honest look at what it's like to be a (dominican/puerto rican/venezuelan) kid left to fend for himself in the minor leagues. needless to say, there are a lot of non-success stories

NO NO: A DOCKUMENTARY - the story of 1970s pitcher dock ellis, who once threw a no-hitter (for the pirates, no less) while tripping on LSD. among other crazy shit like plunking four straight cincinnati reds to start a game. he was a troubled and interesting man

This, along with Aaron's 715th, is my favorite baseball memory ever.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4nwMDZYXTI

I remember that 2015 game (how did I not think of that first?)

These days Toronto vs Texas G5 is the first thing I think of when it comes to games/moments that I want to rewatch. But I didn't want to be accused of homerism by recommending it first ...

Game 7 of the 2016 series is also my pick. Classic Cleveland clutch comeback to tie it coupled with a classic Aroldis Chapman meltdown, finished off with a determined Cubs team scraping out two runs (and Cleveland making it tense at the end too.)

And that's only the last three innings!

This week has been rough and I’ve barely watched any baseball.

More things I learned specifically about “Surfin” Barry Zito from reading excerpts from
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61frVWPOc1L.jpg

- Barry Zito did meth in his teens
- the first chapter opens with a quote from someone saying “if San Fran wins the World Series, does Barry Zito get a ring?” (Ouch - though I am a fan of brutally honest sports autobios).
- Barry Zito’s grandfather started a newspaper with Mussolini (!)

I need to read this book, there’s nothing more boring than reading stories of endless success from people who go to bed early and never do anything bad.

watch game 5 2012 NLCS giants vs cardinals if you want some more zito lore.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8S-PI7HZ8o
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Meay49NgGXI
giants down 1-3 in the series and he gets the start despite a very poor showing in the series before. giants win the next three then zito wins game 1 of the world series vs verlander which you mentioned.

I was thinking about which game I would recommend watching and actually realised the games I got the biggest kick out of weren't necessarily epic important ones. Like any Greg Maddux 85 pitch complete game shutout with like 2 strikeouts and upward of a dozen groundouts + handful of weak pop flys is amazing viewing imo. Especially with how different baseball is now.

Or Tom Glavine locating his fast ball consistently just outside the outside edge the strikezone with such monotone regularity that the umpire starts calling it a strike.

(xpost) You've almost perfectly described Maddux's G2 win against the Yankees in the '96 Series:

86 pitches, 6 H, 2 K, 0 BB, 0 runs. He didn't pitch a shutout, though--Bobby Cox brought in Wohlers for the 9th. He didn't let Maddux finish his Maddux.

yeah those 90s braves pitchers were clinical, hated them of course.

For what it's worth, Maddux was more of a strikeout pitcher than he's generally remembered as (with some help from the umps): 6.1/per 9 for his career, 6.9/per 9 during his '92-'98 peak. My favourite pitcher then--travelled to Montreal to see him somewhere in the middle there.

I did get the chance to see Smoltz's 3,000th career strikeout in person, that was epic. Still much love for him in the ATL.

I was thinking about which game I would recommend watching and actually realised the games I got the biggest kick out of weren't necessarily epic important ones. Like any Greg Maddux 85 pitch complete game shutout with like 2 strikeouts and upward of a dozen groundouts + handful of weak pop flys is amazing viewing imo. Especially with how different baseball is now.

ALCS game 3 2003

One that I forgot to recommend, on YouTube in its entirety: Mark Fidrych vs. the Yankees, June 28, 1976, 48,000 people in Yankee Stadium (on a Monday), ABC's Monday Night game, Fidrych 7-1 with a 2.18 ERA going in, the biggest story in baseball.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwGj4VfCreg

For style, Luis Tiant.

https://phildellio.tripod.com/tiant.jpg

Yes! I have been meaning to check out Fidrych as well!

xps
I'm glad!! He was my favourite player back when I first started watching baseball. used to love andruw jones as well. and in the non atlanta baseball players division it was tony gwynn and his incredibly flat no uppercut swing. then later i was all about ichiro.

(xp) I think you'll fall in love. I was so lucky to have watched that game (14 years old). It's just hard to convey today how one baseball player could so thoroughly capture the public's attention and imagination. It happened again a few years later with Fernando, although I don't know that there's one single game of his where it all coalesced so perfectly.

xp Parker looking cool af.

(Oops--the Fidrych game was in Tiger Stadium, which makes the 48,000 people even more remarkable. The mid-'70s Tigers were not good.)

I love they have the commercials too in that broadcast!

I’ll be honest, a thing I found - and find, tbh - really difficult about watching baseball both live and classic is the number of ad breaks! How does that not drive people mad?

“At that time, I often thought that if I had had to live in the trunk of a dead tree, with nothing to do but look up at the sky flowing overhead, little by little I would have gotten used to it.”

— Albert Camus

Fidrych throwing 250 innings and striking out 97(!) that season is always really amazing to me. 9.6 bWAR!

xp lmao

xp baseball as a tv spectator sport simply isn't designed to hold your attention 100% of the time, you gotta pair it with something else that can be done in fits and starts such as browsing the internet or chopping vegetables or playing a turn-based video game

Parachuting in to say that I am a 51-year-old American male human with exactly one sports allegiance. And that allegiance is to the 1982 St. Louis Cardinals. Not the Cardinals in general, not St. Louis teams in general. Pretty much just that one spectacular season.

I was exactly the right age to be excited by a baseball team. Especially, a locally beloved and long-storied team that suddenly caught on fire in a particular way. Was it slugfesty? No it was not. Was it Sabermetric? No it was not. Was it especially steroidal? No it was not. It was a style of play based on baserunning, stealing, speed, fielding, contact. It was called "Whiteyball" after the (in retrospect) rather unfortunately nicknamed manager Whitey Herzog.

Ozzie Smith. Lonnie Smith. Willie McGee. Keith Hernandez. Bruce Sutter. Joaquin Andujar. It's been 40 years and no sporting persons have dislodged those names from my memory. Nor will they.

Since then, I have watched a few other sporting contests, with varying amounts of interest. But none has matched the passionate intensity of being eleven years old in a red hat in terrible seats in that cranky old Busch stadium with a scorecard on my lap and a fire in my heart. Personally I am fine leaving it there: a whole life of fandom in a few humid evenings in 1982, eating ice cream from a novelty batting helmet.

xp baseball as a tv spectator sport simply isn't designed to hold your attention 100% of the time, you gotta pair it with something else that can be done in fits and starts such as browsing the internet or chopping vegetables or playing a turn-based video game

That's beautiful, YMP.

lol there’s some truth in that. the premiere matchup in those years was Sox/Yanks and those games were famous for lasting well past midnight.

You can blame Brett Gardner as well (4.26). Jeter, Arod, Ichiro, Melky - all of these Yankees had much lower pitches/PA than you’d expect. Ofc, you don’t need to be a tough out if you can hit like they do.

get Ichiro’s name out of the Yankees’ mouth!!

“patience” was really the prime virtue in those years, nobody talked about launch angle or even plate discipline as such. it was like the more pitches you saw the better

i think you can also blame Nomar Garciaparra and the velcro on his fucking batting gloves

Why not both
https://i.postimg.cc/CLGBFfRT/IMG-5138.jpg

Triston Casas vs Johan Oviedo#DirtyWater

Home Run (1) 💣

Exit velo: 105.8 mph
Launch angle: 44 deg
Proj. distance: 350 ft

This would have been a home run in 26/30 MLB ballparks

PIT (3) @ BOS (5)
🔻 1st pic.twitter.com/9H9bePWYC3

— Would it dong? (@would_it_dong) April 4, 2023

(No I’m not saying 44 degrees is optimal, it’s just funny)

Attending at least two (and up to three) baseball games this year with real (American) baseball fans. The remaining game, alas, is with the Astros fan I married.

19/4/24-21/4/24 - Red Sox @ Pirates

9/6/24 - Mets v Phillies (in London)

gyac - I just wanna say, as a Giants fan who lived through those glorious WS years, I adore the fact that you've stumbled upon baseball fandom by reading about and watching those teams. I'm obviously biased, but that era was pure magic here in SF (aside from a celebratory bus burning or two), and it's impossible for me to know how it looked from the outside in. Your perspective and awe is making me even more appreciative, grateful and nostalgic for those years.

Also as a followup (I've largely overlooked this thread of late) I'm really impressed how much you GET baseball and the beautiful things that make it unique as a sport and its general vibe. Some of the posts and discussion here are just beautiful to read and relive. So ... thanks! I look forward to reading and posting here more this year.

My condolences for marrying an Astros fan though

Octobeard, these are the nicest comments! I’m so happy. I really just started this as a general sort of dumping ground for my stupid thoughts about baseball/two time Cy Young winner of my heart Tim Lincecum and current fixations. I’m genuinely touched any time anyone besides me gets anything from it. ❤️❤️❤️

My condolences for marrying an Astros fan though

Ha! I love it. ❤️❤️❤️ right back at ya. I bet you both are fun to watch games with!

FWIW Timmy has also stolen my heart too. And so many others. The passion for him out here in the Bay is unique and unparalleled. It felt like he was truly one of us in a deep, culturally connected way that few pro athletes remotely touch. You definitely have great taste. Good luck to your Mariners! One of these years I'd love to catch a game up there.

BTW I know you're a fan of Grant Brisbee's so if you haven't yet seen it yet, here's one of his all time legendary moments during the 2012 run predicting (accurately) the outcome of the World Series:
https://www.sbnation.com/2012/10/24/3549608/baseball-nation-predicts-the-world-series

One of the many joys of those years was watching Grant's rise as an amateur blogger to big time baseball writer with pizazz. He catalogued so many beautiful moments with intense personality and humor, I feel he was truly a part of the magic of those times.

I love Bochy so much 😭

Texas Rangers manager Bruce Bochy made his first appearance at Scottsdale Stadium wearing a uniform other than the Giants since 2006.

“I didn’t get lost coming here, I’ll say that,’’ said Bochy, who wound up entering through the stands with two of his coaches. “Great memories.

“I mean, (Brandon) Belt could have a statue here for what he did in spring training. And my first year, I’ll never forget the first two fly balls hit to (Barry) Bonds, he didn’t draw leather on them. I said, 'Oh, geez.’

“And (Tim) Lincecum, too. Even before he pitched for me, he’s warming up, and (pitching coach Dave Righetti) goes, 'There’s your No. 1 pick.' I looked out there, and I say, 'There’s no way.’ He weighed about 140 pounds. Then, I saw that arm action, and I said, 'Whoa!'’’

Bochy, who won three World Series titles, received a huge ovation when introduced to the crowd.

https://www.reddit.com/r/baseball/comments/1bu5qx3/pirates_release_the_renegade_a_foot_long_fusion/

I SAW THIS

But I will not be trying it

And yes I see REAL AMERICAN BASEBALL in REAL AMERICA this month 🥳🥳🥳🥳

Welcome and enjoy :)

For reasons best understood by herself my friend decided to text me her updated rankings of player positions by sexiness
https://i.postimg.cc/CxfV4GTM/IMG-8655.jpg

Well, that makes her next birthday easy: Alejandro Kirk poster(s)

Mariners catcher I’m afraid

Lol. My gf I think is legit jealous of my feelings for him

Kirk or Raleigh? I have to admit I love watching Kirk run the bases

Kirk rounding 3rd base is one of my favourite things in baseball. But Cal is the way to go if your thinking of getting me a poster for my birthday!

I thought Blue Jays fans feared Cal Raleigh!

It can be both!

Came home today & found this:

https://i.postimg.cc/43RcD9cc/IMG-8956.jpg
on my desk, part of a really thoughtful gift from clemenza.

Article should in theory be display on the vault, but none of this issue is.

https://vault.si.com/vault/1977/07/18/43697

I’m going to read it tomorrow, and will report back. I need to work out how to handle and take care of it properly since this magazine is quite literally older than I am. Clemenza also sent me an incredible amount of baseball cards which I’ll go through and photograph my faves off tomorrow for that thread. There’s an incredible Bumgarner rookie card in there which reminds me of this:

https://i.postimg.cc/PxQYd5Hq/IMG-7275.jpg

Since starting this thread I’ve been the recipient of incredible generosity from posters across ILBB and it means the world to me that you’re all so willing to share your knowledge, trivia and baseball cards with me. Thank you so, so much. ❤️

It can be both!

I love this.

aww <3

Also by this time next week I will be in Pittsburgh! I just checked and Brayan Bello is lined up for a start in that series which is great, hopefully Devers is back from his shoulder injury. Too bad about Story, guess I’m going to hope the bats have woken up by then and that clown fielding doesn’t dominate as it has all week (it will).

i realize the chances of this happening are infinitesimal, but as john sterling will tell you, you can't predict baseball

if you find yourself in a situation where a ball is coming your way, and you are standing anywhere near zack hample, it is your duty to prevent him from getting that ball by any means necessary

i think he only cares about home run balls, so if you're sitting in left field, be aware (tbf he was in pittsburgh last weekend, so you're probably safe)

I’m aware of Zack Hample but I also do not want to be on TV elbowing him out of the way

you would be a hero to millions tho

most importantly, to me