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Post by Hiram on Apr 28, 2010 23:30:22 GMT -5
Okay gentlemen,
Let's put our baseball thinking caps on...
In only one season, the Cy Young award winners from both leagues were unanimous selections. Name the year and the pitchers.
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Post by Allen Wiener on Apr 29, 2010 7:33:19 GMT -5
I'm going to wild guess 1968 because, as far as my memory works anymore, I think that's the year McLain won 30 and Bob Gibson was at his peak.
Allen
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Post by Hiram on Apr 29, 2010 10:55:01 GMT -5
I'm going to wild guess 1968 because, as far as my memory works anymore, I think that's the year McLain won 30 and Bob Gibson was at his peak. Allen You are correct sir! Well-done. Gibson went 22-9 with that legendary ERA of 1.12. For me, the most amazing part of that record is that he lost nine games.
McLain of course won 30 that year, Yaz won the A.L. batting title with a robust .301 BA, and the Yankees hit .214 as a team (had to throw that one in.) The N.L. won the All-Star game 1-0 (I think it was scored on a ground-out by Willie McCovey) and the New York Mets were defeated by the Houston Astros 1-0, in a game that lasted 24 innings.
The next year the pitching mound was lowered.
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Post by Allen Wiener on Apr 29, 2010 12:02:31 GMT -5
Great stuff, Hiram! A real lesson in how baseball has adjusted over the years in response to too much hitting or too much pitching. 1968 was definitely a year of pitchers! Of course, guys like Gibson would have been standouts in any era. I love that Yankee stat; I recall that being a golden era, when the Yankee dynasty had ended and competition flourished; stars for all over the two leagues got quality face time and attention (among my standout memories is Brooks in the 1970 World Series as the human vacuum cleaner).
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Post by jesswald on Apr 29, 2010 15:27:00 GMT -5
Speaking of Brooks Robinson's 1970 fielding: back then, the World Series MVP won an automobile, possibly a General Motors one, I'm not positive. Anyway, after about four games of Robinson doing unbelievable things, one of his teammates was quoted as saying something like: "Geez, if we knew Brooksie needed a car so bad, we would have taken up a collection."
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Post by Hiram on Apr 29, 2010 16:06:17 GMT -5
I love that Yankee stat; I recall that being a golden era, when the Yankee dynasty had ended and competition flourished; stars for all over the two leagues got quality face time and attention (among my standout memories is Brooks in the 1970 World Series as the human vacuum cleaner). I'm not a Yankee-hater, I just prefer, as Allen mentioned, an environment when more teams have at least an opportunity to be competitive and let their players share some of the limelight. Again, we had that in the past, much less now.
Brooks was awesome. The man won a MVP (1964) on the strength of his defensive play and clutch hitting, and of course his performance in the 1970 World Series was the stuff of legends. I still remember his throw from well outside the 3rd base line that beat Lee May to the bag.
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Post by Hiram on May 15, 2010 16:00:26 GMT -5
Name the two pitchers who have finished the most times in the top five for the Cy Young award without winning it. Each finished six times in the top five.
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Post by Allen Wiener on May 15, 2010 22:25:30 GMT -5
Sentiment makes me want to say Jim Palmer and maybe either Steve Carlton, Nolan Ryan or Tom Seaver -- but I am really guessing wildly here!
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Post by Hiram on May 15, 2010 23:58:18 GMT -5
You need to give yourself more credit Allen, you are great at this.
Nolan Ryan is absolutely positively one of the pitchers (super job) and the other one is an Orioles pitcher (you had the right team) for just over half of his career, Mike Mussina.
The fact that Ryan, who struck out 800 batters more than any other hurler in the history of the game, never won the award is a head-scratcher. The closest Ryan ever came was when he finished second to Palmer in 1973.
The Ryan Express went 62-48 over a three season span, 1972-1974, for a California Angels team that had a record of 222 - 257 over the same span, that's just crazy.
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Post by Hiram on May 24, 2010 18:37:57 GMT -5
OK, new week...new question.
What was the last MLB team to feature four left-handed starting pitchers?
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Post by Hiram on May 27, 2010 13:06:10 GMT -5
Don't know for sure, but this might be the ONLY team to ever feature four left-handed starting pitchers, the 1979 Chicago White Sox. Ken Kravec, Rich Wortham, Ross Baumgarten, and Steve Trout (son of Dizzy Trout).
Tony LaRussa got his first big league managerial job that year, taking over mid-season after Don Kessinger was fired.
The ChiSox also had a left-hander in the BP, Guy Hoffman. The thing I remember about Hoffman is that he was one of the shorter pitchers in the majors, 5'9" tall.
The shortest that I ever saw was Bobby Shantz, who had a solid career for several teams. He was in the bullpen for the Cardinals back in '64. Bobby was 5'6". Anyone recall seeing a pitcher shorter than 5'6"? Nowadays, its hard to find one under 6'.
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Post by Allen Wiener on May 27, 2010 17:37:27 GMT -5
I just deleted a post in which I rhapsodized about the Orioles defeating the White Sox in the '79 playoffs, before blowing the Series to Pittsburgh (after a 3-1 lead!). But it was in 1983 that they beat Chicago in the playoffs before going on to win the Series in 5 from the Phillies. That '79 season was as exciting as it gets if you were an Orioles fan, but I've always wished they could have pulled off that Series to cap the season. Worst of all, the weather was awful in Baltimore during those last two games; freezing, rainy, misty, even snowing at one point! Very depressing bus ride home after that final game.
I recall Frank Lary being called the "Yankee Killer" in those days of Bobby Shantz, et al, as he seemed to own them; he was their daddy. But wasn't Shantz also something of a Yankee killer too? You had to admire American League pitchers who excelled in those days since there was virtually no competition with the Yankees and no team had the kind of support the Yankees could give their pitchers. I wonder what the records of those Yankee pitchers would be if they had played for Detroit or Philadelphia, say, in those days.
Allen
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Post by Hiram on Jun 4, 2010 21:09:03 GMT -5
Armando Galarraga pitched a perfect game the other night, except for the error by umpire Jim Joyce, who was magnanimous enough to admit he blew the call.
Which brings us to the following challenge...name the position player who was involved in three perfect games. That's a tough one, so I'm going to give you gentlemen one of the teams this outfielder (yet another clue) played for...the New York Yankees.
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Post by Chuck T on Jun 8, 2010 12:07:05 GMT -5
For Allen & Hiram: You guys are top knotch with the baseball knowledge. Tell me the answer to one of those questions that mystify us through life. Why did my mother give away my rookie Jackie Robinson, Mickey Mantle and Willie Mays baseball cards, you know the ones that my cousin helped finance his kids college education with. This of course make no mention of the same culpret giving away my complete sets of both orange and green back Davy Crocketts. Shortly before she died at age 100 plus 60 days she asked me if she had been a good mother. I said YES, EXCEPT.
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Post by Allen Wiener on Jun 8, 2010 14:43:41 GMT -5
Ooooh, that smarts! Actually, while my comic books "mysteriously" disappeared, I did keep the baseball cards from 1953-1958, which I later sold through an auction house (pre-eBay days). I didn't get as much as I thought I would, considering I had rookie cards for Aaron, Clemente, Brooks Robinson and a few others. There weren't mint by any means, but they were in great shape. I think I got around $5k for the lot; not bad, considering I paid less than a penny each for them!
I don't really have an answer to your question about why moms gave that stuff away or tossed it out. In the case of my comic books, I suspect it was because my mother thought they were a bad idea, a bad influence on me, a terrible waste of my time, and that I ought to be reading real books. What a crazy idea!
Allen
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