Baseball, Life, and Other Stuff

Baseball In the Valley Debuts in May!

I am pleased to announce that Baseball in the Valley, a half-hour podcast, will make its debut on Thursday, May 19 at 6:00 p. m. EST on the Seamheads National Podcasting Network.  I will host this call-in show that promises to bring fans of the Valley Baseball League the latest news and analysis.

The 6:00 p. m. time slot was chosen so that parents and fans will be able to listen in to the podcast without missing any Valley League action that will be broadcast over the Internet later in the evening.  The Valley League opens its seaon on Thursday, June 2nd when the newest member of the league, the Strasburg Express, plays its inaugural game versus the Haymarket Senators.  Plans are being made to podcast that night's show live from the ballpark.

Baseball in the Valley is part of a larger network that covers most major league teams, the minor leagues, and independent baseball as well.  The network is sponsored by Big League Chew and appears on Blog Talk Radio.  For anyone who cannot listen live at 6:00 on Thursdays, Blog Talk Radio archives all shows which means that fans can tune in at their convenience.  Visit this link for information on the current line-up of podcasts already on the air or making their debuts this week.

I hope that the Valley League fans who are loyal readers of this blog will become loyal listeners.  I'm very interested in any ideas you may have as to topics or guests, so please be sure to share!

A reminder:  Outta the Parkway, the show that covers the Orioles and Nationals will debut tomorrow night at 7:30.  Join host Chip Greene who will be talking to Bob Luke who has written extensively about the Baltimore Elite Giants, a Negro League team, and Dwayne Sims, the founder and CEO of the Negro League Legends Hall of Fame.  Future guests include long-time baseball executive Hal Keller and former Washington Senator Dick Bosman.

Death and Youth and Ernie Tyler

All Baltimore Oriole fans know the name Ernie Tyler.  The long-time umpires' attendant at Memorial Stadium and then at Camden Yards died last Thursday.  His funeral is today.  Ernie began as an usher in the Orioles' inaugural year of 1954 and became the umpires' attendant in 1960.  He never missed a single game, working 3,819 straight until July of 2007 when he attended the Hall of Fame induction of Cal Ripken.  He was there at Ripken's request, which says something about both men.  It is estimated that Ernie rubbed up 350,000 baseballs during his tenure which lasted through this past season.

The Baltimore Sun's Mike Klingaman posted a touching obituary in which he quoted many former Orioles, but no quote touched me more than former Oriole catcher Andy Etchebarren's:  Ernie was a wonderful man who will bypass everything and go straight to Heaven.  I'm sure Ernie is already rubbing up baseballs for Dave McNally, Mike Cuellar, and Pat Dobson who are getting ready to pitch up there.

I knew that each of those 20 game winners that Etchebarren mentioned had died, but it stopped me short nevertheless.  McNally, Cuellar, Dobson . . . Mark Belanger, Steve Barber, Curt Motton . . . Curt Blefary, Moe Drabowsky, Elrod Hendricks . . . At these moments baseball is less a restorative and more of an echo; the echo of a boy yelling himself hoarse for every one of those guys.

Of course, my first and greatest hero is still with us, but when a certain third baseman leaves this world, I hope that I am alone when I receive the news.  I don't want anyone to see my crying like a child.

We baseball fans are pretty resilient, though.  Upon such occasions, we take out our memories and sort through them and trade them like baseball cards, those little pieces of cardboard which show our heroes frozen in a moment, forever young.  Slowly, but surely, that sudden sense of age and time recedes like the tide which we discover has not washed away the cleat marks of the ballplayers we adored.

When I was a boy, I thought that Ernie Tyler would always be on his little stool at the side of the backstop, that Chuck Thompson would always be in the broadcast booth, and that Brooks Robinson would always be at third.  Luckily, there's place inside me where that's still true.

Rest in peace, Ernie.

High Heat a Hot Read!

High Heat, by Tim Wendel is a fascinating, 250 page conversation about the fastest pitcher ever.  Joining Tim in the conversation are Bob Feller, Nolan Ryan, Billy Wagner, and a host of players, scouts, and biographers.  Listening in will certainly warm up these gray winter days, while we are waiting for Spring Training to start.

Wendel's book is not only entertaining, but informative as well.  For example, the author introduces the reader to one James Creighton, "the game's first true fireballer" who instead of lobbing the ball platewards, threw hard and with accuracy.  While others began to throw hard, most had trouble being accurate.  This lead to a series of decreases in the number of balls required for a walk which was orginally set at 9.

Wendel also paid a visit to the American Sports Medicine Institute in Birmingham, Alabama where he learned first-hand the biomechanics of the fastball.

The core of High Heat, however, is the ongoing discussion of who was the fastest pitcher of all time.  That discussion continually returns to the same names, some of which most recognize--notably Feller, Ryan, Walter Johnson, and Sandy Koufax--and others--Amos Rusie and Steve Dalkowski--many do not.  In many ways, this last hurler, Steve Dalkowski, is the central figure in the story.  Dalkowski, who was the model on which wild-armed Nook LaLoosh from the movie Bull Durham was based, epitomizes the theme that the fastball is a gift which one may never master.  For example, Sandy Koufax was 36-40 after his first 6 years in the big leagues; Nolan Ryan almost quit baseball very early in his major league career.  These two hurlers mastered their high heat.  Dalkowski, however, never did, registering such mind-boggling numbers as his line during the 1960 season for Class C Stockton when in 170 innings, he struck out 262 batters and walked 262 batters.

Wendel makes his selection as to the best fireballer of all time, but I'm not going to spoil the ending.  It's well worth your time and effort to read High Heat, whether you are a baseball fan or someone with an interest in how the gifted sometimes struggle to suceed.

Boots Poffenberger

My little home town of Williamsport, current population around 2,200 has produced three major league pitchers over the years:  Nick Adenhart, who died tragically in 2009 in a car accident, Dave Cole who pitched in the 1950s, and Boots Poffenberger, who pitched in the big leagues just a little over 2 years in the late 1930s, but is easily one of the game's most colorful characters ever.  Recently, his grandson, Jeremy Knode invited me to look at the family scrapbooks, a fascinating experience indeed.  Headline after headline in those clippings indicated that Boots was going to amend his wild ways.  He didn't.    Click here to read more about Boots' exploits!

A Couple of Baseball Notes

It's one of those Fridays on which I need to clear a couple of items out of the old notebook.   Spring Training is fast approaching and that means that some of you are already beginning to put together your fantasy teams.  If you are searching for outstanding information, check out Mark Hammond's MoneyStats website.  Mark is a fellow Seamheads contributor and his site contains all you need to know to draft well.

Speaking of Seamheads, as I mentioned before, founder Mark Lynch is putting together a podcasting network.  Chip Greene will be hosting a show on the Orioles and Nationals entitled "Out of the Parkway" on Thursday nights from 7:30-8:00 beginning on February 17th.  Chip has some outstanding guests lined up including Hal Keller, former executive with both versions of the Washington Senators.  Chip as graciously asked me to co-host from time to time. . . . Someone asked me to talk some baseball once a week, so you know that I said yes in about a second and a half.  I'll have some more exciting podcast news later on and I will certainly remind everyone to give Chip and the gang a listen when February 17th draws near.  The podcasts are available through Blog Talk Radio. 

Hang in there gang.  Spring is on its way not withstanding the snow, which fell so hard Wednesday night that it blocked our satellite reception.

Kind Words in a Losing Cause

When speaking or writing about Safe at Home:  A Season in the Valley, I often want to use the word we, because the book truly belongs to so many.  If I am the father, then surely this book has many aunts, uncles, friends, and cousins.  Therefore, it's time for a little "family" news.  We did not win, place, or show in the 18th Annual Writer's Digest Self-Published Book Awards, but I'm not sure how we didn't, given the judge's commentary:

What a fablulous labor of love:  love of a sport, love of old-fashioned ways and of home, and love of the people within the book for each other.  We want to slow life down, but we contiue to live in a hurry, the author says.  Safe at Home:  A Season in the Valley is just an all-around feel-good book that will take you back home again.  The author has written it in such a way that both fans of the game as well as the uninitiated will enjoy reading it, for it is about the people and not just the sport.  But the sport has its role, too.  I learned a lot that I didn't know about baseball.  He strikes a good balance between delivering insider information and explaining the unfamiliar reader.  The appendices were good and "About the Author" is a hoot.

It is so rewarding to see that this judge totally understood the theme that I was trying to convey.  I pass this along, not to sing my own praises, but because it reflects on the book's entire family.  I hope each of you should feels as proudly as I do; you should.

 

Check Out Seamheads.com!

I'm very pleased to say that I have been accepted as a blogger on Seamheads.com.  It's a great site that brings together a myriad number of writers who expound on a variety of topics in the world of baseball.  The goal of Mike Lynch, the founder of Seamheads, has been to assemble "a large writing staff that would add insight experience and passion to the website."  Mike also offers a podcast through the site called "What's on Second:  The Seamheads.com Radio Hour" which is broadcast (podcast?) every Monday night from 9:00-10:00.  Seamheads hopes to offer some exciting podcasts in the future as well, but more about that as it develops.

Seamheads is also the offical site of the Strat-o-Matic 50th Anniversary League in which famous and not-so-famous folks play out the best team in a franchise's history.  Roy Firestone, for example is managing the 1970 Baltimore Orioles, currently in second place behind the 1927 Yankees.  Curt Shilling and Morgan Ensberg are managing teams for whom they played!  This is a must for all table-top baseball game officianados.

A must for all readers of this blog is my latest on New Baseball Terminology .  I'm sure that you'll enjoy it, as well as Seamheads.com

Game of Shadows

Game of Shadows, by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams is the subtitled, "Barry Bonds, Balco, and the Steroids Scandal that Rocked Professional Sports," and that is an apt summary of this 269 page book that was released in 2006.  It is a detective story and fans of that genre, particularly if they are also sports fans would especially love this book.  It's a fast-paced book that bogged down for me only slightly during the chapters on the track and field athletes, through whom the investigation into Balco originated.  That is because I'm simply not as knowledgable about the world of track and field as I am about baseball and it is not a flaw in the writing.

Two fascinating facts concerning steroids in sports stand out for me after reading Game of Shadows.  First, it is amazing the degree to which Barry Bonds, even from his youngest days, has been and continues to be a giant jackass.  For example, at Arizona State, where he attended college, he was thrown off the team by his head coach, who had endured enough of Bonds and his demands for special treatment.  After having second thoughts about booting his best player, he told the team that he would put the expulsion to a vote, thinking that his teammates would want their best player to continue to play.  They voted him off the team as well, but another vote was taken at the behest of the coach and Bonds was reinstated.  The insinuation was that the coach told the players that they had to keep voting until they got it right.  (Kind of like a few faculty meetings in which I've been a part.)

Second, there cannot possibly be a single record in track and field that is legitimate.  If baseball's records are tainted, then track's records are useless.  Do the names Ben Johnson and Marion Jones ring a bell?

If you are interested in knowing more about the steroid scandal or if you simply like a good detective story, then I definitely recommend this book.

First Anniversary of Safe at Home!

Hard to believe, but Safe at Home:  A Season in the Valley made its debut a year ago this past Sunday at a book signing at the New Market Library.  (Even harder to believe given this past winter is the fact that it was relatively warm that day with no snow!)  To date, 618 copies have been sold, a very solid number for a book such as Safe at Home.

From that first signing in New Market and throughout the summer, I have been touched by the response from readers and continue to be pleased and humbled by the book's acceptance.  Winchester, Waynesboro, and Woodstock all carried the book in their respective souvenir stands while Rockbridge not only sold books to fans, but distributed copies to host families.  Just last week, Jay Neal, the General Manager of the new Strasburg Express has graciously agreed to stock Safe at Home in the Express' gift shop, a.k.a. "The Purple Caboose."

Throughout the year Bruce Alger and Melissa Dodge have tirelessly promoted Safe at Home for which I am eternally grateful.  Mo Weber routinely begins many calls with "Hey, Austin!  I got an idea for the book."  Then, of course, there was the Kipps family who bought five copies, one for each member of the family, so that they wouldn't have to wait their turns to read it.  This kind of response,even more so than my love of baseball, is exactly what motivated me to write Safe at Home in the first place. 

I can summarize the experience this way:  It's as if I was walking down the streets of New Market one day and found untold wealth just waiting for me to gather it in, only the wealth is measured not in money, but in friends.  That pretty much makes me the highest paid author in America.  Thank you.

Is Dale Murphy a Hall of Famer?

Robbie Alomar and Bert Blyleven have been voted into baseball's Hall of Fame this week.  That is no surprise and both are deserving.  What does come as a surprise to me is the low vote total of Dale Murphy, who received only 12.6%  which is to say only 73 total votes.  A seven time all-star, two time MVP,five time Gold Glove recipient as a center fielder, four time silver slugger winner, Murphy seems a very strong HOF candidate.  The numbers guys argue that he had "only" 8 solid years in an 18 year career, but this is a patently unfair argument.  Joe DiMaggio totaled 13 seasons, Jackie Robinson 10 (the minimum number to qualify for the HOF ), Sandy Koufax 12.  Koufax is a particularly interesting case in that he was 4 games under .500 for his first 6 seasons in the big leagues or half his career.  Put another way, Koufax was spectacular for "only"  six seasons, yet no one questions that he is a legitimate HOFer.  Was Koufax a much better pitcher for those 6 seasons than Murphy was a hitter for his 8 excellent seasons?  Yes, but not even the numbers guys can denote exactly where the balancing point is when making that judgment.

Yet, there is a nagging doubt that Murphy truly belongs.  His 398 lifetime home runs rank 50th all-time only one behind HOFer Al Kaline.  Tied with Kaline, however, is Andres Galaragga and he is certainly no HOFer.  A check of Murphy's stats on Baseball-Reference.com shows that of the 10 players most similar to Murphy, only one, Duke Snider is in the HOF.  Of course, if you look up similarity scores for Sandy Koufax, you'll find that only one person on his list, Lefty Grove, is in the HOF.

It's quite possible that if Murphy had his big seasons in New York, rather than Atlanta he would already be in the HOF.  Had he sustained a career-ending injury in 1988, his 11th season, when he hit a career high 44 home runs, he would be in.  Even if he retired after 13 seasons--his homer total for seasons 11 & 12 was 44 combined, along with only a .235 batting average, he still would have made the Hall.

Taken all together, I'm 75% sure that Murphy belongs in the Hall of Fame and that is the same percentage of votes needed for entrance.  I'm 100% certain that Dale Murphy should be receiving more than 12.6 % of the votes