The Day That Had To Come

Like all things in life, knew it had to come. Wish it didn't but it did. Watch the clip. That was Doak back in the day before it became about "the run". Open ended with "high school" stands on either end. My seats were in the north end zone. 1976 was his first year. 1977 was mine.

Dadgummit, Bobby. Can't say it without tears.

My Morning Wooten

Jim is on a mostly fiscal conservative rant this morning and as is usual I find myself not necessarily agreeing but not disagreeing vehemently.

But there's one item which tickles my commentary bone.

It will be an outrage if National Football League owners reject a group’s bid to buy the St. Louis Rams football team because commentator Rush Limbaugh is among those making the offer. “I, myself, couldn’t even consider voting for him,” said Baltimore Colts owner Jim Irsay. “When there are comments that are inappropriate, incendiary and insensitive … it’s something that we don’t need.” As with political endorsements, that declaration tells us more about Irsay’s politics than about Limbaugh.

Let's talk about the free market Jim so adores. In any market there are two critical factors - product and brand. The NFL arguably has the most successful product in sports. This product is supported by branding which is guarded with the zeal of a lioness tending her most beautiful cub. Pull a sharpie out and sign a ball after scoring a touchdown? Penalized. Wear your socks too low? Fined. Get caught acting the fool in a strip club? Suspended.

So, this exclusive club of billionaire elitists not wanting a jackass whose job requires him to stir the pot daily is due to politics? This is the cognitive dissonance of Jim's "so-called common sense conservatism".

And Jim, before we go trotting out the implication that anyone who dares criticize the Oxycotin Oz must mean they are a Democrat, it is wise to remember things are never usually the way they seem. Quietly ask a few Georgia Republicans what they really think about our own resident jackass. The one with the initials E.E.

A Legend Passes

Skip Caray, 1939-2008

"A woman walks into a bar, sidles up to a sportscaster and says "For $100, I'll do anything you want". The sportscaster slaps a hundred dollar bill on the bartop and says "Do the pre-game show tomorrow". ~joke told by Caray just a few weeks before his death

Hank Aaron: Class Act

In case you haven't noticed. I'm a fan of The Hammer.

Here were his remarks played last night after Barry Bonds broke his home run record.

"It is a great accomplishment which required skill, longevity and determination. Throughout the past century, the home run has held a special place in baseball and I have been privileged to hold this record for 33 of those years. I move over now and offer my best wishes to Barry and his family on this historic achievement.

My hope today, as it was on that April evening in 1974, is that the achievement of this record will inspire others to chase their own dreams."

And some people think there are no heroes left.

h/t: Atlanta Public Affairs

In The Land Of No Internets

I've made a tactical mistake. I decided to spend a few days visiting my brother's new place in Florida and completely forgot he built it so far back in the woods there is likely no hope for internets for a generation. So things will remain sketchy for the next few days.

In the meantime some screeds from others for your pleasure.

I haven't written much about the Michael Vick saga. It's all too awful. But Spacey sums up my feelings very well.

Paul Broun's first vote? To stop prosecution of those who use medical marijuna. Lawdy!

The baseball debate with Jmac continues.

Poor Jim Galloway. This morning, he must feel like the teacher who said "Lake Titicaca" in front of a group of third graders.

More later as I find hot spots.

Let's Talk Baseball

With the Braves facing down Bonds and saying "not on our watch" as he chases down Hank Aaron's all time home run record, let's take a little break from politics and talk some baseball.

Jmac and I are having a friendly debate about the greatest player ever. I stand by my hero Hank Aaron and agree with ATLmalcontent that his all around play is continually underrated. Jmac would not even rate him in the top five.

Well, that's just plum crazy. But before we get to the passion, let's look at the cold hard facts.

Stats matter. In basebally arguably more than any other sport. So how does my argument that Aaron is greatest all around player ever stack up against other greats? Let's use Jmac's top five for comparison. First, we will look at each player's rank on the all time lists in 6 offensive categories (Home Runs, RBI, Runs, Hits, Total Bases, Steals). For simplicity sake. we will give someone a score of 100 if he is out of the top 100 all time. Then the rankings will be totalled and the players ranked from lowest total to highest total.

Player....HR....RBI....Runs....Hits....Bases....Steals....Total

Aaron....1....1....2....3....1....100....110
Ruth....3....2....3....2....4....100....154
Mays....4....10....7....11....3....100....135
Williams....15.....13....17....64....19....100....228
Cobb....100....7....2....2....5....4....120
Rose....100....86....6....1....7....100....300

Rank

1. Aaron 110
2. Cobb 120
3. Mays 135
4. Ruth 154
5. Williams 228
6. Rose 300

A few things obviously stand out. You could not ask for a more stark contrast of the dead ball era versus the modern game. Cobb's steals and the others home run totals vividly display a time when the ball was barely hit out of the infield. For this reason, Cobb will always be difficult to compare. So let's remove the two obvious outliers; home runs and steals. Aaron still dominates.

1. Aaron 9
2. Cobb 16
3. Mays 31
4. Ruth 51
5. Rose 100
6. Williams 113

Another things stands out. Many will be surprised Ted Williams doesn't rank higher in most categories, especially hits. Yet another demonstration of how his service in the military cut into his career statistics.

But is there a better way? How about we compare the six players to each other. With this method we can include career batting average.

Player....HR....RBI....Runs....Hits....Bases....Steals....Avg....Total

Aaron....1....1....2....3....1....3....4....15
Ruth....2....2....2....5....4....5....3....23
Mays....3....4....5....4....2....2....6....27
Williams....4....5....6....6....6....6....2....35
Cobb....6....3....1....2....3....1....1....17
Rose....5....6....4....1....5....4....5....30

Rank

1. Aaron 15
2. Cobb 17
3. Ruth 23
4. Mays 27
5. Rose 30
6. Williams 35

So there you have it. Aaron dominates any way you look at it. That is the cold hard statistical fact. So now let the passion begin.

The Hammer

One other non-political thing.

Today's must read. A fitting tribute to the greatest baseball player ever. Period. No argument.

NASCAR Politics

Sara has an excellent write up on the sometimes uncomfortable courtship between NASCAR fans and politicians. She also references an article which dives straight into the essence of being a NASCAR fan.

But Don Ward, 48, said there were only three questions Mr. Giuliani needed to know to converse with a fan like himself: “What kind of beer do you like? Who is your favorite manufacturer? And who is your favorite driver?

For the record: Bud, Ford for life, Greg Biffle.

I'm a lifelong Mark Martin fan but even though I am happy he is having fun driving for Ginn Racing, I just can't bring myself to root for him while he's driving a damned Chevy.

And do not get me started on Jeff Gordon.

What Number Will He Drive?

Junior joins Hendrick Motorsports.

For you uneducated out there, the car owner not the driver controls the numbers. So will DEI allow Junior to take 8 with him? Doubtful. So what will he drive. Probably the 5. And before you absolutely lose your mind, it's happened before. Once upon a time his dad drove the 2.

Innocence Lost, Part III

To read Part I, Click Here.

To read Part II, Click Here.

Willie Harris and the immortal Jackie Robinson were both born in the same small town of Cairo, Ga. At the moment, Willie also has another commonality with Jackie. As Jackie was when he crossed the color barrier in 1947, Willie is the only African American player on his team, the Atlanta Braves.

Times are different but the similarity of the surface situations cause many to ask why.

Gone are the golden years of Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Frank Robinson and Bob Gibson. Following the pioneering times of Don Newcombe, Lou Campinella, Larry Doby and of course Jackie Robinson, African Americans not only excelled in baseball, they dominated. The success caused many to wonder the what ifs of Satchel Paige, Cool Papa Bell and Josh Gibson.

Then something happened. A mere 60 years after Jackie sacrificed for an entire people, they began leaving the game he loved so much.

Bethune-Cookman, a historically black college in Daytona Beach, Fla., has only two African American baseball players. The rest are hispanic or white. On a recent HBO Sports documentary, the head coach discussed attending summer camps and struggling to find African Americans to recruit. It is a struggle echoed by all baseball programs at HBCs.

Hall of Fame player Dave Winfield believes he has found the problem. He calls it the 3 Cs. Cost, continuity and competition.

"It didn't cost anything to play," he says. "Whether it was Little League or park and rec ball, you could play until you were drafted without having to pay. Now you might be able to play through Little League, but if you want to get better, you start paying to play. Then the continuity of being able to play for nothing every year stopped. The connection and the continuity of playing all the time and the ability to reach new heights stopped. And now the external competition has risen where 40 years ago you didn't have as many other sports competing. They thought the Super Bowl would fail and look at it now. How about basketball, soccer, extreme sports? Everybody has grabbed a piece of the sports and entertainment pie now."

In the 60's and 70's, baseball was the glamour sport for black America. Basketball was riddled with drugs and hardly ever shown on television. Football was the purview of white America, the lines so divisive a player in the following decade would describe it as a "plantation system". But in baseball, giant men named Mays, Aaron, Morgan and Flood walked the earth.

Then, basketball cleaned up its drug problem and found a man named Magic. Football cut loose its fetters, opening riches and the most coveted position of power, the quarterback, to men named Moon, Cunningham and Williams. Money and fame came quick and easy. In the age of MTV and video games, instant gratification ruled. Why slog through years in the minor leagues when you could sign for millions of dollars draft day?

In the cities and even the small towns, the patches of dirt became abandoned. Young men moved to the asphalt courts where you only needed a leather ball and the ability to impress. A travelling team meant crossing over to the next series of courts to play in a different summer rec league.

But not all agree with this perspective.

Joe Beasley, Southern Regional Director of the Rainbow/PUSH coalition, believes there is no "diminished enthusiasm for African-Americans playing baseball". To him and his organization, the problem is major league organizations do not recruit enough African Americans. A statement that flies in the face of the fact that a Major League team does not recruit anybody. They sign players from lower levels. Lower levels like Bethune-Cookman where even though its student popluation is 90% African American, its baseball team is less than 10% African American.

When I first began this piece, I was angry. The passionate line of attacking my team for no apparent reason had been crossed. I also had witnessed the demagoguery of Jesse Jackson's organization in the past. I again began to wonder if these gulfs could ever be spanned when we continue to drive ourselves apart with meaningless passion plays as the things in life for which we truly care die.

Then, I remembered Travis and Dexter. How they both shaped a young boy from south Georgia and showed him that even in the awful hurts of our differences there was still hope. Their memories reminded me that hope does not come from a blind corporate behemoth of a major league franchise. Nor does it come from the demagogues clinging to relevance by latching on to high profile targets. Hope always comes from the smallest changes. The ones rarely noticed.

Hope will come from a baseball field. When, a child turns a double play. It will come from a classroom. When a child who has never had the opportunity to visit a museum opens an art book for the first time. Hope will come when we remember what we learned as children. Despite our difficulties and differences, innocence does not have to be lost.

Innocence Lost, Part II

To read part I, please CLICK HERE.

Baseball has been part of my life since I can remember. It was in third grade, some time after Travis and I finally finished that map of London when baseball became serious.

The small dirt patch behind the elementary school was our field, as poor as it was. We had a pillow for one base and a chunk of concrete for another. Sliding into second was a trepidous affair for fear of mother later looking at torn jeans or heads being cracked open if you were brave enough to go head first in the style of Pete Rose.

We had progressed from merely a wild herd of children running like mobs towards any ball to an organized gang who picked sides much to the chagrin of those always picked last. It is where I heard my first profanity uttered by a friend. A quick, "hot damn" when I accidently slung my bat into the catcher's face. It was where I first felt that the strangeness of girls was not so strange after all.

She was the preachers kid, full of straight black hair and a tiny mole on her cheek. She came to watch the games with her small friends because they too were figuring out that boys were not so strange after all. One day, she caught a line drive off her forearm. Screams burst forth and of course we did what boys do in moments of panic involving girls - stood stock still in panic. Fortunately for everyone, a nearby teacher came over and ushered her back to the school building. As she walked in the door, bravely choking back tears and clutching her arm, I muttered, "there goes my girl". Nearby, another boy overheard and the taunts began, leaving my mind reeling with the questions of what had I done and what would happen when she inevitably heard what I said?

A few days later, we were back on the patch of dirt playing baseball and shockingly the girls came back as well. The preachers daughter was there, now with a cast on her arm. And just once, she favored me with a smile.

On the field, baseball and I soon parted ways. Natural ability is a harsh evolutionary governor. But it never strayed far from my mind.

Lack of ability on the field morphed into passion of the mind and the mind's easy focus was the Atlanta Braves. Those miserable Braves of the late 70's. It didn't matter to me how horrible they were on the field; the roster was filled with such exotic names as Lum, Pocoroba and Naharodny. They also had a lanky Mormon kid at catcher with a tendency to throw the ball into center field. I had cousins who were Mormons and I had a tendency to throw ball wildly, so at ten years old, I figured I could relate.

A frequent debate in sports circle is which is your favorite sport. Baseball or Football? I once described the difference as marriage versus a one night stand. Football is hot, sweaty, full of action. It happens once a week for a few hours and you leave sated. Baseball goes on for nine months, day after day, only changing incrementally, and at the end, you just hope for a little extra love in the playoffs. But there is always the comfort of knowing spring training is just a few months away.

Not that there isn't passion in baseball. Much like marriage, it is passionate but most times it is a slow burn. Ask any Cubs, Red Sox, Yankees or Dodgers fan about their team and you will receive a mixture of grief, fondness, madness and frivolity. Sometimes anger, if you cross a line.

Ask me and you will hear tales of wonder at Phil Niekro signing a baseball, Dale Murphy hitting another homer, Dale Murphy striking out on another slider, the brief glory of the early eighties and the sustained ecstasy of the 90s.

Ask a young friend of mine about his team and he will imitate Chipper Jones swing, note that John Smoltz is pitching this week and Kelly Johnson is making us all forget the beloved Marcus Giles.

He will also tell you about Willie Harris.

Concluded in Part III.

Innocence Lost, Part I

Joe Beasley, Southern Regional Director Rainbow/PUSH Coalition:

I think it was a lack of diligence on the part of the Braves to recruit African-American players. There's not diminished enthusiasm for African-Americans playing baseball. It's simply the opportunity hasn't presented itself.

griftdrift in May 2006:

Bill Clinton didn't lose Jesse Jackson. He was lost every time someone witnessed his vampiric tendency to show up at a tragedy. He was lost every time someone witnessed his need to place pride before principle. For me, he was lost one hot day in Albany, Ga.

Being birthed and raised in a small town in the deepest part of a southern state, the question of race has always been unavoidable.

I was born in an era when blacks still lived on their side of town. Where busing caused panic in white families. Where a sister would sob through the night from fear of going to the new black high school. Fear that she would be raped by the black boys or beat up by the black girls.

Up until the first grade, my only interaction with black people were the handy man who came around to help fix a fence or a maid when visiting a wealthier friend's house. Then I met Travis.

Travis was my first black friend. I was the next generation of desegregation. Entering first grade a full decade following the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Attitudes had changed little but the gulf of racial understanding had begun to be spanned by the smallest of hands.

We both liked to draw. Every second grader likes to draw but it filled Travis and myself with a passion. While studying London, for God knows what reason, Travis and I were chosen to draw a map of the city on a huge piece of butcher paper stretched taut across the whole bulletin board. We threw ourselves at the project as only small boys do. We worked every free moment, forgetting recess, baseball, bugs and all the other passions of 7-year old males.

In between staring at pictures in our textbook and gripping our "sharpies", Travis and I talked. We talked about our homes and what we liked to eat. He liked grits and I, already feeling the seeds of rebellion, did not. My mother worked for the government and his worked at a restaurant. I was raised on a farm and he was raised in "the quarters". He was bussed clear across town to attend a "white school". I was a 5 minute ride away from pastures filled with cows.

The moment a child considers asking permission to have a friend over for the night is a momentous one. It is the first tentative step in forming one's own community away from the family unit. Of course, I didn't realize this at the time - I simply wanted to ask Travis to come over and spend the night.

Then, I began to think odd thoughts. I looked at Travis with his mid-70s fro and considered my own bowl cut. My new clothes and his hand me downs. I considered my split level house in the country and what I knew was Travis' shotgun shack in the poorest section of town. I gripped my magic marker and silently went back to drawing. The gulf was still there. The differences were far too great for a child to cross.

I lost track of Travis, but I think of him now as I remember another young man I met many years later.

In summers of the past, small towns meant baseball. For a 16-year old boy on summer vacation it also meant a summer job.

I was lucky. I didn't have to work 'baccer or some other hideously gruesome job. I worked for the city recreation department. In the morning, I assisted with the 6-8 year olds in day camp. They played kickball, tag and red rover while I generally stood around making sure they didn't kill themselves. In the evening, I umpired farm league baseball.

Farm league was for the kids 8-10 year olds who were not yet ready for the rigors of true little league. I had been a farm leaguer myself, usually positioned in right field at the end of a game, silently praying a fly ball wasn't hit my way. It was fairly obvious most of the boys didn't have the talent to progress beyond this level. A caught fly ball was a miracle. A pitcher who didn't walk the bases loaded was coveted. A catcher who could throw the ball on the fly to second on a steal was an MVP.

Every now and then, as I stood between the pitcher's mound and second, dodging another errant throw by a spaghetti armed catcher, I would spot a particular kid. One that I knew would make the progression to little league, then pony league and maybe beyond.

I spotted him early in one summer. He was shy, never smiled and wouldn't look you in the eye. But even at eight, he had the look of a baseball player. The confident lope of athleticism which set him apart from the other gangly messes of stumbling arms and legs. He could throw. He could catch. And lordy, could the child hit. The coach wisely placed him at shortstop in the vain hope the team might get some occasional outs at second and a few fly balls drifting into short center. His name was Dexter.

It happened off the bat of a monstrous catcher. One of those children whose glands had run wild causing a minor panic among the local uniform supplier. With a man on first, he smacked a grounder hard past me. I swiveled expecting the ball to scoot into center field but understanding I needed to make sure the runner tagged second. Then, Dexter did something wonderful.

He scooped the ball in his oversized glove, ran to second, tagged the base and gunned it to first. The second minor miracle occured when the tiny first baseman held onto the ball. Everything was silence. All was frozen, including myself. Mouth open, I slowly pointed at second and raised my fist then turned to first, pointed my finger and raised my fist. The crowd erupted. For many, it was probably the first true double play they had ever seen on this particular field.

Dexter trotted past me on his way to the dugout.

"Nice turn, Dexter", I said.

"Thanks", he replied, then turned to me, looked me in the eye and smiled.

I graduated a few years later. A decade later so did Dexter. I heard he received a baseball scholarship to Clemson and then toiled in the minor leagues. After that, as with Travis, I lost track of him. But I will never forget one evening as the sun set, a double play and the innocent smile of a child.

To read Part II, please CLICK HERE.

Afternoon Trivia

What is the rarest feat in baseball?


The unassisted triple play.

It's only happened 13 times an oddly the last two have involved the Braves.

Dega!

Vroom!

The Bullring

A Nextel Cup driver commenting on races at Bristol Motor Speedway: It's like flying a fighter jet inside a washing machine.

Let's Go Racin!

VROOM! VROOM!