Another “Wisdom and Links” is up, so check it out for some good links, some quick musings on barnstorming, and bad “Too Many Cooks” joke.
Category Archives: Baseball
Bizarre Baseball Culture is Returning…
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Starting this week, Bizarre Baseball Culture comes back with a vengeance. Among the things we will be studying in the coming months:
- A post-Charles Schultz Peanuts story
- A public domain bio-comic on Stan Musial
- A blast-from-the-past Strange Sports Stories from a Brave and The Bold comic in 1963… and another from Strange Sports Stories in 1973
- A return to Ultimate Sports Force
- A classic cartoon or two
- And, sometime around Spring Training, if the baseball gods be willing, THE ULTIMATE BIZARRE BASEBALL CULTURE STORY. Yes, even more so than Mr. Go.
So… get hyped.
Looking at the Team MLB roster for the Japan All-Star Series
Above, you can see the roster for the Japan All-Star Series for Team MLB. As you can see, the term “All-Star” is sort of loose. Oh, yes, it’s a good team, and there are plenty of All-Stars on it. It’s definitely a team you’d be able to make the post-season with in a 162 game schedule. But on the other hand, the pitching staff isn’t exactly world-beating and the outfield is thin due to the pull-outs of Bryce Harper and Adam Jones, meaning a utility player like Ben Zobrist or Chris Carter will be playing a bit there. Another worry is that Evan Longoria might have to leave early because his fiancee is very pregnant, and, honestly, I’m surprised he’s going in the first place with something like that going on.
Anyway, here’s a bit of a run-down on the MLB roster… after the jump:
Micro-Update on the MLB-Japan Series: Adam Jones not playing after all
Aside
Okay, micro-update to the previous story I did on the MLB-Japan All-Star Series: Adam Jones actually won’t be taking part, as another commitment came up. So if you go back to that old story, feel free to mentally erase Adam Jones’ name.
Neat Link: Cespedes Family BBQ
While adding in the link yesterday, I realized that there was a site that belonged on the Blogroll that I somehow had never placed in it: The Cespedes Family BBQ. Run by two college students (Jake Mintz and Jordan Shusterman), it features their hilariously offbeat podcast (a recent episode dealt with whether it was safe to eat a baseball and how much Jake’s mom disapproved of the idea), as well as articles on various things, most of them involving their unhealthy obsession with Barry Bonds, shirseys, Yoennis Cespedes, and Backyard Baseball‘s Pablo Sanchez. It all makes no sense, and yet it also makes all the sense in the world.
Their Twitter account is arguably even better.
So, if my “Bizarre Baseball Culture” installments and weird eBay finds aren’t weird enough for you, check out Jake and Jordan’s stuff.
Remember: The Stove Takes Time To Get Hot
Somebody mentioned this a day or two on Twitter, but it goes without saying: The baseball off-season develops far slower than the off-seasons of other sports. When free agent time in the NFL or NBA comes around, there is rapid-fire news of signings, several days in which you can’t turn on ESPN without Adam Schefter showing up to tell you the latest. Really, does that guy ever sleep?
But in baseball… it’s a slow burn. Oh, there is often some early jolt like the Joe Maddon and Paul Molitor hirings, but the players take awhile. It’s likely we won’t see a large number of signing for another month, around the winter meetings, and some players might not be signed until spring training has begun.
So, much like an actual stove, you have to give the hot stove some time to heat up before you can cook.
Neat Link: Chinese Baseball
A new link in the Blogroll: Chinese Baseball. As the name suggests, it’s a look at the nascent baseball scene in the world’s most populated country. This year (2014), they had their first professional baseball in several years, with a very short 12-game season amongst 4 teams.
Check it out.
Will the MLB-Japan All-Star Series be on MLB Network? Yes! And I have a schedule
Good news everyone! It appears that, in the darkness of November, we will be seeing some MLB baseball after all. MLB is sending a team of players over to Japan to play some games against the Japanese National Team, “Samurai Japan” (in essence a NPB all-star team), and, guess what? We’ll be able to see it on television here in the states! Now, they haven’t released any sort of news release yet, but I did some of my own research, in that I looked at MLB Network’s website and looked at their schedule.
MLB’s team is going to be good, at least at the plate, with players like Robinson Cano, Adam Jones, Bryce Harper, Yasiel Puig, Jose Altuve and Justin Morneau having confirmed they are going (Albert Pujols was going to go too, but pulled out). Hisashi Iwakuma is the most notable pitcher going that we know of so far, and it should be fun seeing him pitch in front of (and against) his fellow countrymen.
As far as the Japanese team, it’s going to be very interesting to see how they do, as this will provide a WBC-esque look at Japanese players against MLB competition. Names to keep a close eye on include Kenta Maeda (a pitcher who might be be headed to MLB next year), Shohei Otani (who can both pitch AND play as a position player, and who considered heading to the USA out of high school but later changed his mind and stayed in Japan), Pacific League batting champ Yoshio Itoi, and 2014 Japanese hit champ Tetsuo Yamada.
Here’s the schedule in East Coast time, all games below will be on MLB Network and many of them will be shown again on tape delay at a more reasonable hour for Americans:
November 11, 4 AM: MLB vs. combined team of Hanshin Tigers and Yomiuri Giants (at Koshien Stadium in Nishinomiya, not far from Osaka)
November 12, 4 AM: MLB vs. Samurai Japan (at the Kyocera Dome in Osaka)
November 14, 4 AM: MLB vs. Samurai Japan (at the Tokyo Dome)
November 15, 4 AM: MLB vs. Samurai Japan (at the Tokyo Dome)
November 16, 4 AM: MLB vs. Samurai Japan (at the Tokyo Dome)
November 18, 5 AM: MLB vs. Samurai Japan (at the Sapporo Dome)
November 20, 4 AM: MLB vs. Samurai Japan (in Okinawa)
I’m particularly looking forward to the game at Koshien, as it’s the most historic of all Japanese ballparks and I think it’ll be neat to see MLB players play on the all-dirt infield there.
So, rest well knowing that we aren’t too far away from some more baseball.
The Greatest HoF Player Managing Career
With Paul Molitor taking over the Twins, there will now be two Hall of Fame players managing in the big leagues (Ryne Sandberg is managing the Phillies). It’s a trend that is becoming more and more rare, a result of the fact that Hall of Famers now are more-or-less set for life. If they are managing or coaching, you can be sure it is for the love of the game and/or a want to pay it back by teaching the next generation.
Back before ballplayers were set for life with salaries, the Hall of Fame player managing was more common, often playing at the same time. Of the five initial members of the Hall of Fame (Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Honus Wagner, Christy Mathewson and Walter Johnson), only Ruth had never managed a single game in the majors, and would until his death dream of doing so.
But, the question we have today is: of managers who are in the Hall of Fame primarily for their playing days, who was the best?
There are many ways of looking at it:
As far as total wins, it’s probably Fred Clarke. Fred Clarke was a great player of the 19th century and early 20th century for Louisville and Pittsburgh, and was elected in 1945 by the Old-Timers Committee. As a manager, he went 1602-1181 on his career.
However, there is one problem. While his primary position he was inducted as was left field, his managerial efforts also were a big reason. He was dubbed the first of the successful “boy-managers” on his plaque, and he was a player-manager at the age of 24! He was still playing when he managed the Pirates to four NL pennants and a World Series title in the 1900s. So, while technically he had the most wins for a manager who was inducted as a player, there is that caveat.
In fact, that caveat exists for a lot of managers who were players. Cap Anson, for example, while inducted as a 1B, was also heralded for his player-managing on his HoF plaque. Joe Cronin also had his managerial days mentioned, as did Hughie Jennings, Lou Boudreau and Frankie Frisch. Interestingly, the player-who-managed with the most wins who had no reference whatsoever to his managerial career on his plaque is… Frank Robinson.
Okay, but wins are one thing. What about the balance between wins and losses? Frank Robinson won 1065 games, to be sure, but he lost 1176.
Well, for qualifying managers (at least 320 games skippered), the manager who was a HoF player with the best winning percentage is Frank Chance, of the famous “Tinkers-To-Evers-To-Chance” poem. While he went in as a 1st basemen, his time as a manager was also very successful, as he had a .593 winning percentage and won four NL pennants and two World Series titles for the Cubs (it was a long time ago). However, like Clarke, Anson, and the like, his managerial career was prominent on his plaque. Mickey Cochrane, who also could qualify for his success as a manager, also had his managerial success noted on his plaque.
As far as I can tell, the player-who-managed with the best winning percentage with no reference whatsoever to his managerial career on his plaque is… King Kelly. Yes, King Kelly, the RF/C/3B who had a 16-year career in the 19th century. He is just barely eligible, because managed 330 games in his career, all as a player-manager. His .539 winning percentage puts him ahead of others such as Gabby Hartnett (.536), Eddie Collins (.521) the earlier-mentioned Cobb (.519) and Bob Lemon (.516). And before you ask, Yogi Berra (a .522 winning percentage) did have some of his managerial feats mentioned on his plaque (his 1964 AL pennant).
So, what does this mean? Does this mean that Molitor and Sandberg are doomed to be slightly-above-average-at-best managers?
Of course not. Hall of Fame players who became managers are a far too small sample size, for one, especially Hall of Fame players who become managers without first being player-managers. And, what’s more, it’s silly to think that how good a ballplayer is on the field can be directly translated into how they will be as a manager, especially when one considers that they are also at the mercy of the players that are provided to them.
Still, it is interesting. And now you know some of the best managers in history who were Hall of Fame ballplayers.
Link
Over at Hall of Very Good this week, I have links to some of the best World Series stories of 2014. Check it out!
The Baseball Continuum 