Daily News Gems is my personal blog in which I comment, every now and again, on topics of particular interest to me, namely, newspaper history, baseball, American politics, and a selection of other burning issues of the day. -- Bill Lucey
Ted Williams and Casey Stengel pose with their Hall of Fame plaques in Cooperstown, N.Y. , July, 1966
Photo Credit: AP
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I agree, wholeheartedly, that Ichiro Suzuki should have been voted into the Hall of Fame ballot unanimously, but so too, should the following legends.
Just Remember:
• In 1953, Joe DiMaggio was passed over on his first appearance on the Hall of Fame ballot, coming in eighth with 117 votes out of a possible 264. Interestingly, it wouldn’t be until 1955 (his third try) when Joltin Joe’ was finally elected to the Hall of Fame with 223 out of a possible 251 votes.
• Mr. Chicago, Ernie Banks was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1977 with only 83.81 percent of the vote (321 votes on 383 ballots).
• Jackie Robinson entered the Hall with only 77.5 percent of the vote in 1962 (124 of 160), just 2.5 percent over the required 75 percent for induction. In that same class, Cleveland Indians flame thrower, Bob Feller, “Rapid Robert,” received 150 out of 160 votes, 93.75 percent.
• Willie Mays was snubbed by 23 voters in 1979 (94.68 percent); and a whopping 52 members didn’t think Sandy Koufax was worthy of the Hall, giving the Dodger southpaw 86.87 percent of the vote in 1972.
• “The Splendid Splinter,” Ted Williams received only 282 of 302 votes in 1966, giving him 93.4 percent of the vote.
• 11 writers, if you can imagine that, left Babe Ruth, “The Sultan of Swat’’ off their HOF ballots, giving him 95.13 percent of the vote.
• Hank Aaron, who belted 755 home runs in his celebrated career, earned 97.8 percent of the vote with nine members of the Baseball Writers Association opting not to vote for him on the 1982 Hall of Fame ballot.
• Ty Cobb collected 222 of a possible 226 votes, a 98.2 percentage.
Knowing these greats were far from unanimous, I think we can live with one sports writer deciding not to vote for Ichiro, as exceptional as he was.
Los Angeles Dodgers' Shohei Ohtani waves to fans after becoming MLB's first 50/50 man in a historic game against the Miami Marlins, Thursday, Sept. 19, 2024, in Miami.
Photo Credit: AP/Wilfredo Lee
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With nine games left in the season, Shohei Ohtani has ascended to the top of the mountain, having gone where no one has ever gone before in becoming MLB’s first player to crack 50 home runs and steal 50 bases in the same season.
In Thursday’s game against the Miami Marlins, Ohtani surpassed 50 home runs for the season.
Quite an accomplishment.
Shohei seems to do everything in a big, grand fashion, starting before the season even began, when he signed a monster contract, a whopping 10-year $700 million contract to play for the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Yesterday was no exception. Shohei went large again.
The Dodgers leadoff hitter went to the plate six times, and came away with six hits, including three home runs and two steals with 10 RBIs. In doing so, he became the first player with three home runs and two stolen bases in a game since at least 1900 and the first player since RBIs became official in 1920 with 10 RBIs and five extra-base hits in a game.
The reaction to yesterday’s fireworks was, deservingly so, simply overwhelming.
If you spent any time on social media on Thursday, the feeds on Instagram and X (formerly Twitter), among others, was filled with short videos of Ohtani’s majestic blasts.
And to sweeten the pot even more, not only was history made, but the Dodgers clinched a playoff spot, becoming the fourth team to clinch a spot for the 2024 postseason, following a 20-4 pounding of the Marlins at LoanDepot Park in Miami, Fla.
2024 will be the 12th consecutive year the Dodgers have advanced to the playoffs; but it will be Ohtani’s first trip to the playoffs, after seven full seasons in MLB.
Ever since belting his first career home run against Josh Tomlin of the Cleveland Indians on April 3, 2018, as a member of the Los Angeles Angels, Ohtani has lived up to his grand billing since arriving from Japan.
He now, age 30, has accumulated 222 home runs, 857 hits, and 557 RBI’s since entering the league in 2018.
Not only was history made in Miami on Thursday, but the Japan native additionally became the all-time Dodger single-season record holder in home runs, passing Shawn Green’s club record of 49, set in 2001.
Previously in 2024, Ohtani became only the 6th player in MLB history to have a 40/40 year.
The others are: José Canseco (1988), Barry Bonds (1996), Alex Rodriguez (1998), Alfonso Soriano (2006) and Ronald Acuña Jr. (2023).
What’s interesting about the list, is that three of those six players have been accused of using performance enhancing drugs. The tainted list of players doesn’t include Shohei Ohtani.
When you stop and ponder the accomplishment of hitting 50 home runs and stealing 50 bases in the same season, it's no wonder that former Dodgers player, Justin Turner, once described Shohei as a “once in a lifetime player.”
Given his unique ability to both pitch and hit so superbly, many describe Ohtani as the "Japanese Babe Ruth;" a Reuters article once described him as, a "Nito-ryu," or two-sword samurai
Over in Japan, the celebration for Ohtani becoming a 50/50 man has been deafening.
According to journalist and infographics designer, Satoshi Toyoshima, “Ohtani’s hometown of Oshu City in Iwate Prefecture hung a banner celebrating 50/50 at its city hall. “
In addition, Japan’s national newspapers issued special editions and handed them out on the streets to ecstatic bystanders.
In 2021, Stephen A. Smith, an ESPN host, apologized after saying that Los Angeles Angels pitching and hitting sensation Shohei Ohtani's use of translators negatively impacts Major League Baseball's popularity.
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As euphoric as the reaction has been to Ohtani standing alone as the sole member of the 50/50 club, I detect, at times, some animosity here in the United States to his many clouts this year as a member of the Dodgers.
So, I wondered if the whiff of animosity I’m detecting toward him is because he’s from a big market team or because he’s Japanese?
Ohtani was involved with a scandal early in the season when Ippei Mizuhara, his longtime friend and interpreter was found to have made $4.5 million in wire transfers from the slugger’s account to cover mounting gambling debts.
After a thorough investigation, it was determined, the Japanese superstar didn’t have any prior knowledge of the wire transfers to bookmakers and was cleared of any wrongdoing.
Still, I strongly contend many baseball fans are using the scandal Ohtani was involved with as a convenient excuse not to join in the celebration of his accomplishments, like they would the Derek Jeter’s or Cal Ripken Jr’s of baseball.
Hiroshi Kitamura, Director of International Relations at William & Mary disagrees with me.
“I believe that Shohei Ohtani’s quest for 50/50 was embraced widely,” Kitamura said. “If,” Kitamura continued, “there is less enthusiasm towards him than to Cal Ripken or Derek Jeter, that, I think, is because the bases have become bigger and the pitch clock rule has made it easier to steal bases than in the past.”
Kitamura additionally isn’t detecting an anti-Asian animosity.
“In particular,” Kitamura thinks quite the contrary, “the physical strength he displays, day in and day out, is breaking stereotypes of Asian men and is inspiring new groups of fans.”
Leslie Heaphy, professor of sports history at Kent State at Stark, thinks Ohtani is still suffering from the gambling scandal. “For many,” Heaphy thinks, “just the association is enough to view the player with suspicion. I also think people like homerun records more than stolen bases so that may impact some of the lack of attention as well.”
Whether there are pro-Ohtani or anti-Ohtani forces afoot, Steven Wisensale, professor (emeritus) of public policy at the University of Connecticut (UCONN), thinks we should celebrate and appreciate this unique and unprecedented moment in baseball history.
Wisensale believes this is “a huge milestone and one that no one ever dreamed about previously. I will put it up there with Ripken’s streak, Williams’ .406 and DiMaggio’s 56. If he hits the 50/50 mark, I see no one breaking that unless his name is Shohei Ohtani.”
“For people who know baseball and understand the skills that are needed to succeed, such as reaching the 50/50 milestone”, Wisensale argued, “they will honor that player, regardless of his race or ethnicity.”
Despite the gambling incident now in the rear-view mirror, the scandal appears to have left some scar tissue, at least with some fans.
“I believe his gambling scandal that started the year has taken some charm off of Ohtani with fans; I don't think it matters with him not being from the United States,” Andy Billman, professor of film and media studies at the University of New Haven told me. “Ichiro Suzuki,” Billman pointed out, “is proof when he went off years ago in Seattle and was very popular. Also, in today's viewing capacity for sports, I believe the Dodgers being on the West Coast hurts him more.”
But there are some, albeit a minority, who detect whiffs of hostility to foreigners as a reason for not fully embracing Ohtani’s historic milestone.
Rob Ruck, professor of history at the University of Pittsburgh agrees with me that “some of the animosity is because he's from a foreign country at a time when MAGA ("Make America Great Again") has ramped up nativism to an outrageous level.”
Dodgers manager, Dave Roberts, thinks Ohtani “wants to be the best player that’s ever played this game.”
It sure will be fun for all baseball fans, fun for the United States, fun for Japan, and fun for the youth of both countries over the next few years to see if the Ōshū, Iwate, Japan native lives up to such top billing.
• Ohtani was the first Japanese player to hit for the cycle in the major leagues, something he never accomplished in five years in Japan.
• He's been clocked as fast as 3.80 seconds from home to first.
• On July 13, 2021, became the first player elected to the all-star game as both a player and pitcher.
• Closed out the 2023 World Baseball Classic by striking out Mike Trout. He won the tournament MVP.
• July 13, 2024, became the first Japanese player to hit 200 home runs.
• With an all-star HR in 2024, became the first player to hit a HR and get the win in an all-star game.
• Only two other players in MLB history (Barry Bonds and Brady Anderson) hit both 50 home runs and stolen 50 bases in any season of their careers. Ohtani accomplished both in the same season.
• When Shohei was 17-years old in Japan, he threw a remarkable 99 miles per hour.
• Ohtani was courted by all 30 MLB teams before reaching agreement with the Los Angeles Angels in December, 2017.
Now that we’re in the dog days of August and the pennant races in MLB are heating up, one book I recently devoured might whet your appetite for the postseason.
Baker describes how baseball with its origins as a simple country game, first played in cow pastures and rural patches of farm land, eventually migrated to the major metropolises and in particular New York City.
NYC has been the most populated city in the United States since 1790, when it
exceeded Philadelphia.
It continued to grow by leaps and bounds in large part through immigration. The population of NYC was 3. 4 million in 1900; and doubled over the next 50 years, leaping to 7.89 million residents in 1959.
Before the big ballparks were erected, historians tell us early baseball in New York were played in Central Park, the Parade Ground near Prospect Park, Carroll Park in Brooklyn, and open lots and public parklands in New Jersey.
The decade between 1947 and 1957, of course, was christened the golden age of baseball in New York City.
And for good reason.
During that span, the Yankees won nine pennants and seven World Series-five of them in a row. The Dodgers won six pennants and one world championship. Three times they finished second. The Giants won two NL championships and one World Series.
Taken together, from 1947 through 1957, New York teams came away with 13 MVP awards, eight Rookie of the year honors, seven home run titles, five no-hitters, and four batting championships.
The New York Yankees, the Brooklyn Dodgers, and the New York Giants—advanced to the World Series every year (between 1947-1957) except 1948, the last year Cleveland won a World Series.
And speaking of Cleveland, Baker’s book has plenty of material that would interest Cleveland baseball fans.
He touches on the 1920 World Series, when the Cleveland Indians beat the Brooklyn Robins (Dodgers) in seven games in a best of nine series, a Series which was especially noted for the first unassisted triple play executed in World Series history by the Indians second-sacker, Bill Wambsganss, who made a leaping catch of a line drive, scorched off the bat of Clarence Mitchell in the 5th inning for the first out; he stepped on second base to retire Brooklyn’s Pete Kilduff for the second out, and then tagged a surprised looking Otto Miller (caught between first and second), squashing a Brooklyn rally and completing the historic feat.
Game 5 of the 1920 Series was additionally noted for featuring the first home run hit by a pitcher in a World Series, Cleveland native, Jim Bagby, of the Indians, who cracked a three-run blast off of Brooklyn pitcher Burleigh Grimes in the 4th inning.
History was previously made in the first inning of Game 5 of the 1920 World Series when Elmer Smith of the Indians smacked the first grand slam in World Series history.
The Dodgers wouldn’t be in another World Series for more than 20 years; Cleveland would have to wait almost 30 years.
Baker devotes a significant amount of space to the Polo Grounds, located between 155th and 157th streets at Eighth Avenue, nestled on the Harlem River in Upper Manhattan, home of the New York Giants of the National League from 1891 through 1957.
The Polo Grounds was additionally the home of the New York Yankees from 1913 to 1922 and New York Mets in their first two seasons (1962, 1963).
Source: The Brooklyn Daily Eagle
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In addition to the Giants winning five World Series titles in the Polo Grounds, the stadium is best remembered, sadly, for the place where Cleveland Indians’ shortstop, Ray Chapman, was struck in the head by a pitch thrown by Yankees pitcher Carl Mays on August 16, 1920 and died within hours.
He was only 29 and was the only MLB player killed by a pitch.
Baker provides readers with some fascinating details of Chapman and the submarine pitcher for the Yankees. Mays had a sordid reputation for being erratic with his pitches, some even went so far as to label him, a “headhunter.” In 1917, he led the league in hit batters.
Ty Cobb, in particular, was constantly getting plunked by Mays offerings. Fed up with his wild pitches, Baker wrote that Cobb once laid down a bunt on the first base line and intentionally spiked the back of May's leg, splitting it open and vowing, "The next time you cover the bag, I'll take the skin off your other leg."
Prior to his ill-fated at bat against Mays, Chapman never hit the Yankees submarine pitcher very well; so, the theory goes, the Indians’ shortstop crouched down in the batter’s box, hoping to give himself a competitive advantage in picking up Mays low pitches. When he was first hit, Chapman stood motionless before quickly collapsing to the ground. The ball hit Chapman’s head with such a force, the ball rolled forward to the pitcher’s mound.
Mays initially thought the ball hit Chapman’s bat, so he rifled the ball to first base, before chaos ensued. When he was carried to the clubhouse, one of the last words heard from Chapman’s mouth was the request that his wedding ring be placed on his finger.
Medical records determined Mays pitch cut a three-and-a-half fissure along the base of Chapman's skull, which drove a piece of bone down against his brain.
Despite being demonized for throwing the pitch that killed and greeted with a cascade of boos on road games, Mays maintained his innocence throughout his career. “My conscience is absolutely clear,” the sulky pitcher once said. He also told the press, “I merely wish to say that I am not a murderer, nor do I take unfair advantage of anyone."
At least 5 other A.L. teams, according to Baker, threatened to boycott games if Mays pitched.
Mays was 26-11 in 1920 and sported a league-leading six shoutouts.
Despite winning over 200 games in his bumpy career, allegations first reported by New York journalist, Fred Lieb, that he threw the 1921 World Series, put the kibosh on any thoughts of Mays being considered for the Hall of Fame when his career ended.
Beginning in 1921, owners of the New York clubs began to see the size of the gate receipts swell. In 1923, the Giants had drawn the largest National League crowd ever, 41,000 for a regular season game; and the 1921 World Series between the Yankees and Giants drew the very first million-dollar gate for the Fall Classic.
1921 would mark the first of 13-Subway Series’ (1921-1956) the Yankees would play against either the Giants or the Dodgers in World Series matchups, driving home the universal impression that New York was, indeed, the undisputed baseball capital of the nation.
After a 44-year hiatus, the New York Subway Series was resurrected when the Yankees defeated in the New York Mets in 5 games during the 2000 World Series.
Baker does a superb job in batting down some myths that have been floating through the annals of baseball history. One is that the New York Yankees adopted pinstripes on their uniforms to cover up Babe Ruth’s bulging waistline. Not true. The Chicago Cubs were actually the first team to wear pinstripes in 1907; then the Giants began wearing them in 1911. The Yankees first adopted the pinstripes in 1912, well before the Babe came on board. They stopped wearing them in 1913 and 1914, then began wearing them permanently, beginning in 1915.
Baker also clarifies the term, “Murderers' Row” used to describe the first six hitters of the 1927 Yankees (Earle Combs, Mark Koenig, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Bob Meusel, and Tony Lazzeri) was actually first used to describe the 1919 New York Yankees, though that team paled in comparison to the 1927 Yankees who sported an astounding 110–44 record (.714), captured the A.L. pennant by 19 games, and swept the Pittsburgh Pirates in the World Series.
For those long-entrenched New York Yankee haters, long stretches of Baker’s book might be awfully hard to swallow, such as this poisonous line: “In a 30-year run from 1923 to 1953, the Yankees met and defeated every NL team but the Braves, they won 16 of 18 World Series and compiling a record of 68-26 in the Fall Classic, for a .723 winning percentage. The only World Series they lost at all in this period were the Cardinals, in 1926 and 1942.”
It gets worse Yankee bashers.
“In the 1930's,’’ Baker reminds us, “the Yankees reeled off consecutive seasons of 102, 102, 99 and 106 victories and lost a combined total of three games in four World Series triumphs. The streak culminated in a 1939 team than many would rank as the best major-league team of all time, ahead of the 1927 Yankees.”
Those kind of nauseating statistics would turn anyone’s stomach, including the Brooklyn Dodgers, who only managed one World Series championship (1955) over their cross-town rivals after losing in 1947, 1949, 1952, and 1953. The Yankees beat the “Dem Bums” again in 1956, the Dodgers final season in Brooklyn, before packing up and dashing off for the West Coast.
Still, those baseball fans who take a dim view of New York baseball teams can at least take heart, that all these feats and gargantuan triumphs Baker writes so eloquently about, are in the past, which took place during a bygone era and have softly faded into the night.
The Yankees, after all, haven’t been in a World Series for 15 years, the Mets for almost 10 years.
I’m sure 28 other teams and their fans in MLB hope it stays that way for another 15 years.
Plaques of numbers retired by the New York Yankees in Monument Park at Yankee Stadium.
Photo Source: Wikipedia
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As of 2023, the New York Yankees have won 27 championships; so, it’s probably not much of a surprise that they’ve also retired 22 player numbers, the most in baseball. The only team that is close to retiring that many numbers are the St Louis Cardinals, with 14.
The last Yankee to have his number retired was Paul O’Neill in 2022, who patrolled the outfield for the Bronx Bombers for nine seasons, compiling a lifetime batting average of .288, 281 home runs, and 1,269 runs batted in.
In fact, the Yankees have retired so many numbers that they are now running short of jersey numbers to issue to its current roster. Derek Jeter’s no. 2, which was retired in 2017, was the last single digit number to be retired.
To make up for the scarcity of numbers, the Yankees have petitioned Major League Baseball to ask whether their coaching staff can suit up without numbers. MLB is reportedly reviewing the request.
With 22 numbers retired by the Yankees, many question whether all of these players really deserve such a distinction.
Imagine, Steve Garvey, with a lifetime batting average of .301, an MVP winner in 1974, who won four Gold Gloves, over 16 seasons, has yet to have his # 6 retired by the Dodgers.
Ditto for Detroit Tigers pitcher Mickey Lolich, a three time All-Star, who won three complete games in the 1968 World Series, including a critical win over the St Louis Cardinals future hall of famer, Bob Gibson. At the time of his retirement in 1979, Lolich held the Major League Baseball record for career strikeouts by a left-handed pitcher, even surpassing Warren Spahn. Yet, his number 29 has never been retired by the Tigers.
No wonder some joke that “it’s easier to get into the Hall of Fame than to have your number retired.”
When asked whether all 22 Yankee players numbers deserved to be retired, Washington Post columnist, political commentator, and lifelong Chicago Cubs fan, George F. Will, responded that he “would delete #1 – Billy Martin, who was neither a great player or manager.”
Dan Shaughnessy, sports columnist and associate editor for the Boston Globe, thought that retiring the number of “[Paul] O'Neill (# 21) was ridiculous.” “I guess,” Shaughnessy explained, “because he's on television with them now. So many more worthy than him.”
Others question the retiring of Reggie Jackson’s number 44 in 1993. Conceding he was most definitely Mr. October in the playoffs, Jackson averaged a ho hum .279 batting average with 29 home runs and 92 RBIs in his five years in pinstripes, which really dwarfs what he produced for the Oakland A’s, compiling 1,151 hits, 254 home runs and 733 RBI in nine seasons. Though he caused mountains of dissension in New York when it was called the “Bronx Zoo” and infamously clashed with manager Billy Martin, owner George Steinbrenner liked him, which is most likely the reason why his number was retired in the Bronx.
Interestingly, the A’s didn’t retire Jackson’s #9 until 2004.
Still others wonder whether former Yankee first baseman and team captain, Don Mattingly (no. 23) really deserved to have his number retired. In 14 seasons with the Yankees, Mattingly only won one MVP and only appeared in one round of the postseason, in 1995, his final season in pinstripes, in a wild card round against the Seattle Mariners.
It may be surprising to some that the retiring of jersey numbers wasn’t that common until the 1970s, when on June 4, 1972, the L.A. Dodgers retired three numbers simultaneously: Jackie Robinson, Sandy Koufax, and Roy Campanella.
Interestingly, for 31 years, from 1939 through 1970, only 19 MLB numbers were retired. There are now more than 200 retired numbers in Major League Baseball, which now includes executives, broadcasters, and “fans” (as in the case of the Cleveland Indians/Guardians).
Uniform numbers were first introduced by the New York Yankees in 1929. Not until 1932 did all MLB teams adopt numbers. And when the Yankees began wearing them, it was used to designate the number of the hitter in the batting order. In 1929, for example, Earl Combs, the Yankees leadoff hitter, wore no. 1. Third sacker, Mark Koeing, wearing no. 2, was second in the lineup followed by Ruth, Gehrig, and Bob Meusel, who wore jersey numbers 3, 4, and 5 respectively.
Lou Gehrig had his number 4 retired on July 4, 1939 at Yankee Stadium, soon after being diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), later referred to as the Lou Gehrig’s Disease.
Photo Credit: BETTMANN ARCHIVE
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Lou Gehrig was the first Yankee to have his #4 retired by the Yankees on July 4, 1939 during his moving “luckiest man on the face of the earth” speech after being diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). The “Iron Horse” compiled some monster numbers for the Yankees: a .340 batting average with 493 home runs, two AL MVP Awards and the 1934 Triple Crown. Gehrig additionally played in 2,130 consecutive games; never missing a game from June 1, 1923, until he voluntarily retired during a game on May 2, 1939. A record that remained until Baltimore Orioles’ shortstop Cal Ripken Jr. broke it on September 6, 1995.
Babe Ruth had his number retired by the Yankees in 1948 and Joe DiMaggio in 1952.
One historic note: the first number officially retired by a team in professional sports was that ofhockey player, Ace Bailey, whose number 6 was retired by the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1934.
The benchmarks for retiring numbers, it seems, have relaxed over the years. It used to be common practice that a player’s number wasn’t retired until other players had worn them. At least nine Yankee players, for example, wore no. 3 after Ruth left the team.
Other standards adopted by teams was that a player had to distinguish himself with other teams or until he’s been inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown before their number would be retired.
Eight players have had their numbers retired by more than one team, six by two teams, while Nolan Ryan had his retired by three teams. Nolan Ryan, along with Carlton Fisk have two different numbers retired. No. 20 is the jersey number which has been retired the most by 11 players, including Frank Robinson, Mike Schmidt, and Don Sutton.
Some players have been ignored entirely because their careers came before the adoption of numbers.
Andrew Zimbalist, an American economist and author of 24 books, including “Baseball and Billions” and “May the Best Team Win: Baseball Economics and Public Policy” thinks the Yankees retire too many numbers, to the point of diluting the honor. “One example that should not have been retired is Paul O'Neill (no. 21),” Zimbalist said.
To put the excess of retired New York Yankees numbers in proper perspective, I checked in with retired New York Times’ sports columnist George Vecsey, who explained to me that teams like the Dodgers have a more demanding policy than the Yankees. “They held off retiring Brooklyn deities like Pee Wee Reese and Gil Hodges until after they were voted into the Hall of Fame.” “I would have voted those two into the Hall much earlier,” Vecsey said, “but appreciate the strict standards.”
Vecsey additionally attributes the glut of retired numbers to George Steinbrenner, the first real Boss, long before Bruce Springsteen assumed the title. “Part of it is the ego,” Vecsey recalls, “that says he can do whatever he darn wants. But the longer he has been gone, the more I think about his sentimentality.”
If it were up to Vecsey, are there any player numbers he would not have retired?
“Definitely not Jorge Posada or Bernie Williams or Paul O'Neill, Andy Pettitte or Ron Guidry; Mattingly was hurt early.” Vecsey would also place big question marks over the retiring of Billy Martin, Roger Maris, and Phil Rizzuto’s numbers.
“If I were being strict”, Vecsey explained, “I'd have retired numbers: #3 (Ruth), #4 (Gehrig), #5, (DiMaggio) #6 (Joe Torre), #7 (Mickey Mantle), #8 (Yogi Berra & Bill Dickey), #16 (Whitey Ford), #37 (Casey Stengel), #42 (Mariano Rivera), and Jeter (# 2) -- sure—as the leader of the dynasty.”
Clearly, George Vescey is right on the money. Steinbrenner was proud of his Yankees, and admittedly, contributed to a number of its world championships. The Boss treated the Yankees like they were a Broadway show, he wasn’t interested in raw, untested talent, or solid position players--much like a Broadway show—he wanted the BIG stars who would bring fans to the Bronx, mega superstars like Reggie Jackson, Dave Winfield, Wade Boggs, and Catfish Hunter, to name just a few. Monument Park at Yankee Stadium, in Steinbrenner’s eyes, was an extension of his Broadway show mentality—when fans came to Yankee Stadium, they would feast their eyes on the vast collection of plaques and retired Yankee numbers (whether deserved or not), drumming in the impression that the Yankees are arguably the greatest sports franchise in the world.
Keith Olbermann’s biting commentary (in 2017) over whether Derek Jeter was the greatest Yankee
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NOTE: To the Sports Editor:
Publication Date: Sept. 30, 2001, New York Times
“I am a longtime Yankees fan who remembers viewing his first Yankees game and first night game in 1954. The retired numbers - 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 16, 32, 37, etc., are sitting as symbols on a fence when they would be better utilized on the backs of active players.
The numbers can still hang on the wall as a tribute to past stars. They could also be used to the Yankees' advantage by giving them to their present players.”
It’s actually a splendidly written, meticulously researched, and upbeat social history about the expansion of Black American baseball players into Major League Baseball.
Heaps of attention has historically been paid to Jackie Robinson in becoming the first African-American baseball player in Major League Baseball with the Brooklyn Dodgers on April 15, 1947, while Larry Doby, a 23-year-old outfielder for the Newark Eagles, (the first American League African-American player to smash the color barrier 11 weeks later), often receives little attention or becomes a mere footnote by baseball historians.
Epplin, a New York City writer, centers this American social saga on four individuals: two Black, and two white, all of whom changed the face of baseball forever. Biographical sketches presented of Larry Doby, Satchel Paige, Bill Veeck, and Bob Feller become, knowingly or not, the unsung heroes of the integration of baseball.
Had it not been for Doby and Satchel Paige breaking the color line, many argue, the Indians might not have won the 1948 World Series.
Luckily for baseball, the integration of Jackie Robinson, Larry Doby, Satchel Paige, and others, wouldn’t have been possible without two color-blind owners: Branch Rickey of the Brooklyn Dodgers and of course, Veeck of the Cleveland Indians, who bought the Indians in June, 1946.
The progressive thinking Rickey reportedly said: “the greatest untapped reservoir of raw material in the history of the game is the Black race.” “The Negro,” Ricky observed, “will make us winners for years to come.”
Bill Veeck, meanwhile, not only wasn’t afraid of welcoming Black players into the big leagues, he enthusiastically widened his net with the hiring of Black security guards, vendors, janitors, groundskeepers, ushers and musicians, along with offering a front office job to Olympic gold medalist, Harrison Dillard.
Despite the overabundance of promising talent in the Negro Leagues, it would take years before the rest of baseball would sign Black players, including the New York Yankees who didn’t sign a Black player until 1955, the Detroit Tigers not until 1958, and the Boston Red Sox were the last to the party, by not signing a Black player until 1959, more than ten years after the game was officially integrated.
Alabama born, Satchel Paige, 42-years-old, came on board in July, 1948 during the Indians stretch run of the pennant race. Epplin underscores how Satch during his first month with the Indians, only surrendered seven runs over 38 and a third innings, while generating rock star status. His first three starts in MLB, attracted more than 200,000 fans, inspiring sports columnist for the Cleveland News, Ed McAuley, to write that Paige was “the greatest drawing card in the history of baseball”
Overall, Paige pitched 21 games in the 1948 regular season, including seven starts with two complete game shutouts. His ERA that year was an impressive 2.48.
Larry Doby became the first Black player to belt a home run in a World Series in Game 4 of the Boston Braves and Indians Series. The Indians disposed of the Boston Braves in six games. Doby additionally led the Indians with a .318 batting average in the 1948 Series.
Not many people associate Iowa native Bob Feller with progressive thinking in race relations, especially in 1948. Rapid Robert, in fact, told reporters during his barnstorming tours that he didn’t think many Black players had the right stuff to make it in MLB, including Jackie Robinson.
Cleveland owner Bill Veeck witnesses the signing of ace pitcher Bob Feller to a contract for the 1948 season. Despite the high hopes for the staff ace, the right-hander won 19 games and led the AL for the seventh and last time, while the velocity on his blazing fastball began to wane.
Photo Credit: The Rucker Archive
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But if not for Feller’s widely reported barnstorming tours in the offseason, many in America wouldn’t be aware of the explosive talent of many Black players.
During the barnstorming tours, Joe DiMaggio, the “Yankee Clipper,” would say that Paige was the “best and fastest pitcher he ever faced.” Of course, many mainstream newspapers never published DiMaggio’s comments for fear it would imply Black players were better than whites.
For three consecutive barnstorming tours, Satchel Paige and Bob Feller met head-to-head.
Because of Feller’s major contribution with showcasing marquee Black ball players of the era through different sections of the country, Negro League players invited him to their Negro Baseball League Reunion in Kentucky.
Most fascinating about Epplin’s book of the 1948 World Series is that many of the progressive elements of the 1948 Cleveland Indians was mirroring many events and individuals outside of the diamond during the same year.
In 1948, for example, Atlanta, Georgia hired its first Black police officers at a time when a quarter of the Atlanta police department were reportedly members of the Ku Klux Klan. But much like Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby, Black Atlanta police officers in 1948 had to tolerate racial taunts and abuse, they couldn’t lose their temper, they couldn’t ride police squad cars, and they couldn’t arrest white suspects. They had to call for assistance.
Additionally, in 1948, Alice Coachman Davis won the high jump at the Olympics in London, England, becoming the first Black woman to win an Olympic Gold medal.
In 1948, Johnny Ritchey became the first African-American baseball player to play in the Pacific League as a member of the San Diego Padres.
Most importantly, President Harry Truman issued Executive Order 9981, which directed the armed forces to provide “equality of treatment and opportunity for all personnel without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin.”
Epplin chronicles how Larry Doby had to endure the humiliation of segregation in the military while serving his country. Robert H. Meyer, Professor Emeritus at Moravian College, observed that “Black vets, having just fought against Hitler and vicious bigotry, returned to the country to find themselves treated with a similar bigotry.”
Victoria W. Wolcott, Professor of History at the University of Buffalo, tells me, “1948 was an important milestone in the civil rights movement. It was a period of what historians refer to as “racial liberalism” following World War II.” “Because of migration,” Wolcott said, “during the war years large numbers of African Americans migrated to northern cities, where they could vote. The NAACP also grew significantly during the 1940s and even had some successful voter registration drives in southern cities like Atlanta—as well as legal victories that lead up to Brown v. Board of Education.
In his State of the Union address in 1948, President Truman made a major push for civil rights. Such progressive thinking lost him support in different sections of the country, but as it turned out, it was the Black vote he received which decisively helped him win the 1948 presidential election over Republican governor of New York, Thomas E. Dewey.
Gregg Ivers, Professor of Government in the School of Public Affairs at American University, depicts the 1940s as a “period underappreciated by the general public and even by educators, journalists, and others, who believe that the civil rights movement began with Brown and Rosa Parks.” “Nothing just happens,” Ivers stressed.
Ivers additionally pointed out that 1948 was the last year of the Negro Leagues, which opened up a fresh pool of Black players who were no longer bound to their teams and their domineering owners. Willie Mays played his last game in the Negro Leagues in 1948 as a member of the Birmingham Black Barons.
Progress with civil rights, however, ran into a major roadblock in the 1950s.
Jim Ralph, Professor of American History and Culture at Middlebury College, said so much of the progress with race relations in the mid and late 1940s, came to a screeching halt with the emergence of the Cold War and McCarthyism, which narrowed the activist tendencies of the country. “Left-leaning CIO unions,” Ralph observed, “which had often been pioneers in fighting against racist practices, were on the defensive. A powerful voice for civil and workers’ rights like Paul Robeson found himself under attack for his sympathetic disposition toward the Soviet Union. “
As fascinating as Epplin’s book about the four central pillars in the integration of baseball is, the book, from this observer, is more a valentine to the City of Cleveland in 1948 during a time when industry was thriving, the city was prospering economically; a time when downtown Cleveland was bustling with restaurants, bars, and entertainment venues, and when civic pride was at an all-time high. It was the last time the Cleveland Indians were world champs, the toast of the town.
The years after 1948 in Cleveland, would usher in crushing heartbreak and disappointment.
As Epplin points out, “the year after Veeck departed, attendance dipped to below two million. Six seasons later, the Indians drew fewer than a million fans, second worst in the American League.”
Satchel Paige, moreover, would never taste another World Series appearance again. Ol’ Satchwas elected to the Hall of Fame in 1971 as the first electee of the Committee on Negro Baseball Leagues. He passed away on June 8, 1982.
Despite being the first African-American player in the American League, Larry Doby’s number wasn’t retired by the Indians until 1994, four years before he was elected to the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y. Many argue that Doby, for one reason or another, never lived up to his full potential.
Bob Feller would appear in only one All-Star game after 1948; 1951 would be the last year the Indians one-time staff ace would win more than twenty games (the same year he threw his third and final no-hitter) and would start in only 15 games in his final two seasons with the Tribe before retiring in 1956 with 266 wins, ranking him 28th in history. Feller never won a World Series game.
Due to an impending divorce and wanting to set up his children with a trust fund, Veeck sold the Indians after the 1949 season. He would later emerge as owner of the St Louis Browns and the Chicago White Sox.
John A. Kirk, Professor of History at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, summed up the year 1948 best, when he told me: “1948 was certainly a year of hope, in terms of the direction of race relations, and of liberal and progressive movements more generally.”
One of the downsides of becoming attached to certain players on a professional team is knowing they are operating on borrowed time. They eventually go their own way and leave for new opportunities and greener pastures.
Such is the case with Cleveland Indians utility outfielder, Brandon Guyer, who was a member of the Cleveland Indians from 2016-2018, which included his appearance in the 2016 World Series, when the Cleveland Indians came up short against the Chicago Cubs in seven games. Guyer became the first player to ever enter as a substitute in a deciding Game 7 of World Series and collect two hits.
Along with his nine home runs and 32 RBI’s in 101 games with the Indians in 2016, Guyer distinguished himself in leading MLB with 31 hit by pitches. He batted .336 for the year.
After departing Cleveland after the 2018 season, he signed minor league deals with the Chicago White Sox and San Francisco Giants respectively, but fell victim to the injury bug. He was released by the Giants in March; and on July 6, 2020, the West Chester Pennsylvania native officially announced his retirement.
What is he doing now?
The seven-year veteran of Major League Baseball has written an e-book, The Fully Equipped Athlete in which he chronicles how an athlete can best prepare for a career in baseball, by not only helping them develop their physical skills, but also their nutritional and mental side, all three of these skill sets, Guyer argues, are essential if a baseball player hopes to reach his full potential. Many of the tools that Guyer writes about are the same fundamental tools he developed to break into the major leagues in 2011 with the Tampa Bay Rays.
The easy-going utility player was kind enough to answer some questions I had for him about his time in Cleveland, his family life, and what he’s doing now since retirement.
Q. Prior to your retirement, you played in the major leagues for seven seasons. What were some of the contributing factors that led to your retirement at age 34?
A. “There were a couple factors that led to my retirement. First, I wanted to be around family more. Second, I told myself if I didn't make a big-league team that that would be it. Lastly, I already knew what I wanted to do in the next chapter of my life with Fully Equipped Athlete. All of those reasons made it that much easier.”
Q. You played with the Cleveland Indians from 2016-2018. What are your favorite memories of Cleveland, Ohio as a vibrant city; and what special memories do you have of the team itself, including some individual players you were fortunate enough to play with?
A. “I could not have asked to play for a better organization or city than Cleveland. The fans were amazing and I will never forget the energy they had each and every game. It made it so much easier to play in front of fans that were so passionate just as they were. I was fortunate to play with so many great players there, so it's hard to pick just a couple. I'll just say that I am so grateful to have been part of teams that made it to the playoffs three years in a row.”
Q. Now that you’re no longer under his clutches, what was your former manager, Terry Francona, like to play for? I notice he never embarrasses or calls out a member of the team. He seems to always have your back when reporters are in the room. But what about behind closed doors? Does he light a fire under your keister if a player screwed up or didn’t play up to his potential? Was he approachable as a manager if you had something to get off your chest?
A. “Terry Francona was amazing to play for! You couldn't ask for a better manager to play for. He kept everything loose and let us go out there and have fun. He demanded we play the game hard and the right way, and if we did that all was good. If someone made a mistake, he would never embarrass them or call them out even behind closed doors. He was exactly the same guy you see on TV or in interviews.”
Photo Credit: Fully Equipped Athlete
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Q. Now that you’re retired from Major League Baseball, you’ve begun a new chapter in your life with a new website and athletic program, the Fully Equipped Athlete . What is the objective of this new program and what do you hope to accomplish? Why did you start it?
A. "The mission of Fully Equipped Athlete is to equip athletes with the tools necessary to be great both on and off the field. There is not enough emphasis on the mental side, nutrition side, lifestyle side, etc. for athletes and I want to help them develop those skills so that they can unlock their full potential. Those tools are what helped me make the most of my talent, and I know it will do the same for each and every athlete we work with.”
Q.) I once heard manager Terry Francona during a pregame interview, tell Tom Hamilton that the “mental” preparation for a game is just as important as the “physical” preparation. Do you agree with that? And what exactly did Tito mean by that?
A.) “Yes, he is totally correct. The mental side is putting time in to learn about the opposing team and the pitcher you're going to face. Also, visualizing success and putting yourself in situations that you think may happen in the game so when you get there it will feel like you've already been there before.”
Q.) During your professional baseball career, you and your lovely wife, Lindsay, have raised three adorable children: Riley, Camden, and a new member of the Guyer team, Cooper. How difficult is it for a professional baseball player to raise a family while bouncing from city-to-city over a six-month period? Do you feel more connected to your family now that you don’t have to do so much traveling?
A.) “It is definitely a balance act to have kids and play baseball. For sure, it is harder for my wife as she has to be on her own with the kids when I am out of town. Without a doubt I feel more connected now and so thankful to be around them more and be more involved in their life.
Q. Where is home for you and Lindsay now?
A. “Home is in Rockville, Maryland.”
Q.) How difficult will it be for players to play a 60-day season in front of an empty stadium due to COVID-19? Will the competitiveness still be there?
A.” I think it will for sure be difficult at first, but eventually they will all get used to it. They are the best players in the world for a reason and when it's time to compete they will be able to flip the switch, with fans or not.”
Q.) Prior to the Coronavirus mess, the big talk in MLB circles was the cheating scandal involving the Houston Astros during last year’s postseason, including suspicions Jose Altuve was wired. A number of Astro players, while admitting guilt, pointed out that they weren’t the only ones guilty of stealing signs. As far as you know, were there other players and other teams gaming the system to gain a competitive advantage?
A. “I am honestly not aware of other players or teams taking part in cheating. I know that no team I have been on has done it, but I cannot speak for all of the others. “
Brandon Guyer with his wife, Lindsay, and children, Riley and Camden, when he was with the Cleveland Indians.
Astros general manager Jeff Luhnow and manager AJ Hinch (right) during happier times.
Photo Credit: Brett Coomer/Houston Chronicle
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The dust hasn’t settled yet over the sign-stealing scandal impacting Major League Baseball.
More sign stealing machinations, this time by the Red Sox might be disclosed by MLB in the coming weeks. The Houston Astros, to be sure, are still smarting from the punishment handed down by Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred.
Astros skipper A.J. Hinch and general manager Jeff Luhnow, after being suspended for a year, were swiftly fired by Astros owner Jim Crane and sent on their way.
Alex Cora, bench coach for the Astros in 2017 and implicated in the sign-stealing investigation was also cut loose as manager of the Boston Red Sox.
Newly appointed Mets manager Carlos Beltran, a member of the 2017 Astros team and identified as one of the players who pushed for decoding signals was sent to the Tower as well by Mets COO Fred Wilpon.
The sign-stealing scandal clearly was a player directed initiative; the managers, namely, A.J. Hinch was let go because he didn’t put a stop to it.
The Astros players who went unpunished by the MLB hardly leave this nefarious affair unscathed. They’re going to have to prepare themselves for an uncomfortable season of loud boos from fans, and embarrassment when facing their peers. Buzzer or no buzzer, Jose Altuve is more than likely to get drilled by a few pitchers for the suspicious manner in which he refused to take off his jersey after a dramatic walk-off home run in the ALCS against New York Yankees closer, Alrodis Chapman. Many believe the Astros second baseman was wired with a buzzer. Those charges were never proven.
If fans were left to their own devices, I’m sure they would love their stadiums to blast Hank Williams monster hit, “Your Cheatin Heart’’ anytime Houston swings into town.
When the findings of Manfred’s investigation blew up on the Internet, Twitter feeds, and smart phones from coast-to-coast, the reaction was a state of utter shock. Shock quickly turned into anger. Anger by the fans that Astros stole a world championship, beating the Dodgers in seven games during the 2017 World Series by cheating.
I was certainly enraged that this could happen. Channeling my inner-Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks in “A League of their Own”), “There’s No Spying in Baseball!”
The city of Los Angeles who came up on the short end of the stick during the 2017 World Series was so upset of the injustice that the L.A. City Council unanimously passed a resolution to ask Major League Baseball to strip the Astros and Red Sox of the 2017 and 2018 World Series titles and award them to the Dodgers.
As the days passed by and the more I thought about this, however, the more I wondered how different this was from other sign-stealing discoveries.?
For decades, people held deep dark suspicions that New York Giants outfielder Bobby Thomson was tipped off on what offering was coming from Brooklyn Dodger pitcher, Ralph Branca, before clobbering one deep into the night that clinched the NL pennant for the Giants, a dramatic walk-off home run known as the “The Shot Heard ‘Round the World”
In 2001, those suspicions turned into reality, thanks to Wall Street Journal reporter, Joshua Prager, who published an article which confirmed that Giants coach Herman Franks used a telescope to pilfer signs from the Giants’ clubhouse behind the center field fence from Dodgers catcher Rube Walker.
The Giants sign-stealing scheme was enhanced, greatly, through an electrician they hired, Abe Chadwick, who installed a bell and buzzer system in the clubhouse and wired it to the phones in the bullpen and dugout. Pressing the buzzer once or twice would signal either a fastball or off-speed pitch. This story was chronicled by Chadwick’s niece, Ina Chadwick, with a headline that read: “My Family Fixed the 1951 Pennant." According to this testimonial, “when Bobby Thomson stepped up to the plate to face Dodgers pitcher Ralph Branca-it was Abe’s signal that told Herman Franks-who then signaled to a plant in the bullpen, who signaled to Thomson-when Branca’s fastball was coming.”
And the sign-stealing engineered by the Giants and Leo Durocher as its ringleader wasn’t isolated to the deciding playoff game against the Dodgers. According to published reports, the Giants hired Chadwick, the electrician, on July 19th of the season. They soon were good to go with the buzzers in right field. The Dodgers held a commanding 13.5 lead over the Giants on August 11. Miraculously, the Giants orchestrated a monstrous comeback to force a three-game playoff against their cross-town rivals.
How influential was the electrician is this heroic comeback is anyone’s guess?
So, in 2001, why wasn’t there any outrage over the revelations of Joshua Prager’s WSJ article? Why weren’t there calls for the Giants to be stripped of the 1951 pennant?
We are well into the 21st Century and Bobby Thomson’s Shot Heard Round the World is still being lionized. The bat from the "Shot Heard 'Round the World" is in the collection of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York. The U.S. Postal Service issued a commemorative stamp. Sports Illustrated ranked it as the second greatest moment of the 20th century.
When Prager’s article was published, I never recalled any apologies to Dodger pitcher Ralph Branca who endured years and years of public scorn and humiliation for coughing up Thomson’s historic home run.
Branca died in 2016, five years after Prager’s article was published. As he once said at an old-timer’s game, “A guy commits murder and gets pardoned after 20 years. I didn’t get pardoned.”
The Dodger right-hander, for the most part, kept quiet about his real feelings of Prager’s convincing indictment of Thomson being tipped off. Weeks before Thomson’s death in 2010, however, Branca told the New York Times, “When you took signs all year, and when you had a chance to hit a bloop or hit a home run, would you ignore that sign?” He [Thomson] knew it was coming, Absolutely,’’ Branca said.
In this timely book, Dickson chronicles the sign-stealing concocted by Cleveland Indians ace, Bob Feller during the 1948 season in which “Rapid Robert’’ would pick up signs from opposing catchers using a telescope that Feller used as a gunnery officer on the USS Alabama during World War II. “The telescope,” according to Dickson, “was mounted on a tripod, placed in the Cleveland scoreboard and operated alternately by Feller or [Bob] Lemon, who remembered that he could see the dirt under the catcher’s fingernails. They would call out the next pitch to a groundskeeper-brothers Marshall and Harold Brossard or their father, Emil, who would then use another opening in the scorecard to relay the signs to Tribe hitters, by a variety of changing signals, from a space otherwise used to post number four out-of-towners.”
“Hey, it’s all fair in love and war,” Feller was quoted as saying, “when you’re trying to win a pennant.”
Many claim Feller’s spy ring didn’t carry over into the 1948 World Series against the Boston Braves, which the Indians won in six games. Braves pitcher Johnny Sain wasn’t so sure, so convinced was he that Indians outfielder Larry Doby was tipped off on a pitch in Game four of the WS, in which he hit for a home run. When questioned, Doby vehemently denied he was tipped off.
“Stolen signs win a lot of ball games,” said Dodgers VP Fresco Thompson in 1952.
Regarded as one of the hardest throwing pitchers of his era, we’ve come to know a great deal about Feller--he was the first major leaguer to enlist in the armed forces after Japan dropped a bomb on Pearl Harbor. We also know he led the American League in strikeouts seven times, was a 20-game winner six times; and is the only pitcher to throw an Opening Day no-hitter (April 16, 1940).
But what is rarely (if ever) mentioned in his biography, is that he pilfered signs with his telescope during the 1948 season, at least enough times to secure an AL Pennant.
Where is the outrage?
Dickson additionally writes that Ty Cobb entered baseball in 1905, when the “spyglass era was in full swing.”
The Georgia Peach wrote an article for Life Magazine in 1952, titled: “Tricks That Won Me Ballgames.” In the article, he wrote, “Near me was an advertisement on the fence that read: THE DETROIT NEWS: BEST NEWSPAPER IN THE WEST,” Cobb wrote, “If you watched the B in the advertisement closely you would watch little slots opening and closing, If the slot was open in the top half of the B, our spotter had picked off the signal for the fastball. If the slot in the bottom of the B opened, we knew a curve was coming. I don’t know whether the ad sold any newspapers, but it was a great thing for Tiger batting averages.”
Another glaring example of duplicity came in the 19th century (1898) in a game between the Cincinnati Reds and Philadelphia Phillies. Reds third base coach Tommy Corcoran while coaching at third, got his cleats tangled up in the ground. At first glance, Corcoran thought it was a vine only to discover it was a telegraph wire that ran to the Phillies clubhouse in center field, where a backup catcher sat with binoculars picking up signals and communicating them to the third-base coach, presumably, through vibrations from the wire.
Again, where was the outrage?
MLB always appears late to the dance.
They were late clamping down on steroids during the 1990s, which obviously gave players a competitive advantage. That was the culture then. If Jose Canseco was being injected with steroids and amphetamines, why shouldn’t Alex Rodriquez, to keep up with the Joneses?
When new advanced technology came in the 21st century with live feeds from the center field camera and cameras in the dugouts, some teams, certainly not all, started gaming the system and figured out ways to decode signs coming from these live feeds.
When this new technology was installed, MLB should have been proactive enough to know boys will be boys and taken measures to prevent the decoding. From all the reports in the last few days, there seemed to be a culture that developed that if this team is decoding, why not us.
Interestingly, discussing the new technology in baseball, A.J. Hinch told the Associated Press during the 2018 AL Championship Series, “there’s some unintended consequences that come with the advancement of technology. It’s a league wide conversation that needs to happen in time,”Hinch said. “It’s happening right now during a really important series, and I just think it’s bigger than us. It’s bigger than any team. It’s bigger than any series. It needs to be corralled because of the state of the concern over it.”
Cleveland Indians fans can breathe a sigh of relief, knowing their beloved Tribe under the leadership of Terry Francona didn’t succumb to sign stealing. But they may have come close.
Speaking to local networks, the Indians manager said “I can tell you there are a lot of nights when I go home where I know I need to have a conversation with a player -- especially like a veteran player -- where he may view it differently than I do. And I lose a lot of sleep over stuff like that because obviously I feel a lot of obligation to get it straightened out. But you don't just want to beat somebody over the head and lose them.”
Despite the embarrassment they must be feeling right now, Francona said he still has plenty of respect for the managers fired. “They’re good people,” he told reporters. “They’re really good baseball people. They’re paying a penalty for making a mistake. That doesn’t make them bad people. They made some errors in judgment. The penalty came down, they’ll serve it and then I think they’ll be back.”
And contrary to some commentaries, the sign-stealing scandal of 2017 and 2018 doesn’t rise to the level of the 1919 Black Sox scandal in which the Chicago White Sox intentionally threw the World Series against the Cincinnati Reds.
Jacob Pomrenke, Director of editorial content for SABR (Society for American Baseball Research) and editor of “Scandal on the South Side: the 1919 White Sox”, told me, “the White Sox scandal was about taking bribes to lose games on purpose, which is an existential threat to the sport's integrity,” Pomrenke said. “This was about breaking the rules,” Pomrenke argues, “to gain a competitive edge — which has happened many, many times in sports and will undoubtedly happen again. The methods and details evolve, but as long as the rewards are high enough, some human beings will always feel compelled to use nefarious means to gain an edge.”
To MLB's credit, though they were late in putting a screeching halt to the sign-stealing--they sent a clear message of the hard consequences, and humiliation, that comes with trying to game the system.
I think players and most certainly the managers received Rob Manfred’s message loud and clear.
Though this scandal delivered a mighty black eye to baseball; the damage is certainly reparable as long as fans, players, and the media can move on and chalk these unfortunate episodes up to a hard lesson learned underscored by horribly bad judgement.
Speaking at a fan convention for the Chicago White Sox, newly acquired pitcher Dallas Keuchel said he felt what happened was “blown out of proportion,” but he was sorry.
“It’s just what the state of baseball was at that point and time,” the former Astros pitcher said. “Was it against the rules? Yes, it was, and I personally am sorry for what’s come about, the whole situation.”
Keuchel, however, said he isn’t buying the “Oh my gosh, this has never happened before,” mantra that other teams are accusing Houston and Boston of. “I’m not going into specific detail,” the former AL Cy Young Award winner said.
The grass will be just a little greener at League Park in Cleveland on August 19.
That’s when Tom Kelley, a St Ignatius alum, will appear at the Baseball Heritage Museum at League Park to discuss his efforts to promote baseball in Ireland.
While attending Trinity College in Dublin, Kelley became increasingly more involved with the promotion and the eventual rise of baseball in Ireland.
Kelley has been living in Ireland since 1995.
In addition to Kelley, Dan Coughlin, former Plain Dealer and Cleveland Press sports columnist, WJW Fox 8 reporter and author will be on hand, signing books and participating in a Q & A.
The event will additionally consist of a baseball clinic for players of all ages, starting at 5:30pm.
Kelley, a Cleveland native, is a founding member of the Dublin City Hurricanes, former Irish League MVP and National Team coach and player.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise to avid baseball fans that the Irish have been well represented in Major League Baseball, especially with 44 players born in Ireland.
Despite popular belief, baseball in Ireland itself does have a brief history.
According to author Josh Chetwynd, the first recorded game taking place in Ireland occurred on August 24, 1874, a game which featured the Boston Red Stockings and the Philadelphia Athletics who made a brief trek to The Emerald Isle to showcase America’s national pastime.
Baseball popped up, once again, in Ireland during World War II.
In July, 1942, in Belfast (east coast of Ireland), a game among U.S. serviceman was featured between the 34th Infantry Division Midwest Giants and First Armored Division Kentucky Wildcats, a July 4th game which drew 7,500 spectators.
By November, 1942, the 34th Infantry Division left Northern Ireland to participate in Operation Torch, an American-Anglo invasion of French Morocco and Algeria during the North African campaign of WW II.
By May 1943, historians note, a 12-team league, featuring the New York Eagles, Medical Corps Pill Rollers and Californian Eagles, among other teams, played games at Belfast’s Ravenhill Rugby Grounds.
The active participation of baseball among young Irelanders themselves in their home country wouldn’t take hold until the end of the 20th century.
Cormac Eklof, (now living in Seattle as program manager in the IT world) who played baseball on the Dublin City Hurricanes from 1997 through 2015 and on the Irish National Baseball team, across Europe, from 1996 through 2006, tells me that baseball in Ireland started in the blustery winter of 1995.
It was in that year when about 20 ball players in Eklof’s inner circle were looking to do something more than just play softball. So, they started meeting more regularly to play hardball.
As Eklof explains it, they began scheduling some scrimmage games with the long-term hope of perhaps fielding a team in the European B Championships in August, 1996 in Hull, England.
Scrimmaging became more earnest in the summer of 1996; they were helped, mightily, when the young Irish organization received two coaches from Major League International to coach the team.
Before you knew it, what started as a grass roots movement with no real field to speak of, no perfectly trimmed grass to play on, not even a backstop, just a desire to play baseball on weathered soccer and rugby fields, usually in the sporadic, driving rain, resulted in this group (what they lacked in talent was replaced with plenty of heart) representing Ireland in the 1996 European Championships.
Their first venture into competitive baseball wasn’t pretty. The Czech Republic cleaned their clock, 23-2.
The drubbing the Irish team absorbed wasn’t the real story of Ireland’s first offensive into competitive baseball. The real story was when realizing they could compete against the world, hit and field the ball, and even score some runs.
Ireland ended up losing the first four games of the tournament with a whopping 35 errors.Still, in the final game, they were able to beat Yugoslavia, 8-6. “It felt like we won the tournament,” Irish player Gus Hernandez (a native of Mexico) told Dan O’Neill of the St Louis Dispatch.
Ireland soldiered on in subsequent years: winning two games in the 1998 European Championships and another one in the 2000 tournament. By 2002, Ireland finished fourth, though their improved success was helped greatly by adding American-born players who acquired dual citizenship; a popular practice followed throughout Europe.
By 2004, Ireland came away with the bronze medal, beating Serbia-Montenegro in the European B Pool Championships held in Regensburg, Germany. In 2006, they earned a silver medal at the European B-Pool Championships in Antwerp, Belgium.
Many argue the reason Ireland doesn’t produce many quality pitchers, stems from the island’s most popular sports (hurling, soccer, rugby, and Gaelic football), lacking much throwing.
P.J. Conlon was the rare exception.
On May 7, 2018, Conlon, born in Belfast, Ireland, made his major league debut for the New York Mets (with an Irish tricolor stitched into his glove), making him the first major league player born in Ireland since World War II.
U.S. Ambassador Jean Kennedy Smith throws the first pitch at dedication ceremonies for the O’Malley Little League and Dodger Baseball Fields in Corkagh Park, West Dublin, Ireland. Peter O’Malley (far right), president of the Los Angeles Dodgers from 1970-98, privately built the two fields, opened July 4, 1998, which serve as the centerpiece of baseball in Ireland. From L-R: Aldo Notari0, President of International Baseball Federation; Dr. Creighton Hale, President, Little League Baseball; Ed Piszek, Little League Foundation Trustee; Ambassador Smith; Rod Dedeaux, legendary head baseball coach at USC; and O’Malley.
Photo Credit: WalterOMalley.com
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Another major leap forward for Irish baseball was when they were provided with a diamond to finally, at long last, field a team on and call their own.
On March 4, 1998, O’Malley Field was dedicated at Corkagh Park in Dublin, a facility built through the generous contributions from Los Angeles Dodgers president Peter O’Malley.
According to Cormac Eklof, “the O’Malley Field is the spiritual home of baseball in Ireland.”“There’s been hundreds of games,” Eklof says, “and thousands of innings there since the 1990’s.”
In addition to O’Malley Field, there is a brand-new custom baseball facility in Ashbourne, Meath, which is equipped with clubhouses. There are also fields in Belfast, Cork, and Limerick.
Just as baseball in the United States has served as a crazy quilt for different cultures and ethnicities in a united cause: the pure enjoyment of the game; so too has baseball brought different factions of Irish society together during some stormy times in its history.
In the prize-winning 2006 documentary, “Emerald Diamond,”a film about the history of Baseball Ireland and the Irish national baseball team, director John Fitzgerald captures how baseball served as a bulwark against the raging Catholic-Protestant conflicts of the 1990s.
Will baseball, America’s national pastime, ever become as popular as soccer and Gaelic football in Ireland?
Not likely, at least according to Cormac Eklof.
The former pitcher (who sports a Nomar Garciaparra tattoo) tells me that baseball is a minority sport in Ireland, though it has a loyal following.
“Basketball is really popular, with clubs all over the country and thousands of registered players, some TV and media coverage,” said Eklof. “American Football has a very stable and relatively old federation with several teams and I would guess around 5,000 people involved in a relatively high-profile sport. Baseball Ireland is the minnow of that group, with maybe a couple of thousand people as members. It gets little snippets of attention in the media.”
One way to increase Ireland’s love for the game, is to see MLB players compete on Irish soil.
Since the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox traveled across the pond to play in London this year, Eklof is hopeful that MLB schedules a game in Ireland in the not too distant future.
Eklof believes Dublin has several big stadiums which could be accommodate any major league team, such as Croke Park, and the Aviva, both big stadiums.
The Irish American Baseball Society and The Irish Baseball Hall of Fame, in fact, have formally asked Major League Baseball to consider bringing an MLB series to Dublin and have requested supporters sign a petition in support.
So, to learn more about baseball in Ireland, make plans to come down to the Baseball Heritage Museum on Monday evening (August 19) and share some of your favorite Irish tales (and jokes) with Tom Kelley and Cleveland’s own, Danny Coughlin, who will undoubtedly share a few of their own tales.
On March 17, 1871 (St. Patrick's Day), the National Association of Professional Baseball Players became baseball's first all-professional league in a saloon called, fittingly enough, “Collier's Café” on the corner of Broadway and Thirteenth Street in New York City.
By the 1880's, Irish immigrants and first-generation Irish-Americans comprised between 33 and 41 percent of professional rosters.
Of the more than 16,000 players to appear in the major league since 1876, 38 were born in Ireland, while hundreds more have been of Irish descent.
Andy Leonard (County Cavan), who was born during the Potato Famine, was the first Irish-born major leaguer, making his debut with the Washington Olympics of the old National Association in 1871.
More than two dozen sons of Irish immigrants, who played in the 1880-1920 period, are enshrined in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.
But lo and behold, after 22 years long years, the MLB All-Star game has returned to Progressive Field in a city stripped of its Chief Wahoo logo, replaced by the more diplomatic Block C
First pitch is set for July 9th at 7:30 p.m. EST.
The last time there was an MLB All-Star Game in Cleveland, Cleveland Indians catcher Sandy Alomar Jr. was the toast of the town and the game’s MVP, (the first Puerto Rican named MVP in an All-Star game), when he cracked a two-run home run in the bottom of the 7th to break a tie and propel the American League to a 3-1 win. The win broke a three-year losing streak for the AL. The crowd of 44,916 that night, was the largest in Jacobs Field history.
Interestingly, Alomar, 22 years later, is still in an Indians uniform as a first base coach. In 1997, when he was named to the All-Star team, the older brother of Hall-of-Famer Roberto Alomar, was having a monster year going into the break with a 30-game hitting streak and leading the AL with a .375 batting average.
Since 1997, the makeup of MLB players has grown more diverse. In 1997, for example, foreign born players (born outside of the 50 United States) made up 18.9 percent of MLB’s rosters. In 2019, that has leaped to 28.5 percent.
22 years was a long time ago, much has changed in Cleveland since 1997, the same year Michael R. White was mayor, fighting for a new NFL team (the Browns left Cleveland for Baltimore after the 1995 season); and Bill Clinton, the 42nd U.S. President, was in the White House riding a 55 percent approval rating at a time when few ever heard of a 24-year old female employee of the White House Office of Legislative Affairs and a former White House intern, Monica Lewinsky.
So, assuming someone has been away from Cleveland for 22 years, what exactly has changed in downtown Cleveland since 1997?
Quite a lot, at least according to Curtis Danburg, Senior Director of Communications at the Cleveland Indians.
“In 1997, we [The Cleveland Indians at Jacobs Field] were in the midst of the sellout streak averaging over 42, 997 thousand per night compared with just under 19 thousand per game in 2019.” “The Cleveland Browns,” Danburg additionally pointed out, “weren’t around and the Cleveland Cavaliers were in a down cycle.
Business activity in Cleveland isn't as robust as it was 22 years ago. There are currently three Fortune 500 companies in Cleveland, down from seven in 1997, according to Fortune Magazine.
There were also more active duty Cleveland Police officers in 1997 than there is today. According to Cleveland Police records, there were 1795 officers in 1997. In 2019, there are 1593 officers, 202 less than in 1997.
Since 1997, Progressive Field has sliced about 7,000 seats from its facility (capacity is now roughly 35,225) as it went through a number of renovations, beginning in 2014, which included a two-story bar area that is partially enclosed and an expanded section for children (Kids Clubhouse). A pedestrian bridge and other structures beyond right field were also installed to allow people outside the park to get a glimpse of the field. And in 2016, the Indians unveiled a 59-by-221-foot scoreboard, (the largest in baseball), a season-ticket holder club behind home plate, a beer garden, new concession stands, and a revamped left-field district, among other additions.
In 1997, at the All-Star break, the Indians led the AL Central with a 44-36 record (.550 winning percentage) winning seven out of their last ten and three games ahead of the Chicago White Sox. In 2019, the Indians carry an almost identical record, 45-38 (.542 winning percentage) but in stark contrast to 22 years ago, they are eight-and-a-half games out of first place; though, with still plenty of baseball left, particularly against their division rival, the Minnesota Twins.
What the second half of the season holds for the Tribe in 2019 is anyone’s guess.
We all know what happened in 1997. The Tribe advanced to the World Series for the second time in three years only to have their hearts slashed in Miami Gardens when the Florida Marlins beat the heavily favored Tribe in seven games on a walk-off single slapped by Édgar Rentería in extra innings.
Other changes in Cleveland since 1997?
For starters, the population has shrunk.
The population of Cleveland in 1997 was 498,246; in 2019 it stands at 383,793, a drop of 114, 453 residents, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
But with the addition of the Jack Cleveland Casino (which opened in 2012), along with an explosion of bars (219), breweries (13), clubs (57) and two music venues, including the House of Blues, downtown Cleveland has simply been buzzing with an appreciable increase in hotel rooms.
In 1997, according to the Newmark Knight Frank Valuation & Advisory's Hospitality, Gaming & Leisure Group, the last time there was an MLB All-Star game in Cleveland, there were nine hotels. Since 1997, there have been 16 hotels added. As of June 2019, there are a total of 25 hotels ready to be booked in downtown Cleveland, midtown, and University Circle.
Along with more hotels, obviously, comes more rooms. For the 1997 All-Star game there were 2,722 rooms available in Cleveland spanning 9 hotels. Since 1997, there were 3,325 rooms added over 16 hotels. As of today, there are 6,047 rooms available spanning 25 hotels.
Photo Credit: Rockhall.com
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The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, downtown’s Cleveland’s signature museum, on the shore of Lake Erie, has gone through a significant transformation since 1997.
In 1997, the Rock Hall was only in its second year, the same year they unveiled their first major exhibit: “I Want to Take You Higher: The Psychedelic Era, 1965 – 1969,” a stunning display which included artifacts from John Lennon, Eric Clapton, John Sebastian, the Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin, and a number of others.
Greg Harris, CEO of the Rock Hall, said that after the initial excitement at the Rock Hall, attendance dipped, albeit remained at steady levels for two decades.
In 2016, according to Harris, “we began a significant transformation to leverage visitor feedback, create new and immersive experiences, and welcome visitors to a space that is true to the power of rock & roll.”
The museum's transformation includes the spectacular Connor Theater, featuring arena-quality sound and larger-than-life screens, an All Access Café with a menu designed by Cleveland celebrity chefs, and a soon to be unveiled highly interactive exhibit, The Garage – a space where visitors can host jam sessions using real instruments and even design their own band merchandise.
Harris additionally points out that "our attendance levels have steadily increased along with these important changes, and now in 2019, our experience is better than ever.”
Another significant transformation in Cleveland since 1997 surrounds the world-renowned Cleveland Orchestra and Severance Hall, a concert hall in the University Circle neighborhood of Cleveland, Ohio, located on the campus of Case Western Reserve, about four miles east of Downtown Cleveland, at the corner of Euclid Avenue and East Boulevard.
Severance Hall underwent a full renovation from 1997-2000, a massive renovation, in fact, which changed Severance Hall significantly, including restoring and relocating the 6,025 pipe E.M. Skinner organ, allowing it to be used again during concerts.
The renovation also involved removing the “Szell Shell” (a stage that created a shell in the Danish Modern style, aesthetically at odds with the building’s Art Deco style) and installing a stage shell that better matched the architecture style of the Concert Hall — with improved acoustics, along with restoring the murals in Reinberger Chamber Hall. A full-service restaurant was also added.
Since 1997, there’s has been a change of conductor.
Beginning in 2002, Franz Welser-Möst, an Austrian conductor, replaced Christoph von Dohnány as Music Director of the Cleveland Orchestra.
For those who question whether Cleveland can still support a major orchestra with the explosion of audio streaming platforms, such as iTunes and Spotify, you can take comfort in knowing that the financial health of the orchestra has improved markedly since 1997, despite running into challenges stemming from the financial crisis of the late 2000s.
According to Rebecca Calkin, media relations manager at The Cleveland Orchestra, in 1997, there were a small number of households, mostly subscribers, who attended. “Now, we have a much larger number of households visiting us each year,” Culkin says. “This is fueled by our work developing a younger audience (20 percent of our audience is under 25 years old — around 40,000 people).”
"At the close of the 2017-18 year," Calkin continued, "our deficit has been reduced, ticket sales and touring fees are at an all-time high, and our endowment continues to see solid gains and contributions."
Photo Credit: PlayhouseSquare.org
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For theater-goers, there's also been major expansions at Playhouse Square, the theater district in downtown Cleveland, the largest performing arts center in the United States outside of New York.
According to Cindi Szymanski, Assistant Director of Brand Marketing and Communications at Playhouse Square, in 1997, only three of their five historic theaters had been restored (they had a total of six performance spaces). In 2019, by comparison, all five historic theaters have been restored (with a total of 11 performance spaces).
In 1996, the year before the last MLB All-Star game in Cleveland, Playhouse Square welcomed more than a million guests; a number that is still maintained today.
Yet another transformation in Cleveland has been the curriculum of Cleveland State University, a public research university in downtown Cleveland, which was first established in 1964. Many might be stunned if they browsed through the curriculum in the liberal arts department of CSU to see how much it has changed since well into the 20th century.
So many of the standard courses traditionally taught in history, political science, and English departments, to name a few, have been dropped to address the growing demographics and multicultural interests of students, along with the many global challenges of the 21st century.
The drastic transformation of a liberal arts education at CSU has rankled a number of educators.
Roger B. Manning, emeritus professor from the History Department at CSU, says that in his opinion, "it is not a change for the better. British history has disappeared entirely, and there are fewer courses in European history. " "Courses that I used to teach on history of technology, the Industrial Revolution and War and Western Society," Manning explained, “were not thought worth preserving.” “Throughout my career at Cleveland State, I argued for appointing someone in the history of science without success."
Professor Manning went on to argue that "these courses have been replaced with multiple courses on women's history, black history and queer history.” “While these courses might have a place in the offerings of a large department,” he explains, “and may be worthwhile subjects for research, they should not dominate the offerings of a small department.”
Frederick J Karem, Professor and Chair from the Department of English at CSU, takes a different tack when considering the evolution of a liberal arts education.
"From my standpoint, there's a lot that has remained consistent, but there have been exciting expansions--it's a great time to write and to study literature, at CSU and beyond. We still teach Chaucer, Shakespeare, and lots of classic English writers alongside a diversity of American writers, past and present," Karem says. "I taught one of the first seminars at CSU on Toni Morrison, our Lorain-raised Nobel laureate, and I'm sure they've been 100's more throughout the country since then. "
Karem went on to explain that “CSU has always had a multicultural emphasis because of our city's diversity. In the past two decades we've become more global in our focus, exploring literatures and authors that are in increasing contact in our interconnected world, the area of greatest expansion is what we study in the classroom. "
Karem additionally pointed out that besides hard copy books, they now study stories and narratives in many forms, including films, television shows, graphic novels, and digital media, all of which, according to Karem, "have complexity worth exploring."
In 1997, 22 years ago, it’s amazing how much of the future stared us right in the face; but we just didn’t fully comprehend that we were entering a new age, the digital age.
It was 1997, after all, in which Bill Gates, business magnate and principal founder of Microsoft Corporation, became the world’s richest businessman. The same year Yahoo! Introduced Yahoo Mail, while the domain Facebook.com came online on March 28, 1997, the domain Craigslist.com came online on September 24, 1997, and the domain Netflix.com came online on November 10, 1997.
All powerful forces in our lives in 2019.
In May, 1997, 40 million Americans and thousands in Northeast Ohio used the worldwide communications system, the Internet. A month later, in June, 1997, more than one million job openings were advertised on 5,000 Internet sites, estimated John Sumser, editor of Electronic Recruiting News, an on-line newsletter.
1997 was also the year comedian Ellen DeGeneres (starring on the hit ABC sitcom “Ellen”) courageously came out as a lesbian on the cover of Time Magazine (April 14), paving the way for other performers to pursue gay roles on TV without fear of retribution.
It was 22 years ago, too, when Bedford Heights Mayor Jimmy Dimora, a member of the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections and chairman of the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party, gave serious thought to running for Cuyahoga County Commissioner. NOTE: In 2012, Dimora was convicted of 32 charges, including racketeering, bribery, conspiracy, and tax charges and sentenced to 28 years in federal prison in one of the largest criminal corruption cases in Ohio history.
Finally, in 1997, Tony Grossi of The Cleveland Plain Dealer splashed with page one news (April 21) that Bernie Kosar, 33, hometown hero, after playing 12 NFL seasons, 8 1/2 with the Browns, was retiring from football. His last tour of duty was with the Miami Dolphins. A decision he made so he could "devote his time to business interests and pursue his goal of owning the Cleveland Browns."
The Browns returned to Cleveland (and the NFL) in 1999; but Kosar’s dream of owning the team never came to fruition.
In 1997, nearly 45,000 baseball fans attended the All-Star Game, and another 95,000 participated in Fan Fest activities throughout the weekend, leaving behind an estimated $38 million with hotels, restaurants, taxicabs and shopping centers.
According to Destination Cleveland, the convention and visitor bureau for the Greater Cleveland area, the estimated economic impact for this year’s MLB All-Star week is $65 million and the estimated attendance is over 100,000 guests between Progressive Field and Fan Fest.
So, as visitor’s come streaming into Cleveland in the coming days for the 90th MLB All-Star Game, they’ll be setting their sights on a city with a more vibrant downtown life than was true 22 years ago, more hotels, a bustling casino, an enhanced theater district, more restaurants, breweries, and clubs, to satisfy young and old ready for a good time and watch some baseball in the rock 'n' roll capital of the world.
Much like girl scout cookies, and the Salvation Army bell ringer at the holidays, it’s hard to say no to books.
Especially at the annual Case Western Reserve Book Sale, sponsored by the Association for Continuing Education (ACE), at the Adelbert Gymnasium on the CWRU campus in Cleveland, Ohio.
Saturday marked the 73rd consecutive year the event is being held.
So, how did it all begin?
Jane Leitch, 94, the "grand dame of literary volunteers."
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According to Jane Leitch, 94, the "grand dame of literary volunteers," her sister Caroline, a calculus major at the time, helped launch the book sale back in 1948 to help raise money for the university.
Jane and Caroline (now deceased) were part of the Sutphin family of four girls and two boys. Their father, Albert Sutphin, (known affectionately as the “man in the red necktie”) became president of the Braden Sutphin Ink Co. on East 93rd Street in 1929, a company which produced graphic arts equipment, inks, printing materials, and supplies.
He also owned the Falcon hockey team in 1934, which he renamed the Cleveland Barons. He spearheaded the building of the old Cleveland Arena around East 36th Street and Euclid Avenue.
What started as a modest collection of books (a few thousand) kept in a dusty storage room, quickly ballooned into a full-size gym of books, CDS, records, and memorabilia, divided by subject, now numbering well over 80,000.
The vast majority of the books are donated through the generosity of avid book lovers, or those simply looking to clear shelf space in their homes. Donations pour into their facility throughout the year.
Today, the CWRU book sale is one of the largest in the Midwest and is a destination spot for collectors and dealers from around the region.
As I was walking up the stairs to the Adelbert Gym about 12:30 p.m. today on a gorgeous Saturday afternoon with the blazing sun beating down, I noticed an elderly couple passing by, wheeling two large boxes, as if they were preparing to board a plane for a European vacation.
The CWRU book sale, to be sure, is a weekend event for serious book lovers.
When I walked into the gym, I really had no agenda in what type of books I was looking for.
I recently donated boxes and boxes of books a few months ago to CWRU (of all places) during one of my many moves, so I initially thought this would be a quick browse, since I don’t have that much room in my new apartment.
Unfortunately, I’m attracted to books like bees are to honey.
My eyes were first drawn to an oldie but goodie: William Safire’s, “On Language.” In this book, the former New York Times op-ed columnist and Richard Nixon speech writer, offers a rich and entertaining arrangement to breaking down origins of words, proper usage of phrases, clichés to avoid, and scores of other witty observations.
In addition to his widely-read op-ed column, the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist wrote a New York Times Sunday Magazine column, “On Language” which was the very first item I looked for after lugging the New Times Sunday print edition back home.
I miss those days.
Safire’s book was definitely a keeper. I next stumbled on H.W. Fowler’s “Modern English Usage” another indispensable book to word lovers (which I once owned) which delves deeply into the conventions of grammar and vocabulary without being too pedantic. Another keeper.
I chased Safire and Fowler’s books with “Webster’s Synonyms, Antonyms, and Homonyms” by the Ottenheimer Publishers Inc. and the “Harper Dictionary of Foreign Terms” (third edition) based on the original edition by C.O. Sylvester Mawson, a reference book packed with more than 15,000 foreign expressions from more than 50 languages.
How could I pass those up ?
In the box they went.
With so many online tools and references in this day and age, I thought I had enough quotation resources to satisfy me without having to carry another quotation book back to my apartment.
But then I saw “Familiar Quotations From German and Spanish Authors” by Craufurd Tait Ramage, LL.D. At first glance, it looked like an extremely dull book that would collect dust in anyone’s bookshelf.
But looks, as they say, can be deceiving.
As I skimmed through the book, I found some magnificent quotes in English (with the full text in either German and Spanish), such as from the pen of German poet, Friedrich Schiller, "The May of Life Only Blooms Once;” “Eternity Gives Nothing Back;" "Death is a Blessing to Mortals;"; or from German writer and statesman, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, "Misfortune Never Comes Single;" "Cut Your Coat According to Your Cloth;" or Miguel de Cervantes, the celebrated Spanish writer and considered one of the world's preeminent novelists, "The Pen is The Tongue of the Mind'' and "Blessing to Him Who Invented Sleep."
Yet another diamond in the rough I simply couldn’t pass up.
As I made my way through the history section, I recall reading a good number of the books they had displayed there. Barbara W. Tuchman’s epic, “The Guns of August” which won a Pulitzer-Prize for General Non-Fiction for 1963 was one acclaimed masterpiece (some historians say flawed interpretation of history) which has been on my reading list for years, but I never got around to reading it.
In the box it went.
There were a number of noteworthy books about Cleveland history, which I couldn’t pass up, such as “The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History” (another indispensable reference book I used to have); “Cleveland: Prodigy of the Western Reserve” (1979) by former Cleveland Plain Dealer columnist, George E. Condon, who explores the birth of the city through its heyday of thriving newspapers, its ascendancy during the Roaring ‘20s, when downtown Cleveland reigned supreme, while underscoring memorable sports moments well before the “Mistake on the Lake” made the city the butt of national ridicule.
Another local history book, which made its way into my box (I now needed a second box) was “Cleveland Cops’’ By John H. Tidyman, a former Cleveland Press scribe who gathers first-hand testimony from Cleveland Police Officers about missing children, armed robberies, gun fights, car chases, and other sordid tales of putting their life on the line in the mean streets of Cleveland with a forward written by Edward P. Kovacic, Police Chief of Cleveland from 1990-1994.
For one brief shining moment, I found a wonderful collection of historic Cleveland Plain Dealer Page Ones.
But my enthusiasm for the book was short-lived.
As I set down the books in my hand to take a picture with my cell phone, someone snatched the book of Plain Dealer Page One Headlines, behind my back and under my nose.
Easy come; easy go.
But then I came across a random collection of Page Ones from different national newspapers, from Babe Ruth’s Death to a screaming headline: “Hitler Sole Dictator of Reich; Hindenburg Dead.”
So, my wound was softened just a bit.
As you might imagine, it was a hot day in the gym with no air-conditioning and some sharp elbows to deal with involving customers positioning themselves in the crowded aisles of books.
For some reason, I forgot about the weather and wore a long sleeve button-down dress shirt to the book sale. After a couple of hours, I was dripping in sweat, weighed down in books, and in need of finding the exit door.
But before calling it a day and heading to the exit, I made one final stop at the Sports Section.
There were so many baseball books to feast my eyes on, I felt like a kid in a candy store. I tried to stay strong and hold off from picking up any of these treasures, but the temptation became too unbearable; and before I knew it, the following books had been added to my boxes: The critically acclaimed: “The Summer of 95” By Thomas Kelly and Marc Jaffe (about Cleveland’s highs and crushing lows) with our professional sports franchises.
Another: “100 Greatest Pitchers’’ By Brent P. Kelley,” The Baseball Scrapbook: The Men and the Magic of America’s National Pastime” By Peter C. Bjarkman, and “Baseball: An Illustrated History” By Geoffrey C. Ward and Ken Burns. It’s certainly a classic; I saw the documentary on PBS (1994), but never owned the book.
Easily, the most interesting item I found all day was a foreign language translator. I always heard about these translators and wondered how accurate they are. I spent all of $3.00 for the item.
The only problem, it’s for translations in French and Arabic only.
But you never know if one day I’m walking through Tower City (located on Public Square in downtown Cleveland) and someone might come up to me and ask: “hal tataHaddath al'ingiliiziyya? (Do you speak English?”).
Now, I’ll just consult with my new handy-dandy Arabic translator and answer the person with great confidence.
My day was done.
I checked in my two boxes of books and the wonderful volunteers gave me a slip of paper of the damages I owed. On to the checkout desk.
Another year of the CWRU book sale went by; and I came away another satisfied customer, while meeting a number of interesting book lovers.
For those who missed the event on Saturday, the book sale continues Sunday through Tuesday, June 4th.
