It’s too bad the Red Sox aren’t doing as well these days as they were when this song first came out, but it’s pretty catchy all the same. And William Shatner’s cameo as home plate umpire adds a fun touch to the video.
People always told me that my natural ability and good eyesight were the reasons for my success as a hitter. They never talk about the practice, practice, practice.
~Ted Williams
On June 6, 1913, the New York Yankees lost 2-1 against the Cleveland Indians at the Polo Grounds. This game marked 14 consecutive games played without a win, setting a franchise record. The streak included 13 losses and one tie (a 3-3 game against Boston on May 24th). The team would finish the season with a record of 57–94, coming in 7th place in the American League.
Baseball is a game of the soul.
~Pedro Martinez
In a spring exhibition game on March 23, 1934, Babe Didrikson pitched the first inning for the St. Louis Cardinals. The female track and field Olympian gave up three runs against the Red Sox in Bradenton, Florida.
On the first day of spring training, March 1, 1954, Ted Williams broke his collarbone running after a line drive. Williams would be out for six weeks, and in April he wrote an article with Joe Reichler of the Saturday Evening Post saying that he intended to retire at the end of the season. Williams instead returned to the Red Sox lineup on May 7th, and during the 1954 season he hit .345 with 386 at bats in 117 games.
I re-watched Moneyball this weekend, the movie based on the book by Michael Lewis with the same title. Moneyball tells the story of Billy Beane and Peter Brand during the 2002 season, and how they used a sabermetric approach to build a winning team on a limited budget.
Following the 2001 season, the Oakland A’s lost Johnny Damon, Jason Giambi and Jason Isringhausen to free agency, and general manager Billy Beane, played by Brad Pitt, finds himself needing to replace them. During a scouting trip to Cleveland, Beane meets Peter Brand (played by Jonah Hill), a Yale economics graduate who impresses Beane with his statistical analyses of ballplayers.
With Brand’s help, Beane built a low-budget team by focusing on players’ stats, such as on-base percentage. The start of the season was predictably rough, with the A’s finding themselves ten games back. Beane convinces team owner Stephen Schott to stick with the plan, and Beane then trades Giambi to the Phillies for John Mabry and Carlos Peña to the Tigers, leaving manager Art Howe no choice but to use the team Beane and Brand have designed. Three weeks later, the Athletics are only four games behind first.
The A’s launch into a winning streak that culminates in a dramatic victory over the Kansas City Royals, in which the A’s achieve a then record-breaking 20th consecutive win. The team falls short in the playoffs, however, when they lose to the Minnesota Twins in the ALDS.
Recognizing that sabermetrics is the future of baseball, Boston Red Sox owner John Henry first hires Bill James to the organization, then offers Billy Beane a $12.5 million salary to join Boston as well. Peter Brand tries to persuade Beane that he is worth the offer, however, not wanting to leave his daughter behind, Beane ultimately turns it down to stay with Oakland.
As a movie, I enjoy Moneyball. It’s dramatic, emotional, and there’s lots and lots of baseball. It sheds light on the idea behind sabermetrics. Critics argue that the movie is not an entirely accurate depiction of real-life events, excluding key players and portraying various relationships in a slanted light. It seems to me that the transition from real-life-story-to-movie presents the same challenges as book-to-movie situations: there’s just no way to be 100% true to the original without creating an hours-long film. As with any movie based on real life (or on a book), it’s worth doing your own research on the side in addition to enjoying the cinematic experience.
On February 17, 1937, the New York Yankees purchased the contract of Babe Dahlgren from the Boston Red Sox. Dahlgren would go on to replace Lou Gehrig in the Yankees lineup at the end of the Iron Horse’s consecutive game streak in 1939. During his four-year tenure with the Bronx Bombers, Dahlgren would compile a .248 batting average in 1,143 at-bats before being bought by the Boston Braves.
Forty-year-old Roger Clemens agreed to a $10.1 million, one-year deal with the Yankees on December 30, 2002. At the time, Clemens indicated that 2003 would be his final year in baseball, and the end of the 2003 season became a series of public farewells met with appreciative cheering. Clemens would come out of retirement almost as quickly as he went into it, however, signing with the Houston Astros in early 2004.
In December 1919, Boston Red Sox owner Harry Frazee sold Babe Ruth for $125,000 to the Yankees, and also secured a $300,000 loan from the New York team. Throughout history, Frazee has been criticized for this deal, taking the blame for igniting the Curse of the Bambino, in which Boston did not win a World Series from 1918 to 2004. In the video below, originally aired in 2005, ESPN Classic takes a closer look at the circumstances surrounding the deal and comes to Frazee’s defense. True, Babe Ruth was one of the great pitchers of the era, but Ruth ultimately did not want to be a pitcher, but rather expressed more interest in hitting home runs. Additionally, Ruth’s antics off the field were well-known headache-inducers for any team. These are just a couple of the reasons that motivated Frazee to make the deal.