The 2023 Running Baseball Thread

No one can possibly be surprised by this, as unfortunate as it may be.

 

Especially since this is the third or fourth start he's left early and we haven't even gotten out of April

 

I have zero explanation for what has happened there the last two years. Turns out it wasn’t LaRussa. Sure was fun blaming him for it, though.

 

This White Sox fan's call-in radio rant is worth the time: You Really Gotta Hear this Fan Absolutely TEAR INTO the White Sox Live on the Radio

 

That guy might deserve his own show.

 

JT The Brick, Jr.

 

My first game at that place was when I was a wee youngster in 1957. I saw a guy named Joe Caffie hit his first major league home run for the Indians against, I think, the Yankees. Why I remember that name, I don't know. He played 44 games over two years, then never played in the majors again.

 

I had a baseball history professor in college who witnessed negro league games. That was the one that wowed me most. It was a first-hand account only a handful people alive could’ve had.

 

Years ago I worked with an older guy who saw Jackie Robinson play for the Montreal Royals against the Toronto Maple Leafs. (The mother of one of my wife's coworkers lived in the same Montreal apartment building as the Robinsons, she said they kept in touch via Christmas cards for many years.)

And I saw loads of Jays games (and Argo games and concerts) at Exhibition Stadium, it was a frigid, windswept dump but it was our dump.

 

Mine was in 1962. Jim Kaat vs. Gary Bell.

Probably the most famous "old guy" I saw play was Luke Easter, for the Rochester Red Wings when he was 44 or 45. Also saw Ed Kranepool when he was 18.

 

The two guys with whom I worked at the Contra Costa Times as a senior in high school had both seen Joe DiMaggio play ... in high school. Hank Aguirre gave up a home run to Mickey Mantle in the first game I saw in person at Tiger Stadium. And I can add the Astrodome, the original Oakland Coliseum pre-Mount Davis, Candlestick before they added seats for the 49ers and multiple minor league parks to the discussion.

I'm well over 80 racetracks visited as a fan or writer and at least half of those have been plowed under for development. They will come, Ray. And then they'll tear it down.