2jakes
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The great Jimmie Foxx hangs up his jersey for the final time. Ebbets Field.
(.325 BA, 1.038 OPS, 534 HR, 1922 RBI, 1751 R) 9/23/45
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BATTER UP!
- Thread starter 2jakes
- Start date
The great Jimmie Foxx hangs up his jersey for the final time. Ebbets Field.
(.325 BA, 1.038 OPS, 534 HR, 1922 RBI, 1751 R) 9/23/45
2jakes
I'll Lock Up
- Messages
- 9,680
- Location
- Alamo Heights ☀️ Texas
A Meeting Of Baseball Royalty: Ted Williams & Babe Ruth shake hands at Fenway Park, Boston (1943)
2jakes
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"Pitching is the art of instilling fear."
- Sandy Koufax
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Koufax could break a shoulder with his fast ball, deliberately it was claimed.
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When I was in school, I worked as an overnite convenience store clerk and my boss told me a tale that as a kid his mom
took him to a Red Sox game and upon leaving the stadium late that afternoon they met Williams and another man. His mom asked
TW for an autograph for her son, which Williams declined; thereby prompting mom to launch a diatribe against Williams.
Phenomenal eyesight and an extremely disciplined strike zone aside, Williams' rather mercurial fan attitude can be seen from
a variety of angles but all point to a fairly complicated inner nature.
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In aggregate - notable exceptions in both the GE and today (so no pictures of fat baseball players today are necessary - I get it, some still exist) - but GE athletes did not maintain the physiques that athletes do today - again, overall.
2jakes
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I broke the "unwritten law" of journalism twice. (I became a fan).
After interviewing David Robinson (San Antonio Spurs) I asked if he would sign
his rookie card for me. He complied.
I found him to be a very nice & friendly
man.
The other was Steffi Graf who was #1
in the world of professional tennis.
I had the nerve to ask if I could hit
with her.
She said yes. She held back on her
shots so I could keep up with her.
Afterwards she signed her name on
my shirt sleeve.
Later during her match against her
opponent, she was like a tigress.
Beating her without mercy.
And Jake La Motta was just the way
Bob DeNiro portrayed him. There was
an inner sense that did not required
words to feel the potential rage that
could surface at any time.
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LizzieMaine
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Jimmie Foxx might have been the physically strongest man ever to play baseball. He wasn't any kind of a bodybuilder, but he worked on his family's farm in the off season tossing hay bales into a loft -- by hand.
Koufax was a hard thrower, but Walter Johnson may have thrown even harder. He had a whip-like semi-sidearm delivery that lashed the ball forward with such force that it whistled as it passed the hitter. Consider stepping into the batters' box against Walter Johnson in 1912, with no protective gear of any kind, and you'll get a sense of how courageous old-time ballplayers had to be.
Another very hard thrower you don't hear much about anymore was Ryne Duren, who came up as a pitcher with the Yankees in the late fifties, was palmed off on the Kansas City Athletics, and ended up with the Los Angeles Angels. No matter what uniform he wore, he wore it with a pair of very dark, very thick glasses -- he had very poor vision, and very poor control, and his favorite way of intimidating batters was to throw his first warmup pitch at extremely high speed over the catcher's head into the seats behind home plate.
But the consensus for the hardest-throwing pitcher ever to compete professionally is a minor-leaguer named Steve Dalkowski, who had Johnson's speed coupled with Duren's control. He terrorized several Class D, C, B, and A leagues while moving thru the Baltimore Orioles farm system in the early sixties. He was also a prodigious drinker and, to be charitable, was said to be Not Very Intelligent. This combination would have been too much in most cases, but Dalkowski was so fast -- generally believed to have been in the range of 110mph -- that the Orioles stuck with him, trying to teach him to pitch. He finally seemed to be getting it all lined up, and made the Orioles at Spring Training in 1963, only to pop his elbow in an exhibition game, and was never the same. He fell back into the minors, was released, and began drinking so heavily that he suffered permanent brain damage. He never played a regular-season game in a major league uniform.
And on top of all that, he couldn't see, either.
Koufax was a hard thrower, but Walter Johnson may have thrown even harder. He had a whip-like semi-sidearm delivery that lashed the ball forward with such force that it whistled as it passed the hitter. Consider stepping into the batters' box against Walter Johnson in 1912, with no protective gear of any kind, and you'll get a sense of how courageous old-time ballplayers had to be.
Another very hard thrower you don't hear much about anymore was Ryne Duren, who came up as a pitcher with the Yankees in the late fifties, was palmed off on the Kansas City Athletics, and ended up with the Los Angeles Angels. No matter what uniform he wore, he wore it with a pair of very dark, very thick glasses -- he had very poor vision, and very poor control, and his favorite way of intimidating batters was to throw his first warmup pitch at extremely high speed over the catcher's head into the seats behind home plate.
But the consensus for the hardest-throwing pitcher ever to compete professionally is a minor-leaguer named Steve Dalkowski, who had Johnson's speed coupled with Duren's control. He terrorized several Class D, C, B, and A leagues while moving thru the Baltimore Orioles farm system in the early sixties. He was also a prodigious drinker and, to be charitable, was said to be Not Very Intelligent. This combination would have been too much in most cases, but Dalkowski was so fast -- generally believed to have been in the range of 110mph -- that the Orioles stuck with him, trying to teach him to pitch. He finally seemed to be getting it all lined up, and made the Orioles at Spring Training in 1963, only to pop his elbow in an exhibition game, and was never the same. He fell back into the minors, was released, and began drinking so heavily that he suffered permanent brain damage. He never played a regular-season game in a major league uniform.
And on top of all that, he couldn't see, either.
LizzieMaine
Bartender
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- Where The Tourists Meet The Sea
The definitive Williams story has to be the day he got so mad at striking out that he threw his bat into the stands and hit a woman in the head. That woman turned out to be Joe Cronin's housekeeper, so you can imagine that Theodore Samuel got called into the office after the game.
2jakes
I'll Lock Up
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- Messages
- 10,379
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I don't think you are allowed to say that in today's game! My fave, as a Giant fan, Sal The Barber Maglio.
2jakes
I'll Lock Up
- Messages
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- Alamo Heights ☀️ Texas
2jakes
I'll Lock Up
- Messages
- 9,680
- Location
- Alamo Heights ☀️ Texas
Tiki Tom
My Mail is Forwarded Here
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"Love is the most important thing in the world, but baseball is pretty good, too."
---- Yogi Berra
---- Yogi Berra
2jakes
I'll Lock Up
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Letter from Mama!
Read the letter below this photo then see if you can spot the guy who got it!
Dear Son,
I am writing to let you know that while you are in the military, I turned your room
into a guest room after a good cleaning.
I gave the little boy down the street that old box of baseball cards
under your bed. He said something about Honus Wagner in the collection.
Was that the man who invented baseball or the uniforms?
Love,
Your Mother.
Read the letter below this photo then see if you can spot the guy who got it!
Dear Son,
I am writing to let you know that while you are in the military, I turned your room
into a guest room after a good cleaning.
I gave the little boy down the street that old box of baseball cards
under your bed. He said something about Honus Wagner in the collection.
Was that the man who invented baseball or the uniforms?
Love,
Your Mother.
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My baseball card collection got tossed with the Playboys. Casualties of war.
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Mine were tossed too...
While in the Army I was assigned as military bodyguard to a USO Playmate/Penthouse Pet troupe.
Tiki Tom
My Mail is Forwarded Here
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Playboy!
How charmingly quaint. Smacks almost of wholesomeness.
BTW: Do they still make baseball cards?
How charmingly quaint. Smacks almost of wholesomeness.
BTW: Do they still make baseball cards?
2jakes
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Yes they still make baseball cards
(minus the gum).
I'm waiting to hear from my bank to
see if my loan is approved so I can buy
some.
LizzieMaine
Bartender
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Sal Maglie was the pitching coach for the Red Sox in 1967, and it was he who taught Gentleman Jim Lonborg to be, shall we say, a bit less Gentlemanly on the mound. The result was a Cy Young Award, a pennant, and, oh yes, fun like this:
