Historic Baseball at the Henry Ford.

Heading on a vacation to Michigan this summer and can’t find enough thrilling touristy and basebally things to do… besides the obvious mainstream choices? How about something even more Historic than the Detroit Tigers (though not by much!)

Well, in case you are, stop by the Henry Ford Museum for a Historic Baseball game reenactment (there’s something about that Cival Ware Era, isn’t there?) with live 19th-century music, old school costumes, and real live actors? athletes? I’m not sure what we shall call them. But it sounds swell.

There’s even a tournament in August which is in its 10th anniversary. Historic Baseball clubs from all over the Midwest- great states like Ohio, and Michigan, and Ohio, and Michigan.

You should read more about it. I’ve got to go graduate from school and take finals and stuff.

Hey all, it’s time for another baseball po-em. You may recall our last poem, which coincidentally fell on National Poem In Your Pocket Day… Yes, it was completely an accident and I really had no clue that such a celebration existed. Brush up on that episode of Throwback Thursday by clicking here, you’ll want to, because our poem for today is the chuckling progeny of our old frields Tinker and Evers and Chance.

This poem, a change-up follow-up to Franklin Pierce Adams’ “Baseball’s Sad Lexicon” is entitled “Tinker to Evers?” by Steve Vittori. The poem was first published in 1989 in Spitball Magazine, a literary baseball magazine that features fiction, poetry, prose, art, and book reviews. In his poem, “Tinker to Evers?” Vittori has created an alternate universe, in which the famous Tinker and Evers and Chance are lousy fielders, their careers riddled with errors. Leading us to pause wonder, “Oh where would Chicago’s Bear Cubs have been?” It is indeed quite humorous.

For a ballclub to win in the National League
The infielders need to be versed
In the skills of sweeping the diamond
At shortstop and second and first.

Oh, where would Chicago’s Bear Cubs have been
In nineteen hundred and eight
If the men who patrolled up the middle
Could only produce at the plate?

If with glove not of gold and hands lined with lead
Each knocked down balls with knees or with head;
Then reached down to launch a sub-orbital throw
To the home team dugout or seventeenth row?

Then Pirates and Giants would score on these terrors
Four runs on no hits but five or six on errors,
On Merkle, on Tenney, on Bridwell; and Honus,
An infield double’s your double-hop bonus.

And how would Franklin P. Adams describe
These choreographers’ dance?
Why, just slap the ball up the middle.
Tinker to Evers? No Chance!

“Tinker to Evers?” by Steve Vittori, (c) 1989

Do you have a favorite baseball tradition? Is there a particular ghost of baseball past you would like to revisit? Ever wonder why they do what they do, and when they started doing it? If you have a suggestion, question, or submission for Throwback Thursday, contact Elise by tweeting @Elise_Myers.

Whenever you read something like this:

 The Library of Congress presents these documents as part of the record of the past. These primary historical documents reflect the attitudes, perspectives, and beliefs of different times. The Library of Congress does not endorse the views expressed in these collections, which may contain materials offensive to some readers.

You know you’re getting into some pretty deep controversy, right? Like we are discussing the Civil War, or eugenics, or Watergate. You might think you’re pretty close to digging up some good old Old Hickory propaganda. Or something. It’s 2013 folks, you know, the Library of Congress needs to protect themselves from civil lawsuit and other social injustices.

But does it not seem a little unnecessary that the aforementioned disclaimer is on the page for the Library of Congress’ Official Online Baseball Card Collection?

Yes. It is a thing. Thousands (2,100 to be exact) of tattered and torn and yellowed baseball cards from 1887-1914. All in one place. (Online.) Wherever I want them. (In my lap.) Whenever I want them. (Now.)

And there are some beauties:

Poppin’ collars. It’s okay to be left speechless.

Look out, ladies and gents. Dude Esterbrook is at first for the Indianapolis Hoosiers.

You can search the collection by keyword, team, player, or league… but not by moustache. I have discovered a flaw in your system, LOC.

» Continue reading “Throwback Thursday: Baseball Collectables, Taxpayers, And Hobbits”

Shorts have been a popular item in athletic apparel probably since we swapped out the loincloth, and their younger cousin, the kilt, for something a little less, shall we say, revealing. On second thought, however, I take that back, because I have now Googled: “men playing sports in kilts” and there are websites, such as SportKilt.com dedicated to providing men women and children with drafty fitness fashions, since 1995. One of their slogans is:

“Clothing for men who redefine being a man.”

I can’t say that I disapprove… But what I can say… as an aside… is that I fondly remember that my first boyfriend wore a kilt on a few occasions when we were 13, so I’m sure there is some pretentious American psychologist out there licking his lips in anticipation about all that he could say about that.

But enough of that. Today’s Throwback Thursday post is not about kilts as much as it is about shorts. We’ve established that shorts are popular in sports, but not so much baseball. And there is a good reason for that. Sliding. The only reason you need, really.

But what about another good reason for not wearing shorts in baseball? Oh, maybe because you just look ridiculous, Chicago White Sox.

Bucky Dent, circa 1976, breaking baseball commandments for sure.

Bill Veeck’s wife Mary supposedly takes the fall for this one, but it’s not unlike the incident in the Garden of Eden. Husband was there, husband was standing by, and the serpent said to the wife: “Is that really what the baseball gods said, that you shall not wear shorts in baseball?”

» Continue reading “Throwback Thursday: Baseball Shorts And Original Sin”

About six weeks ago I had to research sports psychology for a teachers’ recertification class.  I came upon an article from 2006 about Alex Rodriguez using generic “baseball-speak” in talking about his play.  You know what I’m talking about – all those seeming clichés.

• “I’m taking it one pitch at a time.”
• “It’s a long season.  Everybody goes through rough stretches.”
• “I’m just trying to stay on an even keel.  Not too high, not too low.”
• “Baseball is a game of failure – if a hitter succeeds 30 percent of the time, he’s a superstar.”

The A-Rod article didn’t say that sports psych’ didn’t work.  It did say, however, that it was hard to quantify its success. In some cases, it seemed the psychologist didn’t want to accept a player’s failure.  In others, the talent level of the player was so great that it wouldn’t take much to get the guy on the right track.  You can read it for yourself.

A second article I found was on the Babe Ruth, and his trip to the psych lab at Columbia University in 1921.  Basically, The Babe would be run through a battery of tests to see why he was so much better than his peers – and couldn’t clubs use these assessments to help in the turbulent, unpredictable of scouting? Tests run on The Babe ran from vision to muscles, from ears to his brain.  The Babe seemed to enjoy the process, and was above average in all areas.  As a result, it was hypothesized that George Herman Ruth could have been great at anything he chose to do.

The two articles were separated by roughly 85 years and pointed to the fact that the better the talent of the player, the better the results he would have — whether he utilized a sports psychologist or not.  This isn’t to bash the business of sports psychology.  The A-Rod article pointed out that without hard evidence, it’s hard to say how much psychology does to improve the players success.

» Continue reading “The Psychology Of A Baseball Player’s Success”

This is not what Zack Greinke experiences every day, but apparently it’s what Tom Garfinkel thinks he does.

We need to talk about people who continue to stigmatize mental illness.

I happen to have social anxiety disorder. I grew up with undiagnosed Asperger’s and was bullied horribly as a young girl, and as a result I now live with the constant fear of rejection and judgment from people. Combined with my horrible OCD, it’s awfully crippling and many social situations terrify me.

I got my Asperger’s diagnosis at age 20. There’s a lot of stigma attached to being on the autism spectrum, too, so much like my social anxiety disorder and OCD, I don’t talk about it too much in public except on the internet, where I blog about living with it.

So we need to bring up the CEO of the Padres, Tom Garfinkel, and what he said to Padres season ticket holders:

“He threw at him on purpose, OK?” Garfinkel told an estimated crowd of 40 or 50 at Petco Park on Friday, a day after the fight. “That’s what happened. They can say 3-and-2 count, 2-1 game, no one does that. Zack Greinke is a different kind of guy. Anyone seen ‘Rain Man’? He’s a very smart guy.”

Rain Man, as most people know, is a film about an autistic savant. Now, most people on the autism spectrum, myself included, don’t have savant skills, but the movie also opened a large number of people’s eyes to autism in general. I’m mind-boggled over this reference, though, because Zack Greinke is most definitely not on the autism spectrum. He has social anxiety disorder.

As someone who has both, I know the difference – social anxiety is defined by severe anxiety in social situations, often brought on by bad experiences in one’s youth, like my bullying. Autism is a difference in one’s brain that makes social interaction difficult. They often go together because, as in my case, children on the autism spectrum are bullied for being different and therefore develop social anxiety, which continues to plague them as adults. I for one am particularly nervous around men my age, as it was boys, not fellow girls, who made fun of me. It prevents me from testing the dating waters because I’m so afraid of negative judgment and more mental and emotional harm.

Here’s the problem with what Tom Garfinkel said: although he didn’t directly refer to Greinke as ‘Rain Man,’ he revealed an extremely poor understanding of mental health issues and autism, one that’s unfortunately quite pervasive in the public’s minds, as well. Garfinkel implied with his comment that autism and social anxiety are the same thing – which they are most definitely not – and reminded me that we still have a long way to go in this society before we overcome the stigma on mental illness in this country.

A year ago today, my colleague Stacey Gotsulias published this article on mental illness in baseball. It’s an absolute must-read. Mental health is not something we should be stigmatizing – it’s something we should be accepting and understanding more. It’s the 21st century. We don’t just take people with mental health problems and throw them into asylums anymore. We need to be learning about them and accepting them and understanding that like chronic physical injuries, mental health issues don’t leave and have to be regulated throughout one’s life.

It’s time to stop stigmatizing mental health in sports. In fact, it’s long past time to stop stigmatizing mental health everywhere. We fear what we do not understand. If people come to a better understanding of mental health issues, then society will be able to accept people – including myself and my colleague Stacey – with them. Don’t judge us automatically. Don’t assume that we need to be institutionalized. Just listen and try to understand and don’t ever, ever treat people with mental illnesses negatively.

Because you know something? They aren’t. Mental health issues are like every other chronic illness out there – something to live with that need understanding and acceptance.

Enough is enough.

Of all sports, baseball is, in my opinion, the most poetic. If you’ve watched the game, you agree. If you were raised on a desert island  and never watched the sport but through some turn of events managed to have a radio (or construct one from found objects, say coconuts or potatoes) and happened to tune into Vin Scully at Chavez Ravine, you would agree. Baseball is poetic. Through the gradual paced buildup, the long-awaited moments of euphoria, and all the slow innings that gently roll into one another, baseball has distinct rhythm and meter unlike any other sport.

Baseball is poetic in movement and in word. The concentration; the subtleties in windups, in swings, in outfield snags; even charging the mound has a colorful language of its own, one that we try to capture with words, but fail at our attempts using the common tongue. Baseball demands a set of words and phrases- a lexicon- of its own, in order for the feeling to be captured, transcribed, and understood.

On today’s Throwback Thursday, I would like to begin a tradition of sharing baseball poetry of auld lang syne, some less auld than others, of course. We will begin this week with a brief poem by Franklin Pierce Adams, published in 1910 in the New York Evening Mail. This poem is written from the viewpoint of a New York Giants fan in witness of the impressive (and utterly heart-wrenching) fielding prowess of three early 1900′s Chicago Cubs infielders: Johnny Evers, Joe Tinker, and Frank Chance.

If poetry isn’t really your thing (yet) but baseball is, read this poem through a couple times. Familiarize yourself with the story that the poem is describing. Then, I highly recommend, read the poem aloud. You’ll notice how playful the language seems, though the mood still lamenting.

These are the saddest of possible words:
“Tinker to Evers to Chance.”
Trio of bear cubs, and fleeter than birds,
Tinker and Evers and Chance.
Ruthlessly pricking our gonfalon bubble,
Making a Giant hit into a double-
Words that are heavy with nothing but trouble:
“Tinker to Evers to Chance.”

“Baseball’s Sad Lexicon” by Franklin Pierce Adams, (c) 1910.

Do you have a favorite baseball tradition? Is there a particular ghost of baseball past you would like to revisit? Ever wonder why they do what they do, and when they started doing it? If you have a suggestion, question, or submission for Throwback Thursday, contact Elise by tweeting @Elise_Myers.

Pretend you’re a mouse. It’s a stretch, I know. For some of you.

Now, pretend you’re a mouse with an intellect rival to that of a human being. Like mouse-Stephen-Hawking, mouse-Einstein. Harder still, eh?

And imagine you used your incredible mousey intellect to design a supercomputer named Deep Thought, in order to ask her one question:

What is the answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe, and everything?

And seven-and-a-half million years later, Deep Thought tells you this:

42.

42 is the answer to the ultimate question of life the universe and everything.

You would agree, if you were a mouse-genius, or at least, if you’ve ever stumbled across one of Douglas Adams’ delightful science fiction novels in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series. That’s my excuse.

But also, you would probably find 42 to be a significant number if you have ever been inside a baseball stadium. Which is more what this Throwback Thursday article is about, as you might guess.

Because, you know, Jackie Robinson wore number 42. And, I might add, Jackie Robinson was The Man. (And I don’t mean that in the stick-it-to-the-man way.) But we talk about Jackie Robinson so often, don’t we? So why today? Because, dear reader, tomorrow, a very special movie about a very special man is coming to theaters near you. Yes, that’s right, it’s 42, the Jackie Robinson story and who cares if it’s going to be good (it is), because baseball.

We could sit here and go through the story of Jackie’s life, but that would include too many spoilers. So this weekend, while you’re struggling through that painful pre-preview “entertainment” at your local movie theater, or waiting in line outside in the near-freezing cold for the 10pm showing tonight, why not whip out some Jackie Robinson trivia to go with that fluorescent-yellow popcorn? It will be a good time (But it probably won’t help with the kernels that are stuck in your teeth).

» Continue reading “Throwback Thursday: The Number 42″

Monday was the eighth day of the season, so on one hand it’s way too early to crown anyone as a post-season favorite. But it’s also far too early to jump ship. The 162-game grind is barely under way, and there’s no way to have a grip on things yet.

That being said, how can we not wonder who truly will be in the hunt for the ring?

There are several things that will be necessary for a team to make it to the post-season:

1. Good starting pitching. No matter what kind of offense a club has, it’s going to need top-notch pitching. That begins with the starters. How about the Nationals, Reds, Dodgers, Giants and Phillies in the N.L. and Detroit, Tampa Bay, Oakland and Toronto in the A.L.? The Phillies will hope Roy Halladay is healthy, and Toronto will need to have new faces few comfortable on the bump and in the stadium.
2. Bullpens. Start with Atlanta, then probably Tampa Bay. The Cincinnati Reds, Giants and Orioles are surely in the mix, and Oakland and the Nationals merit mention.

Great starting pitching can make bullpens look better than they are, because they can be used with more flexibility. Solid bullpens can help starters out on the rough days. Teams that have both live in a state of luxury.

And remember, good bullpens might start with a closer, but as often as not they have the middle relievers and setup men capable of getting the ball in the closer’s hand in the ninth. Mariano Rivera wouldn’t have the rep he does if he pitched for a lower-echelon team. He might have been just as good, but we would never have heard of him.

» Continue reading “What Does It Take To Get To October?”

In or out? The Knothole Gang, photograph from the Milwaukee Sentinel, via BorchertField.com.

When I was in second grade, Derek Jeter was a much younger man, and my greatest worries were what was being offered for hot lunch in the cafeteria. We spent the class day learning how to type and write in cursive (guess which skill has proven more useful), and we ate watermelon jelly beans. Life was good.

I remember one day in class we watched a movie called The Buttercream Gang. I don’t remember anything about it actually, other than that it happened. And also that there was one scene from the movie that has been inaccurately remembered in my mind… some angsty teenage kids from the ’50s walking around in caves or cliffs or something, with little knives, sitting on the hoods of their fast cars, saying things like:

“Is that a threat?”

“No. It’s a promise.”

That became the coolest thing to be said on the playground. Ever. I didn’t know what threats were. Or much less, buttercream. And I didn’t know a lot about gangs either, except that being in one made you cool, so we decided to start throwing pinecones at all the other kids (we called them atomic bombs).

Gangs appeal to kids. I don’t mean the violent scary serious kind of gangs though. I mean the kind of gangs where you buy bubblegum cigarettes and ride your bikes around the north woods of Wisconsin, scaring deer and doing secret hand signals with your second-cousins-once-removed (for instance). The kinds of gangs that appeal to kids desired to fit in and to be cool and, if you were to degrade humanity to animals with clothes, our instinct to be a part of the pack.

“If kids wat to be in a gang, for one reason or another, like to delineate the in from the out, or simply to watch baseball games together, then why not exploit that simple human desire, the desire of belonging, as a marketing strategy?”

-Said one St. Louis Cardinals organization under Branch Rickey in 1917.

And voila, the Knothole Gang was established.

The Knothole Gang: an organization of youngsters fostered to early-onset addictions to baseball. The theory being:

“If we let these little ones come to baseball games at reduced prices now, by the time they are adults they will be completely physically and mentally dependent upon our franchise, and will pay big money for fully grown adult-sized tickets. Then, if they could be so lucky, these baseball-breathing adults might reproduce and create more munchkins to fuel enrollment in the Knothole Gang. And the money floods into our pockets, and the cycle continues. Have a cigar.”

» Continue reading “Throwback Thursday: The Knothole Gang”