The Pecan Park Eagle

 

August 19, 1951. If you don’t know the story, and you’re in the LA area neighborhood today, try to drop in and check out how the Los Angeles Chapter of the The Eddie Gaedel Society and The Baseball Reliquary are commemorating the walk that little Eddie Gaedel took as a member of the St. Louis Browns back on August 19, 1951. It was the vertically challenged little baseball hero’s only time at bat in baseball, but it made quite a splash then – and it has since rippled into the 21st century as an even longer shift in the tides of baseball history.

https://bill37mccurdy.com/2017/08/18/socal-celebrates-gaedel-tommorow-aug-19/

Thereafter the happening, we’ve always been led to believe that American League President Will Harridge forbade the return of the little man – and others like him – from further serious participation in organized professional baseball. If he or the Commissioner ever expressed this mandate in writing, we’ve never seen the evidence of it. If it did exist, however, we doubt it would have the the lighter than air capacity to fly very far in 2017. Besides, when you look at what Jose Altuve (.362 BA) of the Houston Astros is doing today, it makes you wonder what else Mr. Gaedel had in him that he could only then take to the bars and then to his grave after his banishment from further playing time beyond that now famous date in August of 1951.

What’s that? You say that Jose Altuve is too tall to be brought into the picture here? OK. That’s fine. But then, how short does one have to be before he or she isn’t big enough to play major league baseball?

Don’t know the story of Eddie Gaedel? Google it. It won’t be hard to find. Everybody and his mother has been continuously writing about it for 66 years.

Here are the lyrics to the official anthem of The Eddie Gaedel Society, as written by yours truly and adopted and approved by Eddie Gaedel Society President Tom Keefe of the Spokane, Washington Chapter One in 2015:

The Ballad of Eddie Gaedel

(Verse, Melody and Chorus: to the tune of

“Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer”)

By Bill McCurdy, 1999. (Minor Revisions, 03/15/2015)

Verse:

You know Pee Wee and Scooter and short guys named Patek,

And Wee Willie Keeler – as small as a flyspeck,

All little people who drew baseball paychecks,

But, do you recall,

The most famous baseball short guy of them all?

Melody:

Bill Veeck, the Brownie owner,

Wore some very shiny clothes!

And if you saw his sport shirt,

You would even say, “It glows!”

 

All of the other owners,

Used to laugh and call him names!

They wouldn’t let poor Bill Veeck,

Join in any owner games!

Chorus:

Then one humid summer day,

Veeck signed a tiny man.

He smiled like a kid in a Panama suit,

Squeaking, “Play me – when you can!”

Melody:

His name was Eddie Gae-del,

Inches short of four feet tall!

He never played much baseball;

He was always just too small!

 

He wasn’t small on courage,

Eddie saw the larger plan.

Took his heart out of storage,

Making him the bigger man!

Chorus:


Then one day in Sportsman’s Park,

Eddie went to bat!

Took four balls and walked to first,

Then retired – just like that!

Melody:

Oh, how the purists hated,

Adding little Eddie’s name,

To the big book of records,

“ Gaedel” bore a blush of shame!

 

Now when you look up records,

Look up Eddie’s O.B.P.!

It reads a cool One Thousand,

Safe for all eternity!

Hail, Eddie!

********************

AMERICAN LEAGUE WEST STANDINGS

THRU GAMES OF FRIDAY, AUGUST 18, 2017

RANK	AL WEST	W	L	PCT.	GB
1	ASTROS	75	47	.615
2	ANGELS	62	60	.508	13.0
3	MARINERS	62	61	.504	13.5
4	RANGERS	60	61	.496	14.5
5	ATHLETICS	53	69	.434	22.0

********************

AMERICAN LEAGUE WEST GAME SCORES

THRU GAMES OF FRIDAY, AUGUST 18, 2017 

ASTROS 3 – ATHLETICS 1.

WHITE SOX 4 – RANGERS 3. 

MARINERS 7 – RAYS 1.

ORIOLES 9 – ANGELS 7.

 ********************

AMERICAN LEAGUE BATTING AVERAGE LEADERS 

THRU GAMES OF FRIDAY, AUGUST 18, 2017

RANK	PLAYER	TEAM	AB	H	2B	3B	HR	BA
1	JOSE ALTUVE	HOU	467	169	35	3	19	.362
NR *	CARLOS CORREA	HOU	325	104	18	1	20	.320
2	JEAN SEGURA	SEA	386	123	22	1	7	.319
3	ERIC HOSMER	KC	463	146	23	1	20	.315
4	MARWIN GONZALEZ	HOU	338	104	22	0	20	.308
5	JOSE RAMERIZ	CLE	452	139	38	5	18	.308
6	DIDI GREGORIUS	NYY	384	118	19	0	18	.307
7	AVISAIL GARCIA	CWS	368	113	21	3	13	.307
8	GEORGE SPRINGER	HOU	405	123	23	0	28	.304
9	DUSTIN PEDROIA	BOS	340	103	17	0	6	.303
10	EDDIE ROSARIO	MIN	385	116	27	2	16	.301
	Other Top 40 Astros
14	JOSH REDDICK	HOU	376	112	25	3	12	.298
17	YULI GURRIEL	HOU	422	125	33	1	15	.296
37	ALEX BREGMAN	HOU	405	110	29	5	14	.272

NR * LOST TIME ON THE DL HAS TEMPORARILY REMOVED CORREA FROM AN OFFICIAL QUALIFYING PLACE IN THE RANKING OF TOP 40 HITTERS.

********************

Tags: Most Famous Walk in Baseball History

This entry was posted on August 19, 2017 at 12:36 pm and is filed under Baseball, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.