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All Time World Series Wins Leader Board

November 3, 2010

Once upon a time, the Cubs even hosted a few World Series matches at Wrigley Field.

The World Series Record by Team or Franchise, 1903-2010 (as prepared on Wikepedia and reproduced here for the sake of easy, quick reference):

Team †
↓		 Series
won↓		 Latest
win↓		 Series
played↓		 Latest
Series↓
New York Yankees (AL) 27 2009 40 2009
St. Louis Cardinals (NL) 10 2006 17 2006
[Philadelphia/Kansas City] Oakland Athletics (AL) 9 1989 14 1990
Boston Red Sox [Americans] (AL) 7 2007 11 2007
[New York] San Francisco Giants (NL) 6 2010 18 2010
[Brooklyn] Los Angeles Dodgers (NL) ‡ 6 1988 18 1988
Cincinnati Reds (NL) 5 1990 9 1990
Pittsburgh Pirates (NL) 5 1979 7 1979
Detroit Tigers (AL) 4 1984 10 2006
Chicago White Sox (AL) 3 2005 5 2005
[Boston/Milwaukee] Atlanta Braves (NL) 3 1995 9 1999
[1st Washington Senators] Minnesota Twins (AL) 3 1991 6 1991
[St. Louis Browns] Baltimore Orioles (AL) 3 1983 7 1983
Philadelphia Phillies (NL) 2 2008 7 2009
Florida Marlins (NL, 1993) * 2 2003 2 2003
Toronto Blue Jays (AL, 1977) * 2 1993 2 1993
New York Mets (NL, 1962) * 2 1986 4 2000
Cleveland Indians (AL) 2 1948 5 1997
Chicago Cubs (NL) 2 1908 10 1945
[Los Angeles Angels; California Angels; Anaheim Angels]
Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (AL, 1961) *		 1 2002 1 2002
Arizona Diamondbacks (NL, 1998) * 1 2001 1 2001
Kansas City Royals (AL, 1969) * 1 1985 2 1985
[2nd Washington Senators] Texas Rangers (AL, 1961) * 0 — 1 2010
Tampa Bay Rays [Devil Rays] (AL, 1998) * 0 — 1 2008
Colorado Rockies (NL, 1993) * 0 — 1 2007
Houston Astros [Colt .45’s] (NL, 1962) * 0 — 1 2005
San Diego Padres (NL, 1969) * 0 — 2 1998
[Seattle Pilots] Milwaukee Brewers (AL 1969; NL 1998) * 0 — 1 1982
[Montreal Expos] Washington Nationals (NL, 1969) * 0 — 0 —
Seattle Mariners (AL, 1977) * 0 — 0 —

* original league and year of origin for franchise teams.

When the New York/San Francisco Giants defeated the Texas Rangers in this year’s 2010 World Series, they broke a 7th place tie with the Cincinnati Reds and Pittsburgh Pirates for 7th place all time in wins and entered into a 5th place tie with the Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers for 5th place at six wins each.

For the Giants, it was their fourth try since their last win in 1954 that did the trick. On three previous trips, all from San Francisco in 1962, 1989, and 2002), the Giants had fallen short, but not in 2010. The Boys from the west side of the bay put together a scrappy club of hungry veterans and talented youngsters to finally ring the bell for all those fans in NoCal that have supported them since they arrived on the west coast in 1958.

A quick glance at the results chart shows us that the World Series has never been visited by the EEOC. Only the best clubs get there and the New York Yankees have been able to afford more of the best players that make up these best best clubs than any other – and by far.  Those 40 World Series appearances by the Yankees are more than double the numbers compiled by their nearest rivals.

At least, the Houston Astros and Texas Rangers have reached now made it to a World Series, even if neither won. The Astros did it first in 2005, but the Rangers became the first State of Texas club to actually win a World Series game in 2010.

The Chicago Cubs haven’t won a World Series since 1908. That’s 102 years since they took their second World Series crown and 65 years since they made their 10th Series appearance in 1945. That Billy Goat Curse is powerful – and accountably much more far-reaching than that more famous Curse of the Bambino that haunted the Boston Red Sox from 1918 to 2004.

The list of existing teams that have never won a single World Series includes the Texas Rangers, the Tampa Bay Rays, the Colorado Rockies, the Houston Astros, the San Diego Padres, the Milwaukee Brewers, the current Washington Nationals, and the Seattle Mariners.

The Washington Nationals, a club that began life as the Montreal Expos in 1969, and the Seattle Mariners are now the only two existing clubs that have never even been to a World Series.

What is the probability that the winner’s trend we see here will continue to skew its way inevitably in the direction of the New York Yankees much more often than most other places? A lot of that answer hinges on which club Rangers ace Cliff Lee signs to play for as a free agent going into the 2011 season.

Baseball clubs that can afford to build the foundation can also build the house. Baseball clubs with a ton of money can buy the whole house, plus stockpile a lot of the materials that others might otherwise have used to build their own nice houses nearby.

At any rate, have fun staring at the list. It’s also fun to pay attention to trends you see about who’s been there lately – and who hasn’t been there in a very long time.

Congratulations again to the 2010 champion San Francisco Giants. They are having their hometown victory parade today – and they are taking the parade down the same route the 1958 Giants traveled on their “Welcome to San Francisco” parade back in their first west coast year.

Nice touch, San Francisco!

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The Giants Win The Series!

November 2, 2010

Giants Closer Brian Wilson Celebrates a Last Out K!

The Giants won their division. The Giants won the pennant. And now the battling San Francisco Giants have won their 6th World Series overall, the first since they moved to San Francisco in 1958, and the first of any kind since they rolled over the Cleveland Indians to take the crown as the New York Giant in 1954.

The Giants’ five game win over the Texas Rangers was a textbook tribute to what’s possible when talent and tenacity come together in one series. Their combination of coming-up-fast rookies and going-out-like-gangbuster veterans was way, way too much toothy win-hunger for the generally more talented Rangers to handle.

Veteran shortstop Edgar Renteria was a worthy recipient of the Series MVP Award, but they could have just as easily handed the nod to tw-game winner Tim Lincecum or to one-game winners Matt Cain or Madison Bumgarner – or even to rookie catcher Buster Posey.

If we sweep hand the Giants infield, we find the left side amply held down by two veterans with fast-closing expiration dates on their playing careers. In spite of their ages, Juan Uribe at third and Edgar Renteria at short played at the top of their games when it really counted – and each contributed game-winning homers along the way. The right side also fell into inspired hands in Freddy Sanchez at second and Ex-Astro Aubrey Huff at first. Sanchez started the Series by hammering out a record three straight doubles and then a single in his first four trips to the plate and Huff’s long ball made its own contribution to winning along the way.

Beyond the Giant killer starters of Tim Lincecum, Matt, Cain, and Madison Bumgarner, the San Francisco pen was anchored by those scary beard “Smith Brothers” in hair-bonded spirits, Sergio Romo and Brian Wilson. All the arms did was shut out the Rangers twice and hold Texas to 12 total runs and a .190 team batting average.

With 6 total World Series victories, the New York/San Francisco Giants are now tied with the Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers for fifth place on the all-time winners’ list. The St. Louis Cardinals are second with 10 WS victories and, of course, the all-time runaway leaders shall likely remain in first place throughout the balance of the 21st century. And guess who that might be?

Let’s not see the same hands.

That’s right. The New York Yankees are still number one in World Series victories with a total of 27 championships.

As for the 2010 Giants, none of that Yankee stuff matters this morning. All of their old and young Giant clocks came together over the past week to deliver the World Series banner to that beautiful city by the bay this morning – and we don’t mean to Oakland. Today the past and future don’t matter so much in San Francisco. It’s time to celebrate and enjoy the present for all the joy it’s worth.

A number of Giants fans bore post-Game Five signs proclaiming the same general idea: “At long last, the torture is over!”

The “torture” is a reference from the Giants fan perspective on what it’s like living with the pain of near misses on winning over the years. Other than Yankee fans, we all do it, and Giant fans can make a good case for how painful their course has been. As an Astros fan, but baseball man to the core, my guess is that these are the three biggest moments of torture in San Francisco Giants fan history since the team moved to the West Coast and first came to life as such in 1958:

1962: Giants lose Game 7 to Yankees in San Francisco by one run when. with the bases loaded and two outs in the bottom of the 9th,  slugger Willie McCovey’s line drive smash is speared by a leaping little Yankee 2nd baseman named Bobby Richardson.

1989: Twenty-seven years later, the Giants get back to the World Series, but they suffer both an earthquake and an ego-embarrassing loss to across-the-bay rival Oakland.

2002: Thirteen years later, the Giants have a chance to put the Angels away in Game 6, but they blow that one and then lose Game 7 too, once more generating the torture that their fans now celebrate in 2010 as a time of deliverance from that evil torment.

Congratulations, Giants! Congratulations, Giant fans! And may a little hard core of the joy you feel today live on forever in your hearts!

Monte Irvin, HOF

Finally, we want to congratulate our old SABR friend, 91-year old Monte Irvin, on the victory of the Giants in this year’s World Series. Monte Irvin was there as a player for that last World Series championship for the Giants in New York in 1954 – and he was also there in San Francisco last week to throw out the first ball in Series Game One.

Reliable sources report that Houston retiree Irvin was floating on Cloud Nine over the Giants’ chances after they took the 3-1 game lead in Arlington so we are assuming that his heart and soul are really soaring today.

Congratulations to you too, Monte Irvin! And hang around. The Giants need you. Baseball needs.you. Your friends and family need you. This world needs you. There will always be another World Series. There will never be another Monte Irvin.

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How To Make a Real Baseball

November 1, 2010

our tattered friend

Have you ever wondered how they make major league baseballs?

Bob Dorrill and Pat Callahan, a couple of friends who don’t know each other (I don’t think) both sent me links recently to this fascinating clip prepared by the Discovery Channel on how it’s done. The process is both fascinating and mind-boggling. How they ever get that much uniformity in product output without a mass hospitalization of workers for either blindness or acute psychiatric psychosis is beyond me,

Everything from the preparation of the inner cork, the serial winding of differentially thick threads around each cork center, the adjustment of the wind on each thread to just the right tension level and circumferential size, the precise cutting of the cowhide leather into two perfectly matching covers, the selection of the stitching material, and the hand-stitching of each ball by skilled experts is absolutely astonishing.

I would still be working on the first ball I tried to stitch together last April!

They probably don’t tell these perfection-proud ball cover-stitchers what is probably going to happen to most of these balls, that they are either going to be lost as foul balls on their first pitch in play, or else, thrown out of the game as soon as they hit the ground and pick up a little smudge mark. I would hate to think how that information might reach out and immediately impair the care that is now taken by workers on making sure that each ball is just the right size and weight.

Here’s the link to a brief tape on the process. Watch it and never feel quite so indifferent again  about the sight, weight, and shape of a brand new baseball.

How baseballs are manufactured

As kids on the sandlot, we knew the difference between real baseballs and cheap imitations. The cheap jobs turned flat on one side from their first contact with a bat. By game’s end, the cheapo baseballs  had more tiny flat sides than a fly has eye lenses – and they many-side bounced, rather than rolled, along the ground. Rarely did those balls get a second shot on the sandlot, if we had any other choice at hand.

A lot of times, that other choice for a sandlot game ball was a really good Texas League ball whose cover pretty much resembled the one in today’s picture. Tattered and frayed red seams often were held together as much as possible with black electrical tape because we valued these balls, literally to their cork cores. They stayed round, they rode far off the crack of the bat, and they rolled true – like a real baseball should.

Speaking of baseballs, the season could end tonight, couldn’t it? With the surprising Giants now up by three games to one over the mostly stupefied Rangers, it’s pretty much over now, as is. Texas will have to win three games in a row now to take the World Series and the last two of those improbable victories will have to come in San Francisco for that to happen. And with Lincecum and Cain pitching the next two games for the Giants, what are the odds of a stillborn Ranger miracle now, even with Cliff Lee taking the mound for the Rangers in Game Five at Arlington tonight?

Here’s another way to express my pessimism about the Rangers: The odds of the Texas Rangers now winning the 2010 World Series are now longer than the odds of me ever making a real major league baseball and having it come out round at the right weight and size.

Of course, if you don’t mind a little electrical tape, I can put together a baseball that will get us through today’s game.

 

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Babies Play Rocky Horror Base Ball in Katy

October 31, 2010

Houston Babies Have Scary Day in Katy DH Loss.

Yesterday was Halloween Weekend Saturday. The way the Houston Babies played at their vintage base ball tourney in Katy, Texas left no doubt of the fact.

The boys and girl of the Houston club were a  little rusty in their first action since April, reverting to the old habit of hitting up on the ball and setting themselves up in the process for a ton of one-bounce-catch outs that took away all hope for victory against any club that is hitting straight away and gap-slashing the bejabbers out of the old round pill.

The day started out on a cheerful note.

It always seems like old times when Bob Blair pitches.

Ace Babies hurler Bob Blair pitched the Babies’ first game as visitors against the new Katy Combine club, but he had little support from a team that appeared to be suffering from the San Francisco site version of Rangeritis highlighted too recently by that more famous bunch of ballers from Arlington, Texas.

“We just couldn’t hit doodily,”  said Bob Dorrill, the mild-mannered mentor of the pediatric punching Houston Babies.

Down 3-1 with two outs in their last time up, the Babies had the tying runs on 2nd and 3rd, but couldn’t bring them home. One more lazy true-bouncing fly to left field and the game was in the can as a 3-1 Katy win in their first tourney action.

While we are kidding around (a little bit) in our loser stew, it is important we also tip our Babes caps to the Katy Business Association for putting together a Halloween Vintage Base Ball Weekend activity that took the pumpkin orange cake as a wonderful tribute to the history of the old ballgame.

Presenting the Colors.

At 10 o’clock, the day began with individual introductions of each member of the Housotn Babies and Katy Combine clubs. A scouting group then brought in the flag for a presentation of the colors as a Five State Champion barbershop quartet sang Our National Anthem. Then some kid and me were chosen to throw out and theoretically catch the first pitch of the game. The kid threw it a little wide. I retrieved it from the backstop.

After Game One, barbecue, fries, and soft drinks were served free  to all club members and we were entertained throughout the rest of the day by a talented little kid banjo band that played everything from “The Theme from Deliverance” to “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” Had comedian/musician Steve Martin dropped in on us yesterday, he would have felt right at home picking music with the kids.

You might have thought that all of this hoopla would have inspired our veteran Babies club to new heights in our second game after lunch against the visiting Boerne (TX) White Sox. Well, I guess it did in the sense that we used Game Two to hit some even higher one-bonce-catch outs as we also dove into a much messier job of mishandling the ball on the field. As a result, we lost Game Two of the day to Boerne by 8-4. Larry Hajduk pitched credibly against Boerne, but he got very little help from the outbreak of dropped balls and errant throws in the field – and against another club that understands that vintage ball is all about slashing the ball where the fielders “ain’t” there long enough for a one-bounce-catch out.

"We'll be back!" - Houston Babies

Yesterday’s action will be our last vintage ball play until 2011, but look for a return of the Houston Babies in even better form early next year. We’ll be back. It happens every spring.

Meanwhile today, have a safe, fun, and happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from The Houston Babies!

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Base Ball Today in Katy

October 30, 2010

Katy, Texas Ready for Halloween Base Ball!

It all starts today like a giant misplaced Fourth of July firecracker, one now set to explode on the day before Halloween in Katy, Texas in nippy fall weather under beautiful blue Texas autumn skies. Our Houston Babies are one of four teams participating in the one-day, loosely organized schedule in which each of the four teams will play two games, wrapping the 1860s style vintage base ball tourney around a communal lunch that I think includes hot fogs and barbecue.

The other three clubs include the Richmond Giants, the Boerne White Sox, and a new club from Katy whose name is not yet known at this late publication date. Site of the games is Katy City Park #1, located in the 2200 block of Avenue D at Franz Road in Katy, Texas. To reach the park from Houston, drive I-10 West to Katy and then take the Highway 90 exit. Follow Hwy 90N to Avenue D, turn right and proceed to the park.

The Houston Babies (Our new uniforms are much more colorful than these old digs.)

Opening ceremonies begin at 10 o’clock this morning with a Scout Commemoration ceremony and the playing of our National Anthem. Our Houston Babies play in the opener at 10:30 AM against an unspecified opponent. We will also play again in the afternoon at a time to be determined.

As one final, but very big extra, Houston baseball legend Jimmy Wynn is expected to join the Houston Babies today as our honorary team captain. Jimmy had finally heard enough from us about this base ball game that we were playing without gloves and had to come see for himself. We, of course, are all deeply honored by his desire to join with us in this beautiful and fun way to preserve baseball history.

Please join us, if possible. And look for a game results story in tomorrow’s Halloween Day version of today’s activities. We will hope, of course, that what we have left to report at the end of the day is not a horror story.

It can’t be a horror story. Babies manager Bob Dorrill would never allow it. Since this probably will be the Babies’ last playing appearance of 2010, Dorrill will have the troops grinding away at top form.

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Time Traveler in 1928 Chaplin Movie?

October 29, 2010

Have you seen the story that went viral yesterday about the woman walking down the street as an extra in a 1928 Charlie Chaplin silent movie called “The Circus?” The problem is – she seems to be talking on a cell phone – and we didn’t have cell phones in 1928 – or transistor radios – or little recording devices that one could carry and hold by our ear as we spoke into them.

Here’s a link, if you haven’t seen the film itself. If this one isn’t enough for you, or doesn’t work for some reason, just Google or Bing “Time Traveler Chaplin” and you will spring loose a barrel of viewing options for the same brief clip.

http://video.foxnews.com/v/4392185/time-traveler-caught-on-tape/

What is this all about? Who really knows, but since we are heading into Halloween weekend, this is as good a time as any to consider the phenomenon.

Forget all the impossibilities for a moment. Here’s my take on what my eyes see: The woman definitely appears to be talking into a device that she holds firmly to her left ear. At the end of the brief segment she is shown in the film, she even stops and turns obliquely to the camera at her left. You can still see her lips moving.

What my head tells me: No way she’s talking into a cell phone. Science wasn’t even close to anything like cell phones, portable radios, or small recorders in 1928. They had a crude hearing aid about that time, but sane people didn’t talk into them as this woman is doing. Even if it were a cell phone, which it could not be without time travel, how would a time traveler use it? There were no cell phone towers back in 1928 and, unless the time traveler were talking to someone back in the time travel ship, there was no one to talk with, anyway. Also, if this were a legitimate time traveling scientist we see, I cannot see how this particular individual could have passed the physical that would have qualified her for such a critical operation. The subject of interest here apparently is female, middle aged, and overweight. Unless the expedition were looking for someone who might blend in better, or she’s wearing a “fat suit,” I would bet on a younger, more fit timestronaut handling this job.

What I really think: I have to go back to my early psychological clinic days at Tulane Med school for this one. During my time as a member of the Tulane clinical faculty in the Department of Psychiatry & Neurology, we worked with a large population of schizophrenics in a drug and treatment studies program and most of these people lived on their own – and some were homeless when we met them.

The tag phrase for these semi-indepedent people was “ambulatory schizophrenia,” meaning simply as it sounds that all these people could get around town on their own, even if they couldn’t hold jobs or get along with others all that well.

Back in the 1960s in New Orleans, and this is probably still true, it wasn’t unusual to pass people on the street who were simply caught up in either talking to themselves or fighting with some unseen phantom adversary. On top of or preceding mental illness, alcohol and other mind-altering substances often came into play as either a foundational or contributing factor in this scenario.

When cell phones first went viral here in Houston, I now recall thinking: “This is getting to be like the old days in New Orleans. All these one-voice conversations we now have to unavoidably sample in public are like the time of epidemic street-loaded schizophrenia back in New Orleans.”

I think the mystery woman in the Chaplin film is most probably an ambulatory schizophrenic who just happened to have wandered into the street scene as an extra. As for the device she’s holding, she may even have fantasized it to be a “portable phone” so that she could stay in touch with whatever forces she felt were protecting her. (If we had the time and right to do so, I could inundate you with case stories of how that worked in the lives of some psychotic patients I knew, but confidentiality bleeds against the practice.)

Sound far-fetched? OK, then drop the schizophrenia possibility and just go with cell phone using time traveler. I can’t think of anything else it might be.

A Saturday Morning Postscript: Schizophrenics are not necessarily impaired on a number of intellectual levels. Many are quite intelligent – and certainly smart enough to have figured out years ago that it’s not talking to yourself that gets you into trouble with society so much as it is doing it in public places often enough in towns and communities that pay attention to that sort of thing. From what I saw with our Tulane patients back in the 1960s, talking with themselves on the streets of New Orleans was not a big problem unless their language or body movements brought threat to others in the immediate area.

It’s occurred to me that many schizophrenics today have quickly figured out that they may talk to themselves in public all they want these days – as long as they are holding a cell phone next to an ear.

Have a nice weekend, everybody. And make sure that cell phone is charged. You never know when you may get whisked away by a time travel service to some other era in which you are the only one there who has one.

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Valian’s Pizza Update

October 28, 2010

Honest Raia Family Wants Whole Truth Known.

We’ve written quite a bit lately about the rediscovery of Valian’s Pizza at Raia’s Italian Market at 4500 Washington Avenue. Many of us have since been to Raia’s more than once to sample the rich goodness of the thin crust and rich marinara and cheeses that together make up the arguably greatest tasting pizza of all time. I’ve even taken Richard Coselli, the fellow who served as the UH student chairman of Frontier Fiesta back in 1957 when Valian’s Pizza was first introduced at our big annual campus show, to try the Raia version with me.

Richard Coselli’s taste buds agreed with mine. The Raia version, indeed, is enough like the original to be accorded the status of Valian’s Pizza Reincarnated, even if there existed for both of us a slight variation in taste due to some changes in herbs, spices, or meat products now available in comparison to a half century ago.

Now it seems that we have jumped to a wrong conclusion on how the item described by the Raia family on their menu as “Valien’s DeLuxe” pizza came about. It turns out that this beautiful restoration of an all time Houston culinary favorite was not the result of some ancient family friendship between the Valian and Raia families and a handing-off of the former’s famous pizza recipe in the name of friendship for the sake of posterity.

That story was the urban legend that I hooked onto when my friend first told me. And, since my friend had never been to Raia’s, that was also the legend that he had hooked onto from someone else. My error was then going to Raia’s to try the pizza and then writing about the experience without checking out the truth of the story about its origins directly with the cafe’s owners, Luke and Kathy Raia.

I still haven’t met the Raia couple, but I have heard from Kathy Raia a couple of times by e-mail. Give me an “F” in investigative journalism this time, folks, but I wasn’t on assignment, looking for a deception that never existed in the first place. The Raia place just reeks with good taste and integrity.

My willingness to accept the story I first heard about how the pizza started at Raia’s, nevertheless, has only reenforced the urban legend version of a delicious replication that deserves the Valian’s pizza comparison in its own right.

An e-mail I received from Kathy Raia last night explains the whole misunderstanding:

Date: Wed, 27 Oct 2010 16:46:36 -0500
Subject: Re: Raia’s
From: raia.italian.market@gmail.com
To: houston_buff@hotmail.com

Mr. McCurdy, we appreciate your blog about how good our Valien’s pizza is but we don’t want to create any false impressions.  The store manager you talked to is our son. He knew that my husband went to Valian’s when he was younger. We have never had a relationship with the Valian family nor received any recipes from them.
We named this pizza after one of the pizzas we used to order at Valian’s. This pizza was put on our menu as a tribute to the first restaurant in which my husband was introduced to a pizza.
If you would like to clarify this on your blog, we would appreciate it because we have been getting a lot of phone calls and emails.  My husband has had to expain that we didn’t know the Valian family and this pizza is not their recipe.  We just enjoyed going there.
Please come in again and say hi to my husband so y’all can reminisce about Valian’s.
Thanks, Kathy Raia

And thank you for that clarification, Kathy. You and Luke still deserve Valian’s Pizza status and credit with your tribute recipe version of one of the greatest and most uniquely delicious foods ever produced by a Houston family.

Long live Valian’s! Long live Raia’s!

 

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Astro Shadows on World Series

October 27, 2010

Watch for this profile of Texas bench coach Jackie Moore during the World Series, but don't expect to see the eye glasses of the former Round Rock Manager and Astros bench coach.

 

We will see a lot of Texas Rangers President Nolan Ryan at the World Series over the next week or so, as we will Rangers bench coach Jackie Moore, Rangers pitching coach Mike Maddux,  and maybe, if help is needed,  of Rangers reliever Darren Oliver. All are ex-Astros who now give their all to the American League champion Texas Rangers. There is another that you most likely won’t see.  Former Astros vice president Rob Matwick also now works in the front office for the Rangers.

Over in the dugout of the San Francisco Giants, the shadow of Astros Past also stretches visibly. Giants manager Bruce Bochy is a “once upon a time” figure as a former Astros catcher (1978-80) and the Giants first baseman, Aubrey Huff, is a more recent Astros player from 2006.

As most of you know, the Astros shadow didn’t start with the two clubs that made it to the Series. When New York lost to Texas, we lost former Astro Lance Berkman of the Yankees. When Philadelphia fell to San Francisco, we gave up former Astro pitching aces Roy Oswalt and Brad Lidge of the Phillies, along with their first base coach, former Astro Davey Lopes.

Going back to the four teams eliminated in the first round of the playoffs, we find that every single one these clubs also had some kind of past Astro connection. I’ll give you the ones that occur to me off the top of my pointed head. There may be others I’m missing:

Cincinnati Reds: First Base Coach Billy Hatcher;

Atlanta Braves: Closer Billy Wagner;

Tampa Bay Rays: Pitching Coach Jim Hickey, Relievers Chad Qualls and Dan Wheeler, and former minor leaguer Ben Zobrist; and,

Minnesota Twins: None. The Twins are the only club I could think of that didn’t have a single obvious front office, coaching, or player connection to the history of the Houston Astros. If you can think of one, or any others I’ve forgotten, or overlooked, please post their names here as a comment on this article and we shall add them to the fold.

Baseball is life. Life is a circle. And player/personnel movement in baseball is a great big circle.

POST SCRIPT: A couple of readers e-mailed me that they had trouble accessing the “Instructions for Life” article the other day because of a WordPress insistence that they provide usernames and passwords. I checked into the problem and learned form WordPress Support that some kind of glitch had randomly caused some of our readers at “TPPE” to be treated as though they were entering a private blog area, where that kind of info is required.

That’s not our deal here. The Pecan Park Eagle is totally public, requiring no username or password from anyone to access the articles. If you have any trouble with this in the future, please let me know immediately. Thanks, Bill McCurdy.

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Pictures Don’t Lie, Not Much!

October 26, 2010

This apparent scene from the 1950s is actually a picture of model cars in a model town.

Remember the old adage that screamed “pictures don’t lie!” Wow! Especially with all the advances we’ve experienced in recent years with digital photography and computer software picture assimilation and enhancement programs, like Adobe Photoshop, almost anyone with an IQ rising above that of a flea and the interest to learn the technical ropes may now create a picture that has nothing to do with the truth from a factual standpoint.

Take another look at that lead photo of the old cars on the Main Street scene from Anytown, USA back in the 1950s. The skies are even drafted into the landscape with a differential smattering of blues skies and cloudiness that we expect to find in any realistic picture. The photo is one of about thirty and it is only when the human creator appears later in normal size among them that we fully realize as viewers that he is the first person we’ve seen in this little idyllic small town. (I will send all of that material to each of you as Fwd: Model 1950s Town. The original e-mail was sent to me by former classmate and good friend Vito Schlabra.)

Aside from mental photos we now all have as Astros fans of realities that include Lance Berkman as a Yankee, Roy Oswalt as a Phillie, and the Texas Rangers headed for San Francisco and the World Series, here is one of Derek Jeter that I find interesting. It shows what may prove out as the future of Mr. Jeter if he now holds out with the Yankees for a new five-year contract at this point in his career.

Joe DiMaggio once donned a Red Sox jersey and cap, but he was just clowning around.

That’s it for now. Look for that “Fwd: Model 1950s Town” e-mail shortly after you receive this one. It’s really quite impressive,

Have a pleasant Tuesday, everybody, and try to be true to whatever picture you’re attempting to create.

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The 1933 Houston Buffs

October 25, 2010

TOP ROW: Fred Ankenman, President; Stan Keyes; Oscar Fuhr; Ed Greer; Bob Kalbitz; Al Fisher; Andy French, Secretary. MIDDLE ROW: George Payne; Jimmy O’Dea; Carey Selph, Manager; Ival Goodman; George Binder; Eddie Hock. FRONT ROW: Mike Cvengros; Bill Beckman; Gene Moore; Ernie Parker; Tommy West.

The 1933 Houston Buffs were an interesting bunch. They are often forgotten for having played only a couple of years beyond the far more famous 1931 Texas League Champion Buffs of Dizzy Dean and Joe Medwick, but their 94-57 record was good enough for a 6.5 game finish in first place ahead of the Galveston Buccaneers.

Unfortunately, the ’33 Buffs quickly buried good memories with a three-game sweeping loss to fourth place San Antonio in the first round of the Shaughnessy Playoffs. The Missions would go on to defeat Galveston, four games to two, for the Texas League title as the ’33 Buffs basically faded into oblivion.

As a style note, the ’33 Buffs ditched the eye-catching buffalo logo that adorned the forehead crown of their 1932 uniform caps and subbed it with one that looks more like the plain “stripes only” cap we presently use for our  19th century vintage base ball team, the Houston Babies.  Although I cannot swear for certain, I’m reasonably sure the cap was dark blue in color with white stripes. “Houston” isn’t totally relegated anonymity here. That  big “H” on the heart-side plate of the jersey is unmistakably there for the only “BIG H” city in the Texas League back then – the one and only Houston Buffaloes.

Fred Ankenman is the featured “suit” in the team photo. Fred served as a Buffs employee from the late teens decade of the 20th century. Fred served as team president of the club from 1925 to 1942.

Playing manager Carey Selph also made the Texas League All Star team as second baseman and shortstop partner George Binder also got picked for the same team honor, as did pitcher Ed “Bear Tracks” Greer. Jimmy O’Dea of the Buffs also made the all star club as one of two catchers selected.

Ed Greer tied with George Darrow of Galveston for most 1933 Texas League season wins at 22. Buff pitcher Mike Cvengros was right behind those guys with 21 wins, also leading the Texas League for the lowest ERA with a 2.43 mark.

Mike Cvengros put in a lot of time as a major leaguer in 1920s, performing for the Pittsburgh Pirates who lost a swept-away World Series to the 1927 New York Yankees. Buffs outfielder Ival Goodman later played for the Cincinnati Reds that lost a World Series to the 1939 New York Yankees, Interestingly, the ’27 and ’39 Yankees are each considered by many as the arguably greatest Yankee teams of all time.

Meanwhile, as we get ready for the 2010 World Series between the San Francisco Giants and the Texas Rangers in a couple of days, it’s simply fun to again look back on baseball history in the hope that what gains on us is a clearer memory of the players who made the game special for us a very long time ago.

Have a nice start to the new week, everybody!

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