The Pecan Park Eagle

Astros Games TV Blackout Rolls On.

Baseball Lagniappe

John Paciorek’s Slip Shod Exercise Program

John Paciorek achieved a level of immortality when he retired from baseball with a 1.000 MLB batting average. It all happened on September 29, 1963 at Colt Stadium in Houston when the 18-year old Paciorek played right field for the Colt .45’s on an all-rookie team and went 3 for 3 with two walks, 4 runs scored, and 3 RBI on the day for his all single day. He played in a lot of pain that day, but neither he nor the club knew that day that his worsening back injury from even earlier than that day would eventually push him out of the game without another try at big league play.

What most people may not have known at that time was the fact that Paciorek himself may have helped or caused the back problems by his helter-skelter dedication to all kinds of exercises that he simply made up and thought were good ideas to try. The most suspect one was Paciorek’s attempts to muscle up his neck to 19 ” by standing on his head for inordinately long periods of time. It was shortly after he began this regime that permanent lower and upper back pain began to take him over sporadically, then pretty much constantly, as implied by the writings of Dennis Snelling.

In writing of John Paciorek in his profile book on peripheral major league greatness, Dennis Snelling aptly quotes Thomas Carlyle in “A Glimpse of Fame” (1993). – “Nothing is more terrible than activity without insight.”

Dodgers Rival Astros with Dumb TV Deal of Their Own

Yesterday  I learned for the first  time that the Dodgers and their fans are going through a similar freeze on TV games as we in Houston are with Comcast. The provider “bad guy” in LA is Time Warner, whose pricing to other payment television services has been so high that only their 33% of the market now has access to televised Dodger games.

The Pecan Park Eagle most humbly chooses to offer that this mishandling of the fan bond, vis-a-vis the home  television blackouts to large portions of the Houston and Los Angeles markets, is evidence of our need to reassess the aggregate IQ of major league club ownership. I sense that we may have slipped away from genius and closer to idiocy than at any other point in recent years.

We don’t think that Astros owner Jim Crane had a clear idea of what he was buying into on the TV contract when he purchased the club and we do applaud what he’s doing to push this issue with Comcast to settlement or dissolution, but we do hope it comes soon. Fans that can’t see the games are going elsewhere – and they cannot be counted on to simply return when the TV light goes back on. Also, long-term, there are thousands of little 8 to 10 year old kids out there in Houston who normally discover the Astros on TV at these ages. Many of them have nothing to watch locally. So, it isn’t happening. And if baseball misses the ripest time to bond, it may never happen again.

Let’s get it done. ASAP.

Ron Necciai Was No Fluke

As a strikeout artist, Ron Necciai was no fluke. In the game that followed Necciai’s May 13, 1952 27K no-hitter, he pitched a 24K 2-hitter, one that included 5k’s in one inning. It more than earned him a promotion to Burlington. Ron left Bristol with an ERA of 0.42 for the Twins. In 42.2 innings at Bristol, Ron Necciai struck out 109. Nothing fluky about the kid they came to call “The Rocket.”

Field of Dreams Was on TCM Last Night

Turner Classic Movies made it impossible for me to watch the NCAA March Madness Basketball Semi-Finals last night. They did so by showing “Field of Dreams, Angels in the Outfield (the original version), and It Happens Ever Spring.” I love ’em all. The smell of freshly cut grass, the scent of a horsehide baseball, and the homey leathered air of a battered old Rawlings Playmaker glove are forever my portals to the happiest days of my life. – Knowing what we soon enough get to learn about life beyond the white baselines, how could they not have been the happiest days of forever?

Have a peaceful Sunday, everybody!

ODDS & CROOKED NUMBER ITEMS …

 AHOY FROM DEVIL’S ISLAND. After a two-day shipwreck with food poisoning from Sunday afternoon that finally dumped me on the shore of Tuesday morning, still alive, and grateful to be. I’m just glad to be breathing and only suffering from an all-over body soreness from all the convulsing. I am glad to be back in the game, even if I have to claw my way back to a state of moderate coherence on any local or baseball subject that really matters. I haven’t been this sore since my deservedly brief neighborhood boxing career of a thousand childhood adventure years ago. Now I know that a determined germinal infection hits the body with all the power of an everlasting hard landing glove. I could also take a hit much better at 14 than I can at 74. – All I can add to that is – stay away from doggie bag restaurant foods that don’t get refrigerated quickly after you leave the place and go home. The heat stirs up the bacteria faster than we realize. My nemesis this time ( and it almost sickens me to write the words) was red beans & rice with pork sausage. I’m betting it was the “with” part of that combo that got me.

 PARODY ODE TO THE PATIENCE OF ASTROS FANS IN THEIR WAIT FOR A WORLD SERIES TITLE. “No one to walk with, all by ourself; no one to talk with, but we’re happy on the shelf. – Ain’t misbehavin! – Savin’ our love – for you – FOR YOU – for you – FOR YOU! – We don’t stay out late. – No place to go. – We’re home about eight. – Got Raymond on the radio – Ain’t misbehavin! – Just waitin’ out our time for you – World Series Babe! 

“Like Jack Horner – on the corner – don’t go nowhere – what do we care? Victory’s kisses are – worth waiting for – believe us. We’re through with flirtin’ – close calls don’t count! Those times we fell short – don’t matter no great amount. – Our title’s comin’ – just keep us off the Cubbie clock. – A win will get our dreams out of hock – for all time – And leave us with a year that’s sublime. – Oh yeah!”

THE 2012 FACT & FICTION STANDINGS FOR THE HOUSTON ASTROS THROUGH ALL GAMES OF MAY 16, 2012

The following standings depict the actual National League Central standings of the Houston Astros – and also how they would be doing in the American League West with the same records and this were already 2013.