The Pecan Park Eagle

RALPH BRANCA, PITCHER
1951 BROOKLYN DODGERS
Most of us love Ralph. We just don’t want to see him working as our closer for the Astros in the 2017 Post-Season. We also reserve the right to change our minds in October.

Our wonderful Astros baseball icon, SABR Chapter namesake, history colleague, and fun-to-be-with baseball friend – Larry Dierker – asked this question of me as a comment at today’s Baseball’s Loudest Pin Drop Falls Again column:

“Have you checked where the ’51 Giants were (this date in history) compared to the current Astros? This may be our chance to make history.”

I knew in general, but I did the checking. And here’s precisely what I found about yesterday’s date in history for the 1951 National League and this year’s 2017 American League West Division:

NL STANDINGS THRU 8/11/1951

AL WEST DIVISION STNDINGS THRU 8/11/2017

My Answer to Larry Dierker (and I’m responding here for the first time): Dierk, sad as it seems, the best chance for replicating the amazing comeback of the ’51 NYY Giants now mathematically belongs equally to either the 2017 LA Angels or the 2017 Seattle Mariners. Unfortunately, the success of either would leave the door open for the Astros to make history by repeating  the crash and burn failure of the ’51 Brooklyn Dodgers – via something equivalently cruel as Bobby Thomson’s “Shot Heard Round the World” at the Polo Grounds and – look – we don’t want any part of that kind of history-making.

Please, baseball gods. Spare us that one. We don’t want it in base form – and we sure as hell don’t want it in all the cruel ways that baseball sometimes tailor customizes the pain of major disappointment.

Right, Ralph Branca?

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