Overbearing, Ostentatious and Odd

Overbearing, ostentatious, odd. All three words could describe the way Charlie O. Finley operated. You won’t want to miss this week’s read, “Charlie Finley: The Outrageous Story of Baseball’s Super Showman” by G. Michael Green and Roger D. Lanius. Read this book because: 1. Charlie Finley did some good. Up until the end of his […]

No Tears for George

I am a native New Yorker who still lives in the NY/NJ area and I watch the 6 PM News on NBC each evening.  On Monday, December 6, the sports newscaster announced that George Steinbrenner was not elected to the Hall of Fame – and that was it.  No mention that Pat Gillick was elected […]

In Celebration of the Plantation Owners

Back in the good ol’ days, when the working scum knew their places, the great barons of industry were legend. Carnegie, Ford – they made America, not the bohunks, Micks, Sheenys and coloreds who toiled in the factory. Right? That’s how it was written in all the textbooks. Baseball was like that too. The great […]

The Last Game in Town

Sept. 30, 1971. Seventy years and 10,851 games into the story of American League baseball in the nation’s capital, the Senators, 38 games out of first place on the last day of the season, faced the Yankees in the final game in franchise history. The teams had split the first two games of the series […]

Reliving the Seventies: “Big Hair and Plastic Grass”

Pet rocks, mood rings, streakers, hot pants, Pacers, go-go boots, and Wham-O-Super Balls.   Don’t you miss the  good old days?   Spaceship stadiums, exploding scoreboards, ethnic nights, polyester uniforms, Yanky Panky, wide-collared jerseys, gigantic hair, fake grass, ‘staches, high-fashion hues of ketchup and mustard, and garbage thrown onto the field. Are you feeling nostalgic for […]

‘Fros, ‘Stros, ‘Spos, and Discos: Play That Funky Baseball

When my good friend, fellow Seamhead, and self-proclaimed “Strat-O-Matic fanatic” Jeff Polman turned me on to his latest project, I was instantly enthralled and excited.  I was already familiar with Jeff’s fantastic replay of the 1924 season, an era that’s right up my alley, but when I learned that he was going to be replaying […]

Looking Back at the 1990 Lockout

The spring training lockout of 1990 is one of the most obscure disputes in the long stretch of sharp bitterness between MLB players and management from the early ’70s through 1995. As Thomas Boswell wrote just after the lockout ended, “Can anyone remember the details of the baseball strike of 1985, which lasted two days? […]

The Scapegoat

Rule of thumb – you can tell how nice a place is by the number of stonewalled front lawns. The road through Bedford into Stamford is a rock-rimmed capillary, the barricades protecting the homes of the wealthy which sit safely beyond. Turning off the main drag to Ray Grebey’s home, a different picture emerges. Grebey, […]

“Ted Williams and the 1969 Washington Senators, the Last Winning Season”

The author’s second book, Ted Williams and the 1969 Washington Senators: The Last Winning Season, is scheduled to be released by McFarland Publishing on February 24, 2009.