UPDATE: TRUMP INDICTED! INDICTMENT ANNOUNCED THURSDAY AS THE NY GRAND JURY FILED AN INDICTMENT UNDER SEAL FOR DONNY TRUMP. IT WILL BE UNSEALED NEXT WEEK. For those of you in the REGJB Trump Indictment pool who had the 12-6 pm block of March 30, 2023, you will advance to the Perp walk/arraignment pool bracket. For the rest of you, much like picking the Jets over the Chiefs in the survivor pool, thanks for playing.
Let's play ball! Today is opening day. We have a traditional opening day post you newbies can read here. It's a good one. But today we are in a reflective mood.
What is perfection? It's a 6-4-3 double play. It's Willie Mays gliding in center field and making catch. You want to see perfection? Watch this video on throws Roberto Clemente made from right field. He was the first (or one of the first) Hispanic superstars. When the Pirates won the World Series in 1971 and he showed the world how good he was and won the MVP, he was interviewed in the clubhouse and made the shocking decision to first speak in Spanish on nationwide TV to his people in Puerto Rico.
Perfection is Henry Aaron hitting a home run. And Aaron Judge hitting one as well. Aaron and Aaron- there are no coincidences.
Perfection is the smile on a child's face walking into a baseball stadium for the first time and walking down a tunnel and suddenly this bright green field emerges and their face beams.
Perfection is a Nolan Ryan fastball. It is Bob Gibson scowling from the mound. It's a Dwight Gooden curveball impossibly breaking over the plate and it's Sandy Kofax and Tom Seaver and Lefty Carlton.
Perfection is Graig Nettles at third base in the world series, making breathtaking plays time and time again. And it's Brooks Robinson at third in any game he played.
Perfection is Ozzie at short and Johnny Bench behind the plate.
Perfection is stealing second base, and then running to third on the bad throw. Perfection is Jackie Robinson dancing off of third base in the world series and stealing home, and Yogi probably making the tag and then arguing with the ump. Because in baseball, perfection is dispute and arguments and Billy Martin kicking dirt on the umpire's shoes. It is Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris in 61 chasing the greatest ballplayer of all time- The Babe.
Perfection is the hit and run.
Perfection is a 2-1 ballgame played on a hot July day when the fans are drinking cold beer and eating hot dogs and peanuts and there is pitcher's duel, and the home team wins in the bottom of the ninth.
Perfection is Jack Buck yelling "I don't believe what I just saw" after a lame Kirk Gibson hit a game winning home run on one leg in the bottom of the ninth in the world series for the Dodgers. It was any game Vince Scully called. And if you want to go way back, it's Red Barber and Bob Prince calling games on the radio, because in the right hands, baseball is a game for the radio and the mind's eye.
Perfection is any baseball game that takes two and half hours, or three hours, or four because baseball is played by its own rhythms and not with a clock (pitcher's clock not withstanding).
Perfection is the sound a ball makes on a wooden bat and the sound the ball makes as it smacks the leather in the center of a glove. Perfection are the memories of an old man about the games he played in his youth, and the cheering of a father as his daughter strokes a single in her first at bat in a little league game.
In life there is so little that is simple and pleasurable that can make you smile. Baseball can do that and does it over and over every day, every year.
Perfection is baseball and baseball is perfection.
Baseball is a gorilla sport. That's why steroids are so important to the game. You play right field and maybe u make one play in the field. Snooze fest. It's fun to play buy not fun to watch. Futbol is the perfect sport - the beautiful game.
ReplyDeleteYou obviously did not grow up in a baseball town. Steroids do not make a ball player a major leaguer. You can either hit or throw a curve or you can’t. Hand-eye coordination is the key, not weight- lifting. Bud Harrelson played shortstop for the Mets for years and weighed 140 pounds.
Delete1. Earl Weaver throwing a hissy fit at an umpire.
ReplyDelete2. Reggie Jackson blasting a WS home run.
3. Tommy Lasorda cursing like a drunken sailor on a visit to the mound in the '77 WS.
4. And finally, one of the finest moments in baseball: Rick Monday tackling a miscreant who defacced the American flag in 1976 .
How many lawyers will hear Trump say: "You're Fired". start a pool on that.
ReplyDeleteClemente was the best. Poetry in motion. Thank you Rumpole.
ReplyDeleteI’m watching a 5-4 game right now 3:31. Bottom of the 9th. Exciting as hell.
ReplyDeleteThat Pirates game you were watching Rumpole lasted 3:02 according to the Box Score. Good late win for your team with that sacrifice fly in the 8th.
ReplyDelete" Strike me down and I will become more powerful than you can imagine. "
ReplyDeletebaseball was best when NYers would argue who was the better center fielder. Duke Snider of the Brooklyn Dodgers"Da Bums") Willie "say hey" Mays for the Giants, or Mantle for the Yanks?
ReplyDeleteNice work Rumpole.
ReplyDeleteI am not personally a baseball fan, but received a fabulous video from my 5-year-old cousin showing him doing the dance at his first Red Sox game, and from the best seats. The joy Rumpole described was all over this darling boy's face.
ReplyDeleteThe lack of comments here is telling. I doubt that are very few baseball fans left who are not collecting SS or who spend half their time talking about the cost of presecription drugs. Mention Bill Mazeroksi or Whitey Ford in the halls of the REGJB and most lawyers will think you are talking about a client who just took a plea. Mention Rick Monday, as one commenter did, and they will respond "No, dummy, today is Friday." Sad.
ReplyDeleteG-d wears black and gold. Need proof ? Game 7 1960. Pirates -Yankees. Bucs win 10-9. Lead changed 4 times 7th inning Pirate manager pulls Catcher Smokey Burgess after he gets a hit for a pinch runner. Bucs are down 5-4. But they cannot score a run. Pirate catcher Hal Smith enters the game. Yankees go up 7-4 in the 8th. Bottom of 8th Pirate Bill Virdon grounds a ball to yankee shortstop Tony Kubeck. The ball hits a stray pebble and hits Kubek in the throat. Virdon safe at first. Bucs score two including an infield rbi single by Clemente. 7-6. 2 on. 2 outs. Up comes Hal Smith who was inserted for Burgess. He stokes. 3 run home run! 9-7 Bucs. 8th inning. Top of 9th. Yanks score two to tie the game.
ReplyDeleteBottom of 9th. Great fielding and light hitting second baseman Bill Mazeroski comes to face Ralph Terry. It’s 3:37;October 13 1960. On the radio Yankee broadcaster misidentifies Ralph Terry as Art Ditmars.
Max sends one deep to left field. Yogi goes to the wall and can only watch it go. The first game 7 walk off home run. The only one.
The mighty Yankees won three games in the series. 16-3; 10-0; and 12-0. The Bucs won four games 6-4; 3-2; 5-2 and then 10-9.
Before Franco was immaculate there was game 7 1960. G-d wears black and gold.
1960 was the beginning ot the end of Yankee dynasty. And it had a lot to do with George Weis' refusal to sign black players in the '50's. White the Yanks beat the Reds in 5 in '61, they won in 7 in '62 against the Giants (McCovery, Mays, Marichal), then got whipped by Koufax in 4 in '63 and lost to the Cards in 7 in '64 (Gibson, Brock, Flood). It took 12 years for them to come back when Steinbrenner broker the bank to do it. Avid baseball historians should real 1964 by David Halberstam for a riveting history of the race issue in baseball and why the Yankees crumbled in the mid 60's.
ReplyDelete