baseball Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

Why people hated the Yankees

Chief antipathy

Even though I was a fan, I remember why people hated the Yankees when I was growing up. They won too much. From 1949 to 1964, they were in the World Series every year except two, 1954 and 1959, a fact I didn’t even have to look up. They won 9 of the 14 Series. More recently, they won the Series in 2009 but haven’t gotten there since.

I thought about this as I realized I would be rooting against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series. Though they’ve “only” won two of the last five World Series, in 2020 and 2024, with the expanded number of teams, that’s still quite impressive.

Their current roster has a unicorn. Shohei Ohtani’s legendary game (throwing 10 strikeouts as a pitcher AND hitting three home runs) got the Dodgers there, but I have to root for the underdog.

It’s not that I dislike the Dodgers particularly, though I was distraught when they beat the Yankees in the 1963 Series. I liked Maury Wills, who stole over 100 bases the year before; Junior Gilliam; and Tommy and Willie Davis, who were NOT related. I also admired their two best starting pitchers, Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale.

Two teams, both established in 1977, will play in Game 7 of the American League Championship Series tonight. The Seattle Mariners have NEVER been in a World Series, and the Toronto Blue Jays won back-to-back Series in 1992 and 1993 but haven’t appeared since.

NFL

I’ve discovered that I have developed an antipathy against the Kansas City Chiefs. Although I was glad they didn’t have a “threepeat” when they lost the Super Bowl in 2025, I was wary about claims that the Chiefs were getting special treatment. Well, until the game against the Detroit Lions on October 12.

I’m still rooting for the Lions, who lost last week and play tonight. And of course, the Buffalo Bills, the only NFL team that plays its home games in New York State, lost last week and have a bye this week.

I’ve discovered that, now that coach Bill Belincheck is coaching in the college ranks, I don’t have the antipathy towards the New England Patriots hat I did for years.

Yes, these are irrational feelings. So it goes.

September rambling: Snollygoster

Measles and Polio Down In The Schoolyard

Word of the Day: Snollygoster – A shrewd, unprincipled person, especially a politician.

Pity the Nation, a poem by Lawrence Ferlinghetti (2007)

Anti-Intellectualism Is Not a Fruit of the Spirit by Rev. Benjamin Cremer

You can’t worship God and money

A.Word.A.Day: kleptocrat – A politician or an official who uses their position to enrich themselves.

United States Boycotts UN Human Rights Review. The move sets “a terrible precedent that would only embolden dictators and autocrats and dangerously weaken respect for human rights at home and abroad.”

SCOTUS ruling allows ICE to use racial profiling in Los Angeles raids.

Israel’s Attacks on Seed Banks Destroy Millennia of Palestinian Cultural Heritage, and Israel Bombs Hamas Ceasefire Negotiating Team in Doha

Lysenkoism Comes to America: As RFK Jr. purges the CDC and cancels billions in research grants, Americans need a refresher course on what happened to Soviet biological research during the Stalin years.

Are You Ready for Measles’ Wrath?

Submit Your Official Comment Against the EPA’s Plan to Rescind Its Ability to Limit Greenhouse Gas Emissions Created By Any Industry and Gut Vehicle Standards Needed to Fight Climate Change

Tax cuts helped health giants dodge billions while patients faced higher costs and denials.

FOTUS vs. Higher Education and The Baileys: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

The Attack on the Smithsonian Previews His Presidential Library

How math turned me from a D.E.I. skeptic to a supporter

Kennedy Center Ticket Sales Plummet as “MAGA Former Dancer” Takes Over Dance Program. Upcoming ballet performances are between only 4 and 19% sold.

FOTUS steals $400b from American workers

Information

Internet Archive Designated as a Federal Depository Library

The National Archives Recovers Rare Logbook from the Pearl Harbor Attack

The Return of Plundered Belongings Offers a Chance for Healing to a Grieving Lakota Community 170 Years After a Long-Forgotten Massacre

Giorgio Armani, Fashion’s Master of the Power Suit, Dies at 91

CBS News’ Mark Knoller, veteran White House correspondent, dies at 73

Davey Johnson, an Orioles infielder before becoming the manager of the Mets, including their 1986 World Series win, died at 82

High Greens, Chip Ordway– now and forever

The game was perfect. The call, more perfect. Sept. 9, 1965 -Sandy Koufax, Vin Scully

You Know More Finnish Than You Think

Reviews, Ratings, and Pointless Surveys by Seth Meyers

The Beetle Bailey book celebrates 75 years in the funny pages

Spider-Man’s first live-action TV run was on PBS, and I watched it

Now I Know: The Worst Movie Money Couldn’t Buy, The Problem With Faking a Smile, and The Human Traffic Cone?

**The latter box should read: “$893 million in 30 graduated annuity payments”**

MUSIC

Bottle Up Magic – Rebecca Jade (feat. Eric Darius)

Measles and Polio Down In The Schoolyard – Marsh Family parody of Paul Simon’s “Me and Julio” on RFK

In Memoriam: Mark Volman of the Turtles (1947-2025). From Stuart Mason: The masterpiece of the album The Battle of the Bands was ‘Elenore,’ simultaneously an absolutely deathless sunshine pop classic and a not particularly subtle middle finger to White Whale Records.

Supertramp co-founder, singer, and keyboardist Rick Davies died at the age of 81 after a 10-year battle with Multiple Myeloma. 5 standout Rick Davies tracks by Supertramp.

Bohemian Rhapsody, isiZulu version – Ndlovu Youth Choir

Everybody’s Song– Robert Plant and Saving Grace

Moonlight, one of Four Sea Interludes from the Benjamin Britten opera Peter Grimes

One Tiny Flower – Jeff Tweedy

Song To The Moon from Rusalka, Act I, by Antonín Dvořák

Better Broken – Sarah McLaughlin

Coverville 1547: Van Morrison Cover Story IV and 1548: The Aimee Mann Cover Story I

Dead – Sudan Archives

Big Money – Jon Batiste

Letter To My 13-Year-Old Self and Lover Girl – Laufey

Am I Born To Die – Billy Strings, 12/13/24 ACL

Surf’s Up – The Beach Boys

The Boys Of Summer -Don Henley

Hot Fun In The Summertime – Sly & The Family Stone

September Morn – Neil Diamond

I Started A Joke – Ruby Leigh

The Power Of Love – Huey Lewis and the News

Thunderstruck + It’s a Long Way to the Top – Goddesses of Bagpipes

Burning Down The House – David Byrne ft. Olivia Rodrigo – Live at Gov Ball 2025

Is AI Ruining Music? | Dustin Ballard | TED, and AI-generated music sparks industry concern, and AI music takes on a life of its own: Walking Away –Sadie Winters

K-Chuck Radio: Billy Joel gets pitchy and The Out-Of-Phase Stereo Series

Stairway, Denied

Did I play catch with my dad?

“Maybe this is Heaven.”

Did I play catch with my dad? It seems like a pretty simple question, but I don’t know.

The genesis of this process was a Facebook post from a guy in my neighborhood. He never “got ” Field of Dreams. In the movie, Ray (Kevin Costner) is in his cornfield and hears a voice saying, “If you build it, they will come.” He does, and soon, Shoeless Joe and his old teammates return to play baseball again.

Someone opined: “At the heart of the story, it’s about a man reconciling his fraught relationship with his now deceased father. It’s about forgiveness and understanding, and the vehicle for his catharsis is baseball.” There is that. “Shoeless Joe was his dad’s favorite player and needed his redemption, along with the rest of the 1919 White Sox. The Field of Dreams allowed them all to experience that.” Okay.

But, I said, “I don’t think you need to know the Black Sox scandal to appreciate it, though it helps to appreciate baseball.” And maybe you don’t even need that.

I was touched when the doctor saved Ray’s daughter, abandoning his baseball dreams for the greater good. “Defying the threat of foreclosure, Ray listens to the once-cynical, worn-down Terence’s (James Earl Jones) dreamy prediction.”

Every. Single. Time.

When Ray plays catch with his dad, I cry every damn time. Every. Damn. Time.

Yet, I cannot remember whether my father and I played catch, yea or nay. My sisters could not give me a definitive response.

My dad and I attended minor league baseball games in the Binghamton, NY, area, seeing the Triplets. However, he worked nights at IBM in the mid-1960s, so I tended to go to games with my grandfather, McKinley. Dad and I also saw a New York Yankees game at the old Stadium when they beat the Washington Senators, 4-3, quite possibly on July 21, 1962. (I remember the score and the opponent.)

I saw Field of Dreams when it first came out in 1989, when my dad was still alive. Since he died in 2000, I know there are questions I would have liked to have asked about his childhood, his relationship with McKinley, his time in the military, and many other things. It’s a sentimental movie; my father’s passing makes it feel more so.

Leslie Harold (Les) Green died a quarter of a century ago.

ARA: move to one of the states bordering New York

Mel Allen

Kelly asks:

You have to move to one of the states bordering New York. Which one, and where in that state?

Vermont, the 14th state, which was once part of New York, sort of. It’s a very progressive state. “The Vermont Republic abolished slavery before any other U.S. state…Vermont approved women’s suffrage decades before it became part of the national constitution. Women were first allowed to vote in the December 18, 1880 elections when they were granted limited suffrage…. It was the first state to introduce civil unions in 2000 and legalize same-sex marriage in 2009, unforced by court challenge or ruling.”

I’d probably move to the teeming metropolis of Burlington. The city has about 50,000 people, but the metropolitan statistical area has about 225,000, about one-third of the state’s population. It’s near Lake Champlain, with several ferries crossing into New York.

Favorite sports announcer, reporter, or writer?

First, it would probably be limited to baseball and football because that’s all I read about and watch enough to offer an opinion other than Jim Nantz’s coverage of men’s college basketball.

Baseball

Writers: Roger Angell, Peter Gammons, Roger Kahn, Dan Shaughnessy, George Will (yes, THAT George Will), former MLB pitcher Jim Bouton, and, of course, Terence Mann.

Announcers: On one end of the spectrum is the voice I most identified with the game while growing up: Mel Allen. He was the “longtime voice of baseball’s weekly highlight show, This Week in Baseball.”

But I also enjoyed Vin Scully’s dulcet tones, even though I tended not to root for the Los Angeles Dodgers. Mark Evanier wrote in 2013: “You know what needs Vin Scully? When no one cares about anything happening on the field. The outcome of the game doesn’t matter. One team is six runs ahead. The stands are two-thirds empty because even the people who showed up decided that the fifth inning was a good time to head home and beat the non-existent traffic. That’s when somehow Vinnie manages to make it interesting. Even I sometimes listen to him then. What a great talker.”

Bob Costas was always prepared with a story, even during a rain delay.

There are George Owens and Harry Doyle; in other words, Bob Uecker.

Football

Announcers: On the one hand, I like the straightforward play-by-play folks such as Pat Summerall. BTW, “The urban legend was his nickname became “Pat” because of the abbreviation for “point after touchdown” that a field-goal kicker was credited for in a game summary. But in a 1997 Dallas Morning News story, Summerall said after his parents divorced, he was taken in by an aunt and uncle who had a son named Mike. ‘My aunt and uncle just started calling me Pat to go with their Mike,’ Summerall would say, referencing frequently named characters in Irish jokes told during that time.”

However, for color commentary, I was fond of former Raiders coach John Madden. They were a great team.

Here’s my pet peeve: the sideline reporters who talk to head coaches either at the end of the half or right before the third quarter. They ask mundane questions about what they will do differently in the second half. The answers, by definition, are pretty dull: “Well, we have to make more third downs,” “We’ll have to hold onto the ball better,” or “We’ll have to cut down on those penalties.” It’s almost always some obvious thing that you already know if you were watching the game. Useless, pointless. The coaches have been gracious about it, but it’s unnecessary blather.

Both

Writers: Frank Deford, Michael Smith, Red Smith.

Announcers: there’s a bunch of them, among them Al Michaels.

Billy Wagner for Baseball Hall of Fame

Ichiro

If I could vote, I’d pick Billy Wagner for Baseball Hall of Fame induction. This is his 10th and final year on the ballot and last time, he was on a tantalizing 73.8% of the ballots, with 75% required to make it into the Hall. He was a steady relief pitcher. Here’s the case.

I’d also want Andruw Jones (8th year, 61.6% last year), a fabulous defensive centerfielder. Though his offense dropped off precipitously, I’d still pick him. Here’s the case.

In the case of Carlos Beltrán (3rd year, 57.1%), he “established himself as one of the best power-hitting center fielders ever. He ranks fifth all-time in home runs (435) among center fielders (at least 1,000 games played in center). He trails only Willie Mays, Ken Griffey Jr., Mickey Mantle, and Andre Dawson, all of whom are in the Hall of Fame.

“Using the same criteria, Beltrán also ranks fifth in runs batted in, fourth in doubles, 13th in slugging percentage, 17th in OPS, and 13th in isolated power… “

In the narrative, Jimmy Rollins (4th year, 14.8%) “was a four-time Gold Glove Award winner, an MVP, and a member of two pennant-winning teams. In addition, he had 2,455 hits, the 10th most for players who logged 60% of their starts at short; he’s behind Omar Vizquel, 19th-century star Bill Dahlen, and seven Hall of Fame inductees.

As a player who combined extra-base power with speed, he’s the only shortstop in the history of baseball to hit 200 home runs, leg out 100 triples, hit over 500 doubles, and steal at least 400 bases.”

I’ve been pushing Andy Pettitte (7th year, 13.5%) for years. His case is “fairly simple. He won 256 games. There are only five pitchers since 1901 with more than 250 wins who are not in the Hall of Fame.”

I’m on the fence regarding Bobby Abreu and Chase Utley

New on the ballot

I’d also select outfielder Ichiro Suzuki, pitcher CC Sabathia, and infielder Dustin Pedroia, all of whom are described here.

I would not vote for Álex Rodríguez (A-Rod) or Manny Ramírez over performance-enhancing drugs. Next year is Manny’s 10th and last year; maybe then. I’ve declined Francisco Rodríguez (K-Rod) and Omar Vizquel for non-baseball reasons having to do with abuse.

Here are all of the stats for Bobby Abreu, Carlos Beltrán, Mark Buehrle, Carlos González, Curtis Granderson, Félix Hernández, Torii Hunter, Adam Jones, Andruw Jones, Ian Kinsler, Russell Martin, Brian McCann, Dustin Pedroia, Andy Pettitte, Hanley Ramírez, Manny Ramírez, Fernando Rodney, Álex Rodríguez, Francisco Rodríguez, Jimmy Rollins, CC Sabathia, Ichiro Suzuki, Troy Tulowitzki, Chase Utley, Omar Vizquel, Billy Wagner, David Wright, and Ben Zobrist.