Moore joined Everett after the draft and was hitting .500 (12 of 24) through his first six games. Less than two weeks later, he was promoted to Wisconsin while hitting .317.
"It was a great feeling, going into [Everett coach] Dave Meyer's office and being told I was being sent to Wisconsin," Moore said. "I wasn't expecting to get moved up so soon."
Also in the Times, former Rattler Gil Meche is the subject of a Larry Stone column Gil Meche: New and Improved?
Gil Meche feels your skepticism.
He knows that many Mariners fans view this splendid season of his as just another tease in a career filled with them. Every start could be the one where the old Meche reappears, the one whose starts are filled with rallies and blowups and ultimate frustration.
He's here to tell you that this is different. That's he's different.
Missed this yesterday until an observant reader pointed out that yesterday was the Anniversary of the "Pine Tar Game". From Baseball Library:
1983» In the memorable "Pine Tar Game" at Yankee Stadium, George Brett hits an apparent 2-run home run off Rich Gossage to give the Royals a 5–4 lead with two outs in the 9th inning, only to have it taken away when Yankees manager Billy Martin, at the urging of coach Don Zimmer, points out that the pine tar on Brett's bat handle exceeds the 17 inches allowed in the rules. As a result, Brett is called out for illegally batting the ball, giving New York a 4–3 victory. Brett goes ballistic a the Royals immediately protest, and American League President Lee MacPhail overrules his umpires for the first time saying that, while the rules should certainly be rewritten and clarified, the home run will stand and the game will be resumed from that point on August 18th.
Baseball Almanac has an enhanced box score of that game. Including a few memorable images that Blogger won't let me upload right now.
You don't expect to read about minor league pitching coaches being fired. That is why it is such a surprise when it happens:
Last Wednesday night, on an off day, Dayton Dragons pitching coach Larry Pierson was fired, called on the telephone by Johnny Almaraz, the Cincinnati Reds director of player personnel...
Almaraz, the farm director, watched the Dragons on Monday and would offer nothing new on the firing except to say he wanted the pitching staff in Dayton run differently than it was run...
Pierson oversaw four starters — Johnny Cueto (since promoted to Sarasota), Zachary Ward, Travis Wood and Fisher, who were a combined 30-8 entering Monday's game, which the 7-2 Wood started. Yet the Dragons were 48-51 overall, meaning the rest of the staff was 18-43. Pierson, obviously, was blamed for some of that.
Speaking of surpise firings:
ESPN yesterday fired analyst Harold Reynolds from Baseball Tonight, sources told The Post. The reason was not immediately known.
"We are not going to comment," ESPN VP Josh Krulewitz said.
Tip of the cap to the guys at Deadspin.com. They have some thoughts:
...we remain a little shocked. It's not that Reynolds was one of the highlights of the network -- he was all a little too "Big Papi, yeah!!!!" rah-rah-ish for us, though we generally found him pleasant -- but Reynolds never struck us as much of a troublemaker. We're most curious what would cause the network to suddenly drop a guy, overnight, after 11 years. Maybe he refused to do an ESPN Mobile commercial.
Not so quick story. It was the summer of 2000. The Rattlers had Ryan Christianson as their catcher. Ryan was Seattle's #1 pick in the 1999 draft and his agent was the brother of Harold Reynolds. The team was in Clinton there was a doubleheader. Ryan's agent was there and he asked his brother Harold to stop by on his way to somewhere else, beacause before the game there was Harold Reynolds standing on the concourse of Riverview Stadium (as it was then known) talking with Ryan.
After they were done talking I introduced myself to him and asked if he would be willing to come on the air between games. He politely turned me down because he had to leave after the first game to catch his flight. Not wanting to push it, I thanked him for his time and made a little small talk before heading up to the booth.
In about the second or third inning of the second game, the door to the booth opens and in walks Harold Reynolds. He sits down next to me and says something like, "I've got some time. Do you want to do this now?" Of course!
We talked about the game, those really cool Baseball Tonight commercials that were based on baseball movies, and the fact that he played in the Midwest League in 1981. He mentioned that he played in the MWL All-Star Game at County Stadium that year. It was a great talk and I should really go back and see if I can find that tape in my basement.
1 comment:
I haven't seen many (well, any) comments to Chris's excellent posts on Rattler Radio, but I thought that I should jump in on the subject of the infamous Pine Tar Game, still one of the most notorious non-championship games in all of baseball history. I was there that day.
I had a front row box seat directly in line with home plate and facing the Royals dugout on the third base side. When George Breett famously charged out of the dugout to argue with the umpire over the call dis-allowing his home run, he was running straight in my direction -- yikes!!!I'll never forget the look on his face, which is well captured in some of the existing photographs.
I can attest that no announcement about the pine tar ruling was made over the public address system, and so an entire stadium of fans left the ballpark in complete befuddlement. We generally thought that the incident might have had something to do with cork in Brett's beat, since we had seen the umps looking carefully at the bat.
Yankees manager Billy Martin had actually been aware of the excessive pine tar on Brett's bat for quite a while that season, and had been waiting for a crucial game situation to bring the issue up. He always had a real flair for drama.
I and a friend scored such good seats that day because they were offered to us by a college pal who worked in the office of the commissioner of baseball. The commissioner's seats weren't going to be used that Sunday, and our pal thought that we might enjoy them. Yes, indeed!
So when we left Yankee Stadium, we immediately called our pal who worked in the commissioner's office, and got an explanation of the real situation. I can tell you that the entire machinery of official baseball swung into high gear the minute this disputed ruling occurred.
Eventually, American League President Lee MacPhail did overrule the umpires' call and ordered the game resumed with Brett's home run now counted. The final four outs were played on August 13. I couldn't manage to be present that day, although anyone who had a ticket stub from the original game could attend.
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