Reactions

The word that minor league players are going to be tested for HGH (Human Growth Hormones) sent a few reporters out for reaction.

In Fort Wayne: TinCaps cheer test for HGH

On Thursday, Major League Baseball implemented random blood testing for human growth hormone in the minor leagues, the first professional sports league in the United States to take the aggressive step against doping.

“The minors have been so far out in front in most cases of the drug testing, both recreational and performance enhancing, before the major league guys,” TinCaps President Mike Nutter said.

Blood testing for HGH becomes part of the Minor League Drug Prevention and Treatment Program, which baseball Commissioner Bud Selig introduced in 2001 to test for performance-enhancing drugs.

Fort Wayne players and personnel praised the decision as a move toward leveling the playing field.

“We’ll see who is real now,” TinCaps relief pitcher Miles Mikolas said. “We’ll see who the real gamers are.”

Testing will be limited to players with minor-league contracts because they are not members of the Major League Players Association. Blood testing for HGH is not part of the major leagues’ collective bargaining agreement.

In Dayton: Blood testing for HGH meets with approval from Dragons

To members of the Dayton Dragons, this is good news.

“We’re all trying to get to the big leagues here, but you have to do it clean,” first baseman Tommy Nurre said. “You have to keep the game intact like it’s supposed to be.”

Nurre acknowledged drawing blood could be an issue for players who don’t like needles. For others, it’s a fact of life. Third baseman Frank Pfister has had blood drawn since he was diagnosed with a thyroid condition in eighth grade.

“If a little bit of privacy has to be taken away, that’s the way it has to be,” Pfister said.

Dragons outfielder Andrew Means was a college football standout at Indiana University as a wide receiver, and received an invite to the NFL Combine. To him, testing is a necessary evil because cleaning up the minor leagues will lead to cleaner players in the majors.

“It will clear up problems down here before they start testing in the majors,” Means said. “It will make players think twice before they put something in their bodies.”

I heard that FOX 11 was at Time Warner Cable Field yesterday for reaction, but I did not see video on their website.

Jon Miller, Hall of Famer

The newest winner of the Ford C. Frick Award is Jon Miller.

Growing up in the Bay Area, Giants play-by-play man Jon Miller spent hundreds of days and nights listening to Russ Hodges and Lon Simmons call Giants games.

On Monday, Miller received the ultimate honor for a baseball broadcaster, one Hodges and Simmons each earned.

The National Baseball Hall of Fame announced that Miller was selected as the winner of the Ford C. Frick Award, given annually to recognize excellence in baseball broadcasting.

Miller, on vacation in Cartagena, Colombia, got the news in phone calls from Hall President Jeff Idelson and Hall of Fame second baseman Joe Morgan, Miller's partner on ESPN's "Sunday Night Baseball" telecasts for the past 20 seasons.

"The first people I actually thought of were Russ Hodges and Lon Simmons," Miller said in a conference call.

"It really is kind of astounding to me, that I'm the recipient of the award, because Russ and Lon were larger-than-life people to me. They were as big as the biggest movie stars to me."

I just hope that if Mr. Miller says the name of the man for whom the award is named, he has better luck than his time as a hockey announcer for the California Golden Seals when he...well, here is the excerpt from From Peanuts to the Pressbox by Eli Gold.

ESPN's Jon Miller admits that during the first game he called for the NHL's California Golden Seals way back when, he got tongue-tied while trying to say, "The puck fell." Instead he said...well, you know what he said. According to Miller, ever after he has advised aspiring hockey announcers to refer to the puck as "it".

Two losses

In Philly...

On black-armband days like this, you think dark thoughts of loss, the sudden taking of comrades with whom you shared days, weeks, months, years, decades and generations, traveling with a ballclub as many intertwined lives were weathered like driftwood on a tropical beach that suddenly became storm-tossed and gray.

Rich Ashburn was taken from us after a Phillies victory in Shea Stadium Sept. 9, 1997. We all know where we were and what we were doing when news of his death in a Manhattan hotel room broke on Angelo Cataldi's WIP morning show.

Harry Kalas was taken from us after collapsing in the broadcast booth of a ballpark, Nationals Park, hours before the Phillies he loved so much for so many years were to oppose the Nats in their home opener. We will remember where we were and what we were doing when the news he had been rushed to George Washington University Hospital was overridden by club president Dave Montgomery's announcement of his death.

In Detroit...

Mark Fidrych reminded you of your childhood, no matter how old you were when he pitched. This was his charm, his curse, his legacy. He personified athletic innocence.

The Bird got his nickname from walking like Big Bird and his fame from talking to baseballs. He jumped over the white lines on his way to the mound — and when somebody got a hit off him, he spit out his gum and refused to throw that ball again.

When he walked past a phone booth, Fidrych would always check the coin slot to see if there was any loose change. He walked into the Tiger Stadium clubhouse looking like he’d hitchhiked all the way from Massachusetts. General manager Jim Campbell had to buy him a suit.

In baseball.