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Friday, January 02, 2009
One Poor Correspondent: Nawrocki: The Socio-Ethnic Implications of Don Larsen’s Perfect Game
The MLB Network made it debut yesterday, marked primarily by Harold Reynolds heroic restraint in not giving his comely co-host Hazel Mae a hug and by the airing in its entirety of Don Larsen’s perfect game in the 1956 World Series. While the last thing the baseball world needs is more mythologizing of the Dodgers and Yankees of the 1950s, the fact that they showed the whole game - including many Gillette commercials, with ultrarare footage of Don Newcombe shaving with the “heavy” razor, an obvious precursor to the later classic Deacon Jones/Multiblade episode of “The Odd Couple” - allowed us a glimpse into how the game was played two generations ago.
* They didn’t bring out a new ball for each inning, which means that after an infielder recorded a third out, he’d simply roll the ball onto the mound (which would only make it dirtier) rather than flipping it back to an umpire or tossing it into the stands as they do today. After Dodger pitcher Sal Maglie struck out to end the Dodger sixth, Yogi Berra simply flipped the ball to him so Maglie would have it to start the seventh.
* When Mickey Mantle hit lefthanded, the Dodgers shifted their infield so that three players were between first and second bases and only Jackie Robinson, playing third, was on the left side of the infield. I had no idea teams ever used that kind of shift on Mantle.
* After the teams recorded an out with no one on base, and they ritually whipped the ball around the infield, they included the catcher, which no one does today. This was a nice democratic touch.
I’d also add that when runners took their lead off second base, they were direct with the base and not at the pre-rounded spot behind the bag.
Repoz
Posted: January 02, 2009 at 03:32 PM | 39 comment(s)
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Frank Crosetti disagrees.
And thanks for the link, Repoz.
How long would it take before pitchers re-learned how to use the scuffs?
Yes. This is one of many things that drive me crazy but most people probably don't think about or care about. Every time a pitch hits the dirt, BOOM, the catcher automatically hands it to the ump. Keep that ball in play son! Scuffs are a good thing!
Baseballs ain't cheap either. I mean, it's a multibillion dollar industry but changing balls every time one gets exposed to too much sun adds up, I'd think.
Really would have liked to see this game. Thanks Time Warner.
When did this stop? I definitely remember this as the custom when I was a kid in the 60's.
I'd imagine that, since a majority of game-used balls end up in the hands of spectators at the end of the day, that teams write them off as "PR costs". The remainder get used as BP balls, right? So I don't think teams are really "wasting" them, per se.
I remember that the AL and NL used to have different customs when an inning ended on a ground out. In the AL, the first baseman would flip the ball to the first-base umpire. In the NL, he would toss it to the pitchers' mound, where the other team's pitcher would use it to warm up (and then the umpire would take it out of play). I remember an All-Star game where an AL first baseman (I want to say Cecil Fielder) tossed a ball and hit the (NL) umpire in the back with it.
I suppose you're right. I'd still like to see a less-than-pristine ball remain in play, however. That's my main concern, rather than the $$.
Also, I sat in a luxury box once in Oakland in either 1988 or '89, which I remember because Storm Davis was pitching, and because of who I went with it wouldn't have been '87. Our corporate host introduced a game we would all play. There was a cup and a pile of quarters, provided by corporate host. The first person dropped a quarter into the cup and passed it to the next person after an out. And so on after each out. Or something like that. If you were holding the cup at the third out, and -->> at last, the point of this story <<-- the ball, when rolled to the mound for the next inning by the fielder who ended up with it, landed on the dirt of the mound, you won the pot. So the roll the ball back to the mound thing was still going on then.
The thing where fielders who catch the third out toss the ball into the stands is much more recent than that. I remember noticing one year that, all of a sudden, every single fielder on every team was doing it. There had obviously been an edict from the league office to begin this fan-friendly practice. If I had to guess at the year, I would say 2000.
IIRC that was 1995 after the strike. Went to a Yankee game with my kids and balls were being tossed into the stands every which way. Used to be that foul balls fielded by the ball boys down the line were tossed to the dugout during a break in the action, not handed to the fans.
I remember players obviously tossing/rolling the ball to the mound with care and laughing with each other if it came to rest right by the rubber. Stick Michael was definitely trying to do this; after an outfield fly ball third out he'd go out and get the throw and take a roll at the mound. If it came to rest up top he'd be extremely animated about it.
A white baseball against a black background is one thing. A somewhat dingy, discolored ball against a black background? Um, not so good.
I played amateur ball when the same ball was used until it was all but a tight string sphere. It was a sumb*tch..........
There is some correlation to the ability to scuff a ball and keeping a dirt-ed up ball in play, as others have noted above.
Catchers still do that, I think - just ask Josh Paul.
The scheduled replay was as part of the double-header the Friday of the closing weekend series. Baltimore came in down 3 with 4 to play and won the first three (including the replay) before Sutton (, Yount & Ogilvie) beat Palmer on the last day to save Simmons' ass.
That's the only time in baseball history two Hall of Fame pitchers squared off against each other on the last day of the season with a trip to the postseason on the line.
Naturally, it was a high scoring game.
Only from one side as Robin beat the living sh*t out of the Orioles that day leading to the 10-2 win. Everybody dumps on Palmer but he gave 5 ok innings. It was Flanagan/Martinez combining to help the Crew to a 5-run 9th that salted it away.
Well, for one of the teams anyway.
Edit: Harveys, I'm sure you remember that game much more fondly than I do.
Has that really gone by the wayside too?
What always puzzles me is how folks just dump all over Palmer as if he gave the game away. Milwaukee scored more runs in 1982 than any team since the 1962 Giants. They had three guys with 200 or more hits. They hit 213 home runs when 200 plus homers by a team was a HUGE deal. They had the obvious AL MVP hitting SECOND.
4 runs over 5 innings ain't GREAT. But he kept them in the game. And it took an MVP type day to beat him and his team.
You know there's probably a classic book in that Brewer-Oriole '82 season . . . Oh, wait . . .
Yea, Cro was the 3B grouch from 1947 to 1968.
He's now retrieving foul balls for Satan.
& I love that Terry Crowley sat there "like any fan" for 8 innings, and then came up and got an RBI-single in the 8th in Earl's last game.
In one of his early 1980s books (either Why Time Begins on Opening Day or How Life Imitates the World Series), Tom Boswell had an extended write-up on the 1982 pennant race. It's one of the greatest pieces of baseball writing I've ever seen. He's got a section there on how perfect it would be for Baltimore to win it all in Weaver's last years and goes on a tangent about all little details that made it extra special.
Of course, Baltimore didn't win it, but it was a great piece nonetheless.
Are you talking about Nine Innings?
-- MWE
2. Bob Costas should have offered a more detailed explanation of where the Larsen film came from, rather than a brief mention that it was a kinescope. The kinescope (essentially film shot off a TV screen in the days before videotape and digital recording) was made for distribution to armed forces personnel for later viewing. It was in the possession not of MLB but of sports film collector Doak Ewing, who sold the rights to it to MLB Productions, which in turn leased it to the MLB Network.
3. Speaking of Ewing, he had shown the film publicly before Thursday. But not on TV. Among the showings was a fundraiser at the Yogi Berra Museum and Learning Center in Little Falls, N.J., two years ago that was attended by both Larsen and Yogi Berra. Costas evidently was not aware of this, because he indicated neither Berra nor Larsen had seen it before his sitdown with them was taped Dec. 19. Neither man corrected him.
6. I was disappointed the MLB Net deleted some of the cool postgame stuff I saw on the DVD I screened last week. Apparently the motivation simply was to get back to Costas, Berra and Larsen and not linger on the old film, but fascinating material was lost in the process. One of the most unusual moments was Scully, seconds after the end of the game, throwing in yet another plug for the Encyclopedia of Baseball, telling viewers they could read all about the previous perfect game in Major League history in the book, even as the Yankees still were heading into the dugout. It made me wish I were a TV sports columnist in 1956, except that there was no such thing at the time.
7. Also cut from the postgame was an incongruous ad for "Deep Magic Lotion," a commercial aimed at women stuck onto a telecast mostly dedicated to promoting Gillette products. Bob Sheppard can be heard in the background as fans leave Yankee Stadium and for the first time all day Allen and Scully actually talk to each other. On the show Thursday night, the MLB Net stayed with the discussion to the point where Allen says, "Vinny, I don't think you or I will ever see such a thing again," and Scully answers, "No, I guess we can both say we can go now." The film cuts off there, but Allen actually had a funny response to that strangely ominous sentiment coming from a 28-year-old Scully. Says Mel, bringing things back to reality: "Well, we go back to Ebbets Field, and who knows what's going to happen?" Later, signing off, Allen says, "This is Mel saying, smooth sailing, smooth shaving and good afternoon from your host, the Gillette Shaving Company." Cool..
One of the players, Berra I think, said it was a 1PM start.
There appeared to be a strange white object, maybe someone's discarded T-shirt, in short leftfield at one point. I have no idea what that was.
I assumed it was a bag or piece of paper. The wind in the old Yankee Stadium used to swirl papers around like crazy.
Palmer had nobody to blame but himself for raising everyone's expectations. He came into the game on a string of 5 straight quality starts, including a 4-hitter the previous week in Milwaukee; 11 quality starts in his last 12 outings; and 13 wins in his last 14 decisions. And the O's pitching staff had given up all of 11 runs in taking five straight from your Wallbangers.
If only they hadn't lost 4 of 6 to the damned Tigers...
One of the players, Berra I think, said it was a 1PM start.
All of the World Series games started at 1:00 local time up through at least the 60's, which led to incongruities such as the Chicago games in 1959 starting at 2:00 in the East, while the previous year's games in Milwaukee started at 3:00, even though both of those cities are in the Central time zone. This was because back then Wisconsin was still on Standard Time while the Eastern cities (other than Detroit) were all on Daylight---when the Nats played night games in Detroit in the early 50's the starting time in Washington was 9:30 and then 9:00.
But even with a 1:00 start, that towering third deck in Yankee Stadium put the pitcher's mound in the shadows almost as soon as the game had begun. You could also see right field completely in the shadows while the leftfielder was blinded by practically any high fly ball. And as Burt Lancaster might have said, "that Yankee Stadium sun was really something in those days."
Scully would call Koufax's 1965 perfect game, and I'm reasonably sure Scully called Browning's 1988 and Dennis Martinez's 1991 perfect games, both against the Dodgers.
And when Berra and Larsen had their Yankee Stadium reunion in 1999, David Cone threw a perfect game against Montreal.
And when Berra and Larsen had their Yankee Stadium reunion in 1999, David Cone threw a perfect game against Montreal.
Yeah, but World Series, Game 5. No comparison.
To add some perspective, no one has ever thrown even a post season no-hitter, before or since.
When I started going to Wrigley in the 1980s, everyone in the RF bleachers seemed to play "Moundball."
Everyone put a buck in, and one guy got the top of the first, next guy got bottom of first, etc. If you're inning is the winner, you keep the cash (you hold it while it's your turn).
You'd hand over your buck to a stranger and have no idea where it went.
Being from NY/NJ, the level of trust was interesting.
What was funny was that invariably the damn ball would ALMOST land on the mound, but it never would quite stay there. Sometimes it took into the 6th inning.
Not sure what happened after that - the last 3 innings are a blur for the entire bleacher crowd, of course.
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