Author Archives: Russell Dyas

Mother In Laws, DVDs and False Teeth: The Dangers Of Baseball

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After Kendry Morales injured himself this week celebrating after a game-ending grand slam this week’s column had to be my top 10 baseball player injuries.

10. The Atlanta Braves outfielder Terry Harper injured himself by getting a separated shoulder when he high-fived a teammate.

9. Kevin Mitchell always seemed to be injured throughout his career but the most famous is the donut gate incident in which he missed several games.  He broke his tooth when he bit into a frozen chocolate donut that he had put in the microwave for too long and had turned hard.  He needed to have root canal treatment on the tooth, which was later replaced by a gold tooth.

8. If you ever need a reason not to visit the mother-in-law and you are a major league baseball player then David Cone has come up with an idea.  He missed a start after being injured by his mother in law’s Jack Russell Terrier.  You do have to wonder if he had his hand in the Terrier’s mouth so that he could say that the coach ordered him to keep away from his mother in law’s dog.

7. Marty Cordova decided he needed to look good while out on the field and the only thing a baseball player can do is take a trip to the tanning salon.  However, after spending a bit too long under the lights he ended up burning his face. He was told under doctors’ orders to stay out of direct sunlight for a few days.

6. Adam Eaton decided that instead of spending a relaxing evening watching a DVD he would instead take a trip to the A & E.  The accident that caused the injury was Eaton stabbing himself with a knife trying to open the DVD.

5. The shortstop Jason Bartlet tore a nail off one of his fingers while sliding his hand under the television in his room while staying at the Ritz Carlton hotel in Detroit. Apart from anything else we have to ask why he was sliding his hand under the TV in the first place?

4. I am not sure if it is the curse of the shortstops or the curse of the Ritz Hotel but Juan Castro hurt his neck on the pillows at the same hotel that Jason Barlet hurt himself.

3. If you  where thinking that these baseball players have it too easy and thought that Castro was soft for hurting himself on some pillows. Then Larry Anderson proves it beyond a doubt when he strained a muscle while getting out of a Jacuzzi.

2. Ken Griffey Jr makes it up for baseball players around the world when he missed a game after his cup fell and trapped a testicle. I am sure many male readers are asking why he was not out for the whole season with an injury like that.

1. Red Sox Rookie Clarence Blethen came up with a bright idea of taking his teeth out and putting them in his back pocket when he was pitching because he claimed it made him look meaner. The problem was he forgot to put them back in while he was batting. He promptly slide into second base and bit his own butt.

What this teaches us is that being a baseball player is a risky business, off the field as well as on.

Interleague Play & The Marmite Effect: 63 Years In The Making

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Interleague play once again arrived and with it the heated discussion between fans over the pros and cons of Interleague matchups.

MLB Interleague Logo

MLB Interleague Logo

While the official interleague play has had a relatively short life (starting in 1997) compared to rest of the MLB history, ever since its conception it has caused a “Marmite Effect” on fans with people either ‘loving it’ or ‘hating it’.

1930s To The 1950s

The history of Interleague play is quite interesting. As I said the current system has only being going since the 1997 season. The initial concept however dates back to August 1933 when William Veeck Sr. of the Cubs suggested the idea. He came up with the plan during the middle of a 4-year slump in attendance due to the Depression. When he died In October of that year, the plan died with him and the idea was not revisited for another 20 years until 1953.

Another Veeck instigated it, this time Bill Veeck was trying to save the St Louis Browns from closure when he suggested a 32 game schedule. This motion was doomed from the start as the rest of the American League teams wanted Veeck out.

It was then a protégé of Veeck a man called Hank Greenburg from the Indians who next raised the idea. He tried both in 1954 and 1956 but the idea was shot down by the rest of the American League and consequently was never voted on by the National League teams.

In 1959, the Interleague concept started to get some traction by getting the entire support of both leagues. Calvin Griffith wanted to move the Washington Senators to Minneapolis but this was a no starter due to political reasons. The American League proposed an alternative plan with a one-team expansion in each league. This would have seen Minneapolis added to the American League. The New York franchise would return to the National League. Then the idea would have seen interleague play between leagues, but in the National League in the end said no.

1960s To The 1970s

In 1960, the National League approved an expansion to New York and Houston for the 1962 season. The American league then proposed to move the Senators to the Minnesota, replace them with a new expansion club in Washington, and place a second expansion team in Los Angeles for the 1961 season. The Dodgers objected to the new team in Los Angeles and the American League went back to the idea of 9 teams in each league and interleague play, however the National League remained with their original idea and the Interleague plan was abounded and Dodgers backed down after a payment of $550,000 in compensation was made.

In 1962, Commissioner Ford Frick proposed an interleague schedule but the National League blocked the idea.  After that, the plans remained dormant until 1973.

In 1973 the American League adopted the designated hitter rule and at the same time approved of the idea of Interleague play but the National League once again voted no. This meant that the current commissioner at the time Bowie Kuhn (who supported the idea) refused to cast the deciding vote and instead created a committee to look into the issue.

In 1975 and 1976 the American League once again tried to get the concept off the ground but lots of questions of franchise movements  (San Francisco was being threatened with a move to Toronto) and National League refusing to add a 13th team meant that no interleague schedule could work. In the end, the American League added a franchise in Toronto and San Francisco stayed where they were.

1980s to 1990s

In 1983 there was a brief discussion between CBS and MLB over a series of Interleague games on a Thursday night but this came to no fruition.

Then we move all the way to 1993 and the teams took an informal vote with the owners approving the concept of a realigning of the divisions and having 10-20 interleague games per year.

On January 18th 1996, the owners adopted interleague play for the 1997 season. The Eastern, Central and Western Division clubs played each other with the designated hitter being used in the American League cities.

That entire concept from its initial creation to the first game of Interleague play took 63 years but interestingly the original reason behind the concept (to improve game attendance) still holds true as attendance figures increases during Interleague play.

Interleague play provides an opportunity to provide some interesting matchups for fans of the game and I always find Interleague play interesting.  What do you like about Interleague play?

Changing History

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In Plant City, like most American cities there is a local little league team. In this place however the star pitcher is 12 year old Chelsea Baker who has recently thrown her second perfect game.  I am sure she will follow in the footsteps of other women players such as Eri Yoshida and play baseball professionally.

With that in mind I thought this week I would highlight some people who are associated with the game that have been trail blazers.  We all know the likes of Jackie Robinson however there are many other people who have advanced the game.

Mr. Hernández Nodar

Nodar spent 13 years in a Cuban jail. The only crime he committed was to help Cuban baseball players defect to the USA. He spent nearly all of his sentence at the Combinado del Este prison; a notorious prison known for its many human rights violations.

The story reads like a movie plot and includes lows such as Nodar spending 15 months in Solitary Confinement for cheering the USA baseball team. As well as the negative there were positive times such as the friendship he forged with a fellow prisoner Rolando Alberro Arroyo who taught him the ‘ways of prison’. The friendship is one so strong Nodar owes Albeero his life when he protected Nodar from orders of being killed from fellow prison inmates . Nodar since his release has vowed “For each year I spent behind bars, I vow to get one Cuban player into the U.S.,”. The story is one of human hope and I am sure someone will turn it into a movie.

Ila Borders

Borders was the first female to start a men’s NCAA or NAIA college baseball game and she became one of the first females to be part of the men’s professional game. She signed up for the St. Paul Saints of the independent Northern League and her first game was May 31, 1997 against the Sioux Falls Canaries. After a career moving around the various minor league teams, she retired mid way through the 2000 season. Over her minor league career, she was 2-4 with a 6.73 ERA.

Toni Stone

Stone was one of the first women to play in the Negro League. A graduate from Roosevelt High School she started playing professionally in 1949 with the San Francisco Sea Lions.  Unfortunately she was not welcomed by her fellow players and In her words she spent most of her time on the bench with people who hated her. She once described it as “hell”.  She retired after the 1954 season and moved to Oakland, California to work as a nurse and care for her sick husband. Stone died on November 2nd 1996 aged 75.

Stone’s most memorable baseball moment was against the legendary Satchel Paige in 1953 in her own words, “He was so good. That he would ask batters where they wanted it, just so they would have a chance and I said,’ It doesn’t matter just do not hurt me’. I stood there shaking, but I got a hit. Right out over second base. Happiest moment in my life.”

What other people  do you know of that has changed baseball for the better?

Baseball & Earth Day

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Forty years ago a U.S. Senator called Gaylord Nelson started a ‘teach-in’ week that focused on the environment. Over the years the focus has become one day in that week: April 22nd. This has become known as Earth Day.  MLB like many sports generates a large amount of carbon emissions and waste. Just think of all the air miles the players pile up in one season.

MLB Clubs Working Together

Since 2008, MLB has been working towards being an environmentally-conscious sport. The initiatives have been very secular with each club working on their own.  This week MLB has announced the creation of a system with the ‘Natural Resources Defense Council’ (NRDC). The system that has been designed to pull the data from all 30 clubs into one central place.  The idea is the system will “distribute best practice information across the 30 Clubs”.

“Major League Baseball has responsibilities to our fans and the society at large that go beyond the playing field,” said Baseball Commissioner, Allan H. (Bud) Selig. “Our Clubs have made a commitment to sustainability and are leaders in their communities raising awareness and educating fans not just on Earth Day, but everyday about environmental stewardship.”

This week to celebrate Earth Day a number of the clubs will be showcasing their green programmes such as the Atlanta Braves who are offering discounts to visitors who bring recyclables along.

UK Baseball and The Environment.

The environmental impact from MLB is large and they need to have big initiatives to offset some of the damage. However maybe it is time to look closer to home with the British season currently starting this weekend. Do we need to think about the impact we are having on the environment? To a certain degree UK teams already do this through measures such as car-sharing and keeping the grounds we use clean. The next question is how we can extend our efforts to make UK Baseball an environmentally-aware sport?

What is the baseball community currently doing and what can we do to improve the impact the game of baseball has on the environment in this country?

The Man With The Weight Of Great Britain On His Shoulders

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JGreenberg

GB General Manager Jason Greenberg. Photo courtesy of BaseballSoftballUK.com

Not many managers of national sports teams have to worry about how to raise the money so that their team can travel to a major international tournament.  It is certainly not something that would keep Fabio Capello up at night.

However this is one of the many things that Jason Greenberg, the new General Manager for the Great Britain Senior Baseball team, has to contend with.  He recently spent some time talking to BaseballGB about the challenges and opportunities that are on the horizon for the British national team.  See the end of this post to listen to the full audio of the 25-minute interview.

Little League memories

Jason is a lifelong Mariners fan who recently took over the GB General Manager post.  He has always had a passion for baseball. His early boyhood life in Seattle was spent playing baseball and eating Big League Chew and this experience has stayed with him ever since.  As Jason explains, “I never forget playing Little League. The Little League complex [in the States], that is the thing I am most jealous of … that is the biggest difference between baseball there and what it could be here.”

Jason moved across the pond to the UK five years ago.  He was looking for a baseball club to play for and that is when he hooked up with Herts Baseball club. It was from that day his involvement with British baseball was sealed. Baseball is Jason’s life. As well as being the GB General Manger he still helps with Herts Baseball club and works full time for BaseballSoftballUK. Continue reading →

Annual MLB.TV Fail

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Last night was the main opening day for most of the MLB clubs sadly for UK viewers MLB.TV had its annual opening day fail.  People subscribed to the service where getting Black out restriction messages no matter where their location.

The question is why do we seem to have this annual fail every year?

Customers will not see any refund from the opening day bug if history is anything to go by.  As UK viewers who do not have access to MLB on TV unless you have ESPN America. This means that the MLB.TV service is critical for viewers to see MLB live action but also if you want to see a game at a reasonable time then the MLB.TV service is also necessary.

At time of going to press, the MLB Advanced Media were unavailable for comment and the blackout bug was still affecting the archived games.

Let us hope it is fixed for tonight?

It’s Here

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Well it’s here. In a few hours from that first pitch at Fenway Park the months of joy, tears and frustration will start as the New York Yankees will take on the Boston Red Soxs in the first game of the 2010 MLB season.

This is what we have been building up to from the long slog since the end of the World Series in 2009 to the start of Spring Training. Once Spring Training began all we cared about was that here was some baseball starting to be played.  We looked over our team trying to work out which players would get a place in the big leagues and which would end up back in the minors. We will have sat through Keri Hilson singing the anthem and Fighter Jets flying over. However none of this matters as all this has just been the prequel to the main season.

There will be joy, tears and sometimes frustration as our chosen team makes its way with one goal in mind – the World Series in 2010.

There will be arguments as we discuss the virtues of each team and its players. We are all biased but in our mind our team, be that the Giants, Mariners, Dodgers, A’s or the Mets can get to the World Series; if only Jonathan Sanchez can get one more out.

Now it is time to turn on the baseball and grab a drink from the fridge and sit back.

It’s time to shout…

It’s time to cheer…

It’s time to mutter those famous words “Play Ball”…

It’s time as MLB 2010 has arrived!

British Baseball Federation 2010 Schedules

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BbfLogoWant British Baseball Federation (BBF) schedules in your calendar? Well we aim to please here at BaseballGB.

Below are all of the BBF 2010 schedules with links to XML,  HTML, CSV and ICAL formats.

As always these schedules are correct at time of being published, but you should check with the club before travelling to the event etc. If you do notice a mistake then please comment below so we can correct it. Matt will be taking a closer look at the structure of the 2010 BBF season in next Thursday’s British Baseball Beat.

National Baseball League (NBL): XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

AAA North: XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

AAA South: XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

AA Midlands: XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

AA North: XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

AA South: XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

A South: XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

All Leagues: XML, HTML, CSV, ICAL

Cults, Tara Lipinski & Baseball

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As baseball fans in the UK we all have that story, the one where we discover baseball. Whether it be from a family member or seeing the game on TV in a moment of insomnia.

My story starts on the 30th March 1997. The news was reporting the aftermath of the mass suicide of the 39 Heaven’s cult, in Ireland in the previous month they had legalised divorce and Tara Lipinski at 14 became the youngest women’s world figure skating champion.  However British TV was changing with the launch of Channel 5 but it was not without controversy.

In the run up to the launch they ran newspaper and billboard adverts announcing how “Baseball was the new cricket”. The cricket fans within the UK where up in arms. How dare Channel 5 suggest baseball was a replacement for such a national institution.

In 1997 I was 15 and already a fan of American football. I was taken in by the chance to see more American sport. I had to wait a whole two weeks after launch day for our video to retune but once we had Channel 5 I tuned in the next Sunday to watch live baseball.

At that point it was presented by Tommy Boyd. Maybe it was the nostalgia for seeing Tommy Boyd back on TV (he used to present children’s programmes on ITV) or it could have been the chance to see live American sport other than the NFL. Either way I was hooked into a lifetime of insomnia from watching baseball.

After a few weeks it was clear I was going to need a team to support. It was an easy choice. As an NFL fan before watching baseball I supported the 49ers so I became a Giants fan.

The timing was great for Channel 5 to provide American sport on British TV as the signal for US Armed forces radio was getting weaker and weaker. The times I spent around my parents’ kitchen balancing the radio in dubious positions as it was the only place I could get the signal.

While Channel 5 has grown up into Five TV and has now dropped its American sport coverage the question is how we start encouraging new people to the sport.

The main difference between 1997 and 2010 is the internet.  In 1997 there was an average of 1,681,868 websites compared to over 206,675,938 in 2010.  People have access to a lot more information and more importantly access to live streaming via the internet. I think younger generations will find out about baseball but not in the way that we have in the past due to using new technologies.

How did you become a fan of baseball?

Positive Times In 2010?

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There has been a large amount of bad feeling around recently in the baseball scene. UK baseball has had letters, resignations, meetings and motions, while MLB this week had the shock news that Texas Rangers manager Ron Washington took cocaine. Although the UK infighting seems to have been around for a while and the drugs scandals are nothing new, we tend to forget that as baseball fans there is a lot to be positive about.

The first thing to look forward to is an exciting season of baseball both here in the UK and in the USA. The UK Teams are on the up and they are getting more people interested in playing. The MLB season ahead looks to be a great one with lots of potential.

Money has been given to BaseballSoftballUK to run the Play Ball scheme once again. I remember this from the first time it was in place and it provided a much needed grass-roots development scheme that kicked-started baseball in this country. I hope that once again we can start to get more young people interested in baseball and out there playing it.

While we have lost the coverage of MLB from Five.tv, what we do have is live games on the internet and pay-for TV on ESPN America. We have to be realistic in the current climate that sports with a smaller audience share are going to be cut. At least it is unlike when Channel 4 stopped showing American football back in years past. We do have the opportunity to watch MLB elsewhere.

Another thing that could be good for UK fans, especially as watching games often involves us staying up into the early hours and then getting up for work, is that MLB are looking at a number of rule changes. Some of them are designed to stop overly long games. Other rules that could be changed are the way that home field advantage for the World Series is decided and the usage of reply for fair-or-foul calls.

The off-the-field stories both at home and away can be a distraction, but as Opening day gets nearer, we as fans of baseball have a lot to be positive about. Let us forget for now the politics. Load up your PC or turn on your TV and fire up a spring training game.

What are you looking forward to about this coming season?