Results tagged ‘ Bobby Thomson ’
Sweet music
By Craig Muder
It was the day before Induction Sunday, so this moment in the first-base dugout at Doubleday Field was a rare chance to sit down.
One-hundred yards away, the Hall of Fame Awards Presentation was just getting started. On the stage was Terry Cashman, telling the assembled crowd about how he came to write his classic piece of baseball nostalgia “Talkin’ Baseball (Willie, Mickey and The Duke).”
I was tired, I was hot (Saturday featured another day of 90-plus degree temperatures in Cooperstown) and I was thinking about the next item on my to-do list.
And then Terry Cashman started to sing.
The Whiz Kids had won it; Bobby Thomson had done it; and Yogi read the comics all the while…
I have never felt tears well up that quickly.
We’re talking baseball; Kluszewski, Campanella…
Suddenly, it was 1981 all over again. I was 12 years old, in love with this game and its history, and Terry Cashman was signing to me. I decoded each line of the song like it was a treasure.
Talkin’ baseball; The Man and Bobby Feller…
The first time I heard that song, I knew there were kindred spirits out there. Others felt the same love, and Cashman had captured that feeling. In the days before the internet and when ESPN was in its infancy, the song was a unifying force.
The Scooter, The Barber and the Newk; They knew them all from Boston to Dubuque…
All the controversies, trials and quibbling, it’s all just background noise. This game can still be perfect; and the memory of it can still make me cry.
It was all on display this weekend in Cooperstown.
Especially Willie, Mickey and The Duke…
Thank you, Terry, for giving us fans our piece of history. And thank you for coming to Cooperstown.
Craig Muder is the director of communications for the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
Hall Monitor: Playoff Pleasures
By Trevor Hayes
The regular season is done. That means October is upon us and there is no better time to see greatness than during Autumn’s Glory.
Busy at the Hall: With the regular season over and the postseason heating up, donations are rolling into Cooperstown. On Sept. 19, Bobby Abreu clocked his 20th homer of the season, giving him nine seasons with at least 20 home runs and 20 stolen bases. Only Barry and Bobby Bonds – at 10 each – have more 20/20 seasons. To commemorate the achievement, his bat is now in Cooperstown.
Also announced this week following his historic pitching performance on Wednesday, Roy Halladay’s jersey and a ball from the no-hitter will be making their way to join the artifacts from his May 29th perfect game and the items on display from Don Larsen’s 1956 perfecto – the only other no-hitter in postseason history.
Not to be outdone: Tim Lincecum of the Giants, whose 1.78 September team ERA is the lowest in the Divisional Era, proved his mettle yesterday. Like Halladay, pitching in his first postseason game, Lincecum was brilliant. The two-time Cy Young winner struck out a postseason record 14 Braves, as he tossed a complete game two-hitter. Lincecum’s mark tied Joe Coleman (1972), John Candelaria (1975), Mike Boddicker (1983) and Mike Scott (1986) for the major league record in a postseason debut.
Walking-off into infamy: Halladay threw his gem against the best offense in the National League, the Cincinnati Reds – a team which punched its first ticket to the postseason since 1995 in dramatic fashion last Tuesday. With the score tied at two, Jay Bruce smashed the first pitch he saw in the bottom of the ninth into batter’s eye grass in left-center field at Great American Ballpark. The walk-off was the fifth game-ending home run to clinch a postseason berth.
The others include Steve Finley’s grand slam for the Dodgers in 2004, Alfonso Soriano’s first career hit that sent the 1999 Yankees on to postseason glory and the famous “Shot Heard Round the World” by Bobby Thomson for the 1951 Giants. The only Hall of Famer walk-off postseason clincher came from Hank Aaron, in the 11th inning for the 1957 Milwaukee Braves.
Trend Tracker: Twenty-year-old rookie Jayson Heyward drew a walk against Lincecum, one of just three Braves to reach base against the Giants ace. Heyward’s walk was just an extension of the 91 he racked up during the regular season – a number surpassed at his age by only Hall of Famers Mel Ott (113 in 1929) and Ted Williams (107 in 1939).
Also look for Tampa Bay catcher John Jaso. The lefty-swinging backstop only stole four bases this season, but batted leadoff 45 times in his 88 starts. Hitting .272 with a .380 on-base percentage, if the Rays stay alive, he may get a start there again. If he hits leadoff against right-handed Colby Lewis on Saturday, he would join just two other catchers to start in the one-hole in the postseason. The others are noted speedster Jason Kendall for the 2006 Oakland A’s and Hall of Famer Roger Bresnahan for the 1905 New York Giants.
Trevor Hayes is the editorial production manager at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
Era ends, but history lives
By Craig Muder
For baseball fans born between 1960 and 1980, his story was the first you committed to memory.
“The Giants win the pennant! The Giants win the pennant!”
On Monday, that story ended with the death of Bobby Thomson. But the legend lives forever.
I can still see the pages of my dog-eared copy of the David S. Neft & Richard M. Cohen World Series encyclopedia. A Christmas gift from my parents in 1979, it provided my first taste of the baseball statistics that would one day fill my mind. In that book, each Fall Classic from 1903 through 1978 is preserved – along with season stats from the two Series teams.
But as a bonus, Neft & Cohen provided box scores and play-by-play of season tiebreakers, including the most famous of them all: The 1951 three-game classic between the Giants and the Dodgers.
It was like finding a dollar in the couch cushions – something extra to be devoured. I poured through those box scores over and over, dreaming of becoming Thomson while agonizing over the fate of Ralph Branca.
No matter what the future holds for baseball, the past will always remain king. That time, that city, that moment, that comeback… It was all too perfect – a scene never to be repeated.
The Autumn Glory exhibit at the Baseball Hall of Fame serves as a monument to Thomson’s pennant-winning homer with an exhibit dedicated to the Oct. 3, 1951 Shot Heard ‘Round the World. Thomson’s bat, cap and spikes from that day are on display, as well as a rosin bag used by Branca. They serve as a reminder of the greatest homer ever struck in major league competition.
The Museum’s Library also contains a copy of that Neft & Cohen chronology, a book that started so many on the path to baseball adoration.
In so many ways, that path began with a home run by Bobby Thomson.
Craig Muder is director of communications for the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
Oct. 28, 1953: Barber makes New York switch
By Thomas Lawrence
Perching in his beloved “Catbird Seat,” Red Barber always called it like he saw it.
“Get to the park early. Do your homework. Be prepared. Be accurate. He was a stickler for that,” said Vin Scully, speaking about his mentor Barber – the long-time voice of the Reds, Brooklyn Dodgers and Yankees.
After spending five years with Cincinnati (1934-38) and 15 with the Dodgers (1939-53), Barber took a job with the Yankees 56 years ago Wednesday – on Oct. 28, 1953. It was just 22 days after those same Yankees defeated his Dodgers in the World Series.
Walter Lanier “Red” Barber was born on Feb. 17, 1908, in Columbus, Miss., and was a fearless professional and baseball fan from the start.
While attending the University of Florida in Gainesville, Barber got his start in broadcasting in 1930, which led to his hiring by the Reds and his first game on April 17, 1934. Only it wasn’t just his first broadcast – it was the first big league game he’d been to.
Barber wasn’t afraid to try new things behind the mic, revolutionizing phrases like “rhubarb,” “can of corn” and “the bases are F.O.B.” – which stood for “Full of Brooklyns.”
He was there when Bobby Thomson hit the shot heard round the world, when Jackie Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier and when Don Larsen tossed his perfect game for the Yankees in 1956. Barber was also there on Aug. 26, 1939, when his Dodgers took on the Reds in the first ever televised game.
It was his professionalism, his originality and his candor that made him the first recipient of the Hall of Fame’s Ford C. Frick Award in 1978 – along with fellow Yankee broadcaster Mel Allen.
Since then other transcendent voices of the game like Vin Scully (1982), Jack Buck (1987), Harry Caray (1989) and Harry Kalas (2002) have taken home the Frick Award.
Thomas Lawrence was the 2009 publications intern at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
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