The top half of the Nats lineup had a field day on Thursday evening against a very strong Cardinals ballclub but the pitching staff nearly gave it away before Elijah Dukes hit a walk off home run in the 10^th.  The home town team was up 7 – 0 after three frames and gave up the lead in the top of the 10^th on a homer by Cards rookie right fielder Joe Mather.  After Christian Guzman singled to lead off the bottom half of the 10^th, Dukes worked the count and then hit a rocket to the deepest part of the park to complete his 4 for 6, four rbi night. 

Tim Redding started strong and with a seven run lead it appeared he was a cinch for his seventh win.  But he gave up three in the fourth and three again in the sixth on a home run by one Mark Worrell – which sent him packing.  You don’t know Worrell?!  Well, no surprise.  Thursday was his first appearance in the majors and his shot half way up the stands in left on a 3-2 Redding fastball was his first major league at-bat. Maybe he’s the second coming of this guy. 

In addition to Dukes’ four hits, Guzman had four and Boone and Castro had three apiece to lead the 16-hit attack.  And the highlight for the defense was a nifty 3-6-1 double play to end the fifth.  But it looked bleak when Rausch gave up two in the ninth to tie it and Sanchez gave up a dinger in the 10^th.  And what was left of the 32,357 that attended the game reached for the Pepto-Bismol before Dukes’ heroics.      

Diamond Nuggets 

The kinks in the ballpark continue to irritate.  Thursday night two concession stands had inoperative credit card scanners which forced me to bite the bullet and stand in line at the ATM.  Which, of course, made me watch the Nats score two runs in the bottom of the third on t.v. while waiting in line. 

I shared an elevator ride with Screech the mascot Thursday night.  I must admit he was nice to the kids and didn’t smell despite his gray feathers.  One notch in the “keep him” column.

 As we walked to the bus to take us back to the car at RFK we came upon the “Field of Dreams” that was playing on a large out-door screen on a grassy plaza near the park.   Evidently it was a promotion put on by the developer of the new buildings going up in the area. What a treat after seeing a walk off home run on such a beautiful evening in an almost-full park.  We approached the plaza just at Moonlight Graham dislodged the piece of hot dog from little Karen’s throat.  Well, if you catch the film at that point you can’t not watch to the end. 

 So, at 10:30 on a school night my 10 year old daughter and her friend and I sit on the grass watching the movie while I recite the dialog in my head.  We watch as Shoeless Joe (Ray Liotta) yells out to Graham (Burt Lancaster), “Hey rookie. . . . you were good.”  And then we smile as Thomas Mann (James Earl Jones) hesitates with the glee evident on his face before entering the corn field as we realize that the cool evening breeze we feel on our faces is coming from the same direction that makes the corn sway in the film.   And then we watch the catcher take off his mask as Ray (Kevin Costner) utters, “Oh my god.”  And then I listen with pride as my daughter, after hearing her friend ask, “who’s that?” explains that its Ray’s dad when he was young so he doesn’t know Ray is his son but Ray knows it’s his dad. 

As we begin to walk to the bus my daughter looks up at me and says, “Hey dad, what’s your favorite movie?”  Without speaking I simply point to the screen that now has the credits rolling across. 

“Yeah, me too,” she says.

On Saturday night I had the great fortune to witness some baseball history: Manny Ramirez hitting his 500th home run in the top of the seventh inning. If you haven’t seen the video he accomplished the feat with authority, sending the ball 400 feet to the opposite field. It was a great thrill to hear the crowd react with a sustained roar which underscores the benefit of being at the ballpark rather than watching something like that on t.v. Just great fun. Being a Sox fan and having probably 25,000 of my compatriots in the park didn’t hurt either.

After the game I got to thinking that what with three people in the 700-homer club and five in the 600-homer club (with Ken Griffey, Jr at 599 that number will increase by one any day now), the 500 Club (with 24 members) doesn’t tend to get as much notice outside the city of the player who reaches that goal. But I think you’ll agree that it requires sustained homer production for years coupled with the good fortune of not spending too much time hurt.

For a comparison of the rarity of the accomplishment, there have been 256 no-hitters hrown in the majors. Perhaps the number of perfect games thrown in MLB history would be a better comparison: 17. But what statistic comes close in hitting? The only thing I could come up with, which matches hitting ability over a sustained period with not getting hurt, is batting over .400 in a season. Its been done 32 times (35 if you count the 1887 season when walks were considered hits) and hasn’t been done since Teddy Ballgame did it before the war.

However you compare it, Manny’s had a hell of a career.

Diamond Nuggets

For years the tradition at Camden Yards has been to play “Thank God I’m a Country Boy” by John Denver (note the creepy album cover) during the seventh inning stretch. It’s a stupid song that I’ve never liked and I’ve never understood why they play it since it’s got nothing to do with baseball, Baltimore or that ballpark staple, beer.

Since 2002 it has been the tradition at Fenway Park to play “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond between the top and bottom half of the eighth inning. It’s equally lame and other than the singer’s name it has nothing to do with baseball and I don’t get the point of it either other than the fact that people love to sing “oh, oh, oh.”

Anyway, in Baltimore on Saturday night during the seventh inning stretch a message was put on the video screen in center field that read, “. . .now a little treat for all of the Red Sox fans here tonight” and then the first several notes of “Sweet Caroline” began to play over the loud speakers. Sox fans were at first stunned but then began to smile with eyes wide. Could this be? In Baltimore? What good guys they are! How great,we thought, to have this happen right after Manny’s 500th dinger?!

And then, in large letters on the video screen: NOT!

“Thank God I’m a Country Boy” then began to play to great hoots, huzzahs and laughs all around.

Yeah, they got us good. And you’d have to have been a curmudgeon not to have laughed along.

The Hiatus: It should be “what I thought about over the last three weeks,” as the inordinate time between posts has left our (admittedly few) readers wondering. My excuse is simple: there is no baseball in the Middle East — but instead politics, which is a form of entertainment far more dangerous, if less satisfying.  Come to think of it, I can think of no Muslim who has played this game, but I am open to correction. The closest is Yu Darvish, now of the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters. His parents came to Japan from Iran, though he says he now considers himself “100 percent Japanese.” The kid is good.

Pokey: Jim Bowden’s fetish for former Redlegs continues apace. The most recent addition is one Pokey Reese, an eight year veteran who last played in 2004. The reason for the addition? Jim has been less than forthcoming. What is so astonishing is that Pokey wracked up some $11 million in salary in his indifferent career, a goodly sum for a player who strikes out more than he walks — with a 0.43 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Here is Pokey in his last days, with the Red Sox, when he did anything but hit well:

All Is Right With The World: The Nats tore up the Arizona Assholes on Friday, with Willie Harris taking the honors when he put a Micah Owings slider in the Arizona bullben. The final 7 to 4 belied the relative worth of the two teams: the Assholes (I am thinking of changing their name, now that this showboat is on the DL) are one of the best teams in baseball, while the Nats are … er … ah … ah … “building for the future.” Owings is great with the bat (we keep being told), but has a nasty habit of hitting players he should be striking out. This game was no different; Owings hit Milledge and Mackowiak for no good reason other than “he pitches inside.”

If you follow the Nats in the same way that I do, then you check the morning standings to see not where they stand in relation to the Braves, Phillies, Mets and Marlins — but where they stand in relation to Friars, Giants, Mariners and Royals. The Nats are better than any of them. It’s of inestimable psychological importance that the Acta’s move forward, at the same time that some of the game’s more traditional names sink southwards. By the end of the year they will easily surpass the Reds and Pirates, who are both one-major-DL away from fading from sight. Dusty, in particular, is very busy just now blowing this guy’s arm out.

Bobby Richardson: I’ve been thinking about Richardson lately, because one afternoon it occurred to me that baseball announcers who focus on the glory days of the New York Yankees spend a lot of time talking about “that pepperpot,” Billy Martin. But for me, at least, the real Yankees pepperpot was Bobby Richardson – an incomparably better second bagger than Martin and a better hitter. Martin’s legacy is built on his stint as manager, not a player (I suppose that’s obvious, but still), with the result that Richardson is all-but-forgotten. Richardson won three World Series with the Bombers, and teamed with Tony Kubek to form one of the best doubleplay combinations of the late ’50s.

Martin glorifiers will point out that Billy won the Series MVP in 1953, but Richardson won it in 1960, though Mazeroski’s walk-off won the seven-game tilt for the Bucs. As Casey Stengel noted of him: Bobby Richardson was the best .260 hitter ever to play the game.” Richardson wore #1 while with the Yankees, but so did Martin — and it was Martin’s number that was retired.

April may be the cruelest month but May appears to be the wackiest. First it was the White Sox using blow-up dolls in the clubhouse to break out of slump. This past week it was revealed that the Yanks are trying to coax lady luck into their dugout by wearing lady’s undies.

Jason Giambi (he of the Mendoza-esq batting average) and Johnny Damon (who is sub-par as well) decided to turn to the only thing they hadn’t yet tried to boost their anemic numbers – a gold thong. The image sickens.

This certainly isn’t your father’s MLB. It’d be hard to imagine Stan Musial yanking on granny’s panties because he’d hit a skid. Not to mention the world of crap he’d get from his boys if he did. But Giambi’s and Damon’s teammates don’t seem to have a hard time with it. A lot of good the “no facial hair” policy did for team discipline.

Once Torre and the elder Steinbrenner stepped aside all hell broke loose. And after this year the House that Ruth Build will be torn down. And you thought selling the Babe was a bad idea. Bulldozing the place will be like spitting on his grave.

And his descendants are dancing on it – in their wive’s underwear.

Diamond Nuggets

I needed my tickets for a recent contest to be reissued due to a mix up with friends who couldn’t make the game. The team’s season ticket staff couldn’t have been more helpful. “Not a problem,” I was told. “Just go to the Ticket Services window at the center field gate,” and I could pick them up. Sure enough, there was only one person ahead of me and once I was at the window it was about 90 seconds until I had my ducats. I wasn’t clear on the need for the bullet proof glass between me and the ticket agent though. Despite his sunny disposition I had the feeling that I needed to watch my back.

Fireworks hint: Every Friday night home game is followed by a fireworks display which I found out by accident recently. Also by accident I had the best view possible. Just behind section 320 there is a platform that is at the top of the ramp leading down to lower levels and, eventually, the main concourse. The fireworks are shot into the sky just beyond the road that goes around that side of the stadium next to the Anacostia. I’ve never been so close to the explosions. Just great fun. Try it.

Juan Of God: A guy I really liked to watch play (and always thought was impressive and underrated),  was the St. Louis Cardinals Juan Encarnacion – or, more properly, Juan De Dios Encarnacion. I realize now, in looking at his stats, that I may be one of the few guys that ever believed he could be more than a stand-in in the outfield: while the GM for whatever team he played for looked around for someone better.

The former Tiger, Red, Dodger, Marlin and (finally) Cardinal had a high strike-out ratio, but was exciting to watch. I suppose I enjoyed watching him because he seemed such a natural athlete, and I cringed every time he came to the plate against the Cubs. He was one of those Cubs-slayers, like what’s-his-name with the Astros: oh yeah, Luke Scott. Luke Scott looked like Stan Musial against the Cubs (see below). And so it was that I was watching Encarnacion closely on August 31 last summer when a foul ball off the bat of Aaron Miles crushed his left eye socket. The Cards were thereafter careful about what they said about De Dios, but it was clear that prognosis was not good. And two days ago the Cardinals General Manager said his career might be over. Too bad, he was a good ballplayer and — at 30 — had his most productive years ahead of him.

The Debate: I went through my daily-weekly-monthly debate (really, it’s more like picking a fight), with some baseball friends, arguing that the second-best all-time player in baseball is not Ted Williams, but Stan Musial. Stan The Man is virtually ignored in talk of “the greats” (no, really, he is) while everyone talks about Dimaggio, Gehrig, Mays, Aaron and Mantle. It’s easy to get lost in that crowd, I know, but Musial’s lifetime numbers continue to blow me away: .331 batting average, .417 OBP, .559 SLG, 475 home runs, seven batting titles (Williams had six) and three MVPs (Williams had two).

Okay, okay, okay. I lost the argument. Williams lifetime numbers of breathtaking: .344 batting average, .482 OBP, .634 SLG, and 521 home runs. Of course, he played in an easier league.

Gnats Notes: You have to wonder whether Ronnie Belliard has an attitude problem. He came up as a pinch-hitter late in the first game against the Stro’s in Minute Maid and he looked like hell, striking out on three pitches. He took the first two and swung through the third and as I watched I kept thinking, “this guy doesn’t look like he wants to be there.” On Ronnie’s behalf we might add that the renaissance of Felipe has put Ronnie solidly on the bench — which isn’t the first time that has happened to him in his career. He played 54 games in the Cards World Series season, holding down the second base job late in the season and playing his heart out (he hit .462 in the last 50-plus games for the Cards): and his reward was that Walt Jocketty couldn’t wait to get rid of him. So we shouldn’t be surprised if Ronnie is thinking that maybe, someday, someone will notice that he’s a heck of a ballplayer and (having decided that) will stick him at second base and keep him there … no matter what his start.

So now the Nats are hitting better, or so the reasoning goes — though Zimmerman and Kearns are mired in the 220s and Nick’s power numbers are way down. The key of course is to hit on all cylinders, which is the key for everyone. And while the sports wogs continue to talk about how loaded the Nats are with pitching in the minors, no one is bragging about their power hitters at Columbus, Harrisburg or Potomac. I have a sinking feeling that the reason is that they’re not there. Justin Maxwell, meanwhile, is hitting a torrid .222 at Harrisburg. Ugh.

Who The Hell Is Casey Kotchman? Baseball Tonight’s commentators talk endlessly about “it’s not nasty, it’s filthy” — or some such — and have lately been singing the praises of the Angels’ starting rotation. They have a point. Even without John Lackey, Garland, Santana, Saunders and even Jared Weaver look like the real deal and the outfield powerhouses of Matthews, Hunter and Guerrero (who was actually benched for a game for not hitting, if you can imagine that) should be enough to carry the Halos into the divisional playoffs. But the one guy I’ve been watching (because no one talks about him much) is Casey Kotchman. He’s hitting .333 with six home runs and 21 RBIs, and quietly but decisively proving himself as a future star. He’s what? 25? 26? How can you not notice?

When a hitter is going good, they say he’s “seeing the ball well” — and they say the opposite when he’s not. Thusly: Don Sutton has been saying lately that Austin Kearns is just “not seeing the ball well,” the ostensible reason for his .194 average, two home runs and 11 runs batted in. “Seeing the ball well” is a slippery term, it seems to me, but it beats the hell out of any other explanation: that a hitter is “not in his groove” or that (for some reason) he’s jinxed — “they’re just not falling in.”

Kearns had two solid hits Thursday night against the Bucs, nominal evidence that he is finally hitting his way out of his latest “funk” (another one of those slippery terms), one of them a single in the eighth that scored the game-winning run. You could see the relief in Kearns’ face when he jogged out to right for the top of the ninth. But to say that Kearns is “not seeing the ball well” is a bit of an understatement: true only if you can claim he hasn’t seen the ball well since he arrived from Cincinnati in July of 2006.Back then, some in the Nats’ front office hailed Kearns as the second coming of Vlad Guerrero, who slipped away from the Expos, back in 2003. Guerrero was then (and still may be) the best hitter in baseball (well, if you don’t count this guy). But if Kearns was ever going to be Guerrero then, it seemed to me, it was highly unlikely that the Reds would part with him, no matter how desperate they were for pitching. For us Nats fans, it would be just fine if “country” (there is a growing coterie of Kearns partisans out in right field who call him this) would regularly hit .289 with 25 or so home runs — rather than struggling to breach the Mendoza line. By the way: Vlad “sees the ball well.”

The closest I ever came to really understanding what people mean when they say that a player “sees the ball well” came in the middle of the 1982 season. The summer of 1982 was fascinating. There was a good race in the American League, with the then-California Angels being led by third baseman Doug DeCinces, their newest acquisition. DeCinces had come over during the winter in a trade with Baltimore for Dan “Disco Dan” Ford — one of the greatest trades in Angels’ history. The Halos had a murderer’s row of hitters: Boone, Carew, Grich, Lynn, Jackson and Baylor. DeCinces was the throw-in, the on-base guy from Baltimore with the okay-glove who had never quite lived up to the billing he had received after being drafted in the third round of the 1970 draft. He was the highly touted replacement for the legendary Brooks Robinson.

Of course, DeCinces could never really replace Robinson and while the Baltimore fans understood that, Baltimore’s announcers were forever mentioning that DeCinces’ glove could never equal Robinson’s. “Robinson would have had that one,” they would say. And so DeCinces was shipped west. (The guy who replaced DeCinces was an anonymous character from Havre de Grace, Maryland by the name of Cal Ripken.) Anyway …. for a time in the summer of 1982, long about mid-July to mid-August if I recall, Doug DeCinces suddenly became the best hitter in baseball. People noticed. I remember tuning in to the Game of the Week just to see him, and checking the papers every day to see what he had done. Other players talked about what he was doing in hushed tones and the likes of Baylor and Jackson and Carew would stand and watch him during batting practice. He hit fricking everything. Even Reggie was in awe. 

For a time there wasn’t anything DeCinces couldn’t hit, and a player who had wracked up a fairly average home run total of 4, 11, 11, 19, 28, 16, 16 and 13 home runs over the course of his eight-year career was suddenly putting them out with incredible regularity. He hit thirty that year, most of them in the hottest weeks of California’s deep summer. I remember someone (Vin Scully I think) interviewed him after one of his more prodigious shots in Anaheim. What was his secret? And DeCinces shrugged: he said he was just seeing the ball well. And Scully asked what that meant. And DeCinces answer was priceless: “When it comes up there,” he said, “it looks like a watermelon.”

But nothing lasts forever. By September, DeCinces had cooled off, Milwaukee triumphed in the playoffs (California was the better team), and St. Louis beat the Brewers in seven games in one of the most exciting World Series ever played. DeCinces played for four more years before heading to Japan and then was out of baseball. But for a time, in the summer of 1982, Doug DeCinces “saw the ball” better than any baseball player at the time. We might wish the same for Austin Kearns.

The proposed acquisition of the Windy City’s chewing gum-maker Wrigley by Virginia-based candy bar giant Mars had analysts buzzing today about the possible implications the deal could have on the naming rights to the Cubs’ home, Wrigley Field. With the team on the market naming rights for the venerable ballpark will be in play, according to market gurus. The $23 billion mega deal is on hold pending shareholder approval

Jerry Mathers, an industry analyst at Deutsche Bank, said in an interview that one possibility would be the unwieldy ‘Mars/Wrigley Field’. “The synergies between the companies are obvious,” Mathers said. “As far as the industry is concerned the new company will be the gorilla in the room – so it would make sense to take advantage of the opportunity naming rights would provide.”

Merril Lynch analyst Lawrence Mondello noted today that the merger provides Warren E. Buffett a unique chance to promote Bershire Hathaway, which loaned Mars $4.4 billion to close the deal. “‘Berkshire Ballpark’ would link a sports icon with a titan in the investment field,” Mondello said. “It’s a natural.”

However, Chicago-based industry expert and White Sox fan Edward G. Haskell offered a different take. Mars should push one of its own brands by dubbing the ball park ‘Snickers Yard.’ “It would certainly go a long way,” he noted slyly, “in describing what Sox fans think of the place,” he noted.

Personally, given the growing trend in Major League Baseball away from tobacco and towards seeds and chewing gum in the dugouts, Mars would be wise to exploit a new opportunity while keeping a link to the past. ‘Juicy Fruit Field’ would be a chance to lure the ball players away from Bazooka while maintaining a home town Wrigley connection.

After a surge in its stock price on Monday, at the end of the trading day on Tuesday Wrigley closed at $76.87, down four cents.

Just when you think that what the Nationals really need is pitching, along comes a guy like John Lannan, who sets down sixteen in a row while striking out 11. Lannan’s fastball — inside and tight — was a pitch-to-behold, clocking in at something just overe 91 mph. He seemed, at times, almost overpowering and, when not overpowering, confident and in control. And suddenly, the complete funk the team is in seems less a result of poor pitching than poor hitting: plus the adventure of seeing Christian Guzman fielding ground balls.

After last night’s version of how-to-lose, I race for this year’s version of Baseball Prospectus to reread the last sentence of their narrative account of what the future of our team looks like: “Stay tuned,” the editors intone, “because the next four years should be all sorts of fun.” And when, praytell, would that “fun” begin? “Patience,” Stan Kasten says. Okay, fair enough. But while we’re being patient, we hope that Kasten-Bowden-Acta and company are searching around for the future — some more-than-warm bodies that can carry the club up the middle while Lannan and O’Connor and Clippard and Balester — but especially Balester mature.

There are players here: Zimmerman and Johnson and Milledge and Flores (oh for God’s sake: just get him back from Columbus and put him behind the plate) and even Kearns, but the weakness up-the-middle is glaring and fatal. Last night it was Ronnie Belliard’s turn: Belliard Buckner’d Ryan Church’s slow roller with two out in the bottom of the eighth, cracking the door for the Mets and eventually sending the game into the 14th, when reliever Joel Hanrahan (only Chad Cordero was left in the pen) wild-pitched the Mets to victory. Anybody can boot a ball and one booted ball does not a season make, but Ronnie (“adequacy in cleats”) is not the club’s future — and Jim Bowden knows it.With the dirth of two-baggers in the minors, the Nats might look around for a young second baseman, a quick bat and good glove backed up in a system replete with infielders or stuck in park at some woebegone place like Iowa or Portland. There are a few — Triple A or majors bench types — most particularly with teams who might salivate over putting someone like John Rauch or Luis Ayala or Saul Rivera in their bullpen, which is all the Nats have to deal. So much as I love the Nats relief corps, Rauch and Ayala and Rivera are not about to pitch us to .500 and how many long relievers are there in the Hall of Fame anyway? So if we’re going to make a swap, then Jim should (just this once) go hunting for a second baseman — and look elsewhere than in the Cincinnati farm system. Here are some nominees.

Eric Patterson

Patterson is stuck on the bench in Cubbieland, subbing for Mark De Rosa and seeing time in Left and even Centerfield. But he’s a natural at second and a better hitter than his brother Corey — but nearly everyone is. Mike Fontenot is still Lou’s fair-haired favorite and the Slugs have been looking to unload Patterson in a deal for the Orioles Brian Roberts. The Cubs bullpen, meanwhile, is in free-fall: Bob Howry can’t hit the strike zone, Michael Wertz is a mess and Scott Eyre is injured. The Prospectus (my recent Bible) says the Cubs should “either hand him the second-base job or deal him to a team that will.” I have a nominee.

Danny Richar

The former Arizona Asshole has had a so-so minor league career, but he hits the ball with authority and at 24 he is all up-side. He needs to work on laying off high fastballs — but who doesn’t and his glove and range are more than serviceable. If the White Sox won’t give him a shot (and they seem, oddly, in love with Juan Uribe — who’s just plain lazy), then the Nats should give Richar his chance. Then too, the asking price would likely be modest in comparison with Patterson, particularly if Bobby Jenks continues to make the 9th inning an adventure.

Kevin Melillo

Oakland Athletics Melillo is stuck at Triple-A, and is likely to be there for awhile. Billy Beane is in love with Mark Ellis (as well he should be), though Melillo hits for average and average power and is all of 25. Untried and untested, the rap on this recommendation is that there is no guarantee that Melillo will ever go anywhere. But the response is my default position: I would rather have a 25-year-old with some potential booting a ball than a 32-year-old. And if you’re going to lose ten in a row, well then at least do it with a kid who can learn something by it. Of course, trading a top-flight reliever to Oakland violates one of my rules: never make a deal with Billy Beane.

Matt Antonelli

San Diego Padres Antonelli might still be a year away, but so too are a host of second basemen — a lot of whom are in the majors. Case in point? The Friars are playing Tadahito Iguchi at second and while Iguchi is serviceable (a “fuilityman” in my book) he is hitting a torrid .235 and went 0-7 in the latest 22-inning epic. Meanwhile, the Pads are keeping Antonelli down in Portland, ostensibly because he needs to straighten out his swing. So does Iguchi, but nevermind. So bring Antonelli to that new-park-by-the-Anacostia and tell him to straighten out his swing in the majors. The problem? Antonelli will be expensive — and the Padres certainly know Iguchi’s weaknesses as well as anyone. Listen, if you don’t think these are good ideas and you think that Ronnie Belliard are better than any of these, you have a point. We know Belliard can hit, and I’m sure that he feels as badly about what happened in the eighth at Shea as anyone. Even so — in the midst of a spiraling losing streak, the least we could do is lose with kids.

Back in 1965, Bobby Bragan had to be the most hated man in Wisconsin. This had nothing to do with Bragan himself, you understand, but with the fact that he was the manager of the lame duck Milwaukee Braves — who had announced before the beginning of the season that they would be abandoning County Stadium for the greener pastures of Atlanta. The city was stunned. Why would anyone want to leave Milwaukee for a city that was still recovering from Sherman’s well-deserved burning? Worse yet, the Braves were so desperate to leave that they offered Milwaukee $500,000 to let them out of their stadium lease. The city turned them down.

The Braves’ move was even more surprising because the team had just arrived from Boston in 1953, complete with a bevy of young talent that would bring them to the National League Pennant and a World Series within five years. They won it all in 1957, behind the pitching of Lew Burdette – with his famous spitter — who compiled three complete game wins and an ERA of 0.67. Crandall, Torre, Schoendienst, Mathews, Logan, Covington, Bruton and Aaron are still, for my money, one of the great World Series teams of all time.

Just so: eight years later, the folks who ran the Braves decided it was time to leave and so it was that every time Bragan emerged from the dugout he was booed mercilessly. Bragan feigned disinterest — but everyone knew he was thin-skinned.  Bragan’s reputation had preceded him. Back when Branch Rickey decided that Jackie Robinson would be baseball’s first black player, Bragan led a revolt of Dodgers’ who threatened to sign a petition saying that if Robinson played, they woundn’t. Bragan reportedly led the cabal that included Dixie Walker, Eddie Stanky, and Kirby Higbe. Dodger manager Leo Durocher got wind of this during Spring Training and called an early morning team meeting. Showing up in his pajamas and bright yellow bathrobe, Durocher told his players what he thought: “I hear some of you players don’t want to play with Robinson,” he said, “and that you have a petition drawn up that you are going to sign. Well boys, you know what you can do with that petition. You can wipe your ass with it. I hear Dixie Walker is going to send Mr. Rickey a letter asking to be traded. Just hand him the letter, Dixie, and you’re gone. GONE. I don’t care if a guy is yellow or black or if he has stripes like a fuckin’ zebra. I am the manager, and I say he plays.”

While the Bragan petition was dropped, Bragan’s reputation as being anti-Robinson was sealed, despite his later claim after “just one road trip, I saw the quality of Jackie the man and the player. I told Rickey I had changed my mind and I was honored to be a teammate of Jackie Robinson.”In any event (and putting aside Bragan’s later reputation as a steller minor league administrator), Milwaukee’s fans (and especially their African-American fans) never let Bragan forget what they thought of him. Bragan returned the favor: during one hot August game, Braves left fielder Rico Carty misplayed a ball in left field (not an oddity, as I recall) and Bragan came out of the dugout and headed to the mound. But instead of replacing the pitcher, he waved Carty into the dugout: the only time I have ever seen a manager so publicly humiliate a player. By the end of the game, the fans at County Stadium (and there weren’t many of them) were standing and clapping: “Rico, Rico, Rico.” (We might only imagine what the fans might have done had Bragan decided to replace the guy in right field — Henry Aaron — but not even Bragan would dare do that.)

Bragan’s stillborn petition might have divided the Dodgers between a pro-Robinson group and a sullen and silent cadre of Bragan supporters, but it didn’t. That the Dodgers went on the win the 1947 Pennant was attributable to the play of Robinson, who was voted Rookie of the Year, but also to Pee Wee Reese — who made a point of welcoming Robinson to the club and standing by him during some of the worst moments of the season. Bragan had expected Reese, a southerner, to be one of the petition signers, but Reese refused. In Cincinnati, where a large number of Reese fans showed up to shout epithets at Robinson, Reese walked across second base to chat with Robinson and put his arm around him.

Crosley Field went deathly still. If “the Little Colonel,” as his legion of fans called him, could welcome Jackie Robinson to the big leagues, well then so could they. Reese was a great personality. He held down an announcing spot on the “Game of the Week” with Dizzy Dean for years, back when the Yankees dominated the game and his color commentary was a thing of beauty. He was never a great baseball player — and partisans of Ron Santo point to Reese as an example of why the Cubs Captain should take his place in the Hall. But Reese wasn’t voted into the hall because he was a great player: he was voted into the Hall because of what he did for Jackie Robinson and baseball. Reese was elected to the Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee in 1984. The last line of his plaque reads: “Instrumental in easing acceptance of Jackie Robinson as baseball’s first black performer.”  

I have to hand it to Mark, he got his predictions posted before the season started; and they were pretty good. I must admit, he caught me off guard. When I was growing up I never predicted who would come in first in any division. It was usually just praying for the Red Sox and hating the Yankees. Kinda like this:

After that it was basically watching to see how the Sox would screw it up each year. Haven’t had to do that much lately. I guess the cumulative effect of the Hail Mary’s finally paid off.

My predictions for the A.L. follow - although they won’t be as well-formatted as Mark’s were (so, who did that for you anyway?) Here goes:

EastBoston – Too many guns.New York – Wang wins 20; No one else wins 14.

Tampa Bay/Toronto – Depends on whether Shields or Halladay has a better year.

Toronto/Tampa Bay – See above.

Baltimore – Its official: Angelos has finally driven them into a ravine.

Central

Detroit – Under Leyland, Willis is the new Carmona; Maglio challenges Vlad for MVP.

Cleveland – C.C. and the Sunshine Band can’t repeat . . . but come close.

Chicago – Sox pick up Nick Swisher! Oh. Never mind.

Kansas City – A small market team with small market guys.

Minnesota – Livan doesn’t help.

West

Los Angeles Angels of Anahiem and kinda near Yorba Linda too – Torii Hunter seals the deal.

Seattle – They fade down the stretch.

Texas – Millwood and pray for rain. And pray for rain. Repeat.

Oakland – Even with Duchscherer as the third starter.

Next, my N.L. predictions. . . .