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Sunday, April 20, 2025

REDS vs. Astros, not many people saw this game in 1968

 

TRIVIA WINNER: Cy Young won 20 games only once in his career, although he won more than that a lot, but the only 20 win season was in 1900 with the St. Louis Cardinals in their first season as "the Cardinals." 10 points toward the person's total

NEW TRIVIA CONTEST: You will still be required to enter the drawing as usual. However,  through June 2025 you will get points depending on the complexity of the questions. Enter each week and correct answers will get those points-one guess per person per week. The reader with the most points after June's final column will get a $50 Starbucks Gift Card. Ties will be placed into a drawing. Tell your friends and sports fans who like trivia. We will keep track of your points. - YOU MUST ENTER VIA THE EMAIL AT THE END OF THIS COLUMN.

NEW TRIVIA QUESTION: While the Astros gave up 17 runs in their worst game of 1968, what was the most runs the team scored that year in one game? TOTAL 10 POINTS

April 29th, 1968 was a date few of the 10,000 plus fans at the Astrodome will ever forget. It was a day four Astro's pitchers were pounded for 17 runs at the hands of the Cincinnati Reds. Interestingly enough, the Reds did not make a position change substitution in the nine inning game.

The Reds scored four runs in the first three innings off Jim Ray but by the fourth it was all but over. That inning the Reds burst thru for a six-spot and led 10-1 after four innings. In the fourth Tony Perez tripled to drive in two and scored on another hit. The Astros never got off the ground.

Jim Maloney went five innings with Bob Lee going the final four as there was no need to waste the starting pitcher leading 11-1. Lee finished it up and the Reds destroyed Houston 17-2. 

Four Reds had three hits, and Pete Rose had four. Tony Perez drove in five runs, Rose and Lee May each drove in three. Ray gave up seven runs in three-plus innings while Danny Coombs gifted three, Tom Dukes four and Don Wilson the last three. 

Johnny Bench and Perez each homered and when the dust settled the Reds had 22 hits to the Astros 10. It would be hard to imagine more than a handful of hard core fans were left in this Monday night game to see the final out. 

TRIVIA CONTEST; Enter via the following email. Send 1) your answer to the trivia question at the top of the column, 2) your name, address and email so where we know where to send the card if you win 3) any comment you have on the column. One winner will be selected at the end of the calendar year based on the total points acquired via weekly contests.

                              brillpro@gmail.com 
 ==========================================================
I've written more than a dozen books including at least two sports books. You can find these at my Amazon page or at my own website www.bobbrillbooks.com. Please take a look at the sports books, the western novel series or the "Tattoo Murder," which is a crime book set in Ventura, CA.

Use PayPal to brillpro@prodigy.net or contact us at the same email for other payment. 

Sunday, April 13, 2025

Are or Were the Games Too Long in 1962?

 

TRIVIA WINNER: The Braves Billy Bruton led the Majors in triples in 1960 and was pretty much a triples machine during his career. 15 points toward the person's total

NEW TRIVIA CONTEST: You will still be required to enter the drawing as usual. However,  through June 2025 you will get points depending on the complexity of the questions. Enter each week and correct answers will get those points-one guess per person per week. The reader with the most points after June's final column will get a $50 Starbucks Gift Card. Ties will be placed into a drawing. Tell your friends and sports fans who like trivia. We will keep track of your points. - YOU MUST ENTER VIA THE EMAIL AT THE END OF THIS COLUMN.

NEW TRIVIA QUESTION: Cy Young won just 20 games for a team which only used eight pitchers all season. What that team's city and nickname? TOTAL 10 POINTS

"Major League Baseball Games are Too Long!" Sound familiar? MLB owners said it in 1962.

With the recently concluded Winter Meetings we thought it interesting to see what happened 60 years ago at the 1962 Winter Meetings. There were some interesting developments. Owners felt the games were going too long so they decided to embark on a strategy to shorten playing time. Games were marathon length and it wasn't unusual for a game to take 3 hours to play.

        (Dan Pfister gave up 106 Walks for KC which led the AL in Walks Issued)


 The focus quickly turned to the pitchers. The owners voted to limit warm-up pitches from the mound to just five in between innings. It had been eight. The American League added this exception; during the first 30 days of the season pitchers could still take eight warm-ups, figuring it was early on and pitchers may have not had enough spring training work. The next thing they did was look at mound visits by the managers.

The NL decided the manager could only visit the mound once per inning for the same pitcher. A second visit would result in the removal of the pitcher. The AL rule had already been one visit to the mound per the same pitcher, by the manager in an entire game. 

Both leagues agreed that a pitcher awaiting his turn at bat had to do so from the On-Deck Circle. Previously a warm up player could take that spot in the Circle while the pitcher rested on the bench. The AL went even further in that it required a catcher in the On-Deck to remove ALL his catching gear while awaiting his turn to hit.

There also would be "no" Inter-league trading in June. Commissioner Ford Frick said “when you start trading like that in the middle of the season you leave yourself open to considerable criticism,” as “you might even find pennant contenders in one league getting help from low-ranked clubs in the other league and that doesn’t make sense.”

The first trade of the Winter Meetings saw Cleveland sent 3B Bubba Phillips to Detroit for rookie pitchers Ron Nischwitz and Gordon Seyfried. The big trade of the gathering saw the Yankees send 1B Bill Skowron to the rival Dodgers for pitcher Stan Williams. NYY wanted Williams badly despite him giving up the walk that lost the pennant in his final appearance in a Dodger uniform. 

Williams will always be remembered for walking in the winning run during the 1962 National League Playoff against the Giants.

TRIVIA CONTEST; Enter via the following email. Send 1) your answer to the trivia question at the top of the column, 2) your name, address and email so where we know where to send the card if you win 3) any comment you have on the column. One winner will be selected at the end of the calendar year based on the total points acquired via weekly contests.

                              brillpro@gmail.com 
 ==========================================================
I've written more than a dozen books including at least two sports books. You can find these at my Amazon page or at my own website www.bobbrillbooks.com. Please take a look at the sports books, the western novel series or the "Tattoo Murder," which is a crime book set in Ventura, CA.

Use PayPal to brillpro@prodigy.net or contact us at the same email for other payment. 

Sunday, April 6, 2025

Wednesday in the Park - You Know It Was the 4th of July

 

TRIVIA WINNER: Don Mossi and Bill Monboquette were the pitchers who got the decisions in Satchel Paige's last MLB game. 15 points toward the person's total

NEW TRIVIA CONTEST: You will still be required to enter the drawing as usual. However,  through June 2025 you will get points depending on the complexity of the questions. Enter each week and correct answers will get those points-one guess per person per week. The reader with the most points after June's final column will get a $50 Starbucks Gift Card. Ties will be placed into a drawing. Tell your friends and sports fans who like trivia. We will keep track of your points. - YOU MUST ENTER VIA THE EMAIL AT THE END OF THIS COLUMN.

NEW TRIVIA QUESTION: Who was the Milwaukee Brave who led the Majors in triples in 1960? TOTAL 10 POINTS

And it wasn't even in Chicago. Sort of a paraphrase of a song by "Chicago," but this one deals with a double duty loss by the Tigers to the Indians. Just 21,000 fans showed up in Cleveland Stadium that July 4th, 1962 to see the Tigers score a total of two runs in the double dip. This was probably a double header any fan would pay to see who was not rooting for the Tigers.

The first game was one for the ages as Jim Perry battled Hank Aguirre all the way, with Perry himself scoring the only run of the game. It happened in the bottom of the ninth. Something you will never see today. Perry led off the inning with a single, Willie Tasby bunted him over. Perry took third on a single by Tito Francona and pinch-hitter Gene Green (batting for Ty Cline) singled Perry home with the walk off win. 

The most interesting part of that is that they let Perry hit and pinch-hit for Cline! Aguirre took the loss giving up just four hits until the ninth inning. 

The Tigers fell in the second game as well. It was 6-2. Doc Edwards homered and Don Dillard hit a grand slam in the bottom of the 13th to win it. Chuck Essegian, Woody Held and Jerry Kindall all got on base before Dillard took Jerry Casale deep to win the second walk off of the day.

Barry Latman and Don Mossi each went eight innings and each gave up just one run but neither got a decision.

TRIVIA CONTEST; Enter via the following email. Send 1) your answer to the trivia question at the top of the column, 2) your name, address and email so where we know where to send the card if you win 3) any comment you have on the column. One winner will be selected at the end of the calendar year based on the total points acquired via weekly contests.

                              brillpro@gmail.com 
 ==========================================================
I've written more than a dozen books including at least two sports books. You can find these at my Amazon page or at my own website www.bobbrillbooks.com. Please take a look at the sports books, the western novel series or the "Tattoo Murder," which is a crime book set in Ventura, CA.

Use PayPal to brillpro@prodigy.net or contact us at the same email for other payment.