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Post by inger on May 4, 2023 13:40:27 GMT -5
Happy birthday to Ben Grieve. No. I mean seriously. Players born on this date have not been supremely productive. Grieves 8.4 career WAR is the second highest since the deadball era, with only Ken Oberkfell exceeding him at 22.4.
Miguel is next at 7.7. It’s strange how some dates have multiple HOF players and others have… BEN GRIEVE…
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Post by desousa on May 4, 2023 15:06:51 GMT -5
Happy birthday to Ben Grieve. No. I mean seriously. Players born on this date have not been supremely productive. Grieves 8.4 career WAR is the second highest since the deadball era, with only Ken Oberkfell exceeding him at 22.4. Miguel is next at 7.7. It’s strange how some dates have multiple HOF players and others have… BEN GRIEVE… I believe Grieve had a nice little run of 4 or 5 seasons and then dropped off the map. |
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Post by inger on May 4, 2023 15:17:18 GMT -5
Happy birthday to Ben Grieve. No. I mean seriously. Players born on this date have not been supremely productive. Grieves 8.4 career WAR is the second highest since the deadball era, with only Ken Oberkfell exceeding him at 22.4. Miguel is next at 7.7. It’s strange how some dates have multiple HOF players and others have… BEN GRIEVE… I believe Grieve had a nice little run of 4 or 5 seasons and then dropped off the map. He wasn’t useless. His five year peak produced .271 .366 .450 .816 115 and 103 HR. His biggest issue was that he didn’t meet lofty expectations… He wax also pretty much finished at 26, so more longevity would have helped… |
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Post by pippsheadache on May 4, 2023 15:30:39 GMT -5
I believe Grieve had a nice little run of 4 or 5 seasons and then dropped off the map. He wasn’t useless. His five year peak produced .271 .366 .450 .816 115 and 103 HR. His biggest issue was that he didn’t meet lofty expectations… He wax also pretty much finished at 26, so more longevity would have helped… Yeah, I think that was the deal with Grieve. He had a respectable career -- very highly-touted first round pick -- he and his father Tom were the first-ever father and son first round picks, although Ben had a better career. Ben was part of a solid group of young players the A's developed in the late 90s-early 00s with Jason Giambi and Miguel Tejada and Eric Chavez and all those pitchers Zito, Mulder, Hudson et al. The big mystery with him was how he inexplicably went off the cliff in his mid-twenties. It wasn't injuries or any obvious one issue. Still, he fared better than many ROYs from that era like Todd Hollandsworth or Angel Berroa and Bob Hamelin or Chris Coghlan. |
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Post by pippsheadache on May 4, 2023 15:53:37 GMT -5
ANDRE ROGERS His numbers weren’t great with the bat, but he was slick in the field. But mostly, it was this: "Aside from the national pride that this (Andre Rodger's being called up in 1957) generated not only among baseball fans, but Bahamians in general, what this meant to the Bahamas as a country could not be evaluated in dollars and cents. Every time Andre Rodgers stepped on a field in baseball stadiums across the United States and his name and where he was from was announced, that represented thousands and thousands of dollars in free publicity for the Bahamas." - Sportswriter Oswald T. Brown in The Nassau Guardian (11/21/2003) Rodgers grew up playing cricket in the Bahamas. He had never even seen a game of baseball before he tried out for the NYG in 1954. He was signed immediately and assigned to their minor league farm system... I remember Andre Rodgers as a tall, lanky shortstop with good defensive skills. If there is one thing I would recall it is that he was from the Bahamas because it was constantly being mentioned. He was another Carl Hubbell development. One year with the Cubs he and the unfortunate Kenny Hubbs and Ernie Banks set a short-lived NL record for turning double plays. I clearly remember having his card cut out from the back of a box of Post Toasties in 1961. My brother and I would always try to add things to the blank backs of the cards, and I think my first sentence here was what we added. He was the first of what so far have been eight Bahamian-born players in the major leagues. The handful besides Rodgers who stuck around for a few years include Tony Curry, Ed Armbrister and current Marlin Jazz Chisholm. All eight Bahamians are from Nassau. We visited the Andre Rodgers Stadium there -- it didn't appear too active and I think they demolished it to build a new one -- cricket still holds the upper hand. Do any of you remember the song "Funky Nassau" from 1971 by Beginning Of The End? It was a fairly big hit, good song. But I don't want to have this bleed into the music thread. The UK-governed Caribbean hasn't produced many MLB players. In addition to the Bahamas, Jamaica had churned out four -- Chili Davis, Devon White, Justin Masterson and Rolando Roomes. While the U.S. Virgin Islands have had a fair number, including our own beloved Horace Clarke, there have been none from the BVI. Belize has one, former Oriole Chito Martinez. There have never been any from Bermuda (okay, I know, not Caribbean), Barbados, Trinidad, Guyana, Turks and Caicos or any other English-speaking place in the Caribbean. |
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Post by inger on May 4, 2023 16:27:42 GMT -5
ANDRE ROGERS His numbers weren’t great with the bat, but he was slick in the field. But mostly, it was this: "Aside from the national pride that this (Andre Rodger's being called up in 1957) generated not only among baseball fans, but Bahamians in general, what this meant to the Bahamas as a country could not be evaluated in dollars and cents. Every time Andre Rodgers stepped on a field in baseball stadiums across the United States and his name and where he was from was announced, that represented thousands and thousands of dollars in free publicity for the Bahamas." - Sportswriter Oswald T. Brown in The Nassau Guardian (11/21/2003) Rodgers grew up playing cricket in the Bahamas. He had never even seen a game of baseball before he tried out for the NYG in 1954. He was signed immediately and assigned to their minor league farm system... I remember Andre Rodgers as a tall, lanky shortstop with good defensive skills. If there is one thing I would recall it is that he was from the Bahamas because it was constantly being mentioned. He was another Carl Hubbell development. One year with the Cubs he and the unfortunate Kenny Hubbs and Ernie Banks set a short-lived NL record for turning double plays. I clearly remember having his card cut out from the back of a box of Post Toasties in 1961. My brother and I would always try to add things to the blank backs of the cards, and I think my first sentence here was what we added. He was the first of what so far have been eight Bahamian-born players in the major leagues. The handful besides Rodgers who stuck around for a few years include Tony Curry, Ed Armbrister and current Marlin Jazz Chisholm. All eight Bahamians are from Nassau. We visited the Andre Rodgers Stadium there -- it didn't appear too active and I think they demolished it to build a new one -- cricket still holds the upper hand. Do any of you remember the song "Funky Nassau" from 1971 by Beginning Of The End? It was a fairly big hit, good song. But I don't want to have this bleed into the music thread. The UK-governed Caribbean hasn't produced many MLB players. In addition to the Bahamas, Jamaica had churned out four -- Chili Davis, Devon White, Justin Masterson and Rolando Roomes. While the U.S. Virgin Islands have had a fair number, including our own beloved Horace Clarke, there have been none from the BVI. Belize has one, former Oriole Chito Martinez. There have never been any from Bermuda (okay, I know, not Caribbean), Barbados, Trinidad, Guyana, Turks and Caicos or any other English-speaking place in the Caribbean. The Andre Rogers Stadium was originally scheduled to be completed in 2015, but apparently delays took the completion date all the way to 2022. When did you see it? (I was originally going to include the stadia info with the post, but I didn’t think it would pique any interest. You never with Mr. Pipps though 🕵️♀️)… “They’ve given you a number, and taken ‘way your name”… |
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Post by pippsheadache on May 4, 2023 16:39:24 GMT -5
Inger, we saw the old stadium in the early 2000s. We were last in Nassau around 2016, but I couldn't interest my wife in foregoing dinner to check on construction of the new one. She's patient, but not that patient.
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Post by rizzuto on May 4, 2023 19:04:35 GMT -5
Happy birthday to Ben Grieve. No. I mean seriously. Players born on this date have not been supremely productive. Grieves 8.4 career WAR is the second highest since the deadball era, with only Ken Oberkfell exceeding him at 22.4. Miguel is next at 7.7. It’s strange how some dates have multiple HOF players and others have… BEN GRIEVE… When I had season tickets to single A ball in Visalia, California in the 1990s, I saw Ben Grieve play several times for Modesto. Grieve had lots of fan fare as a high first round pick (second). He looked like guy who was going to easily make the show, and he did with a pretty left-handed swing with power, hit for average and took walks. He was not a star defensively, yet more or less competent in the outfield. Honestly, he was kind of what I expected Greg Bird to be offensively. Lots of people thought he would be a perennial all-star. Sometimes, the drive to be a star is just not there. Phil Hughes comes to mind in that respect. Where was the fire in Grieve and Hughes? |
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Post by rizzuto on May 4, 2023 19:16:09 GMT -5
Inger, we saw the old stadium in the early 2000s. We were last in Nassau around 2016, but I couldn't interest my wife in foregoing dinner to check on construction of the new one. She's patient, but not that patient. Sarah and I took my niece on a cruise around 2011 that had a one-day stop in the Bahamas. Riding around Nassau on a big scooter is what convinced me to buy a motorcycle when we returned to California. I had no idea there was a baseball stadium there. |
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Post by rizzuto on May 4, 2023 19:29:04 GMT -5
If this was silver and black, this is my motorcycle. Also, my handle bars were not straight across, more of an artful bend, easy to reach.  |
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Post by pippsheadache on May 4, 2023 19:31:22 GMT -5
Inger, we saw the old stadium in the early 2000s. We were last in Nassau around 2016, but I couldn't interest my wife in foregoing dinner to check on construction of the new one. She's patient, but not that patient. Sarah and I took my niece on a cruise around 2011 that had a one-day stop in the Bahamas. Riding around Nassau on a big scooter is what convinced me to buy a motorcycle when we returned to California. I had no idea there was a baseball stadium there. Rizz, at that point I don't believe there was an actual stadium there. The old Andre Rodgers Stadium would have been demolished and construction on the new one would not have begun. And really the old one would have barely qualified as a short-season A ball field. I don't think it would have held more than maybe 4,000 people. The only reason I even sought out the old stadium was because of remembering Andre Rodgers being from Nassau. Baseball cards shaping my travel. Glad you've been there. We enjoyed Nassau -- we enjoy any place in the Caribbean, including places a lot of people don't like such as Kingston and Port of Spain. But the real beauty of the Bahamas is in the outer islands like Eleuthera and Great Inagua and the tiny sandbars where there's nothing larger than a golf cart for transportation. What a cool memory for you. |
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Post by pippsheadache on May 4, 2023 19:32:19 GMT -5
If this was silver and black, this is my motorcycle. Also, my handle bars were not straight across, more of an artful bend, easy to reach. Born to be wild! That's a serious bike. |
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Post by rizzuto on May 4, 2023 19:37:34 GMT -5
If this was silver and black, this is my motorcycle. Also, my handle bars were not straight across, more of an artful bend, easy to reach. Born to be wild! That's a serious bike. Really easy to drive and comfortable. It sits a couple inches higher than a Harley or most other cruisers. That was important to me. 1600cc but it handled easily. I must admit a bit of hesitation riding it on some of the streets in San Francisco, where it seems you're going straight up and straight down. Lombard Street was a breeze though. |
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Post by pippsheadache on May 4, 2023 19:40:18 GMT -5
Born to be wild! That's a serious bike. Really easy to drive and comfortable. It sits a couple inches higher than a Harley or most other cruisers. That was important to me. 1600cc but it handled easily. I must admit a bit of hesitation riding it on some of the streets in San Francisco, where it seems you're going straight up and straight down. Lombard Street was a breeze though. Nice! Lombard must feel like a slalom on that. |
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Post by rizzuto on May 4, 2023 19:42:18 GMT -5
Sarah and I took my niece on a cruise around 2011 that had a one-day stop in the Bahamas. Riding around Nassau on a big scooter is what convinced me to buy a motorcycle when we returned to California. I had no idea there was a baseball stadium there. Rizz, at that point I don't believe there was an actual stadium there. The old Andre Rodgers Stadium would have been demolished and construction on the new one would not have begun. And really the old one would have barely qualified as a short-season A ball field. I don't think it would have held more than maybe 4,000 people. The only reason I even sought out the old stadium was because of remembering Andre Rodgers being from Nassau. Baseball cards shaping my travel. Glad you've been there. We enjoyed Nassau -- we enjoy any place in the Caribbean, including places a lot of people don't like such as Kingston and Port of Spain. But the real beauty of the Bahamas is in the outer islands like Eleuthera and Great Inagua and the tiny sandbars where there's nothing larger than a golf cart for transportation. What a cool memory for you. Sarah was on the back of the scooter holding on to me, and we were laughing at an old bit by comedian Ron White about renting a scooter in Santorini, Greece: "Lean the way I lean, God damn it!" Such good times. |
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