While the Chicago Cubs won yesterday, it was just their fifth win in 15 games, four coming vs the 24 games under .500, Cincinnati Reds.
Speaking of four, last year the New York Mets after being swept in a 4 game, meaningless regular season series at Chicago vs the Cubs, swept the Cubs in 4 straight in the NLCS.
This past weekend, again the Mets won all four vs the Cubs. Chicago had won 9 straight regular season games vs the Mets until last weekend’s 4 straight wins by the New York team.
Elie Wiesel, an incredible man, who dedicated his life to helping people move forward while never forgetting the horror of a Holocaust in Europe that killed 12 million people, half of them Jewish, including Mr.Wiesel’s family, died in the past week at age 87.
There are no words even remotely close to powerful enough to describe the atrocities of that event and of the courage and sheer will of Mr. Wiesel to carry on a productive, meaningful, life after enduring what he experienced as a young boy. Even the Nobel Prize given to him pales in significance as to what he did enduring and helping.
Yet he did so and in my opinion, God, as was often the case with “Lucy Ricardo,” on “I love Lucy” has some “splaining” to do when he greets Elie Wiesel, concerning how such terror could have happened and still does.
My words to Elie Wiesel are those of thanks for a lifetime of work and inspiration and I will try in my little way, to carry on a life devoid of prejudice and perhaps of some help to others.
Elie Wiesel, an extraordinary human being, pictured above.
Exactly 33 years ago today on Monday July 4, 1983 Dave Righetti pitched a no hit game for the New York Yankees vs the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium.
Years later, Righetti a truly classy individual, who has been a part of 3 San Francisco Giants’ title teams as their long time pitching coach, recalled the game fondly as he and I chatted in the S.F. dugout before a game vs the New York Mets.
I recall seeing the end of the game on Sports Channel with the great Mel Allen calling the end of the game.
Righetti, never on a title team with the Yankees, struck out future Hall of Famer, Wade Boggs to end the game.
Boggs needed to go to the Yankees to claim a title in 1996, never having won one with the Red Sox. Righetti has prospered as stated before, winning 3 titles as S.F. pitching coach.
Dave Righetti, pictured above, after hurling the no hit game 33 years ago today.
Click above to view and hear the last out of Righetti’s no hit game. Frank Messer, a fine announcer is heard on the call followed by comments from another fine announcer, rare for an ex player, Bill White.
There have been two different time spans, each after the beginning of League Championship Series play and before the horrible extra, greedy round of playoffs which includes wild card team(s), in which both the Oakland A’s and Pittsburgh Pirates made the post-season together but did not meet in the World Series.
From (1970-1975), (if only it were then as I would trade having Barack Obama as President for Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, not for a great deal of much needed money but to be 40 plus years younger), the teams combined for an incredible 10 division titles in 12 possibilities, 9 in 10 possibilities from (1971-1975) when the A’s won 5 straight one quarter A.L. West crowns.
Yet they never met in the World Series. However as in (1909-1913), the teams won 4 World Series, again 3 by the A’s. By the way from (1925-1931), the teams won 3 of the 5 World Series they gained entry to, two by the then Philadelphia Athletics.
Finally from (1988-1992), a 5 year span which manifested in 4 division titles for the A’s, three for the Pirates, no World Series clashes between the teams nor Pirates’ appearances in the W.S.
Additionally supposedly great Oakland A’s teams under the fine but vastly over rated manager, Tony La Russa won but one of their 3 World Series appearances in that span.
Roberto Clemente, pictured above, led the Pittsburgh Pirates to the 1971 World Series crown.
One weekend baseball match up that is not a redux of a past World Series battle (the only post-season possibility as the teams involved were always in different leagues) is the Pirates and Athletics.
They have never met in a World Series despite each having entity winning teams together, within short spans of time, in two different spans in the same season more than once, in fact 4 times, the first two cited in this post, the other two tomorrow.
The earliest example is that from (1909-1914), a concentrated span of 6 seasons, the A’s then in Philadelphia, now in Oakland and in between in Kansas City where they never came close to winning a pennant, and Pittsburgh Pirates combined for 5 pennants but did not meet in the World Series.
In that span, the Athletics won 4 pennants, the Pirates only one.
A better example is (1925-1931) when the teams combined for 5 pennants, 3 by the A’s, but never clashed in the World Series.
This week’s puzzle on NPR (National Public Radio), presented by New York Times puzzle editor Will Shorts was relatively easy.
I am not good with puzzles and though 3800 plus people sent in the right answer, I would not have been one of them.
Anyway the clue from last week was name two cities, whose states postal code (first two letters) would be the same as the first two letters of the other city, in the different state.
In other words the first two letters of one city and the first two letters of the other city’s state will be the same. The first two letters of the state is also the postal code for that state. Answer in one of tomorrow’s posts.
Yesterday in a day game, the Toronto Blue Jays ended the Cleveland Indians’ winning streak at 14 games.
The streak coincided with two straight and far more important wins by the Cleveland Cavaliers that gave the city of Cleveland its first sports’ title since 1964.
Cleveland has a nice lead in the A.L. Central and as baseball approaches the halfway point in the 2016 season, let’s see how the Indians play from here on out.
In addition to the 4 LCS “replays” there are 3 World Series repeats this weekend.
In the one world Series of the three that did not result in a 4 game sweep the Philadelphia Phillies are meeting the current World champion, Kansas City Royals.
The Phillies won their 1980 W.S. clash in six games but the Royals around so much lees time than the Phils have as many World Series crowns.
In 1998 the New York Yankees swept the San Diego Padres in the world Series. They are meeting this weekend in San Diego.
In 2005, the Chicago White Sox won their first title in 88 years, sweeping the Houston Astros, then in the National League.
The teams are meeting this weekend in an American League regular season series in Houston.
The great Frank “Tug” McGraw leaps for joy as the Phillies win their first World Series in 1980.
The NLCS redux involves the venerable National League franchise, the St. Louis Cardinals, who vanquished this weekend’s opponent, the Milwaukee Brewers, in six games in the 2011 NLCS.
The Brewers were for many years an American League team and they are the only team to play in both an ALCS and NLCS.
The ALCS rematch is one that evokes memories of the classic Boston Red Sox 7 game triumph, nearly 30 years ago vs the Angels in the 1986 ALCS.
Seven of the 15 weekend major league baseball match ups involve teams that met once and only once either in League Championship Series or World Series play.
Looking at NLCS history involving teams clashing this weekend, the New York Mets defeated the Chicago Cubs in 4 straight games in last year’s NLCS, after losing all 7 regular season tilts between the two clubs. The Mets have won the first two “reg” games this season, in the current series at Citi Field.
The Miami Marlins then known as the Florida Marlins, a name under which they won 2 World Series titles (other than the Yankees (5) only the Boston Red Sox and S.F. Giants 3 each, after respective 86 and 56 year title droughts, have won more World Series since the Marlins began play in 1997), defeated the Atlanta Braves in a pretty big upset for baseball, in six games in the 1997 NLCS.
In our next post, a look at another NLCS redux, this involving a team that moved from the American League to the National League and the one ALCS redux (it was a classic one), this weekend.
Click below to view “The Staple Sisters” sing “Let’s Do It Again.”
Staple Singers – Lets Do It Again
Andy B Sports 