One of the great mysteries of baseball life is: How do you keep Pedro
Martinez from beating you?
Well, we know that hitting against him doesn't work real
hot. So the Detroit Tigers and Cleveland Indians came upon a much better
strategy last weekend:
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Triviality
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Six active players have won a home run title while playing for the
organization that originally signed them -- but not one is still with that
team. Can you name them?
(Answer at bottom)
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The rain dance.
Four straight days, it was Pedro's turn to pitch -- first against the
Tigers, then against the Indians. Four straight days, the Red Sox got rained
out.
For the Tigers and Indians, this was a development that waterproofed them
against a whole mess of strikeouts. And for the rest of us, it produced maybe
the greatest Pedro quote of all time.
"I think it's romantic, the rain," Martinez poeticized. "Rainy days are
good to cuddle and stay at home. Not to play ball."
The Red Sox, however, were not allowed to cuddle and stay at home. They
had to come to the ballpark every single day and wait for the rain to go away. Baseball is cruel that way.
That meant three straight days and nights last weekend of cramming themselves
into their clubhouse at Fenway -- a room custom-designed for the ballplayers
of 1912, whose average height apparently was about 4-feet-2. So you've heard
of cabin fever? These guys had clubhouse fever.
|  | | While Pedro Martinez dominates, the rest of baseball searches for anyone who can simply get some outs. |
"I've been in cabins bigger than that locker room at Fenway," said
catcher Scott Hatteberg. "You cram 40 people in there, it gets pretty tight."
So how did these men kill time, maintain their sanity and avoid
unnecessary cuddling for all those hours? Here's the report from Hatteberg, our
rain-delay correspondent:
Muchee madness: When in doubt, eat. That's our motto. And it worked
well for the Red Sox.
"If you got up and walked around, it seemed like you were always going
past the food table and the cooler with all the drinks," Hatteberg said. "So
you wind up eating a lot of snacks. I'll admit it. I snacked quite a bit.
Potato chips. Cookies. All your big food groups. Everything a champion needs."
The tube: Too bad the people from the Neilsen ratings weren't surveying
Fenway last weekend. Ratings would have soared for just about every program
on the air, except possibly "Teletubbies" and skin-care infomercials.
"We watched pretty much everything you could watch," Hatteberg said. "We
watched the basketball playoffs. We saw pretty much every game of those. We
had some Blues fans, so they were watching the hockey. That was on in the
weight room. We've got some wrestling fans, too. So we watched some of that.
And that last day, Sunday, we were there from 9 o'clock in the morning and
didn't leave till about 5. So I think we caught every baseball game on the
air. We've got six TVs. Every one had a different game on."
And, amazingly, after all that quality viewing, there was still way more
time to burn. So ...
"We watched a bunch of movies, too," Hatteberg said. "I know I saw 'Happy
Gilmour' -- for about the 50th time. We've got about five movies that we
basically rotate over and over, and 'Happy Gilmour' is real good. If you can
watch it 50 times and still laugh, it must be pretty good."
Finally, there was the most popular programming of all: The Weather
Channel. These guys used to watch radar-gun readings. Last week, they were
more interested in the Dopplar Radar readings.
"Yeah, but (Fenway superintendent) Joe Mooney's got his own Dopplar, I
think," Hatteberg said. "You'd look at the radar, and there was nothing but
green over New England. Next thing you knew, we had a two-hour window."
The chess club: You can tell these guys had soared beyond the boredom
line if they started hauling out the pawns and rooks. And Hatteberg reported
there was a massive outbreak of chess playing, too. Eventually, players who
didn't even know how to play chess were playing.
"Hey, we had so much time on our hands," Hatteberg said, "guys had time
to learn."
Deja vu-yah: What a life. Every day, these men woke up, turned their
windshield wipers on, came to the park, ate their chips, watched every
sporting event in North America, never played and went back home.
What we had here was a baseball team trapped in a performance of "Groundhog Day."
"It definitely seemed that way," Hatteberg said. "Nothing ever changed.
Day after day, we walked in and that was it. It was the same thing, over and
over and over."
So imagine their shock when they headed for Texas on Sunday night and
arrived at a place where no water fell from the sky, where Noah had sold his
ark, where baseball was actually played.
"We showed up in Texas, and there was this giant orb in the sky,"
Hatteberg said. "We said, 'What's that?' "
The bright side: Thankfully for the Red Sox, it won't always be like
this. Their next homestand they may even get to play a game or six. But they
couldn't help but imagine what life would be like if every homestand was like
that one -- three games, three rainouts.
"If every homestand was like that," Hatteberg said, "I could work for
ESPN, with all the TV I watched. And I could take on Kasparov, with all the
chess I played."
Three-peat of the week
Speaking of deja-vu events, there was another classic last weekend, when the
Anaheim Angels ventured to the wildest dome on earth, Tropicana Field.
In the fourth inning of their game April 21, Mo Vaughn, Tim Salmon and
Troy Glaus all hit home runs. Then, in the ninth inning, Mo Vaughn, Tim
Salmon and Troy Glaus all hit home runs again.
Two different innings. Three home runs by the same guys. First time ever,
in the 10 billion ballgames ever played.
Of course, there hadn't been unprecedented outbreak of home run history in a
couple of hours, so we were due.
"It was weird," Glaus said. "I'm standing there on deck in the ninth, and
it wasn't like a premonition, but after (Salmon) hit his homer, I said,
'Shoot, I've got to hit one now.' "
So naturally, he did, as the remaining occupants of the Trop were
scratching their heads and asking, "Wait a minute. Didn't that just happen
about an hour ago?" One of those occupants, in fact, was our favorite
turbo-charged Angels broadcast personality, the great Rex Hudler.
"When it happened the second time, I had to check my scorecard again,"
Hudler said. "You know, I'm new to keeping score because I never did that as
a player, so I make mistakes. So I looked over at my partner's card to make
sure I had this right. It was like cheating on a math test, and I was
cheating off his paper. But he had the same thing I had. And I said, 'Wow.
That really happened. That's kind of unusual, isn't it?' "
Yeah. Kind of. But the Trop is an unusual kind of place. After all,
Glaus' first homer broke one of the world's most heralded laws -- the law of
physics. It went up, but it never did come down, because it got stuck in one
of those ever-present Tropicana Field catwalks, out in left field.
"It disappeared, dude," Hudler said. "Greg Vaughn, he was spinning around
like a dog chasing a frisbee, and the frisbee got lost."
People may knock the Trop from time to time, but part of the fun of sports is
seeing things you've never seen before. And face it: Nobody ever saw that at
Wrigley Field.
"These guys are strong, man," said Angels manager Mike Scioscia. "I've heard
the saying that a guy hit the ball so hard, it never came down. Well, I guess
we saw it tonight."
Brawl game of the week
The World Baseball Boxing Federation is in danger of going out of
business, now that Frank Robinson has suspended everyone but the hot dog
vendors after last weekend's Tigers-White Sox Smackdown at Comiskey Park.
And frankly, no one will miss that World Baseball Boxing Federation,
except for the people who have to assemble the plays of the week.
But if that Tigers-White Sox brawl was baseball's last donnybrook ever,
it was sure an all-timer. Tigers coach Juan Samuel has been in the big
leagues as a player or coach for 18 seasons. And he rates this fight the
wildest he's ever seen.
Then again, it had to be wild for Samuel to get suspended for 15 games,
since he's generally regarded as one of the most congenial men in the entire
sport.
So when this columnist somehow turned out to be the informant to break
the news to Samuel on Thursday that he'd just been suspended for 15 games, he
said: "You've gotta be kidding."
No we weren't, of course. And once we'd convinced him of that, Samuel was
disappointed in more than just his stiff sentence.
"If I knew I was getting 15," he joked, "I probably should have thrown
more punches."
His next assignment will be to appeal this sentence. His other assignment? Figure out what's he going to do for those 15 games.
"Well, I could go to the WWF," he quipped. "I hope I get contacted by
them."
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List of the week
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When Andruw Jones and Chipper Jones went back-to-back Wednesday, it was
another great occasion: the first time two players named Jones
went back-to-back. But we have had previous same-name, same-game
back-to-backers. Here, courtesy of SABR's David Vincent, is the complete list:
Sept. 15,1938: Lloyd and Paul Waner, Pirates
Aug. 20, 1962: Willie and Tommy Davis, Dodgers
Sept. 9, 1964: Willie and Tommy Davis, Dodgers
April 13 1966: Frank and Brooks Robinson, Orioles
April 23, 1967: Frank and Brooks Robinson, Orioles
May 19, 1967: Frank and Brooks Robinson, Orioles
Aug. 2, 1983: Dave and Steve Henderson, Mariners
Sept. 14, 1990: Ken Griffey Sr. and Ken Griffey Jr., Mariners
Sept. 26, 1991: Rickey and Dave Henderson, Athletics
Aug. 30, 1995: Edgar and Tino Martinez, Mariners
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Personal shopper of the week
He doesn't watch the Home Shopping Network. He never surfs Ebay. He'd
rather wash sweat socks than go to the mall. So it's safe to say Reds
clubhouse manager Rick Stowe was a long shot to become baseball's most
valuable shopper of the year.
"I hate shopping," Stowe told us. "I can't stand it. If my wife wants to
go shopping, she's on her own. I'll watch the kids or something."
But last weekend, Stowe not only went shopping on company time. He played
a role in baseball's first-ever shopping delay of a game.
It all started when the umpiring crew for the Reds' series with the
Dodgers traveled from Montreal to Cincinnati. They made it fine. Their gear,
on the other hand, went to New York. So all together now: Uh-oh.
It was about an hour and 15 minutes before game time. Stowe was minding
his own business, doing his clubhouse thing. The attendant from the umpires'
room walked in and handed him a shopping list.
"I thought he was kidding," Stowe said. "I said, 'What's this about?' "
Well, it was essentially about not having the umpires work a game wearing Reds
jackets and Dockers. So Stowe gathered up his assistant, Larry
Woelfel, and off they went on an umpires'-gear shopping spree.
They ran out of the stadium and jumped into manager Jack McKeon's car.
Why his car? Best parking spot in the joint. "It was right there. Good space.
His is usually our errands car," Stowe said.
They headed for Koch's Sporting Goods a few blocks from the stadium.
Oops. Closed at 5:30. So off they went to Dick's Sporting Goods store,
about six miles away.
They sprinted inside, found the manager, explained the deal and showed
him the list. They gathered a bunch of store employees and went roaring
around the store, like contestants on a bad game show.
"We were wearing our Reds shirts, but nobody seemed to notice," Stowe
said. "About 10 of the store employees were wearing Griffey Jr. shirts. So we
didn't look that unusual."
Eventually, they wound up with four golf rain suits, four pairs of
Spandex pants (instead of long johns), four white T-shirts, eight pairs of
socks, four belts, a ball-strike indicator, a brush to dust off the plate and
four generic black hats. Total tab: $621 -- all of which went on Stowe's Visa
card. (This story can serve as a receipt for his expense account.)
By then, it was 6:30. Game time was 7:05 -- in theory. But first, the
anti-shoplifting devices had to be removed from this whole pile of gear. So
by the time the shopaholics got back in the car, it was 6:38. They went
zooming toward the ballpark until ... Wham. A mile and a half from the stadium, they ran into
gridlocked traffic from people trying to get to the game and a Barney show across the
street. (Just one more reason to love that Barney.) Most printable version of
Stowe's reaction to the gridlock: "Oh, no."
But 50 yards away, Stowe saw a policeman on a motorcycle -- "and we just
started screaming, 'Hey, hey, any way you can help us out here?' Luckily, he
believed us, since we had all the stuff all over the back seat. I don't think
he thought these were two guys just late for the ballgame."
Stow got a police escort down the wrong side of the road -- "lights flashing, all the bells and whistles. I enjoyed that," Stowe said. "It was the coolest part of the whole thing."
They arrived right around game time. Reds C.O.O. John Allen was waiting
for them. They ran to the umpires' room "and literally dumped it all out of
the bags. And they said, 'Hey, perfect.' "
So the pitchers were told to warm up. The umps put on their outfits. ("I
thought they looked really stylish," Stowe said, admiringly.) And while the
game began 27 minutes late, at least it began with an umpiring crew that
didn't look as if it had spent the day shopping at a flea market.
After this tremendous shopping performance, Stowe -- who has worked in the
Reds' clubhouse for 20 years -- might have a big-time future. After all, isn't
this how concierges start?
"No way," he said. "I want no future in that. I quit. I'll stick to
equipment manager."
Useless information dept.
It's that time of the year to zero in on the finalists in the Tom Lawless
Memorial Last Guy to Get a Hit competition. The three players left who have
made it from Opening Day to this weekend without a hit: Baltimore's Jesse
Garcia (0-for-11), Montreal's Lenny Webster (0-for-8), and the winner of this
year's A-trophy (last player to get into a game), Texas' Scott Sheldon (0-for-3). Stay tuned.
Then there's this special division of the TLMLGTGAH 0-fer-lympiad: Red Sox
catcher Tim Speher went 0 for spring training (0-for-17 with Boston), then
got sent to Pawtucket, started his season with strikeouts in eight straight
at-bats and was 0-for-16 until he finally got his first hit of the year,
April 21 vs. Rochester.
Perhaps you've seen this line in the transactions column someplace before:
"Designated Jeff Manto for assignment." Yes, sir. He's done it again. When
the Rockies designated the much-traveled Manto this week, it was the eighth
time he has been designated for assignment -- believed to be an all-time
record. Manto, who once said he has enough designation paperwork to wallpaper
his living room with, has now been designated eight times, released five
times, traded three times, claimed on waivers twice, become a free agent nine
times and taken in the Rule 5 draft twice. He has played in 25 cities, for
12 organizations, not even counting a cameo stint with the Yomiuri Giants. We
can hardly wait for his next destination -- or designation.
Dodgers pitcher Alan Mills has taken the early lead in the
cheapest-save-of-the-2000s derby. Mills got a save in a 16-2 win over the
Reds on April 22. Now he just has to hold on. Cheapest saves of the '90s: a
tie between Texas' Ed Vosberg, for saving a 26-7 game in 1996, and
Cincinnati's Stan Belinda, for saving a 22-3 game last September.
It was amazing enough that Vaughn, Salmon and Glaus hit homers
in the same inning twice in one game for the Angels last weekend. But it was
especially amazing that all three bombs in the second barrage came off
homer-proof closer Roberto Hernandez. Hernandez gave up one home run all last
year. He'd allowed three homers in his previous 107 appearances put together.
And he'd never served up more than one gopherball in any of his other 518
games in the big leagues. You never know.
It may not be the Justice Department that caused Microsoft stock to plummet
after all. If circumstantial evidence means anything, it could all be Ken
Griffey Jr.'s fault. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's (and ESPN.com's) Jim Caple computed that
in the time Junior was in Seattle, a $100 investment in Microsoft shares
would have risen to $15,142.26 by the time Griffey was traded. And since the
trade? Those same shares have lost $5,169.57 worth of their value -- down to
$9,972.69. Hmmm. But at least those T-shirt salesmen in Cincinnati are happy.
We've heard of some strange curses -- but the Curse of the Opening Day
Starter? The Brewers' last two Opening Day pitchers -- Rafael Roque and Steve
Woodard -- still haven't won a single start since they were annointed to pitch the first game. Roque went 0-5 in nine starts last year (though he did win in
relief). Woodard started 0-3 in five starts this year.
The Dodgers came within an RBI infield single by pitcher Eric Gagne of being
shut out for three straight games last week. They lost 1-0 in two straight games. The
Elias Sports Bureau's Ken Hirdt reports that no team has been shut out three
times in a row since the Tigers did it in Sparky Anderson's final three games
in 1995. No National League team has done it since the '92 Mets (July 25-27).
And no team has lost three straight 1-0 games since the 1960 Phillies (Sam
Jones over Jim Owens on May 11, Jack Sanford over Robin Roberts on May 12,
Jim O'Toole over John Buzhardt on May 13).
Randy Johnson is up to 129 double-figure strikeout games -- which is more
than J.R. Richard (39), Christy Mathewson (29), Juan Marichal (25) and Vida
Blue (28) put together (124).
Pedro Martinez actually trailed (Rangers 2, Red Sox 1) in his start Tuesday
in Texas -- the first time he'd been behind at any point of any game since
last Sept. 10. But since his last loss on Aug. 19, Pedro has been absurd: 101
1/3 innings, 50 hits, 10 earned runs, 160 strikeouts, one home run. He's
11-0, 0.99, counting the postseason. After he beat Texas, on nine days' rest,
Rangers manager Johnny Oates chuckled: "He did pretty good for being rusty.
"He must have gotten some WD-40."
Funky road trip of the week: The Mets start a conveniently located
four-city journey to Colorado, San Francisco, Florida and Pittsburgh this
weekend. Naturally, they have to play games in San Francisco and Miami on
back-to-back days, but they do have an off day between Florida and
Pittsburgh. Bring on that realignment.
Schedule quirk of the week: Until they kicked off another homestand at Pac
Bell on Friday, the Giants had played more games in Florida this season (six)
than in San Francisco (five).
It's hard to believe we just missed another home run record last week. We
had eight straight days with a grand slam. And the Sultan of Swat Stats,
SABR's David Vincent, reports that ties the second-longest streak of all
time. The longest: 10 straight days, in 1995.
The Devil Rays went from Aug. 22 to April 23 without
winning a series at home. They played nine series in between, losing six and
splitting three.
And what book did Chuck Finley just happen to bring to Boston for that
rained-out Red Sox-Indians series? What else? "The Perfect Storm."
Trivia answer
Matt Williams (Giants), Ken Griffey (Mariners),
Mark McGwire (Athletics), Albert Belle (Indians), Juan Gonzalez (Rangers),
Jose Canseco (Athletics).
Jayson Stark is a senior writer at ESPN.com. | |
ALSO SEE
Stark: Home runs here to stay
Home run theories
AUDIO/VIDEO
 ESPN's Jayson Stark talks about this year's home run craze.
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