A's in ALCS

ALCS:  Detroit 4, Oakland 2
NLCS:  NY Mets 4, St. Louis 3
World Series:  Detroit 4, NY Mets 2

    Alternate pick if Oakland advances to the World Series:
Oakland 4, NY Mets 2.  Any of the four AL teams that reached the post season would beat the NL champion.  The NL is weak this year.

    Some Angel fans are anti-Oakland.  This is a southern California vs northern California rivalry.  I sometimes vacation in northern California near Mt Shasta.  For awhile I lived in Incline Village, Nevada on the northeast side of Lake Tahoe (God bless those gamblers!  They paid my state tax for ten years!).  I got to know many A's and Giant's fans.  Over the years I have gone to about 25 games each at Candlestick Park and the Oakland Alameda County Mausoleum.

    At Chapman College in Orange I was friends with George Sobrero, a former soft drink and peanut vendor at the Mausoleum.  His name strikes a cord because there was a Guillermo Sobrero who was captured and decapitated by Abu Sayef in the Philippines about seven years ago.  Guillermo was a regular at Tommy's Sushi in Tustin.  That is the sushi bar where I had a conversation with The Wonder Dog, Angel broadcaster Rex Hudler on September 9th, 2002.  I recall the date because that was the date of the first game of a four game A's @ Angels series.  When I mentioned Guillermo Sobrero's name to the sushi chef, he made a slicing motion across his neck.  I gathered that in a standing room only sushi bar all customers are replaceable.

    When Oakland visited Angel Stadium in 2003 the scoreboard crew would put up a likeness of an infamous terrorist every time Eric Chavez came to bat.  His teammates perhaps teased him with a "Batting clean-up for the Oakland Athletics, number 3, Mohammed Atta!"   When the A's prepared to visit Anaheim they did not say "We are going to Disneyland!"   Instead they proclaimed "We are going to the Big Atta!"  Call Homeland Security?  Well the A's started it.  In August 1981 I went to a 3 game Angels @ A's series at the Mausoleum.  During each game on the scoreboard there was a film clip of an Angel bobblehead doll getting stomped on by an A's player.

    In Albany on Solano Avenue (near the UC Berkeley campus) I used to frequent Peet's Coffee and Solano Cellar's (a wine store).  In July 1985 I purchased a case and a half of wine locker quality red wine after a wine tasting.  One of the other customers recommended that I eat at a ribs restaurant about two miles east of the Mausoleum.  I had a plate of delicious pork ribs and drove to the stadium to see a night game.  I paid to park and went in to the game.  When the game was over I returned to my car and was surprised to find the electric front driver's window all the way down.  About ten cars away from my car there was the shell of a burnt out car.  Nothing was missing from my car.  The wine was still in the trunk.  I reckon somebody had followed me from the ribs joint and was giving me a message (leave a bigger tip?).  I was very impressed with the skill it took to unlock my car door and roll down the electric window.  Just having a friendly!

    If the Yankees had advanced to the ALCS I would definitely be rooting for Oakland.  Whoever is playing the Yanks is my team.  Last century for football I was a L.A. Rams fan and a fan of whoever was playing the Cowboys.  I disapprove of the Jack Nicholson front-runner bandwagon types that root for the Yankees, Cowboys, and Lakers.  Where is the geography there?

    The Tigers knocked off the Yankees in the ALCS.  In four of the past five seasons the team that eliminated the Yankees went on to win the World Series.  The exception to that were the 2005 Angels.  During last year Chisox-Angels ALCS I spoke with White Sox fans who were disappointed that they did not get the opportunity to beat the Yankees in the post season.

    In 1984 at Game 3 of the Cubs @ Padres NLCS I purchased a terrace box ticket from two Tiger fans who worked at a General Motors dealership in Phoenix.  They were scouting the Tigers World Series opponent.  I quoted Joe Falls for them ("Oh how I hate Ohio State," "Be a lert, the world needs more lerts.") and we hit it off well.  About five years later there was a Phoenix to Detroit plane that crashed.  About 15 GM employees died in that crash.  I will root for the Tigers while thinking about these perhaps deceased car dealers.  Over the years I have seen the Michigan Wolverines lose 6 of the 7 Rose Bowl games I saw them play.  The Michiganders need to win a major event once in a while!

CORRECTION:

    Four consecutive home runs have only occurred four times in baseball history:

1961 Milwaukee Braves--  Eddie Mathews, Hank Aaron, Joe Adcock, Frank Thomas
1963 Cleveland Indians--  Woodie Held, Pedro Ramos, Tito Francona, Larry Brown
1964 Minnesota Twins--  Tony Oliva, Bob Allison, Jimmie Hall, Harmon Killebrew
2006 Los Angeles Dodgers--  Jeff Kent, J.D. Drew, Russell Martin, Marlon Anderson

    While reading a NY Times story about Joe Torre's possible resignation or firing I saw it mentioned that Joe has a health problem.  I decided to look up his brother, Frank Torre, at the Baseball Reference website to see if Frank was still alive (he is).  I was surprised to see that Frank had hit only 13 career regular season home runs.  I knew that Frank Torre had hit a World Series home run because I had listened to it on a cassette tape I purchased from Charlie (c/o Danrick Enterprises, Clifton, New Jersey--now out of business.  His tape collection was sold to MLB).  I was surprised to notice that Frank did not play in the Majors in 1961.  Earlier I had e-mailed you a list that showed Frank Torre as the Brave who hit the fourth of four consecutive home runs against the Cincinnati Reds at Crosley Field in 1961.  I accessed Retrosheet to look at that boxscore.  That fourth home run actually was hit by Frank Thomas, NOT Frank Torre.  The list shown above has been corrected to show that.  Before there was the Big Hurt there was another Frank Thomas.  This Frank Thomas played for the Braves, Pirates, Phillies and the 1962 NY Mets.  He also hit a home run off of the one and only George Plimpton of "Paper Lion" fame.

    The Dodgers went three-and-out against the Mets.  Jeff Kent recovered from his Game 1 blunder (9-4-2-2) on the basepaths to go 4-for-5 in Game 3.  That included a double and a 2-run home run in the 5th inning that tied the score.  That reminded me of Larry Walker.  In a September 2004 Cards @ Dodgers night game Walker on a hit and run went one step past second base, did not retouch the bag when returning to first base on a flyout, resulting in a double play.  The next afternoon Walker took it out on the Dodgers, going 4-for-5 with 2 home runs, a double, and a flyout just short of the warning track in right field.

    The Jeff Kent and J.D. Drew two outs at home plate (with assistance from third base coach Rich Donnelly) snafu reminded me of the first game the Seattle Pilots played @ California on 4/8/69.  In the second inning Radio Rodriguez and Tom Satriano both singled.  Bobby Knoop then launched a long flyball into the rightfield corner.  Pilot rightfielder Mike Hegan crashed into the box seat railing as he gloved and dropped the ball.  Hegan was hurt and collapsed on the track.  Second baseman Tommy Harper raced out to retrieve the ball.  This had inside-the-park home run written all over it.  Rodriguez scored easily.  However, Satriano thought the ball was caught and returned to first base as Knoop passed him.  Knoop was called out as Satriano advanced to second.  Marty Pattin got out of the inning with no further damage.  A 3-run inning had been reduced to a 1-run inning.  Those runs would have made a difference as the Halos lost 4-3.  No it was not 2 outs on one play, but it was a loss of two runs, and a distant cousin of the Donnelly disaster.

    Lefty reliefer Joe Beimel cut his hand on a broken glass in a New York bar at 0230 the night before the NLDS started.  The cut required stitches and Beimel was left off the Dodgers first round roster.  The lack of their best lefty reliever hurt the Dodgers in Games 1 and 3.  Beimel is unlikely to return as a Dodger next year.  The Gaslight drinking district in San Diego likes Padres pitchers who drink.  Witness David Boomer Wells and Rod Shooter Beck.  Perhaps Beimel will move on to San Diego where he will be known as Bloody Beimel.

    Beimel's injury was a premonition that Wells would not fair well in his NLDS Game 2 start against St. Louis.  The 5/16/04 Cubs @ Padres game was the first game I went to at Petco Park.  Before that game Sammy Sosa had back-to-back sneezes in the clubhouse.  Sammy hurt his neck, did not play, and wound up on the disabled list.  After the game David Wells fell off a bar stool, cut his hand, and also went on the DL.  In the game that afternoon Wells lost to Glendon Rusch 4-2.

    I have seen all eight of the 2006 post season qualifiers play post season games.  That is a first.  I have never seen the Atlanta Braves play a post season game.  Since the start of the wild card era this is the first season Atlanta has not reached post season play.  Here are the records of all the post season games I have been to (LDS, LCS, and World Series are combined.  2006 games are included.):

2006

Detroit                1-1
Minnesota           0-2
Oakland              2-1
NY Yankees       2-7
LA Dodgers        9-6
NY Mets             2-3
St. Louis              2-3
San Diego            4-2

All Others

Boston                 2-0
Chi White Sox     3-0
LA Angels           9-6
Chi Cubs              0-3
Philadelphia         1-1
Pittsburgh            1-0
San Francisco      0-3

    With the Dodgers and Padres both being eliminated this past weekend I entertained the possibility of going to Oakland to see Games 1 and 2 of the Tigers @ A's ALCS.  I had no doubt about being able to find tickets.  However, my 1993 Ford Explorer is on its last legs.  San Diego is the farthest road trip that I would drive to.   I could be going down Grapevine right now enroute to Oakland.  I opted instead to write this.

    Tommy Lasorda is in three post season television commercials exhorting Indian, Cub and Red Sox fans to watch post season games on television.  Now that the Dodgers are eliminated Lasorda should do a Dodgers version of that ad.  What goes around comes around.

Stats    (a.k.a. Yetijuice)