20-Nov‑2017
MONDAY
Q. Who suffered through a broken finger,
pleurisy as well as bruised ribs during the 1958 season, just a year before
sitting out the 1959 season on the DL?
Hint: In fairness, he did play 5 games in ’59,
but lost part of a lung that year in a battle with tuberculosis.
Hint: He suffered a severe eye injury in the
Civilian Conservation Corps prior to WWII.
Hint: He was discharged from the US Army in 1945
due to a shoulder injury and severe eye problems.
Hint: After 3 seasons in the minors, he played 19
years in the majors and was a major league manager for another 14 years beyond
that.
-He also coached in the majors for an
additional 18 years not included in the seasons mentioned above.
FCR - Adam Balutis, Arlington, Virginia
Incorrect
answers: Ralph Houk, Don Zimmer
TUESDAY (Not included in this
week’s theme)
Q. Before the advent of Mike Trout, who was
said to be the finest athlete ever to come out of a New Jersey high school?
Hint: An early turning point for him was when he
took the money meant for the purchase of a saxophone and used it to but a
baseball glove.
Hint: He once answered an opposing player’s grand
slam in the top of an inning by hitting a grand slam in the bottom of the same
inning.
FCR - Daniel Wilson, St. Paul
Incorrect
answers: Joe Medwick, Larry Doby, Joe Charboneau,
Goose Goslin, Willie Wilson, Todd Frazier
WEDNESDAY
Q. Who was the first National League pitcher
to win the Cy Young Award with an ERA over 3.00 that season?
Hint: All other pitchers, in either league, who
received CYA votes that year, had lower ERAs.
Hint: He hit 12 home runs the year he played in
Japan.
- Others receiving votes were Sal Maglie ERA 2.89 for BRO* [4.0 votes]; Whitey Ford 2.47 ERA [1.0 vote];
and Warren Spahn ERA 2.78 [1.0 vote]
FCR - Dan Silverberg, Aventura, Florida
Incorrect
answers: Bob Gibson, Jim Lonborg, Vern
Law, Early Wynn, Pete Vukovich, Brandon Webb, LaMarr Hoyt
THURSDAY
Q. Who is the only player to win the GG
award with 4 different teams?
Hint: Before Vida Blue in 1971, he was the last left-handed
pitcher to have a 20-win season for the A's.
Hint: He is tied with Willie Mays for a record
that can never be broken.
Hint: His brother once replaced Yogi Berra.
- GG for NYY (1957-60); PIT (1961); HOU (1962)
& STL (1963)
- 24-7 in 1952 for PHA
- Only he and Mays won GGs in each of the
first 8 years the award was offered (1957-63).
Mays won 5 more (1964-68).
- Billy Shantz was put in at C in place of Berra 29-Jun-1960 in the top
of the 9th. It was his last
appearance in the majors and he caught Jim Coates for exactly 4 batters.
FCR - Dan Silverberg, Aventura, Florida
Incorrect
answers: Bob Welch, Billy Pierce, Joe
Torre
FRIDAY
Q Who is the only Pittsburgh Pirate to
hit for the cycle twice since Ralph Kiner was a rookie?
Hint: When John
Olerud hit for the cycle a second time, he broke this
player's record for the fewest triples of any player who hit for the cycle
twice in a career.
Hint: Maybe rain sooner? He homered off Spahn and Sain a total of 7
times.
Hint: Reminiscing about his career, he once told
a biographer, “I’m the first white
player who ever got hit by a pitch from a black player. Everyone kind of hesitated when he hit me,
there was almost like a hush. It was like, what’s gonna happen next?”
- HBP anecdote told to Ed Attanasio in This Great Game: “But
nothing happened and the game went on. It
didn’t matter to me one way or another,” added Westlake. [P was Dan Bankhead, MLB’s first black
pitcher. G was 26‑Aug-1947, Bankhead’s MLB debut
and his only game that year.]
*Both triples in Olerud’s cycles were the only triples he had in each of those
seasons.
FCR - Dan Silverberg, Aventura, Florida
Incorrect
answers: Dick Groat, Hank Sauer, Gus
Bell, Ted Kluszewski, Ralph Kiner, Frank Thomas, Joe Garagiola, Danny Murtaugh,
Bob Skinner, Dick Stuart
SATURDAY
Q. Who was the first White Sox player to
hit a home run over the right field grandstand in Comiskey Park?
Hint: He hit it off a Hall of Fame pitcher.
Hint: Yet in high school, he turned down a
scholarship to play football for the University of Texas.
Hint: Ted Williams declared that he “…was the
most underrated and best clutch hitter I ever played against.”
Hint: George Steinbrenner offered him the
position of General Manager of the Yankees.
He did not accept, not wanting to uproot his family.
FCR - Rick Tharp, Gaithersburg, Maryland
Incorrect
answers: Ted Kluszewski, Greg Luzinski,
Luke Appling, Frank Thomas
WEEKEND BONUS
Q. When Joe Torre hit into 4 double plays
in one game, whose National League record did he break?
Hint: He was the Dodgers third baseman when their
home stadium moved from Ebbets Field to the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum?
Hint: He shared an unusual first name with a
legendary automobile pioneer.
Hint: He was born in the same city where, just
over a decade later, one of the greatest third basemen of all time would be
born.
Hint: He and two teammates once won a game
dramatically with three consecutive home runs.
- Born in Little Rock, Arkansas
10-Feb-1926. Brooks Robinson was born there too, 12
years later on 18-May-1937.
FCR - Mike Sparks, Sarasota
Incorrect
answers: Gil Hodges, Junior Gilliam, Don
Hoak, Pee Wee Reese, Dick Groat
SUNDAY
Q. Who was named California Interscholastic
Federation Player of the Year in 1942, playing for Pasadena High School for
starring in basketball and baseball?
Hint: He briefly played professional basketball
with George Mikan.
Hint: At the time of his selection to his only
MLB All-Star team, he was leading the American League, hitting .366.
Hint: He was the third base coach for a team that
won consecutive division championships in each of the 4 seasons he coached
there.
- Pasadena
High School has additional
notable alumni, e.g., George Patton, Howard Hawkes, Jerry Tarkanian, Michael
Cooper, Bob Eubanks, Eddie Van Halen and Stan Smith.
- He played for the National Basketball League’s Chicago
American Gears
in 1946-47. Scored exactly 1 point
before following wise advice to focus on baseball. Jackie Robinson and George Crowe also played in that
league.
- Coached
the Oakland A’s 1971-74. (They won a 5th
the following season without him.) Coached the Cubs in 1975.
FCR - Anthony Zydlewski, Virginia Beach
Incorrect
answers: Jackie Robinson, Duke Snider,
Junior Gilliam, Dave Ricketts, Bobby Doerr, Monte Irvin
WEEKLY THEME – Living former
All-Stars who are now at least 91 years old
Player Born All-Star years
First Correct
Respondent to Identify Theme –
Incorrect theme
guesses:
Friday - Oldest
living players to appear in a World Series
Sat - Oldest
living all stars
Sunday - Oldest
living former All-Star players now that Bobby Doerr has passed
- Living
players over 90 who played at least 10 years in the major leagues
- All-Star
players who also coached and scouted AND who served in the U.S. military
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