Saturday, April 15, 2023

1976

I just can't quit thinking about Tim Hosley and Randy Hundley.

There have been moments in the last few days of 2023 when I've been among here-and-now people in my actual scope of meaning and, sometimes, actual sphere of influence with whom I've been actually talking and interacting with in actual Madisonville, Kentucky. And then I find myself losing bead on conversation because my head is drifting back to Tim Hosley and Randy Hundley and imagining this sunny Tuesday afternoon in Chicago, the ups and downs of their histories and prehistories, Vince Lloyd and Jerry Morales, South Carolina and Virginia, the Chicago Tribune and WGN, the A's and the Padres, proms and fantasy camps, Hawaii and Palatine, Spartanburg and Williard Schmidt.



Why am I so stupid?

The Cubs on April 13, 1976, brought back Hundley as a backup catcher and demoted Hosley, a backup catcher. Hundley's signing was announced and celebrated during Chicago's home opener of that season, against the Mets. I'm not sure whether Hosley's demotion was executed before, during or after Hosley's pinch-hit popout in the Cubs' victory.

I'm not certain, but I might have had these actual pieces of cardboard since I was 7. I'm 54 now. It's not rare, but it's a curious thing to carry these things all of the places I've carried them for this many years. Sometimes I fancy myself a cell-memory descendant of Andrew or the Numbers writer, and it's just written in heart to count and to note, and so it's best that I just recognize and adhere. Mostly, though, I just wonder, why am I so stupid? And adhere.

I think it could be a heck of an interesting book or a pretty movie, Tim Hosley and Randy Hundley on the Sunny Afternoon of April 13, 1976, in Chicago, Illinois, United States of America. But I doubt I will write either one of those today because baseball doesn't stop and I've moved on to April 15, 1976, for Minnesota at New York (A) in the first-ever game at newly renovated Yankee Stadium (the old one at East 161st Street and River Avenue)

15 Apr 1976, Thu Daily News (New York, New York) Newspapers.com

16 Apr 1976, Fri Daily News (New York, New York) Newspapers.com
The New York Daily News reported in this 1976 morning's editions that the Yankees had been thinking about trading Ron Guidry to the Royals for Tony Solaita, and it sounds like they would've done it but Kansas City backed out on the deal!

15 Apr 1976, Thu Daily News (New York, New York) Newspapers.com

34 comments:

  1. Phil Rizzuto just put out a call for anyone in the metro area who might have a furnished home to rent. Several Yankees players and coaches who are currently living solo in hotels would like to have their families move to town. "So if you're going down the shore for the summer," suggests "The Scooter," call the Yankees' business office.

    It's 4-3, Twins in the bottom of the fourth inning ...

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  2. The first four Yankee batters of the fourth inning are the last four in the New York batting order, and they produce four singles. "And two of them were pinch hitters, so Billy Martin really has his crystal ball working for him," Rizzuto notes. The Yankees have now taken a 5-4 lead ...

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  3. "Looks good to see all of these people in this beautiful new ballpark," Rizzuto says. He is especially taken with the main new scoreboard, though he has to admit he has yet to figure out where in the park they are displaying scores of other ongoing games.

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    1. The old scoreboard -- the last scoreboard in the Old Yankee Stadium -- is one of my favorite scoreboards of all time.

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  4. Among the more famous names of the 52,613 on hand:

    — Mrs. Babe Ruth
    — Mrs. Lou Gehrig
    — Mr. Coffee, Joe DiMaggio
    — Mickey Mantle and Don Larsen
    — Frank Gifford and Johnny Lujack
    — Weeb Ewbank
    — Joe Louis

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  5. I see that the Dodgers are already out of it.

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  6. My main memory of April 1976 is that Raymond Floyd ran off and left everyone to win the Masters, which was a big disappointment to me after all the drama that had happened in 1975.

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  7. Back to Baseball! Yes, that's it! I could not remember the name of this site so far in fake 1976, and I was distressed I was never going to get to see the A's this season.

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  8. Tony Oliva is both on the Twins' active roster and, for the first season, serving as first-base coach. "He holds the distinction of being the only on-field team member to appear with all three Minnesota Twins' World Series teams: star outfielder in 1965, hitting coach in 1987 and bench coach in 1991."

    Tony Oliva might be the youngest great baseball player I don't really remember ever seeing. I mean, I know of him, knew of him and had his baseball cards, but I don't remember ever actually seeing him play. MLB76 is going to be his last season, and he's going to turn 38 years old in July of that year.

    The other eventual Hall-of-Famers who are going to retired after MLB76 are Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson and Billy Williams. They're all older than Oliva, and I remember seeing Aaron play, anyway. Brooks Robinson is going to retire after MLB77, and he's both older than Oliva and a dude I remember watching.

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    1. I also have no memory of Tony Oliva. But back then, the only way you could watch the Twins was if they turned up on NBC's Game of the Week.

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  9. Yankees blow it open in the bottom of the eighth.

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  10. The home-plate umpire is Don Denkinger. I once shared a house with two guys in Falls Church, Virginia, and one of them was friends with Don Denkinger's daughter.

    "Following the 2022 death of Bill Haller, Denkinger is the last umpire to have worked a World Series from 1974 or earlier who is still alive.

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  11. I have very vivid memories of this lineup:

    1. Rivers, CF
    2. White, LF
    3. Munson, C
    4. Chambliss, 1B
    5. Nettles, 3B
    6. Gamble, RF
    7. Randolph, 2B
    8. Piniella, DH
    9. Stanley, SS

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    1. The Yankees are really starting to put their American League all-star team together. Chambliss and Nettles had come over from Cleveland a few years ago; Piniella from Kansas City. The offseason pickups for 1976 included Rivers from California, Gamble from Cleveland and, of course, Manager Billy Martin, effectively from Minnesota and Texas.

      Randolph was a gamble. He was identified as a very promising prospect with Pittsburgh. But to get him, the Yankees had to send George "Doc" Medich, a big right-hander who was only 27 and had won 14, 19 and 16 games in the last three seasons. New York also got back pitchers Ken Brett and Doc Ellis in the trade with the Pirates, which really shows how highly valued Medich was in the moment. Ellis had been a National League All-Star.

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    2. Rivers was a different kind of gamble. He had been the Angels' starting center-fielder in 1974 and '75, and he led the league in triples each of those seasons and stole 70 bases last year.

      But to get him and Ed Figueroa, a 27-year-old right-hander who had gone 16-13/2.91 last season, the Yankees had to give up Bobby Bonds, one of baseball's absolute biggest stars and who had 32 home runs and 30 stolen bases in MBL75. While there was a delay in getting the April 15 game started as dignitaries were still getting into the refurbished Yankee Stadium, the broadcasters went back and forth over where the home runs were going to come from in 1976 and how much that was going to matter.

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  12. Rich Coggins started this game at DH for the Yankees. He was replaced by Lou Piniella, and soon afterword he went to the White Sox.

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  13. Jim Mason started this game at shortstop for the Yankees, but was replaced by Fred Stanley in the later innings. Mason played 93 games at short for the Yankees in 1976, finished the year with a batting average of .180, and went to Toronto in the offseason.

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  14. Yankees end up winning, 11-4. They were shut out in the season opener, and now they've won four in a row. The radio awards player of the game to Tidrow, who threw five scoreless innings for the victory. With that, he also gets five points in some kind of season standings sponsored by Schaefer Beer. (Oscar Gamble earned three points; Mickey Rivers, one.) Furthermore, Tidrow wins a bunch of gift certificates for Jack in the Box, which is timely because earlier in today's broadcast a commercial for the fast-food chain noted that the restaurant has introduced tacos.

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  15. New York had 14 hits against Minnesota, none being home runs.

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  16. (By the way, I really like the sports cartoons in the New York Daily News. I'm going to add the April 16 edition into the original post here.)

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  17. New York hired Billy Martin during last season, not this past offseason. My bad.

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    1. This whole era of Yankees history and all of its comings and goings is so easy to keep a bead on and not at all shady:

      In 1971, George Steinbrenner, a ship-building magnate born in Ohio, had tried to buy the Indians from Vernon Stouffer but he was rejected. After the failure, he told (Indians general manager Gabe) Paul to keep his ears open in case an offer to buy a team came up. The following year, Paul informed Steinbrenner that CBS was looking to sell the New York Yankees. Weeks later, Steinbrenner had lined up a syndicate that would purchase the team. In 1973, Paul sold his interest in the Indians and joined the syndicate.[11] Installed as club president that year after the April departure of minority owner E. Michael Burke and the year-end election of GM/interim president Lee MacPhail to the presidency of the American League, Paul helped Steinbrenner rebuild the once-proud Yankees into a champion. In 1974, Paul was selected MLB Executive of the Year for the second time in his career, as the Yankees finished second in the American League East Division and improved by nine games from the 1973 edition. The final piece of the puzzle was the hiring of Billy Martin as manager in 1975, which Steinbrenner did over the objections of Paul. ...

      The key to re-building the Yankees was a series of trades that Paul pulled off. Paul raised some eyebrows among Cleveland fans because less than two months before he became a part of the group purchasing the Yankees and assumed the role of President for the Yankees, he dealt All-Star third baseman Graig Nettles and catcher Gerry Moses to the New York Yankees for a group of journeyman players. Then he acquired in succession: Chris Chambliss, Dick Tidrow and Oscar Gamble from his former team, the Indians; Lou Piniella from the Royals; Mickey Rivers and Ed Figueroa from the Angels; Willie Randolph, Ken Brett and Dock Ellis from the Pirates; and Bucky Dent from the White Sox. Paul also made sure to not go with trades that Steinbrenner wanted to do, such as including a young propsect in a trade named Ron Guidry. ...

      Paul attempted to quit in the 1976 season, but Steinbrenner implored him to stay on, complete with writing a list of promises of independence. Paul stayed on, although he would spend a variety of time during the year keeping the peace between Martin and Steinbrenner, as the latter wanted Paul to "talk about the conduct of the game," to Martin, who was drinking heavily and pursuing women on a constant basis (which included Paul's daughter).

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    2. To be fair to the Yankees and the American League about the whole Gabe Paul/Graig Nettles deal, it apparently didn’t seem any too suspicious at the time. The Akron Beacon Journal on Nov. 27, 1972, bannered the story at the top of its Page A-1: “Nettles, Moses Go For 4 Yanks.”

      The New York Yankees acquired Third Baseman Graig Nettles and Catcher Jerry Moses from the Cleveland Indians in a six-player trade Monday at the baseball Winter meetings.

      The Yankees sent to the Indians Cacher-First Baseman John Ellis, Shortstop Jerry Kenny and Outfielders Charlie Spikes and Rusty Torres, all young hopefuls. …

      “I’m not worrying about youth. I’m going out to get it this season,” Yankee Manager Ralph Hook said of the American League pennant.

      Although the Yankees gave up four young prospects, they received two players who are no older than 28. Nettles, the oldest in the deal, was the one the Yankees wanted.

      “We’ve talked with the Indians about Nettles for more than a year, but it wasn’t a deal until we threw in Spikes,” said Lee MacPhail, the Yankees’ general manager.

      The Yanks, who have been seeking a long-ball hitter to bat fourth in the lineup, have just the man in Nettles.

      The third baseman has averaged better than 23 home runs a year for the last three seasons. Last year, Nettles had a sub-par season with 17 home runs and 70 runs batted in while batting .253. ...

      Spikes obviously was the key man for the Indians.

      The 6-3, 215-pound right-hand hitter had a .309 average with 27 homers and 82 RBI with the Yankees’ Eastern League farm club at West Haven. He came up at the end of the 1972 season and batted .147 in 14 games with the Yankees. …

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    3. In January 1973, after Paul made the jump to New York, the boys around the Boston Globe sports desk were, indeed, starting to raise brows. Note the sneer and especially the use of “deftly” in Clif Keane’s brief Jan. 17, 1973, report on the high-level doings among Boston’s competitors in the A.L. East:

      When does a baseball man make one statement and then have to switch gears jus a bit?

      It happened last week when Gabe Paul dug into his jeans and found $1 million he wanted to invest in the New York Yankees.

      Paul was general manager of the Indians, and negotiated the deal which sent Craig (sted) Nettles, third baseman, to the Yankees for four players, Charlie Spikes, Rusty Torres, Jerry Kenney and John Ellis.

      “This should be the means of making the Indians a power for the next few years,” said Paul when the swap was made.

      Last week, Paul joined with long-haired Mike Burke and about 10 others in purchasing the New York Yankees.

      Now what does he say about the deal?

      “It’s one of those deals in which both teams prosper,” said Paul, very deftly to the New York press yesterday.

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  18. The Red Sox and Angels are playing the annual Patriot Day game in Boston right now. I believe that MLB should schedule at least one game at noon Eastern time every day during baseball season.

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  19. Also, Ohtani is both pitching and batting in this game. So far, he has two hits. The first time he got on base, he wore the old school jacket on the base paths to keep his arm warm. But the second time, he's decided to pass on the jacket.

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    1. Angels are 0-1 in games against the A's when Ohtani is pitching this season.

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    2. He pitched against the Nats, and went 7 innings with 1 hit and no runs. The Angels won 2-0

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  20. ABC Monday Night Baseball will have either Cardinals/Mets for viewers "in the East including New York and Houston" or Dodgers/Astros for viewers "in Los Angeles, St. Louis and parts of the West. Check your local listings for the game and time in your area."

    Alas, the Sun-Democrat Channel Selector for April 18-24 is not divulging which one we’ll get, though I bet we can guess. Anyway, we’ll just have to tune in to Channel 3 at 7:30 Monday after On the Rocks to see for sure.

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  21. Well, I just finished watching the BackToBaseball.com for the April 20, 1976, A's game.

    The Tigers opened a 4-0 lead and ran off Oakland starter Paul Mitchell after only a couple or three innings. They still led, 5-3, going into the bottom of the ninth, as Joe Coleman attempted to finish a perfect game. But Bert Campaneris singled and stole second to open the half, then Matt Alexander came on as a pinch-runner for Phil Garner after he drew a walk. Somewhere along about here, the Tigers went to their new reliever that they acquired from Houston in the offseason, Jim Crawford. A double steal put A's at second and third, and then Claudell Washington walked after a Bill North flyout. Joe Rudi's single drove in Campaneris and Alexander and moved Washington to third. The Tigers brought on rookie Mark "The Bird" Fidrych, and he gave up a single to Oakland's Don Baylor. Washington scored, and the A's won, 6-5!

    I'm so glad I finally remembered BackToBaseball.com.

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