Dodgers blogs check in on an incredible weekend
Eric Stephen hits a perfect note
Jon Weisman is churning out story after story but this was one was what I was looking for
or maybe it was this one celebrating Charlie Culberson
Do bad choices make great stories?
While riding the metro home from the Rose Bowl on Saturday Night I was struck by a jacket I saw on a young woman between 20 – 22. Her jacket proudly said on the back:
Bad
Choices
Make
Great
Stories
She could have been part of the group I’d hung out with at X concerts thirty-five years ago, but this was 2016 not 1981. She looked like someone who had made a few bad choices in her life but was happy with her current situation.
I’m a little too pragmatic a person, but I let my mind wonder about this little saying she was so proud to be wearing. I started running through bad choices people make and was having a hard time coming up with ones that would have a good story.
Is a DUI a good story? Not if it ends in jail or death for someone, or at a minimum the loss of your license. If you make it home without any consequences is it a good story? Doesn’t strike me as one but maybe that is a badge people wear.
Is a teenage pregnancy a good story? Sometimes, it worked out for my niece.
Is picking the loser who likes to hit a woman a good story?
Is picking the winner who likes to hit a woman a good story? In either case, it was a bad choice.
Is driving a motorcycle recklessly without a helmet a good story?
Is driving 120 on the way to Arizona a good story? Absolutely, until it isn’t .
Most of us make bad choices every day, and I don’t think there are many good stories to be found. In my own experience, I could only find one instant where I’d made a bad choice and it turned into a good story. At age 14 a girl and I played hookey from school and hitchhiked to the beach from Glendale. It was a wild and crazy trip that kept bordering on becoming a disaster, but eventually, we found our way home with one hell of a story.
The great stories are the great choices. Aren’t they? Otherwise, aren’t they bad stories?
Maybe I need to expand my horizons. Sometimes we don’t know going in if we are making a bad choice, but I think the jacket was talking about going in knowing full well this was a bad choice and being ok with the consequences.
But I’m just a guy on a metro headed home to suburbia. That wasn’t exactly a good choice, and I certainly don’t have any good stories to tell about suburbia.
Vin sings
When word first came out that something “shocking” would happen on Vin’s last day, I jokingly said he’d be singing the National Anthem. I really hoped that it would involve singing.
Writers all over the continent who actually knew Vin are busy writing why he was so important to this town or to the baseball world or their own lives.
I can’t really add to anything these great writers might be saying, so I’m just going to talk about what he meant to me.
And I’m going to keep it simple.
He meant everything to me.
He might be the last hero I have on a pedestal. I’ve been very careful with that pedestal since Bill Cosby came crashing down.
When I was lucky enough to get to cover the Dodgers I found out two things. Vin Scully loves to sing/hum to himself. I often wanted to ask him if he hadn’t become a baseball announcer if he would have loved to have been a singer but I never had the courage to approach him. The closest I got to Vin Scully was opening the door for him when he had just gotten some ice cream. Vin said thank you.
Ha
We went to Friday’s festivities. I made it through that okay, some tears but not as many as I expected.
Today wasn’t so easy. I stayed home, I wanted to hear Vin make his last call from Dodger Stadium.
When he got to say Deuces Wild one more time I laughed with joy.
When Corey Seager tripled to tie the game I laughed with joy.
When Corey Seager homered to tie the game and give us extra Vinnings I laughed with joy.
When Charlie Culberson homered to give Vin the greatest way to walk off a career I laughed and laughed
When he sang to us, i just cried. and inside I haven’t stopped yet.
I have to thank the Los Angeles Dodgers for giving Vin a great season to end his career on.
What a team. What a year. What a day
If the Dodgers win a World Championship and they play Vin singing “You are the wings beneath my feet” to us I may lose my normal composure and go bat shit crazy.
For a moment anyway.
The magic of 58
I’m going to turn 58 on Nov 24th this year. I was born in 1958 and I told Dave Young how cool I thought this was, that I was born in 1958 and would be celebrating my 58th birthday this year. He was unimpressed.
But you know, 1958 was a pretty good year. I was born in Pasadena the same year the Dodgers came to Los Angeles. That year brought Vin Scully to Los Angeles and started the love affair between announcer and city that has been a constant over these 58 years.
I wasn’t even a year old when the Los Angeles Dodgers won their first World Championship in 1959 but somehow that magic seeped into my crib. Maybe it was my Grandmother and Grandfather (Mana and Da) listening to Vin while rocking me to sleep? Maybe I could hear my brothers transistor radio under his pillow late at night?
However, it happened I’m sure Vin Scully had a part to play in it when I was but a tot. I’ve been a Los Angeles Dodger fan since I first understood what major league baseball was. By then I didn’t even live in Los Angeles but by the time I came back in 1970 I was already a big fan.
Coming from a city Alexandria, VA where no one cared about baseball to Glendale, Ca where everybody talked about Dodger baseball was nirvana for me. One really could play catch on the front lawn and hear Vin Scully’s prose emanating from multiple houses.
For the next 46 years, Vin Scully was as big a part of my life as he was yours. I’m not really ready for the end. I’m not ready to acknowledge my childhood is over. Vin has kept me eternally young as he is the constant between our twelve-year-old person and our fifty-eight-year-old person. This year I stopped watching the game when Vinny was calling them. I simply closed my eyes and listened to the TV. My wife would test me time and time again by putting it on mute to see if I was as asleep. I usually passed the test. My biggest complaint about Vin Scully is that the Dodgers were wasting his talent by only using him for TV. His greatest skill was talking to us on the radio. Let Charley or whoever do TV, give us Vin on the radio. They wouldn’t do that so I made it happen myself.
But even I had to watch the last two innings today. It was the type of sendoff you only hope can happen. It was a special end to an emotional weekend.
Jon Weisman put together a special Dodgers Insider for Vin, and since Jon was involved I’m sure it is excellent. I won’t read it. Not yet. Not until the Dodgers stop playing baseball this year. Hopefully, that won’t happen until November.
The LA Times Sunday edition today, had a section devoted to Vin Scully. I’ve heard great things about it. I won’t read it. Not yet. Not until the Dodgers stop playing baseball this year. Hopefully, that won’t happen until November.
There is no kidding myself, baseball will not be the same for me going forward, just as the Lakers have never been the same for me since Chick left. I’ll have to muddle through it without Vin Scully, and as Joe Davis gives us the exit velocity of the game-winning home run by Corey Seager next year, I’ll appreciate the info, but the call won’t be giving me goose bumps.
Or maybe it will, I have to say I really like Joe Davis, though it would be cool if the trio of Joe/Orel/Nomar could temper the homer parts of their demeanor.
A Hollywood ending that even Hollywood couldn’t write
The day that should have had so much promise started out with the horrible news that baseball had lost one of its great stars in a fishing boat accident. Winning a pennant now seemed inconsequential. Witnessing the last calls of Vin at home was already going to make for a stressful day, losing Jose Fernandez and Vin Scully on the same day just didn’t seem right.
One was just starting out with a road map that looked like it could lead to Cooperstown, the other had parked at Cooperstown decades before. In a strange twist, it was going to take someone like Vin Scully to get me through another tough day, even if it was the last time he would be able to do it.
This game was fan appreciation day. It was Vin Scully’s last home game. It was a possible pennant-winning day. The drama involved the combination of the three.
Could the Dodgers win their fourth straight pennant on fan appreciation day in front of Vin Scully on his last game at Dodger Stadium? Had the stars really aligned to make this a possibility? I asked Craig Minami if the Dodgers had ever clinched a pennant on Fan Appreciation day, and he couldn’t remember it happening.
The LAD have won eleven ROY awards. The award is named after Jackie Robinson who won the first ever award for the Brooklyn Dodgers. The Dodgers have owned this award from Jackie Robinson to Fernando to Mike Piazza but for one day Corey Seager transcended them all.
If Corey Seager does nothing ever again he gave Dodger fans exactly what they needed and wanted on this Sunday.
One might say”Extra Vinnings” #WinForVin
— Sons of Steve Garvey (@sosgsosg) September 25, 2016
He gave the Dodgers Extra Vinning when he slammed a two-out home run in the bottom of the 9th against a pitcher who had just toyed with Toles and Turner. He gave Vin Scully the call we wanted to hear one more time. The dramatic call, the roar of the crowd . Corey Seager gave us something we only hoped could happen, but never expected it to happen.
He gave us Charlie Culberson.
Charlie Culberson will never hit a more important home run for Los Angeles Dodger fans, I don’t care if he hits a World Series home run. This was it. This was not just a pennant-winning home run, that was going to happen no matter what. No, Charlie Culberson gave the greatest baseball announcer of all time the greatest call one could ask for to go out on.
Corey Seager and Charlie Culberson were the wings under our feet today.
Thank You
Horrible Sunday morning
Getting my car washed at 08:00 AM at a local carwash charity for Sebastian Bordonaro so he could get his service dog I had time to check out the twitter feed. I was expecting lots of Dodger love but instead, I got a punch to the gut.
My favorite pitcher died this morning, an inspirational story has ended much too soon. This is when great writers come to the forefront to help us express what we are feeling and Grant Brisbee did just that.
Jose Fernandez was not someone you had to remind yourself to humanize. He was not a player you had reduced to an on-field construct because that’s just how we have to compartmentalize everything. No, no, goodness no. He was so radiant that when he’s ripped away, you almost have to force yourself to remember the talent. How well he played the sport is the afterthought because all you can think about at first is the joy.
Met fans are being taken on quite a ride
As the Mets struggle to keep up with the Giants and Cardinals in the Wild Card race despite their ravaged rotation, their fans are being treated to a great game after great game. The ending may not always be what they are hoping for, but the drama is coming at them in spades.
For the 3rd night in a row, the Mets engaged in a nail biter. They had lost the previous two games by one run, and it looked like they would lose this in extra innings by two runs, but Asdrubal Cabrera blasted a three-run walk-off home run to propel the Mets to a much-needed victory.
This game had everything:
- Mets were leading 4 – 3 when Franco hit a three-run home run to give the Phillies the lead 6 – 4.
- In the bottom of the 9th, much maligned Jose Reyes tied the game with a two-run home run.
- In the top of the 11th, old friend A.J. Ellis hit a single to put the Phillies up 7-6. That was followed by another run to give the Phillies an 8 – 6 lead headed into the bottom of the 11th.
- Cabrera hits the game-winning three-run home run
- Final Score 9 – 8
That victory allowed the Mets to keep pace with Giants who beat the Padres in their own nail biter 2 – 1. The Cardinals didn’t play so they drop 1/2 game back of both teams.
Meanwhile, Matt Kemp crushed the Marlins hopes with two home runs giving him 33 for the season. Kemp now leads all NL outfielders in home runs.
Hey, did Carlos Ruiz become A.J. Ellis and A.J. Ellis become Carlos Ruiz after the trade?
Before the trade A.J. Ellis had a .537 OPS and Ruiz had a .719 OPS
After the trade A.J. Ellis has a .772 OPS and Ruiz has a .517 OPS
Yazmani Grandal and the big RBI game
Since Yazmani Grandal joined the team in 2015, he has had some big games, so how does his big games compare against his Dodger peers over the same time span? Pretty damn good.
If we look at LAD since 2015 to have driven in at least five runs:
- Eleven times in that period a LAD has driven in at least five runs.
- Grandal has done it four of those eleven times
- Adrian Gonzalez has done it three of those eleven times
- Chase Utley has done it twice
- Justin Turner, Andrew Toles, Chris Taylor, and Yasiel Puig have done it once
- The Dodgers have done it nine times in 2016, only twice in 2015
Grandal and the LAD switch hitting home run numbers
LAD Switch Hitters with two or more home runs in a game:
- 38 times a switch hitter has hit at least two home runs in a game
- Grandal has now done it four times in only two years
- Reggie Smith did it six times over a three year period 1976 – 1978
- Eddie Murray did it five times over a two-year period 1989- 1990
- Milton Bradley did it five times over a two-year period 2004 – 2005
- Four players did it one time between the Milton Bradley and Yazmani Grandal eras. Jose Cruz, Bill Mueller, Raffy Furcal, and Orlando Hudson
- Grandal has the most RBI by a LAD switch hitter with 8. And 6. He had five tonight.
- This was only the second time a switch-hitter with at least two home runs also hit a double. The other was John Shelby in 1987.
- Unlikely names on this list are Maury Wills and Derrell Thomas. Wills hit only 20 lifetime home runs in 7588 at-bats. So he hit 10% of his major league home runs in one game. Derrel Thomas hit only 12 home runs over his five LAD seasons.
- Eight times a LAD switch hitter has driven in at least five runs. Grandal has done it three of those eight times.
Wild, wild card night ends with losses for everyone
Ender Inciarte made sure the Mets couldn’t pull ahead of either the Cardinals or Giants with this walk off catch.
ATL@NYM: Inciarte pulls back potential walk-off homer https://t.co/mu3IqXSMNu via @mlb
— Phil Gurnee (@meercatjohn) September 22, 2016
While the Mets were losing to the Braves, the Cardinals were blasted by the Rockies 11 – 1, and the Giants were sent packing by the Dodgers Yasiel Puig 9 – 3.
Even the Marlins got in on the losing, being dropped by the Nationals 8 – 3. With everyone else losing the Pirates decided to make a little game of it and won their second in a row to jump over the Marlins in a futile attempt for the play in game.
Inciarte started off slow this year but since June 5th he has had an OPS of .800. On June 5th it was .523, and is now a cumulative .736. Add in his glove, and decent splits, the Braves have themselves a full-time centerfielder. Dansby Swanson has become the full-time shortstop and has acquitted himself well with his 112 OPS+ in his first 100 major league at-bats. Even Aaron Blair is getting in on the action with a nice game in his last start when he beat Thor. Why am I mentioning Inciarte/Swanson/Blair? Oh, just because.
Dodgers, Yesterday and Today 