Thursday, July 26, 2012

Harrelson continues to nuture the Long Island Ducks at Hofstra seminar

Thursday morning, Bud Harrelson presided over the Hofstra University Club as part of the Operation Downtown Seminar entitled, The Birth of Long Island Ducks Baseball. The presentation, which was sponsored by the Scott Skodnek Business Development Center and Astoria Federal Savings, was attended by over 100 leaders in a variety of Long Island businesses.

Bud Harrelson / N. Diunte
Harrelson has been part of the ownership groups of the Long Island Ducks since their inception in 2000. Despite his two World Series rings with the New York Mets during his major league tenure (one as a player in 1969 and one as a coach in 1986), Harrelson cited this chapter of his baseball life as the most fulfilling.

“I’m often asked about my best accomplishment in baseball and I answer, ‘The Long Island Ducks.’ I say it is the best thing I’ve ever done because the fans know me, and I know them.”

Now that the Ducks are firmly entrenched in the community, fan support hasn’t wavered. “We have affordable family entertainment, less than the cost of a movie. We are approaching six million fans in career attendance, and stand in the upper ten percent in minor league attendance,” said Harrelson.

The Ducks are an independent team in the Atlantic League, which means that they aren’t tethered to any major league club. As they have grown, the Ducks have become a magnet for high caliber talent.

“We look at those players who are the non-roster invitees to spring training," he said. "Those are the guys we want. When we started, we really had to go after ex-major league players, now their agents are calling us.”

Despite a league maximum salary of $3,000 per month, former major leaguers are willing to play with the Ducks because of their reputation of getting players back into a major league organization.

“In the last ten years, we’ve had over 50 contracts purchased by MLB organizations. We are warehousing players, but every time one leaves, another one comes.”

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

1973 NL champs Millan and Staub wax poetic about the current state of the Mets

The current saga of the New York Mets were on the minds of Felix Millan and Rusty Staub, two key players from their 1973 National League Championship team, as they interacted with fans on Tuesday afternoon as part of the Mets Alumni Association Presented by Citi and the Citi Tuesdays program.

Mets and Dodgers honor Mike Sandlock, oldest living Dodger at Citi Field

Mike Sandlock
Honoring the long standing connection of the Dodgers to Brooklyn, the New York Mets honored 96-year-old Greenwich, Connecticut, native Mike Sandlock at Citi Field Saturday afternoon. Sandlock, a former catcher, is the oldest living Dodger and a link to the franchise’s history that preceded the famed Boys of Summer.

Click here to read a full interview with Sandlock, which includes pictures from his personal collection, his day at Citi Field, and video clips from the interview.


Sunday, July 8, 2012

Dissecting Satchel Paige's major league debut

Just two days after the record books said he turned 42, Satchel Paige made his major league debut with the Cleveland Indians on July 9, 1948 in front of a crowd of 34,780 at Cleveland Stadium. The sheer magnitude of the situation shouldn’t have fazed the legendary hurler, who once pitched in the championship game of dictator Rafael Trujillo’s league in the Dominican Republic under the threat of a machine gun toting militia. Yet, for Paige, toeing the rubber on major league soil brought a sense of high drama, shaking one of baseball’s most experienced moundsmen.

“I felt those nerves … they were jumping every which way,” Paige recalled.

Satchel Paige
Standing at the plate for the St. Louis Browns was 29-year-old first baseman Chuck Stevens, who entered the game sporting a .252 batting average with one home run, certainly not the type of numbers that would rattle fear into opposing hurlers. While Paige admitted his nerves, Stevens on the other hand saw a familiar target. Back in the late 1930s and early 1940s, Paige came out to Stevens’ California hometown of Long Beach to play winter ball. The two squared off many times before that fateful day.

“I played against him about ten times before that night. I played against him when he could really smoke it,” said the 94-year-old Stevens from his home in California. “When Satch relieved against us [in Cleveland], he was just spotting the ball around. [It seemed like] he had lost 60 mph off of his fastball. He threw his breaking stuff and he had great control so you knew he was going to be around the plate all the time. He wasn’t going to overpower you like I had seen him in his earlier days.”

Stevens wasted no time getting acquainted with his old friend. He promptly laced Paige’s offering into left field.

“The ballgame in Cleveland was not a big deal for me because I was just hitting off of Satch," he said. "I singled into left field, between [Ken] Keltner and [Lou] Boudreau. … I always had pretty good luck off of him.”

Stevens dates his success against Paige back to a meeting they had a few years prior, just as he returned from his service in World War II.

“One of the longest home runs I had ever hit in my life was off of Paige," he said. "I had just gotten out of close to four years in the service, and we played an exhibition game in Long Beach and Satch pitched against our ball club. The ball I hit, I guess it must have been well over 400 feet. I wondered where all that power came from when I was rounding the bases.”

Stevens’ teammate Ned Garver was a 22-year-old rookie relief pitcher. Only in the major leagues for two months, he found himself right in the middle of this historical event.

“There was never a time when there wasn’t a bunch of hoopla around Satchel because he was such a colorful guy,” said the 85-year-old Garver from his home in Ohio.

Garver pitched two and one-thirds innings of scoreless relief for the save that day, but his clearest memories from that game started before a pitch was even thrown.

“We had a man on our team who hit cleanup and played left field [Whitey Platt]. He was from Florida. He told the manager he wasn’t going to play,” Garver recalled. “Zack Taylor was our manager, and you know back in those days, you didn’t tell somebody you weren’t going to play. You didn’t get away with that kind of crap. [Taylor] said, ‘No, you’re gonnna play.’ So he put him in the lineup.” Platt wasn’t a happy camper to say the least, and when he batted against Paige, he let him know it. “The first pitch Paige threw to him, he threw his bat at Satchel, and it whistled out there about belt high. He just wanted to show that he did not like that situation.”

Paige fooled Platt so badly for strike three with his famed hesitation pitch, that his bat once again took flight, this time flying up the third base line. Looking to extract some sort of revenge for Platt’s first toss of the bat, Garver said Satchel pulled one from his bag of tricks to finish the deal.

“If he threw a bat at Satchel like he did, Satchel was not going to look on that with favor, so he was probably going to give some of his better stuff along the way. To strike him out gave him some satisfaction.”

Paige pitched two scoreless innings that day, quickly shaking whatever nerves he had when Stevens stepped to the plate. He finished the season with a 6-1 record and helped the Indians get to the World Series, where he made one appearance in relief. Even though his best days were behind him, he still had enough left to outsmart major league hitters and give fans a taste of what the major leagues missed in his prime.

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Mets legend Ed Kranepool disappointed with David Wright's reserve selection

Ed Kranepool holds many distinctions in 50-year association with the New York Mets. At 17, he was the youngest member of the inaugural 1962 team, and when he finished his career in 1979, he left as their all-time leader in hits, at-bats and games played. Tuesday afternoon, Kranepool spread some good will as part of the Mets Citi Tuesdays program at Citbank in Huntington Station.

Ed Kranepool signs an autograph at Citibank in Huntington Square
“I’ve been representing the Mets for 50 years," Kranepool said. "I signed in 1962, so it’s been a long association and most of it has been good. Representing here with Citibank has been great. They support the alumni program [and] they create the programs we participate in. I enjoy meeting all of the bankers and their customers and it’s a great support level that Citibank has offered the Mets and got behind them with sponsorship; they’re doing a lot of good things for the community.”

With David Wright on the heels of Kranepool’s all-time franchise hits record, the third baseman’s snub by the fans for the starting nod for the All-Star Game did not sit well with Kranepool.

“First of all, you want to get the fans involved, but I think they have too much of a say right now. I think it is a disgrace that David Wright is not the starting third baseman for the National League,” he said. “He’s hitting .360, driving in runs, [and] playing every day. He’s made a tremendous comeback. The other gentleman is having a good season, but not a David Wright season. All you have to do is check the record, check the book. There is no reason [that he shouldn’t be starting].”

Kranepool suggested that the current voting system should undergo a facelift.

“He loses by so many votes, c’mon," he said. "I think the fans should be involved, it’s their game, but I don’t think their vote should carry [the whole thing]. They should have a portion of it. Let the coaches and managers vote and the sportswriters vote. Two out of three wins and you mark it up.”

The discussion of Wright’s oversight by the fans roused up memories of Kranepool’s selection to the 1965 All-Star Game. Only 20 years old, Kranepool found himself surrounded by the likes of Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente and Sandy Koufax on the National League squad.

“That was a tremendous feat for myself, I was only 20 when I made the All-Star team,” Kranepool recalled.

As excited that Kranepool was to be representing the Mets in Minnesota, he would have enjoyed it more if Philadelphia Phillies manager Gene Mauch would have called Kranepool’s number off of the bench.

“I didn’t play in the game," he said. "I was disappointed … It’s kind of frustrating because I never made it again. You want to play. … What’s the sense of sending a guy to the All-Star Game, if he’s not going to play? Not that you want the three days off, you’d rather be in the All-Star Game, but if you’re going there, I want to say I played in the game. Let the country see you play the game.”



While he acknowledged that the All-Star team managers have been more aware of getting everyone involved in the mid-summer classic; however, he still thinks the game can stand a few minor adjustments.

“They do a better job of managing the players today in the game; they get everybody in, but I think they should have free substitution with a couple of players," he said. "They ought to mark before the game, two-to-three guys who play a lot of positions and keep them around. If you put them in the game, you’re allowed to remove them, [to] get everybody in the game. … They should change certain rules. Baseball in certain ways is trying to make changes and other ways, they’re antiquated in their positioning.”