Andrus Center

The Great Rivera Is Out

I’m no Yankee fan and Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks) said it for all time in A League of Their Own, “there’s no crying in baseball,” but every fan has to be moved by the awful image of the greatest closer in the history of the game grimacing in pain on the warning track in Kansas City with a torn ACL.

What a way for the season – and perhaps the career – of the great Mariano Rivera to end.

By most accounts, Mo Rivera has been the guts of the great Yankee teams of recent years; the guy who got the ball in the ninth inning and delivered time and again for the pinstripe set. For non-Yankee fans everywhere the sight of Rivera jogging in from the bullpen to save another game was about enough to prompt a switch of the dial to the Home Shopping Channel. Game over. Mr. Automatic has the ball and no one was going to lay a bat on him.

Tyler Kepner writing in the New York Times makes the case, if it need be made, for Rivera’s greatness:  “Joe Torre, the manager for most of Rivera’s career, always said that the postseason elevated Rivera over everyone else. The evidence is staggering. At a time when the stakes are highest, and the competition is strongest, the man with the best E.R.A. of the live-ball era is actually better. By a lot.

“Rivera’s postseason E.R.A. is 0.70. He has not allowed a postseason home run in 81 innings, since Jay Payton in the 2000 World Series, in a game the Yankees won,” Kepner wrote. “Rivera’s ability to pitch multiple innings in October, the way the pioneering closers did, has made him invaluable.”

Indeed. The guy is the best kind of baseball player – and teammate – he led by example, including shagging batting practice fly balls every day until yesterday.

Rivera need not come back – although I hope he can – to have his career affirmed with a lead pipe cinch first ballot selection to Cooperstown. Six times in his 18 year career he has saved 30 or more games, seven times 40 or more.

It is fitting in so many ways that Mariano Rivera is the last active player to wear Jackie Robinson’s number 42, the number that has been retired in all of baseball. Like the great Robinson Rivera, too, has been a pioneer. A quiet, gifted practioneer of excellence who has defined what it means to take the ball every time with a win on the line. If this is the end, he deserved better, but no matter since he is still the best.

Age Wins…

Jamie Moyer, the 49 year old left-hander who is now throwing his junk for the Colorado Rockies, recently became the oldest pitcher to ever win a major league game. Moyer may be the baseball personification of the old line that “age and treachery will always overcome youth and skill.”

Moyer faced 25 year old Pittsburgh Pirate standout Andrew McCutchen three times Tuesday night. Moyer was pitching in the Majors before McCutchen was born and the kid never reached base against the old man. McCutchen couldn’t believe it.

“I can’t believe he got me out,” McCutchen told the Associated Press. “You know he has nothing to throw by you, but he just nitpicks.” No, actually Andrew, he pitches – well – and has for a long, long time.

An admiring Hall of Famer and former Moyer teammate, Goose Gossage, said it well: “He throws slow, slower and slowest. How else would you describe it?”

Moyer is an inspiration to aging jocks everywhere. I’ve probably seen him pitch more games in person than any other pitcher of his – or my generation – and like most fans I’ve sat in the stands thinking “even I could hit this guy.” Nope.

Moyer’s fastball screeches in at a top speed of 79 miles an hour. Goose Gossage brought it closer to 100, but it’s really not the speed that matters with the cagey Moyer. It’s the competitiveness, the smarts and the experience that matter. Moyer has taken care of himself, been a student of his craft and, no big surprise, has learned a lot in 25 years with nine different teams.

And, aging jocks take notice, a 79 mile an hour fastball is still beyond the reach of most people. Don’t believe me? The Fort Myers Miracle, the Minnesota Twins affiliate in the Florida State League, are running a promotion where a fan can win a ticket to a future game if they can top 79 on a radar gun. More than 80 folks spent a buck a piece the other night to crank up three pitches in hopes to throwing harder than the ancient Moyer. No one did. One frustrated pitcher spent $50 on the promotion and no doubt left with a sore arm, heckling from his buddies and a hole in his wallet.

Moyer is proof that age is, in many respects, a state of mind. Winston Churchill was 65 when he became Prime Minister of Great Britain and 77 when he took over the second time. Christopher Plummer won as Oscar at 82 and the great Jack Nicklaus was 46 when he won the Masters. Experience and perspective matter in so many ways. It helps to hit the exercise bike, too.

Moyer says the key for him is how he feels the day after he pitches. Considering the typical aches and pains most of us start to feel on the long side of 40, it’s hard to imagine rolling out of the sack at age 49 the morning after throwing 100 pitches. My back hurts just thinking about it.

Think you can hit a Moyer fastball? Most of us would be lucky to foul one of his pitches off. Think you can throw a Moyer fastball? Not gonna happen for most. At the ripe old age of 49, Jamie Moyer gives all of us cause to marvel at those who play the boys game so well when the arrival of the AARP card is just around the corner. Age and treachery, indeed. But don’t count out experience and desire, important ingredients for success at any age.

One Tough Job

Now that the pundits have finally agreed that Mitt Romney is going to be the Republican presidential nominee, we can devote attention to something really important – the start of the baseball season.

The guy in the photo is Hall of Famer Mickie Cochrane who, according to no less an authority than my baseball loving father, was the greatest catcher who ever put on shin guards. Cochrane played 13 seasons for the Philadelphia Athletics and the Detroit Tigers, including two years as player-manager for Detroit. His lifetime average was .320, he was twice the American League MVP and his durability behind the plate was legendary.

Black Mike, as Cochrane was nicknamed, had perhaps his best year on the legendary 1930’s A’s team that included several other future Hall of Famers. He hit .357 that year, had 85 runs batted in, 10 homers and 42 doubles. He caught 130 games and struck out only 18 times all season. His career came to an early end in 1937 when he was beaned – pre-batting helmet days – by a pitch at Yankee Stadium. His skull was fractured in three places.

Cochrane died in 1962. He was only 59. The Associated Press wrote in his obituary that “it was said of him that as a master of the mechanics of catching, he had no peer.”

I go to baseball games for lots of reasons, but I spend a lot of time watching the catchers. Once again it was my dad who pointed out to me for the first time that the catcher is the only player on the diamond who has the entire game in front of him. The catchers perspective on the field is unique. Good catchers help establish the pace of the game. A really good catcher, one respected by his pitching staff, is probably worth five or six wins a season, at least, just because he’ll know when to make a trip to the mound or insist on a particular pitch at a critical moment.

The great Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Feller said it well: “If you believe your catcher is intelligent and you know that he has considerable experience, it is a good thing to leave the game almost entirely in his hands.”

Catchers also have the toughest, the physically toughest, job on the field. Just ask the Giants’ great young catcher Buster Posey who is thankfully recovering from a horrid injury last season. Yankee Hall of Fame catcher Bill Dickey, another candidate for greatest ever at the position, once said: “A catcher must want to catch. He must make up his mind that it isn’t the terrible job it is painted, and that he isn’t going to say every day, Why, oh why with so many other positions in baseball did I take up this one.”

Most catchers don’t have great speed. Would you if you were up and down, squatting and bending a couple hundred times a game? Catchers hands are often all beat up. They suffer split nails, broken fingers, bruises. It’s a tough job. The fact that a Mickie Cochrane, or a Yogi Berra, a Johnny Bench or a Dickey could play the position so well for so long is remarkable. There are only 16 catchers are in the Hall and only three of them played since the late 1960’s. It’s both a tough position and one at which it is exceeding difficult to excel.

The baseball season begins in earnest Thursday. Watch the catchers. Pitchers are a dime a dozen. Home run hitters get the ink. Catchers make great teams.

Knowing When to Quit

The World Series winning manager was on David Letterman’s show last night – he’s earned a victory lap – talking about his unlikely last season in the dugout and his retirement as manager of the Cardinals. As I listened to the interview, I couldn’t help but reflect on the importance of having the self awareness to know when to hang it up.

There is a lot to be said for going out on top. LaRussa has.

Not everyone liked the PETA-defending, pitcher yanking, bibliophile. David Lengel quotes a friend as saying had he known LaRussa would quit after winning the World Series he would have cheered for him all along. Like him or not, the guy is a winner, as in 5,097 times a winner.

But back to knowing when to hang it up. DiMaggio did it right, Mantle didn’t. The great Willie Mays stayed at least a year too long. And knowing when to quit isn’t just confined to baseball. Newt Gingrich is trying to stretch it out for goodness knows what reason. He did many things poorly, but Lyndon Johnson knew when to quit. Theodore Roosevelt didn’t. Guys like Mike Gravel and Harold Stassen hang around to the point where they become a punchline.

Robert Reich, the former Labor Secretary in the Clinton Administration, quit at the top of his game, a decision he explained in a radio interview a while back. Turns out he really did want to spend more time with his family. How many times have we heard that as the all-purpose excuse for a CEO or politician who has to quit rather than wants to quit.

My mother used to say that every plant needs to be re-potted once in a while. LaRussa is proof of that old truism. Already it’s reported that Jerry Reinsdorf wants to talk to him about a front office job with the White Sox.

Knowing when to quit can also open lots of new doors.

The Game That Breaks Your Heart

The sport page headline in the Boston Herald this morning: “The Choke’s on Us.”

Herald columnist John Tomase captured the full agony of Boston fans in his third graph: “The Red Sox were euthanized by the Orioles last night when $142 million man Carl Crawford failed to catch a sinking liner in the ninth, allowing the O’s to walk off with a 4-3 victory.” Ouch.

The generally more staid Boston Globe wasn’t. The headline there: “Shameful Red Sox Made Unwanted History.” Recalling disasters of the past, the paper noted that the ghost of Bucky Dent is alive and well.

With the closer to home Mariners out of anything – except meaningless games – by the All Star break, I took some pleasure in anticipating the Sox in the post season. When I watched them drop two of three to the hapless M’s in mid-August, I should have known the jig was up. The meltdown in Beantown will go down in the record books as the greatest fall from baseball grace ever in September. For me it began at Safeco on Friday night in summer. These guys wore the season-long collar of doom; we just didn’t know it until last night.

Funny thing about sports – and politics – once the cloud of doom settles over a team (or candidate) there is virtually nothing – nothing – a manager can do to let the sunshine in. All through September, Red Sox skipper, Tony Francona, looked like a guy preparing to lose. He had the brave but worried look of Jimmy Carter’s campaign in 1980 or George H.W. Bush in ’92. He seemed to know he was going to lose the whole campaign, but was hoping for an October (or late September) surprise. Not gonna happen.

Still, what an amazing night of baseball. Three key games all in progress simultaneously. The channel changer needs a new battery this morning. Mike Lopresti kept a timeline for USA Today. He recorded the end at 12:07 am Eastern when the Red Sox shuffled off to a “winter of discontent.”

The late, great Commissioner and historian of the great game, A. Bartlett Giamatti, a Red Sox fan, said it better than anyone: “It breaks your heart. It is designed to break your heart. The game begins in the spring, when everything else begins again, and it blossoms in the summer, filling the afternoons and evenings, and then as soon as the chill rains come, it stops and leaves you to face the fall alone.”

There will be playoffs now and a World Series. I’ll watch it all with the full knowledge that winter has arrived early.

Baseball as It Should Be

The following letter appeared recently in the New York Times…

To the Editor:

Only a Yankee fan ensconced in that new shopping mall in the Bronx called Yankee Stadium could wish that management play more organ music during a game.

I aw my first game in 1934 in the “new” rebuilt Fenway Park in Boston. I long for the days when the game and not a cacophonous rock concert was the attraction.

In wistful moments, I fantasize that I am commissioner of baseball. In addition to a ban on music during games, I would issue the following edicts: no game should be played indoors on artificial turf, and spitting should result in the same fine and suspension as bumping an umpire.

Players would also be reminded that they wear knickers and not pantaloons. Haute couture would best be served if fans could see the distinctive socks that are part of a team uniform – red ones included.

Armand W. Loranger, Pound Ridge, N.Y. July 21, 2011

Enough said…

When Did it End for You?

Growing up and loving baseball, I remember having near complete admiration for the daring exploits of the Big Red Machine and particularly “Charlie Hustle” – Pete Rose. I still remember reading a story where Rose made a comment that showed why the guy was such a competitor.

Pete said that maybe a dozen or twenty times during the long major league season, he would come to bat late in a game with no chance that his appearance at the plate could help decide the game one way or the other. In effect, the contest was over. One team or the other – the Reds or their opponent – were too far ahead to think that a comeback was possible. Rose said in such situation he went to the plate determined not to go through the motions on the way to a shower and a steak, but he went to bat determined to get a hit. His logic was superb. The other team was going through the motions. The pitcher was running out the clock, not exerting himself and certainly not bringing his best stuff to the contest. It was a perfect time, in the mind of the hyper-competitive Pete Rose, to add another base hit. Over the course of a long season, Rose knew, a handful of hits can mean the difference between a .280 average and hitting .300. Rose never gave in. Every at bat mattered even if the game wasn’t on the line. I loved that.

Then came the betting, the suspension, the ban, the fact that the best singles hitter of all time, with the all-time record for base hits, won’t make the Hall of Fame because he committed the original sin of baseball – he bet on games. End of innocence. At that moment, I lost the sense that the game was pure. I lost the innocence of a real fan.

The New York Times writer Alan Schwarz had a great piece recently on his own loss of sports innocence – it involved a long-ago Mets trade – and then on Sunday the paper offered fans a chance to comment on when the innocence ended for them. Most, like my Pete Rose case, involved the recognition that things aren’t what they appeared to be, that loyalty knows no home field in sports, that greed, pride and even cheating are more common than we ever want to admit. Our innocence blinds us to reality until one telling moment when it doesn’t.

Now, cue Roger Clemens, Lenny Dykstra, the owners of the L.A. Dodgers, Tiger Woods (who can’t even dismiss his caddy with any class), Lance Armstrong, and you add your favorite pick(s).

My favorite from the fans who responded to the Times article was the guy who wrote this:  “I grew up in the Chicago area. It was when the Cubs traded Lou Brock for Ernie Broglio. Who is Ernie Broglio you say? Exactly.”

Ernie Broglio, by the way, had a respectable 77-74 record as a pitcher in nine seasons, but, hey, he wasn’t Lou Brock. End of innocence.

OK, I know, most sports heroes aren’t. They are all  human. It’s not right to hold them to such high standards. There are few role models, few Henry Aarons or Harmon Killebrews. But, at its best, sport is about dreams and fantasy and hope that miracles can still happen. Maybe it’s naive innocence to believe it, but we do. I don’t want to dislike Pete Rose, but he had it all Charlie Hustle did, but it apparently wasn’t enough. I wanted to believe it was. We all do. We wanted to believe that innocence could triumph over greed and cheating. I wanted to believe that Pete was just what he seemed to be. Then couldn’t.

It’s human nature to have such beliefs. It’s human nature to hurt when they end. Baseball – and sports for that matter – in a messy, contentious, nasty, conflicted world, should be the proving ground for innocence, but it isn’t. There is always a Rose or an Ernie Broglio. Say it ain’t so, Joe. Get some class, Tiger, or at least some self awareness. Even baseball, the perfect game, can break your heart. Innocence can be thrown out stretching a double.

I didn’t suffer the Dodgers leaving Brooklyn or the Colts loading up the moving vans and vanishing in the night to Indianapolis, of all places, but Charlie Hustle snuffed out my innocence candle all the same. I still love baseball. I’m still in awe of the greatest players and the history of the game. I see a kid playing catch with a dad and think, this is the game. I just wish that kid, as he is bound to do, will never reach his moment when it changes. His innocence will end, it always does, and with it a little magic. Maybe that is as it must be with all things, even perfect games played in the sunshine on grass. I just wish Pete hadn’t made those silly bets and that I could get choked up watching him enter the Hall. It won’t ever – ever – happen and there is no innocence in that.