Books and Replays

I was about 75 percent through reading “The Colonel and Hug,” the Steve Steinberg and Lyle Spatz book about Jacob Ruppert, Miller Huggins and the birth of the Yankee dynasties, when I did what I usually do when reading a baseball book.

As I learned about the sale of Babe Ruth to the Yankees in December 1919, the Yanks' first World Series teams and players like Lou Gehrig, Joe Dugan, Bob Shawkey and Waite Hoyt, I caught myself thinking about doing an APBA baseball replay from the late 1920s. I went to the game company's website, looked at the rosters for the 1927 season and checked retrosheet.org, a great baseball website, for more information about that year. I scanned the standings and league leaders and I inspected the box scores for various teams.

It's a common occurrence. Whatever era I am reading about at the time generally sparks an interest in doing that season's replay. That's one of the draws of the game we play. Immersing oneself into a replay season enhances the reading. It's almost a three-dimensional approach. We read about Babe Ruth, say, in Robert Creamer's biography of the Babe, but we can also replicate his career at the plate by rolling the dice and playing the game.

It happens a lot.

I want to roll the 1969 season whenever I read Jim Bouton's classic “Ball Four.” I itch to replay something in the 1930s when I delve into Creamer's bio on Joe DiMaggio and the 1980s become the interest when I read Keith Hernandez's “If At First.”

I bought the 1919 APBA baseball season immediately after reading Al Stump's questionable biography of Ty Cobb. On the inverse, I bought Tom Kelley's book 'Season of Dreams,” about the 1991 Minnesota Twins' drive to the World Series after I got the 1991 APBA baseball season to play. And I found a battered paperback of Vida Blue's biography in a used bookstore specifically to read while I did a replay of the 1972 season.

I've done a few book reviews here before and offered various suggested readings for various era replays. I think it goes hand-in-hand. Those of us who spend months, years, doing replays, also read a lot. Sports history and biographies are probably some of the replayers' staple material.

While I finished “The Colonel and Hug,” which was a well-researched book (the details of the death of Huggins was rather short, though: “Huggins got sick. He died. New chapter.”), I thought about getting that 1927 season. I have another baseball book on deck to read next, though. “Big Data Baseball,” by Travis Sawchik, a “Moneyball” look at the 2013 Pittsburgh Pirates' first winning season in 20 years, may motivate me to grab that season's replay from APBA.

First, though, I need to finish the 1950 replay. Then it's on to 1991 and Tom Kelley's book.

Two Doubleheaders: Sept. 4, 1950

When you reach Labor Day in an APBA baseball replay, you know the season is drawing to a close and each game takes on more importance. Teams only have about 20 to 25 games left to play and the pennant races are taking final shape.

If you make it this far in a replay, it's a landmark, a milestone and a motivation to continue on to see how the season turns out.

In my 1950 replay, the New York Yankees have all but captured the American League pennant. As of Sept. 4, 1950, the team is 9 games in front of Boston with a 93-40 record. Unless I see the biggest collapse in any replay I've ever done, the Yanks should soon be selling World Series tickets.

But the National League is a different story, and two doubleheaders on the 1950 Labor Day took on the big-game feel.

Brooklyn traveled to Boston for two while Philadelphia hosted the league-leading Giants.

When Sept. 4 began, here were how the four teams fared in the standings:

NY Giants 75-55

Boston 72-57

Brooklyn 71-58

Philadelphia 63-70

It's been a close race during the season. Boston led for much of the way, but the Giants, with Sal Maglie on the mound and Monte Irvin at bat, surged ahead in mid-August. The games had the pennant-race feel to them.

Brooklyn at Boston

Game 1 – Don Newcombe pitched the entire game for the Dodgers and Johnny Sain lasted eight innings for Boston before he gave up four runs. The teams were scoreless through five innings. Sain was perfect through the first three innings and only gave up a double to Duke Snider through five innings.

But in the sixth, Brooklyn scored two and then added four more runs on singles and sacrifice flies. It wasn't an impressive slugfest for the Bums, but they took the victory, 6-0. Newcome earned his 20th victory of the season.

Game 2 – Gil Hodges slammed a home run in the second, giving the Dodgers a 2-0 lead that held through eight and two-third innings. Preacher Roe gave up only four hits, but Warren Spahn hurled a masterpiece of his own, giving up five hits while on the mound.

The Dodgers were hoping for a second shutout, but with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, Earl Torgeson slapped a single and Bob Elliott, the Braves' third baseman who had gone 0 for 7 in the two games up to that point, launched his own homer into the Braves Field bleachers. The game headed into extra innings knotted at 2 apiece.

In the tenth inning, Tommy Brown hit a Bobby Hogue pitch into the stands and the Bums led, 4-2. Dan Bankhead picked up his 10^th save and the Dodgers swept Boston. Now they had to see how the Giants would do.

New York Giants at Philadelphia

Game 1 – As the first NASCAR race began in Darlington, S.C., on Sept. 4, 1950, the Phillies were taking the field in Shibe Park some 550 miles to the north. New York took a quick 2-0 lead after the Giant's half of the first, but Philadelphia battled back, scoring lone runs in the second and fourth innings, both on sacrifice flies by Mike Golait. But Monte Irvin drove in two runs in the fifth inning for the Giants and New York held on to win, 6-4.

Game 2 – The Phillies, which won the National League pennant in real life that year, have been a frustrating team to replay. The frustration mounted again after they built a 10-3 lead in the seventh and then watched in horror as the Giants began chipping away.

Philadelphia starter Ken Johnson opened the eighth by walking Eddie Stanky and then giving up a single to Don Mueller. Irvin then hit a double and drove them both in and forcing Phillies manager Eddie Sawyer to go to the bullpen. But Blix Donnelly was shelled as well, loading the bases before catcher Wes Westrum stroked a double and cleared the bases. He struck out Stanky, though, ending the inning and Philadelphia still led, 10-9.

After a scoreless bottom of the eighth, Sawyer called Jim Konstanty in to end the game. Konstanty is one of the few bright spots on this replay team and he came through yet again, getting a pop out and two fly outs to end the game and earn his 23^rd save.

So, after the two doubleheaders, the standings changed to reflect this:

New York 76-56

Brooklyn 73-58

Boston 72-59

Philadelphia 64-71

When the day was over, Brooklyn picked up one game on the Giants and are two and a half games behind. The Dodgers travel to Philadelphia next for a two-game series and then on to the Polo Grounds for two against the Giants. The Braves head to New York for their own two-game series. They will also play the Giants on Sept 23 and 24 in Boston and then end the season with two more games in New York.

It looks like this could go down to the wire, and the games in the National League bear watching closely as the season continues.

That Smell

Ooooh that smell

Can't you smell that smell

Ooooh that smell.

The smell of death surrounds you.

That Smell, Lynyrd Skynyrd

I've always been either blessed or cursed with a good sense of smell. It probably compensates for the poor vision I've had; it's somewhat like the bear — he can't see 10 feet in front of him, but he can smell dinner walking around two miles away if the wind is right.

My heightened olfaction is a blessing when I smell things like chocolate cake baking or the lilacs bushes in the backyard of my ol' Minnesota home or a woman's good perfume. (To all of my ex-girlfriends who may stumble across this blog, you know what I'm talkin' 'bout.)

But it's the bane of bad as well. As a newspaper reporter, I've followed my nose, as they say, to find stories. Unfortunately, some of those stories have stunk. I had to shoot photographs of a guy police found dead in his shuttered up house after a week of 85-degree temperatures. And I caught a small plane crash one Christmas Eve in which the pilot burned up. It was so cold at the crash site that we actually huddled around the smoldering wreckage, warming our hands by the fire, when we detected the scent.

And once I did a story about some bacterial thing that killed thousands of fish in a small lake at a West Memphis, Ark., trailer park. (For news trivia fans, it was the same trailer park where Damien Echols of the West Memphis Three fame grew up). For some reason, I didn't consider the fact that thousands of dead fish in the summer weren't the most aromatic thing around.

My nose knows.

So, earlier this week when I entered my APBA room and caught a faint whiff of something not quite right, I became concerned. It smelled like a bad night at the burrito buffet, or the start of a skunk's artistry (fartistry?) At first, I thought maybe I had stepped in something and tracked it in. There's a pesky dog next door who thinks it's sport to deposit his treasures in tall tufts of grass and then laughs when I hit them unwittingly with the lawn mower.

As the day continued, the smell worsened. I looked outside to see if maybe some bovine had died behind the hedges by my house. Elsie's smellsie may have been wafting in through a closed window. Nope.

I did that self-checking thing in desperation. Did I do something and not realize it? Have I reached that age? But the stench remained in the room and when I left, the rest of the house smelled fine.

By evening, I couldn't play games in my 1950 APBA baseball replay. It was the first time I had a game cancelled on account of smell. I just couldn't bear to play the New York Stankees against the St. Louis Brown Stuffs. I could envision the baseball grounds crew coming in with cans of Glade air freshener and incense. Maybe I could hang a scented pine tree car freshener in the outfield.

The next day I lit a True Living Heavenly Home candle. It was cinnamon and cherry scented. I'm not that domesticated, but I had gotten one earlier for Christmas cheer. I lit it and waited, the scents of holiday glee mingled with the offensive reek.. It smelled like Martha Stewart farted.

I searched the room for any evidence, like if Jimmy Hoffa was buried under the desk.

And then, lo, I spotted it.

A long worm had died along the baseboard and stiffened, looking like a piece of licorice. A few weeks ago, we had heavy rains and worms were doing conga lines on my back patio. A few had actually slithered in through a gap in lose weather stripping. This one, apparently, slinkied itself all the way to the back room where I play the games and gave up the ghost.

And, apparently, when worms go on to the dirt clod in the sky, they leave behind an awful mess. The worm gave up the ghost, but I almost gave up lunch.

Fortunately, he had the presence to die with a bit of a hook-shaped twist on one end. I used a pen to haul it in, like using a Pick-up Sticks to grab a fish hook. No way was I going to actually touch that. I took it outside and put it in the trash can. I first considered driving to a town 40 miles away and tossing it in some truck stop restroom just to keep the stink away.

By nightfall the smell had pretty much cleared.

But even now, two days later, when I come into the room I think I can detect some hint of worm. It may be paranoia, it may be the heightened sense of smell I have kicking in again.

I'm keeping that Heavenly Home candle and a book of matches nearby just in case that stinky Slinky was traveling with his friends.

Game No. 1,000

After one year, one month and two weeks, I've reached game number 1,000 in my 1950 APBA baseball replay. It's one of those landmarks that lets the replayer recognize the progression of the season and that it's nearing an end. I have 232 more games to go before the season is completed.

The game came in the middle of games played for Aug. 29, 1950. When Johnny Wyrostek blooped a single in the bottom of the ninth to drive in Lloyd Merriman to give Cincinnati a 5-4 win over the Boston Braves, the 1,000^th game was over.

As I head into the last month of games, it appears the New York Yankees will run away with the American League pennant. Eddie Lopat paces the Yankees with 19 wins on the mound and Joe DiMaggio is the league's home run leader with 36 so far.

The National League is a bit more undecided. The New York Giants took the lead a few weeks ago in the season and looked unstoppable. But two losses in Cincinnati and then one in Pittsburgh has tightened the race. The pesky, overachieving Boston Braves are still hanging on. In fact, five teams area within a good winning streak of making the National League an interesting race.

Here are the standings upon the completion of Game 1,000.

American League

                  W    L     GB

New York  88   37     -

Boston       78   47   10

Cleveland  75   53   14.5

Detroit       72   52   15.5

Washington 52 72   35.5

Phil'phia     48   78  40.5

St. Louis    46   78   41.5

Chicago     42   84   46.5

National League

                  W     L   GB

New York   73   53    -

Boston        69   56   3.5

St. Louis     68   56    4

Brooklyn    67   57    5

Pittsburgh   67   58   5.5

Phil'phia     60   68   14.5

Chicago      52   71   19.5

Cincinnati  43   80   28.5

Here are the leaders:

American League

Home runs: 36-J. DiMaggio, NYY; 33-Mize, NYY; 31-T. Williams, Bos; 29-Easter, Cle.

Wins: 20-2 Wynn, Cle; 19-3 Lopat, NYY; 19-4 Houtteman, Det; 15-3 Dobson, Bos.

Saves: 15-Calvert, Det; 13-Page, NYY; 12-Aloma, Chi; 9-Harris, Wsh.

National League

Home runs: 37- Kiner, Pit and Sauer, Chi; 32-Snider, Bro; 31- Ennis, Phl and Kluszewski, Cin.

Wins: 19-6 Newcombe, Bro; 17-8 Simmons, Phl and Chambers, Pit; 16-5 Maglie, NYG; 16-8 Spahn, Bos.

Saves; 20-Konstanty, Phl; 13-Hogue, Bos; 12-Brazle, StL and Hansen, NYG; 10-Leonard, Chi.

Barring some crazy mishap, the Yankees will make it to World Series in my replay of the 1950 season, just as they did in the real Series. The Whiz Kid Phillies, however, who faced the Yankees in the real Series that year, have been the replay's biggest disappointment. But five other teams vie for that slot, and with a little more than a month remaining in the replay, this could be one of the better pennant races I've seen in my years of replaying the games.

Standing Obsession

The seed for my obsession with standings may have been planted in the spring of 1969, the year baseball went to two divisions in each league and the standings printed in the daily newspaper took on a larger appearance.

Whenever it was, I've been hooked on the agate pages in the sports sections of newspapers for decades.

And that may be one of the driving forces for me in doing replays with the APBA baseball sets I have. There is a sense of accomplishment when updating the standings after games. It's also a storytelling technique of the season — there's the drama of a pennant race, the tension of watching teams go on losing slides and the euphoria of winning streaks. It's a way to gauge the season's progress with mere numbers.

I was eight when baseball went to the newer format and I gleaned the daily proceedings in the Minneapolis Tribune. (The Tribune merged with the Star in 1982, some 13 years after my first standings epiphany). My Twins, from then on, were less difficult to find in the list of teams. Rather than 10 teams, I had to pick them out of only six teams. And in that first year of the West and East Divisions in each league, Minnesota was easy to spot. After losing their first four games and landing in last place that season, the Twins worked their way to the top of the American League West and eventually won it.

It was a good motivation to follow those standings that year. Remember, kids, back then we didn't have ESPN for constant update. We didn't have cable in northern Minnesota where I lived, for that matter, until the mid 1970s.

I would clip standings out of the newspaper and use them for bookmarks. When my parents would unwrap Christmas decorations each year, I saw they used newspapers to protect the fragile glass they stored in the attic the rest of the year. Some of those papers were sports pages and, after searching through the wrappings, I would spot some standings from a time when they first wrapped those decorations.

Standings were everywhere. And when baseball ended, there was football and the Minnesota Vikings to follow and basketball and hockey. Standings in some sport were an every day occurrence.

Each season, sports fans look at the newspaper, or now the Internet, on Opening Day of baseball. It's that old Hope Springs Eternal feeling. It's a time when your team can lead the standings, or at least be tied for first with an 0-0 record.. As a Twins' fan this year, my Eternal Feeling became an infernal reeling after a day. As I write this, Minny is already in last place, five games behind Detroit. The standings are not a fun place for me. Meanwhile, my APBA buddy Shawn Baier in Traverse City, Mich., (which is at the inside knuckle of the pinky if you view Michigan as a left-handed mitten) sees those same standings and has glee. Same numbers for each of us, totally different emotions.

When I begin setting up an APBA replay, I handwrite each team's schedule on a page of paper,  make stat pages for the basics — home runs and pitching records — and set up pitching rotations. The last thing, and perhaps the most joyous, is writing the standings page.

It's what I do for all sports replays. To me, and this may be the obsession part, there's something magical about seeing the standings, ready for the games to be played, the wins and losses to be noted.

It's probably weird to go on about that, but you have to be a bit weird to devote all the time we do in completing a replay. The standings are part of it, a visual of how our process in the replay is going.

So each day I still look at the newspaper — the one I work for, obviously — and for the most part, the first thing I check, despite me working in news, is the standings. It fuels the obsession and keeps the replays going.

Streaks

Baseball is a game of streaks and it's not been more evident than in the past few weeks of my 1950 APBA baseball replay.

Obviously, one of the longest streaks is a personal one. It's the number of days I've played at least one game. It goes back several weeks, maybe even months. I really can't remember a day when I haven't rolled at least a game or two. Maybe it happened when I was sick, or during a really long work day, but it's a rare day when I don't have a game.

That said, I've picked up the pace in this replay. I've reached Aug. 23 and the end is in sight. It's like that sprint for the last lap of the race, the second wind to finish the drive.

And with the increase, I've noticed a lot of streaks in the games and with teams.

Wins and loses

Lately, it seems like teams are either on a winning streak or losing consecutive games. The New York Yankees have won seven in a row and have made the American League theirs to lose. They are 9.5 games ahead of the Boston Red Sox as of Aug. 23. On July 1, they were 2 games ahead.

On the other side is the Philadelphia As. The team lost 10 games in a row before beating Chicago, 9-7. The White Sox have had streaks of their own. They are currently on a five-game losing streak that followed a three-game winning streak that followed a seven-game losing streak. The White Sox have games ahead in New York, Boston and Detroit — the top three American League teams. Expect more streaks.

In the National League, the Boston Braves are on a three-game winning streak that ended a five-game losing streak. Pittsburgh has come alive again, winning five games in a row and are six games behind league-leader New York Giants. And after looking pretty good and challenging the Giants, the St. Louis Cardinals have lost three in a row.

Pitchers

Curt Simmons has been one of the few bright spots for the increasingly frustrating Philadelphia Phillies' team. In the real 1950 season, the Whiz Kids won the National League. In my replay, they are 57-65 and 15 games behind New York. The last six losses by Philadelphia (not consecutive) have been by two runs or less.

But Simmons had kept the losing streaks at bay. He's won nine decisions in a row.

Early Wynn has won seven decisions in a row for the Cleveland Indians and Boston Braves pitcher Johnny Sain has also won seven consecutive games.

Dick Star has lost seven in a row for the St. Louis Browns and Ray Scarborough has helped keep the Chicago White Sox in last place in the American League by losing his last six games.

Batting

Ralph Kiner hit home runs in three consecutive games for the Pittsburgh Pirates.

In a season where home runs aren't that prolific, the Cleveland Indians have hit home runs in five consecutive games. That streak was continued when Wynn, the pitcher, hit one in one game and back up catcher Ray Murray clouted a solo shot in another contest.

Scoring

And finally, before today's contest between New York and Detroit, which the Yankees won, 7-2, the last night games I rolled featured the winning team scoring at least nine runs. That streak included winning teams scoring 18,17, 16, 15 and 14 runs.

As the season heads toward the last full month of play, I am sure there will be more streaks to watch.

Speed

I crested a hill and saw the long straightaway on a highway in north central Arkansas this past weekend when I realized the last time I was on the road, nearly 40 years ago, I was going 105 mph.

I turned around, drove back up the hill, turned around again and revved the engine.

I topped the triple digits on the speedometer in 1976 when I had a junker Oldsmobile Omega with a V-8 and a four-barrel carburetor. The car fell apart and was literally held together by wire and clothespins. On one of my first vehicle dates with that car, the fan shelter fell and I had to stop to clip it back on before picking up my date. It was raining that day and I had to lay under the car to secure the fan. I showed up looking a bit askew.

But the car went fast.

And I hit the 105 while driving with a friend on that stretch in the summer of 1976. The straight section was only about two miles long, ending at another curve. The challenge was to decide when to slow down. Go too fast and you plow into a house at the curve. Chicken out too soon and you may not reach 100.

It was stupid, childish folly. Had I had a blow out, or a deer — which frequented that area — crossed in front of me, the paramedics would be picking us up with a sponge.

I didn't think about that then. Speed. That's all that mattered then.

So, I wanted to return to that feeling last weekend when I made the U-turn on the lonely highway, aimed at the bottom of the hill and took off.

But as I picked up speed, I wasn't thinking like a 16-year-old kid. I was an adult now and adult things flooded my thoughts. What if I crashed? Would my car insurance costs go up? Would the shabby health insurance I have cover any medical care? Would the engine blow up? I was in a Honda Pilot, not a speedy car.

I reached 80 mph and slowed down. The curve was still far enough ahead that I could have tried for 100 mph, but I didn't. Maturity, for once in my life, overruled impulse. Sense over instinct, and all that.

So, you say, what does this have to do with APBA baseball replays?

Well, speeding down that roadway is like doing a season replay. It's a way to stop time briefly, in a sense. I was hurtling down the same road I was on 39 years ago and it was a point of reference in life. Yet I had aged.

When we do replays, we return to a time that's long gone. In my case now, I'm doing the 1950 season; I wasn't born then, but I know my father probably followed his Yankees on the radio that year and he may have even gone to games that season. Here, 65 years later, I was going back a point of reference of time for him.

I did do the 1977 season a few years ago and when that season actually happened, I was a lovestruck kid who had just topped 105 mph the summer before. When I replayed the season — the same season I watched on television and followed closely — everything was different. I lost that innocence of being a kid and the hopes that youth brings and instead viewed that same time with a different attitude.

Back when the season was real, I probably worried about if my girlfriend still liked me, if I had enough money to go to a movie and if I could pass the latest English test at high school. When I replayed the season, I worried about my mortgage, health, work issues and my mortality.

So, all that rambling to try to explain that we do these replays, in part, to hang on to something that we've long lost. I'm never going to go 105 mph again, but a brief moment last weekend as my car picked up speed, I felt that time again. I'll never go back to 1976 or 1977 or any time before, but I can have a sense of that time, albeit with a different perspective, by replaying the baseball season with APBA.