Friday, July 24, 2020

Blog Kiosk: 7/24/2020 - Dodgers Links & News - Some Odds and Ends


Dodgers win. Baseball wins.

Game one of the shortened 2020 season began in earnest last night, and fortunately the Dodgers came out united and ready to mash. They banged out 12 hits -- including a four-for-five night from Kiké Hernandez (who is slowly but surely turning into "The Jet") -- to score eight runs to defeat the pumpkin's from up north, 8-1 (boxscore).

The Dodgers also joined numerous other players/teams in peacefully protesting for change. Via Alyson Footer at MLB.com:
“Everybody's here, we’re all on the same team. We're all here for change,” Betts said. “Even their team -- even the Giants -- I definitely tip my cap to the support. We have a great group of guys here, we're all supportive of each other. It definitely doesn't surprise me that [Bellinger] and [Muncy] were there with me.”
Photo above via MLBonFOX on twitter. Below are more links to check out:
  • This Day in Dodgers History: In 1931 Brooklyn Robins (Dodgers) outfielder Babe Herman hit for the cycle against the the Pittsburgh Pirates. In 1939 the Brooklyn Dodgers selected Dixie Walker off waivers from the Detroit Tigers. He would go on to play nine season in Brooklyn -- slashing .311/.386/.441/.827 for the Dodgers. In 1967 Dodgers President Branch Rickey is posthumously inducted in the Baseball Hall of Fame. In 1993 Mets outfielder Vince Coleman tossed a M-80 firecracker from his car as he was leaving the Dodger Stadium parking area. It is reported that three people are injured; including an 11-year old boy and a two-year old girl. Coleman eventually pleaded guilty to one misdemeanor count of unlawful possession of an explosive device and is sentenced to 200 hours of community service. The incident, along with many others, leads the Mets to announced a month later that he would never play for the team again. 
  • Happy Birthday, Tommy McCarthy, Joe Wall, Joe Schultz, Preston Ward, Norihiro Nakamura & Scott Van Slyke!
  • Mookie Betts after the game, via SportsNetLA on twitter:

“Walk-off win, scores from first on a single. This is bad a--,” he says of this particular one. “If LA wants to know what Mookie Betts is about, check out this one play.”
...
“When Mookie’s going, it doesn’t matter how hard you throw,” Price says. “You can be in, off the plate, inside, his hands are so quick, and he doesn’t swing and miss a whole lot. In an era of baseball right now that (swing and miss) goes on a whole lot, with Mookie, he doesn’t do that a whole lot. He has some really good hand-eye coordination, really good athlete and LA’s going to fall in love with him.”
Maybe you see a reliever who’s been consistently reliable for the Dodgers since 2015, his first full season. Among all relievers who’ve thrown a minimum of 250 innings since that year, Baez’s ERA of 3.06 ranks 25th of 61. When your competition consists of elite closers like Craig Kimbrel and Kenley Jansen, that’s pretty impressive. And in 2019, Baez had his best season yet, maintaining a 3.52 FIP throughout 69.2 innings en route to 1.3 fWAR. 
  • This weeks Topps 2020 Throwback Thursday set features the 2001 Stadium Club Football design and it includes a card for Dodger hurler Walker Buehler. Check out his card on the right. Go here to check it out and order.
  • Per Cassandra Negley at Yahoo Sports -- "Dr. Anthony Fauci jokes about wild first pitch, assesses returns of MLB, NFL, NCAA."
“When we were discussing how to open up baseball again I was one of I’m sure many people that they consulted with. And one of the things that we said was important is paramount safety for the players and their families, safety for the personnel and safety for anyone who might be a spectator. And what they’ve done, as we did last night, there were no spectators in the stands and the players had followed strict protocol.
“I think it can be done. It’s a little bit different because there are no spectators in the stands, but I think the United States, which is really craving for some sort of relief from the kinds of restrictions we’ve been under, would love to see baseball in any form even if just on television.”
  • Per Marly Rivera at ESPN -- "'If not now, when?': Black MLB players past and present on what needs to change." Emphasis mine.
Dusty Baker, MLB outfielder, 1968 to 1986, current Astros manager: "I was accused of making up stories about Chicago, about the hate mail that I got, the anthrax [threat], the letters that I got. The FBI coming into my office from the hate crimes division. I was accused of making that up to try to get sympathy. I was making nothing up. I was never afraid to speak up, but I always chose my words carefully. And while I was never afraid to speak up, a lot of guys were. If you spoke up, you knew you better be in a pretty good position where they can't get rid of you. You can't really blame players for not wanting to speak out because they're not in a secure situation.
"There were a lot of times I wanted to say a whole lot more, and not only tell the truth, but tell the whole truth. I always told the truth, but sometimes you have to monitor how much truth."
  • How did that get there? This could end up being the greatest mystery of the 2020 season. Via a tweet from the Dodgers:

* Please follow on twitter @ernestreyes *
* Dodgers Blue Heaven home page *
By at Friday, July 24, 2020
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