If Your Birthday is November 11th...

...you share it with P.J. Conlon. The first native of Belfast, Northern Ireland to play in the majors this century (h/t Kevin Kernan of the NY Post), he moved with his family to California when he was just two. He pitched in three games for the 2018 Mets. I caught him on the last of them, July 10th.

Also on our cake and candles list:

  • Jason Grilli, who pitched 15 years in the majors. While he attended Seton Hall University, just outside New York City, the well traveled righty, who appeared for nine different teams, never played for either New York team.
  • Damion Easley reached his peak as the Tigers 2nd baseman in the late ''90s. The native New Yorker, who lived in suburban Mount Vernon until he was 11, finished his career with the Mets, where his highlight was an August 2nd, 2007 inside-the-park home run.
  • Mike Bacsik, whose namesake father pitched for several teams in the mid and late 1970s, played the same position with the Indians, Mets, Rangers and Nats between 2001 and 2007.
  • Danny Rios was the first Yankee born in Spain. (Although, much like P.J. Conlon, he grew up in the USA, after his family came here when he was two.) The righthanded reliever appeared in a pair of games in 1997, before a brief stop with the Royals. He returned to the New York area with the indy league Newark Bears before finishing his career in Mexico and Korea,

And we remember a pair of Hall of Famers born on this date. Interestingly, they were both teammates on some great Pittsburgh teams during the early and middle 1920s.

  • Pie Traynor was baseball's first great third baseman, a defensive standout and lifetime .320 career who played his entire career with the Pirates, who retired his number 20. He enjoyed a successful second career behind a microphone, hosting a nightly sports show on a Pittsburgh station and doing commentary on local Wrestling telecasts.
  • Rabbit Maranville played 2nd and shortstop for 23 seasons, Besides the Pirates, he saw action with the Braves, Dodgers, Cardinals and Cubs -- where he was a player-manager in 1925. A gifted defensive player, he was elected to the Hall in 1954, just months after his death.






 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Rare Remnant of a Lost Ballpark

Image
When the subject of baseball in Brooklyn comes up, the discussion centers around Ebbets Field, the Flatbush venue most famously home to The Boys of Summer.  Those legendary 1940s and '50s teams that featured such historic and beloved players as Jackie Robinson, Duke Snider, Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella and Gil Hodges. Ebbets Field hosted its last major league game in 1957 and was torn down during the winter of 1960. But decades earlier, just before World War One, the Dodgers were based in the Park Slope area and played at Washington Park.  Once they moved out, the land was occupied by another stadium, which housed a different franchise.  The upstart Federal League, which played in the 1914 and '15 seasons, had a Brooklyn team called the TipTops.  Owned by a local baking magnate Robert Ward, whose company produced TipTop bread, the club took over the abandoned lot along 3rd Street and built a new brick and steel venue. The only no-hitter in the Federal League's two-year r
Read more

Another Yankee Trade

Image
Yankee fans: here's a last look at shortstop Trey Sweeney .  The 2021 first round draft choice was part of the three player trade with the Dodgers that brings reliever Victor Gonzalez and infield prospect Jorbit Vivas to New York. Now seeking to rebuild their pitching depth after dealing for Juan Soto and Alex Verdugo, the Yanks deemed Sweeney expendable.  While the Louisville native showed promising power in his three seasons with the organization -- he batted only .248 to go with his 36 career homers -- Brian Cashman has committed to Anthony Volpe and Oswald Peraza as his young middle infielders.  So Sweeney became a trade chip. ( My images of Trey Sweeney are from the Somerset/Binghamton AA games on July 15th and September 19th, 2023. )
Read more

Will He Wear Zero in the Bronx?

Image
The Yankees bolstered their starting rotation with Thursday's signing of Marcus Stroman .  The Long Island native, who spent 2019 and '21 with the Mets before moving onto the Cubs, brings a 77-76 career record to the Bronx, along with a recent loyalty to uniform number (?) zero.  If he requests that, he'd become the third Yank to wear it, following the path of Adam Ottavino and Domingo German.  Of course, neither of their Yankee tenures ended all that well -- Ottavino struggled badly in 2020, before reviving his career with the Red Sox and Mets; German's alcohol and domestic violence issues sabotaged such Yankee highlights as last year's perfect game. Can a number truly be lucky? You can understand kids in little league or high school ball wanting to wear 2 in honor of Derek Jeter or 7 for Mickey Mantle.  But is there an heroic ballplayer associated with 0?  The closest I recall comes from pro football, where the Oakland Raiders Hall of Fame center Jim Otto wore 00
Read more