There was
mild consternation recently, in the world of Philadelphia baseball,
when Bryce Harper was recently felled by a Trent Thornton pitch.
Thornton is a Blue Jays' rookie, and he hurled a 96 mile an hour
fastball a little bit low and inside to Harper. You could hear the
gasps everywhere at Spectrum Field.
Harper is a
special player, without question. He has been compared to Robert
Redford in his portrayal of “The Natural”, a movie from several
years ago. He has all the tools, and has been productive in the seven
years that he has played in Washington. But it was time to test the
free agent market, to see if perhaps some other team might want to
pay handsomely for his services.
Initial
X-rays at the ballpark indicated that he had a right foot contusion,
but no broken bones. Manager Gabe Kapler commented after the game:
“We don't have reason for major concern, but obviously, we want to
go inside and take a look first. We're confident and we understand
that we have a good club on the field, and we're confident that Bryce
is going to be all right”.
Harper
recently signed a $ 330 million, 13 year contract with the Phillies.
He has yet to collect a hit in Spring Training baseball, but that is
not a concern. Naturally, with that amount of money tied up in a
contract, there is some concern about his foot. Harper left the
Washington Nationals as a free agent to sign with Philadelphia.
His signing
was greeted with the usual in Philly. More than 2 000 season tickets
were sold the next day. The store that sells the official team
jerseys cannot keep enough Harper “9” jerseys on the shelves.
There is “Harper Fever” in the city which houses the Liberty
Bell.
Unfortunately
for Blue Jay fans, the Phillies do not play in Toronto this summer.
The team plays in the National League, and the Jays will have other
teams from that league this year.
News on the
basketball front: the Carleton Ravens recently won another Canadian
Championship. The team, coached by Dave Smart, has completely
dominated Canadian college ball for the past 15 years. The Americans
have completed their regular season games, and are in the playoff
mode. There are 64 teams chasing the NCAA title. I am backing Duke
this year, led by Zion Williamson and RJ Barrett, a Canadian freshman
who is likely to enter the NBA next year.
The Florida
Everblades are in the final stages of their hockey season. Despite
all of the changes in personnel, the team will finish as one of the
top ECHL teams this year, hosting playoff games as they continue to
succeed.
Bianca
Andreescu, an 18 year old Canadian tennis player, became the only
Canadian ever to win a major WTA tournament last week in Indian
Wells. She picked up more than a million dollars (American Cash) for
his efforts!
And a happy
St. Patrick's Day it was for Rory McIlroy as he picked up more than 2
million for his golfing win in North Florida! Ah, the luck o' the
Irish!! And plenty of skill too!
Randy Jackson, a Fence-Clearing Footnote to Baseball History, Dies at 93
Randy Jackson with Jackie Robinson at spring training in March 1956. The Dodgers had obtained Jackson the previous December, expecting him to take over at third base from an aging Robinson. But injuries limited his playing time.CreditAssociated Press
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Randy Jackson with Jackie Robinson at spring training in March 1956. The Dodgers had obtained Jackson the previous December, expecting him to take over at third base from an aging Robinson. But injuries limited his playing time.CreditCreditAssociated Press
The Brooklyn Dodgerstraded for the Chicago Cubs’ All-Star Randy Jackson in December 1955, hoping he would become their regular third baseman.
Injuries limited his playing time during the next two seasons, but on Sept. 28, 1957, when he delivered a three-run homer against the Phillies in Philadelphia, Jackson became a footnote in the history of a storied franchise.
Jackson, who died on Wednesday morning at 93 at his home in Athens, Ga., was the last Brooklyn Dodger to hit a home run.
The Dodgers were playing their next-to-last game when Jackson’s drive landed in the upper left-field stands at Connie Mack Stadium off a pitch from the right-hander Don Cardwell, propelling Brooklyn to an 8-4 victory in a series that followed the Dodgers’ final home games at Ebbets Field.
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Jackson was an unlikely candidate for his melancholy achievement: He had hit only one other home run that season, and he played in just 48 games while hobbled by a leg injury. And that home run seemed nothing special to him when the third-place Dodgers closed out their history the next day with a 2-1 loss to the Phillies, the last Brooklyn pitch delivered by an unproven left-hander named Sandy Koufax.
Earlier in that summer of ’57, when the Dodgers were on the brink of moving to Los Angeles and the New York Giants seemed headed to San Francisco, the Brooklyn-born comedian Phil Foster took up a lost cause with his rendition of“Let’s Keep the Dodgers in Brooklyn”on Coral Records.
The song, foreshadowing the borough of Brooklyn’s fate if its heroes fled to the West Coast, included a brief tribute to Jackson and the outfielder Gino Cimoli, though their Dodger careers were modest:
“Brooklyn would be like a pair of socks that’s holey/ Without Jackson and Cimoli.”
Jackson, in fact, had his best major league seasons playing for the Cubs from 1950 to 1955. He was a two-time All-Star with Chicago, hit 59 home runs over his final three seasons there and played alongside the future Hall of Fame shortstop Ernie Banks.
The Dodgers obtained Jackson in a multiplayer deal, expecting him to take over at third base from an aging Jackie Robinson. He arrived with a reputation for lacking fire, but as he told The Miami News at his first Dodger spring training camp, “My voice doesn’t carry more than six feet before it drops off, so what’s the use?”
The Dodgers of 1956 at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. Charles DiGiovanna, clubhouse assistant, is seated on the ground in front. First row, from left: Sandy Amoros, coaches Joe Becker, Billy Herman and Jake Pitler, manager Walter Alston, Pee Wee Reese, Clem Labine, Carl Erskine, Dixie Howell, Gil Hodges and Carl Furillo. Second row, from left: road secretary Lee Scott, Duke Snider, Sandy Koufax, Chico Fernandez, Charles Neal, Gino Cimoli, Ken Lehman, Randy Jackson, Jackie Robinson, Dale Mitchell and trainer Harold Wendler. Third row, from left: clubhouse attendant John Griffin, Al Walker, Ed Roebuck, Don Drysdale, Roger Craig, Don Newcombe, Jim Gilliam, Sal Maglie, Don Bessent and Roy Campanella.CreditMarty Lederhandler/Associated Press
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The Dodgers of 1956 at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. Charles DiGiovanna, clubhouse assistant, is seated on the ground in front. First row, from left: Sandy Amoros, coaches Joe Becker, Billy Herman and Jake Pitler, manager Walter Alston, Pee Wee Reese, Clem Labine, Carl Erskine, Dixie Howell, Gil Hodges and Carl Furillo. Second row, from left: road secretary Lee Scott, Duke Snider, Sandy Koufax, Chico Fernandez, Charles Neal, Gino Cimoli, Ken Lehman, Randy Jackson, Jackie Robinson, Dale Mitchell and trainer Harold Wendler. Third row, from left: clubhouse attendant John Griffin, Al Walker, Ed Roebuck, Don Drysdale, Roger Craig, Don Newcombe, Jim Gilliam, Sal Maglie, Don Bessent and Roy Campanella.CreditMarty Lederhandler/Associated Press
He did have his moments before that parting home run.
In June 1956, Jackson combined with Duke Snider and Gil Hodges in a barrage of three consecutive ninth-inning home runs to lift the Dodgers to a victory over the Phillies at Ebbets Field. Jackson appeared in his only World Series that fall, going 0 for 3 as a pinch-hitter when the Dodgers lost to the Yankees in seven games.
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Robinson retired after the 1956 season. Pee Wee Reese, the Dodgers’ longtime shortstop, shared third base with Jackson, Charlie Neal and Don Zimmer in 1957, the Dodgers’ last year in Brooklyn.
Ransom Joseph Jackson Jr. was born on Feb. 10, 1926, in Little Rock, Ark., the son of Ransom Sr. and Ann Polk Coolidge Jackson. His father, a former Princeton University baseball captain, prospered in the 1920s running a cotton brokerage business with two partners and offices in New York, London and Paris. After the business failed in the stock market crash of 1929, he sold life insurance. The Yankee catcher Bill Dickey was a family friend.
Randy won three Southwest Conference batting titles and played halfback in two Cotton Bowl games, for Texas Christian in 1945 and the University of Texas in 1946, while enrolled in World War II-era naval officer training programs on their campuses.
He was signed by the Cubs in 1947 and made his debut for them in May 1950. Along the way he acquired the name Handsome Ransom. (“The nickname has less to do with looks and more to do with a sportswriter looking for something to rhyme with Ransom,” he wrote in a 2016 memoir,“Handsome Ransom Jackson: Accidental Big Leaguer,”written with Gaylon H. White.)
He remained with the Dodgers when they moved to Los Angeles in 1958, was sent to Cleveland late that season, then finished his career as a Cub again in 1959. A right-handed batter, he hit 103 home runs and had a career batting average of .261. During the off-seasons he worked in his family’s laundry business and sold life insurance.
Jackson’s first marriage, to Ruth Fowler, ended in divorce. He is survived by his second wife, Terry (Yeargan) Jackson; two sons, Randy and Chuck, and a daughter, Ann Bolton, from his first marriage; two daughters, Ginny Bunn and Meredith Jackson-Parton, and a son, Ransom, from his second marriage; 13 grandchildren; and eight great-grandchildren. His son Randy said the cause of death was pneumonia.
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Jackson, who owned an insurance agency in Athens after his playing days, still received autograph requests in his late years, though he said some of the letter writers thought they were reaching the musician Randy Jackson, a longtime judge on “American Idol.”
That final Brooklyn Dodger home run had never registered with Jackson until he got a phone call from one of his sons in the late 1990s.
As Jackson related it to The Athens Banner-Herald: “He told me that ‘Good Morning America’ had a trivia question: Who was the last Brooklyn Dodger to hit a home run? It was me. I did not know that myself till then.”
ANDREESCU WINS FIRST WTA TITLE IN INDIAN WELLS She becomes the first Canadian player to win a WTA Premier Mandatory tournament
Montreal, March 17, 2019 – Bianca Andreescu claimed her
first WTA title on Sunday at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells. This
is the Canadian’s seventh singles title on the professional tour,
having been crowned champion at six ITF tournaments since 2016.
At only 18 years old, Bianca Andreescu (Mississauga, ON) takes home her
first title on the WTA tour after reaching the final earlier this year
at a tournament in Auckland. In the past two weeks, she has defeated a
number of experienced and accomplished players including Elina
Svitolina, world no. 6 and champion of the WTA finals in 2018, and
Angelique Kerber, world no. 8 and three-time Grand Slam champion.
It was quite the final between Andreescu and Kerber. The Mississauga
native raced off to a great start, but her level dipped in the second,
and Kerber stepped up ger game bringing the match to a decider.
Andreescu dug deep to overcome the heat, exhaustion and fatigue to take
the match in dramatic fashion by a score of 6-4, 3-6, 6-4.
With her historic victory, the 18-year-old Canadian becomes the first
Canadian to win a Premier Mandatory singles title and the first Canadian
to win a WTA singles title since Eugenie Bouchard was crowned champion
in Nuremberg, Germany in 2014. She also become the first Wild Card to
win the title in Indian Wells and the youngest player to be crowned
champion since Serena Williams won back in 1999.
With the crowd behind her throughout the entire match, Andreescu made
sure to thank her supporters. “I would like to thank the amazing crowd
and everyone who came out to watch my matches this week. This tournament
wouldn’t be possible without you. I would also like to thank my parents
who sacrificed so much so that I could pursue my dreams and my team for
being there for me throughout the years. It means so much to be able to
share this moment with you, ” said Andreescu after her victory. “I hope
this can be an inspiration for other young athletes. As I always say,
if you believe in yourself, anything is possible.”
This victory allows Andreescu to break into the WTA Top 50 for the first
time in her career, peaking at a career-high world no. 24. Her
performance in Indian Wells allowed her to jump over 30 spots in the WTA
rankings.
“I am incredibly proud of Bianca. She has worked extremely hard and had
to overcome a number of obstacles to get to this point in her career.
She is showing that she has the game to keep up with and defeat some of
the best players in the world. This is an important moment in her young
career and I am certain that there are many more to come,” stated
Sylvain Bruneau after Sunday’s final.
Andreescu is off to an outstanding start to the year, having notched
five wins over Top 20 players as well as a significant win over Venus
Williams. She was crowned champion at the WTA 125K tournament in Newport
Beach and helped lead the Canadian Fed Cup team to victory in the
Netherlands. Andreescu also made a number of deep runs since January,
including the final in Auckland and the semi-finals in Acapulco. Next up
for the young Canadian is the Miami Open, which begins next week.
Spring
Training begins in early February. Pitchers and catchers are first to
arrive, and other players make their appearance over the next couple
of weeks. Teams begin to formulate rosters in early March, playing
games against teams in two separate areas: the Grapefruit League in
the south east of the United States, and the Cactus League in the
south west.
To prepare
for the baseball season, I grabbed a copy of “Spring Training”,
which was tucked inside the “2019 Florida Weekly Guide”. Glenn
Miller has written a series of articles to enlighten baseball fans.
His articles include a peek at activities in Fort Myers over the
years. The Minnesota Twins and the Boston Red Sox make the “City of
Palms” their home, until the regular season arrives. The Tampa Bay
Rays use Port Charlotte to prepare for its season, not far from Fort
Myers.
For 90
years, teams have been stretching their muscles, snatching ground
balls, getting out the kinks in south-west Florida. The Philadelphia
A's started their season in Fort Myers in 1929, and won the World
Series that year, knocking off the Chicago Cubs in five games. The
other teams to win the World Series after training in Fort Myers? The
Pittsburgh Pirates, in 1960, with Bill Mazeroski leading the way with
a dramatic homer against the Yankees. The 1985 Kansas City Royals,
who beat the St, Louis Cardinals in seven games. The 1991 Minnesota
Twins, in their first year in Fort Myers, led by Kirby Puckett,
knocking off the Braves in seven games. The 2004 Boston Red Sox, with
Pedro Martinez and David Ortiz, disposing of the Cardinals in four
straight games. The Red Sox followed that victory with championships
in 2007, 2013, and last year.
The Sox play
their spring training games at home in Jet Blue Park, sometimes
affectionately called “Fenway South”. It is designed to be
similar to their home in Boston, complete with a manual scoreboard,
and a “Green Monster” in left field.
The Twins
play at Hammond Field, in a complex of several baseball diamonds.
There are more than a hundred players involved in spring training.
Most teams have a few spots to fill on their rosters. Those who do
not make the main squad will be designated to play on one of their
minor league teams. A few may become free agents, going in search of
another team that might want to use their talents.
We attended
a college game last weekend at Florida Gulf Coast University. This
game is at a very high level, with players honing their skills to
make it to the big leagues. The premier left-handed pitcher in the
Major Leagues today, Boston's Chris Sale, played at FGCU. Two others,
Jacob Barnes (Milwaukee Brewers), and Richard Bleier (Baltimore
Orioles), are also on Major League rosters.
The Eagles
trailed 8-5 going into the bottom half of the 8th inning.
Joe Kinker, who went into the game batting .478, came to bat with the
bases loaded. He cleared the left field fence to win the game for the
Eagles.
The next
day, we settled in for the game between the Twins and the Blue Jays.
The Jays exploded for five runs in the first inning, and finished the
game winning 10-1. Bo Bichette and Rowdy Tellez led the Jays with 2
home runs apiece. Cavan Biggio also had a dinger. Ryan Borucki had an
outstanding performance on the mound, limiting the Twins to five hits
over five innings. The Jays' defense was outstanding, playing
error-less ball.
It will be
an interesting season for the Jays. Gone are all of the stars of
years gone by. The roster will be made up of rookies, and other young
players. So be it. Go to Toronto. Buy a program. Enjoy the “New
Look Jays”.
But if you
get a chance, jump on a jumbo jet, head to Florida. The Jays train in
Dunedin, and you will appreciate the sun, and the fine green playing
fields. You will enjoy hearing the words, “Play Ball”!
It has been
an interesting season for the Florida Gulf Coast Eagles Men's
basketball team. And yes, what you are thinking is correct. When one
describes a season as being “interesting”, it usually indicates
that not all has gone just the way the coaches would have preferred.
Coaches have had to deal with the usual litany of negatives with the
program: injuries, players leaving the program for a variety of
reasons. It seems the team has had to deal with far more than normal
this season.
Their backs
were against the wall as they recently traveled to Jacksonville to
face the Dolphins. The Eagles won 77-74, to earn a tie for third
place, settled for fourth, and gained a home court advantage in the
first round of the playoffs.
All playoff
teams opened on Monday night. The Eagles faced the New Jersey
Institute of Technology. We had seen the Highlanders in mid-February,
and the Eagles won by two points. Abdul Lewis and Shyquan Gibbs had
been impressive for the Highlanders.
The other
six teams competing in the ASUN tournament are: Lipscomb, Kennesaw
State from Georgia, North Alabama, North Florida, and the newcomer to
the conference this year, Liberty.
It has been
a transitional year for the Eagles, with several newcomers in the
lineup. Schadrac Casimir hails from Connecticut, and is a graduate
transfer from Iona. At 5' 10”, he earns his minutes with his
shooting ability, and his athletic skills.
In Monday
night's game, Casimir scored 7 points. His teammate, Dinero
Mercurius, had an outstanding game with 27 points. The squad from the
New Jersey Institute of Technology proved to be too much for the
Eagles, as they outscored the home team 83-78.
The
Highlanders were led by Zach Cooks who had 20 points at half time,
and finished the game with 25. Diandre Wilson had 26 points for NJIT.
Abdul Lewis dominated the paint, and ended with 18 points.
The
Highlanders led by more than 20 points in the first half. The Eagles
closed the gap with a huge dunk by Troy Baxter, and a three point
shot from Casimir.
At half
time, a student from FGCU was given an opportunity to shoot from half
court for $ 7000. For the first time in the history of the contest,
the ball swished through the net.
The Eagles
came within 2 points at the end of the game, but could not seal the
deal. They will go back to the drawing board, and retool for next
year.
Always great
entertainment, at a great price!!
James Hurst
March, 2019
An update: Liberty defeated Lipscomb in the final to gain a spot as The ASUN champs to the NCAA title. Great stuff for their first season in the Conference.
