Wednesday Whatnot: My Own Quisenberry Tree, Ten Years After, and Tornado Sirens

If you've never been here before, well welcome. There is no longer rhyme nor reason to the postings here, but such are the times.

It has been a long, long time since anything original, of substantial length, found its way to post format here inside the House of Georges, so I'm not sure if what follows the jump is any good. Hell, I'm not sure if anything every published on here was any good, but this piece bit at me to be written, and when I started it, it felt good.

I wasn't sure where it would end, but I knew it was going to keep gnawing away at me If I didn't finish it. Now I have, and with the click of your mouse, may ye be the judge of the miscellaneous ramblings that follow.

As a kid, it seemed like we moved around a lot. I’m certain there are others who moved more, and we were a far cry from the kids of military families that you meet at school, but my elementary school, as a kindergartner, closed after one year there. After a new school for first grade, and in the window of time between the beginning of kindergarten and the end of first grade, my folks divorced and started seeing other people. My dad got this bacheloresque apartment with a Murphy bed, which, for the record, was the coolest thing on the planet for weekends with him, and when that lease was up, he moved into this house with these two gals, Tammy and Cheryl. They were nice enough, didn’t mind my sister and I being over on weekends, and didn’t even raise too much of a stink the Saturday my sister did a somersault onto their new puppy.

But then relationships for each of my parents developed, and each pair took the second-marriage plunge. My mom’s new husband saw a work transfer take him immediately to Atlanta. My dad and his new wife got a condo. It was a neat place. We spent a lot of weekends there. I remember the negative space in between each stair that we’d unsuccessfully hide in, the yellow CostCo stool in the kitchen that I’d sit on while my stepmom prepared meals. And there was the neighbor whose condo shared a wall with theirs. He had this brown hound named Sam who seemed to spend every night outside, which is sad in and of itself, but even sadder considering that for every police, fire, and ambulance siren –- or tornado-siren test -– he would croon a big, long howl for every emitted wail.

Dad told me that the piercing sounds hurt his sensitive ears. It used to drive me bananas, and even scare me a touch, but in hindsight, I think Sam was lonely. But this condo was neat in that it sat on a corner lot, was largely undeveloped, and as a result, had significant land with tall grasses outside its front door, and beyond the back-yard fence. And as a project in first grade, each kid in Miss Gravino’s room was given a baby tree to plant. I remember feeling nervous because our house was on the market, and we were set to move to Atlanta, so I didn’t know where I would plant my tree. Dad, whether he meant to or not, always had a strange way of soothing qualms and finding solutions, and so it was decided that we would plant it off to the side of the condo, about 50 feet from the front door, visible from the spot where he parked his van.

And so we planted it, right before we joined my stepdad in Atlanta. That same summer, my dad and his wife had a baby girl. By the following summer, they were expecting their second, and had thus, outgrown the condo. So they found a new home out south, and it was a sad day to say good-bye to our tree, having noticed its growth on visits in town to see dad. But dad promised, as he was prone to do, to bring me by to check in on the tree, which we did, and it was always a soothing visit. It’s like Joe Posnanski says: our memory is a strange thing. I can remember what that condo looked like, inside and out. I can remember receiving the tree in my first-grade classroom, and I remember the day that we planted it, but I can’t remember what kind of tree it was.

What I do remember is that my dad swung by the condo periodically to check on the tree, and at one point, my guess is that he discovered markings and ropes and signs of forthcoming construction right there in the space the tree occupied. Either that or he had a conversation with someone about it, but either way, he contacted the appropriate person/people, and to my amazement, got them to agree to move the tree just out of the way of the incoming plot on which they were likely going to build a new unit. He informed me of these proceedings via mail, as he, for a stretch, was really, really good about writing to us in Atlanta. And I remember being so excited to see with my own eyes that the tree’s life had been spared. I think that I questioned the plans to add on to the complex, and had a hard time understanding why they would choose to extend the lot when we had so clearly laid claim to it by planting our tree.

But nevertheless, dad took me by the condo the next time we were in town for a visit, and there it was: a precious square of pink tape surrounding the tree’s new section of earth, and some staked-down rope, that anchored the need to straighten the tree’s growth.

The other day, as I read Posanski’s piece about Dan Quisenberry, my mind, my senses, my emotions, and my memory were flooded. I even, in fact, had to reach for a Kleenex. Okay, maybe two. Baseball, minus 1994-1999, has always been a huge part of my life. I’m not sure how old I was when dad took me to my first game at Royals Stadium, but I was a young kid, for sure. I remember U.L. Washington and his toothpick, fat Willie Aikens at first base, Willie Wilson, Amos Otis, Frank White, and of course, George Brett. I remember the smell of beer and peanut shells, the ever-troubling conundrum of the guilt associated with littering the concrete by your feet with dozens and dozens of shells. I remember always being awestruck by the fountains beyond the outfield wall, that the signs out there could change their advertisements electronically.

I don’t think they called it Crown Vision back then, but the scoreboard was always a fantastic sight, offering stats, scores of other games in progress, and comic relief via the screaming cartoon ball they’d play when someone drilled one deep, or the fielder stretched out in his lawn chair when there was a “lazy pop fly.” I remember dad’s boomingly gruff holler of “WillieWillieWillieWillie!” every time number six came to the plate, or made a great play in the field. I remember quickly memorizing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” and I vividly remember pitching changes. When one occurred for the visiting team, it was Cab Calloway on the big screen doing “Minnie the Moocher.”



When the Royals swapped hurlers, this crafty white car zipped out of the bullpen and delivered a reliever, and sometimes, that guy was Dan Quisenberry.



I played ball for 11 years and I still jump at the opportunity to play when it arises. But not softball. For the life of me, I cannot read a softball’s projection from the outfield, and I can almost never hit one out of the infield. But somewhere along the line of my baseball-playing days, I acquired a catcher’s mitt, and it was nothing shy of fantastic. It was such a spectacle, so different from my glove, a wisp of a hope that I was on my way to having enough equipment to gear up an entire team. But what it really meant was that playing pitch-and-catch in the yard was much more feasible and realistic, and I would always spend a significant chunk of my time “on the mound” pitching submarine style, like Quisenberry, who was, I realized later in life, always a silent hero of mine. I paid Kent Tekulve no mind in those days, even though I had his card, and had even seen him pitch on TV.

The same goes for submariners I see today. Impostors, shot a soft thought across my brain. You’re no Quiz. And it was in that new house, the one out south, that my dad and his family moved into, that I discovered an enormous basement. Once they had settled in, it took all of five minutes to shuffle some things around and arrange an obstruction-free stretch – that had to be, just had to be, 60 feet, six inches long. And on the far wall, I made a square out of masking tape that was most definitely 17 inches wide, and knees-to-jersey-letters high. Or so I pretended. And I grabbed my glove, and a tennis ball, and spent hours down there, pitching nothing but submarine style, drilling the “strike zone” time and time again. I developed such a zone down there that I frequently found myself annoyed when my sisters would all come down to play dress-up.

Before concocting that pitching lane, though, I too, would pitch normally outside, with a buddy, or my pops, and every once in a while, throw in a submariner with the token “Quisenberry!” holler that Posnanski so poignantly nailed.

In Atlanta, I became a Braves fan. I of course liked Dale Murphy the most, but there were some others -– Bob Horner, Chris Chambliss, Brett Butler, Pascual Perez, Claudell Washington, Biff Pocoroba, Steve Bedrosian, Phil Niekro -– on those teams that I admired. I remember enjoying my new friends in our temporary second-grade home. Later in the year, construction on our home was finished, and we moved into it, and it was a great neighborhood, with great schools, and I made more friends, and was even there for two whole school years. We played and built forts in the woods, and, when we weren’t playing organized baseball, we were playing it in someone’s driveway. And I have fond, fond memories of those long summer days, but I can also recall thinking vividly and quite frequently about Kansas City, the life we’d left behind there, and of course, the Royals.

Dad would always give me standings updates in his letters. And I’m certain he knew more about how the Braves were fairing -– or more accurately, were not -– in the National League. We used to dream together that there would be a Braves-Royals World Series, a reason for us to have a visit in between Christmas and summer. But it never happened, and in 1985, my mom’s second marriage fell apart, and back to Kansas City we came. It was right after school let out for the year, so I was around for most of the ’85 season, but probably not immersed in it until the playoffs.

That World Series was awesome, of course, and dad took me out of school for the championship parade, and all was right with the world. I don’t remember paying much attention to the baseball season in ’86, probably still elated over the Royals’ championship, but I do of course remember those infamous playoffs with Mookie Wilson, Ray Knight, and of course, Bill Buckner. And then, I remember like it was yesterday: Boy Scout camp in early summer 1987. Osceola, MO, home of H. Roe Bartle Scout Reservation along the Truman Reservoir. Visitor’s Day came around, and with the influx of parents and siblings to see their sons came the news that Dick Howser had died. And I was absolutely stunned.

Being only 12, and largely naïve to most everything in the world, I just didn’t get it. I remember thinking that he wasn’t an old guy, so how could he be dead, that he’d just taken us on a great championship ride, and what would we do now? Having never really, at that point, experienced loss in the form of death, I was really bummed. But I also secretly remember thinking: At least it wasn’t one of our players.

Some 10 years after, those feelings surfaced again. The news of Dan Quisenberry’s death seemed even more surreal, even though I’d lost a grandfather and an uncle, and was old enough to have read and heard about the deaths of many a celebrity. It just didn’t add up. He’d gone in the same fashion as Howser, only six years younger. The following year they planted a tree in Quiz’s honor. It sat along the edge of the highway just outside of Kauffman Stadium. And I was definitely part of the “Almost nobody knew about that tree.”

Some 10 years after, as so eloquently put by Posnanski, the Missouri Department of Transportation mistakenly tore it down amidst a highway-expansion project.

At the time Mr. Posnanski was putting up this piece, a good friend of mine, reached a point in a personal project that I felt worthy of a mention. He’s using Facebook status updates to run through his top 50 songs of all time. The day before Posnanski published his “The Quisenberry Tree” post, my buddy published number 43 on his list: “I’d Love to Change the World” by Ten Years After. He said: “One of my earliest memories was my mom playing this song on our record player and dancing around. I still love this song even if it is a bit apathetic and preachy. Sorta like me. "So I leave it up to you."

Now I’m not going to get into a debate about the musical prowess of Ten Years After. Calling any of their tracks not named “I’d Love to Change the World” a hit, is a generous compliment. I did, at one time, own a copy of “A Space in Time,” the album that spawned the single. It is not worth owning beyond having a copy of that one track, but it is perhaps worth noting that it was released in 1971, which I imagine would’ve been Quiz’s freshman year at the University of La Verne. The U of LV, by the way, employs the team nickname Leopards, which I find fitting for the submariner.

That is, his life, both on the field, and off, can get you in spots.

It’s funny: Today I was driving to pick up a client, and, like every other first Wednesday of the month in Kansas that I can remember, I heard the practice tornado sirens sound. At first, they just blasted my ears on the close ends, and seemed oddly distant on the far ones. If you’re not familiar, picture a bullhorn that rotates from a spot high above the ground, like on a water tower. The thing slowly spins while it screeches, seeming like 40 ambulances driving through year ear canal when it faces you, yet propped up somewhere in a neighboring county when it does not. But they were sounding, and I paid them little notice initially. But as they are prone to, they sent me down memory lane of the Wednesdays in Kansas schools listening to the sirens, wondering if these practice audio-blast songs and all the countless tornado drills – sitting in a row, Indian-style, along a concrete wall away from glass, heads in laps, hands on heads -- would really have us equipped for the day that a twister actually blasted through our neighborhood.

The point, though, is that now, thanks to my childhood, a hero submariner, a great writer, and the Internet, I now have forged some bizarre connection to Dan Quisenberry, tornado sirens and the band Ten Years After. I’ve always loved the line “I’d love to change the world, but I don’t know what to do.” If I did, I might start by not giving Dan Quisenberry brain cancer. But then he doesn’t offer lines like, “I never ask ‘Why me.’ Why not me?’” And there would be no tree planted in his honor, no road crew to tear it down, no Posnanski to write about him, and no sparked memories of my own tree. No connection to Ten Years After, and no burning desire to pen these pages.

So like my friend, and his connection to the song’s lyrics: “I leave it up to you.”
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Tuesday Tidbits: It Has Now Officially, Gotten Stankiest Out There

It's a gloomy day in Kansas City. That is, it's raining. Either snow or rain has been falling consistently for three straight days now, and sporting news hitting the CyberStands doesn't look much better. In case you've not heard, Kansas City Chiefs wide receiver Dwayne Bowe has been suspended by the NFL for four games for violating the league's performance-enhancing substance policy. Word is that he'll not appeal the suspension, that it'll start immediately. Speculations are that, as Bowe came into training camp 30 pounds overweight, he used a diuretic to help shed some pounds, which, if correcty, translates to off-season laziness. This means no Steelers at home this weekend, no Chargers on the road in two weeks, no Broncos and no Bills for the first part of a three-game home stand. Thank God for the Chris Chambers signing, as our playoff chances were looking threatened there for a minute.

In NCAA news, Kansas Jayhawks Head Football Coach Mark Mangino is going under the scope. I don't mean surgery, and I don't mean they're going to try and place the big fella on a slide for examination. I mean that the school is investigating allegations of questionable conduct in the form of "yelling at and making contact with a player earlier this season." But that's just a few clouds on a figuratively bright day for KC sports...

...because Kansas City Royal Zack Greinke has won the American League Cy Young Award, by count of 25 of 28 votes. When the chatterings began, I had little faith that Greinke would actually win it. The case for Zack tried to make itself inevitable, though, as the regular season drew to a close, and the playoffs began. But today, a certain someone's prediction rang true.

On the evening of April the 8th, of 2009, I texted Old No. 7 that KC's number two starter had looked real sharp in a 2-0 shutout of the Chicago White Sox at U.S. Cellular Field.

His response was something to the tune of, "Part of a little Cy Young campaign I like to call Gettin' Stanky with Zack Greinke," which made me chuckle. Of course I liked the notion of it, but never did I think it would come true, some seven months later. Well played, sir, and well deserved, Mr. Greinke. Three cheers for good news. Hell, three cheers for great news.
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Baseball in the Daytime: The Day After the Real Mexican Independence Day

Welcome back in for what's basically the only feature we bring you anymore with any regularity. What with the economy in the outhouse, we've had to cut our staff significantly. Gone are the beat writers that brought you Tradition Tuesday, We Are Hot Chicks Wednesday, ThumbTubes & YouNails, and the ol' Fiction Fix. Left are the lazy slouches known as the Iron Triangle. Bummer for you. No big whoop for us, the lazy and uninventive.

What remains, then, is some day baseball, the occasional long-winded feature, and the dying hopes of the Cy Young award going to a young man with a special-mouthed girlfriend. Your day baseball slate, a click away.

Kansas City @ Detroit, 12:05 Central: Heading into last night's game at Comerica, I had a feeling the Royals would lose. It was one of those situations where, having won seven of their last 10, and considering that Minnesota had won to potentially slide up a game on the Tigers, that the Royals typically find a way not to win. My thoughts changed for a minute when they went up 3-0, but ol' Lenny DiNardo couldn't quite make it through the fifth. Tigers four, Royals three. A solid two-plus weeks into September, it's time to fully shift away from Operation Standings Affect and into Operation Avoid One Hundred Losses. Today's matchup doesn't really bode well for that transition, either. I mean, one of the best arms in the American League will be on the hill for Kansas City: Zack Greinke. This second half, in terms of run support, has just been brutal for Stank, though. He's 13-8 heading into today's tilt, and really, could be aiming for win number 20. His E.R.A. of 2.19 is still the best in baseball. Tim Lincecum of Los Gigantes is closest with a 2.30, and only Linc' and Justin Verlander have more K's. Stank's counterpart today, Edwin Jackson, has done well for himself this season. He sits at 12-8, with a 3.22, and has fanned 145 while walking 62. If you're watching, DirecTV 213, 721 are your channels. If you're listening, it's XM 176.

Milwaukee @ Chicago, 1:20: Matchup number two on our day baseball slate is a bit sad, in that in includes two teams from the same division that really could be contending for a Wild Card spot, had their respective trains not derailed last month. There's a mild discrepancy regarding today's starters for the visiting team: The local fishwrap says the 3-5 Mike Burns'll be on the mound in Chicago; MLB's Intranets site says Dave Bush will take the hill for the Brew Crew. If it's Bush -- and we'll assume that it is -- he's trying to work his way back to .500, having won his last two starts. If it's Burns, he'll be looking for win number four on the season, and hoping to whittle away at a a six-plus E.R.A. The Brewers are playing for next year and for pride. Chicago, with six and-a-half games and four clubs in front of them, could still squeak in, but they'd need some light's-out baseball, a wing, and a prayer. The Cubbies look to get that rollin'; Milwaukee's looking for a series split. DirecTV likes this one so much, it's offering three choices: 307, 722, 723. XM felt it was only worth one: 183.

That's your schtick for today, baseball fans. Here's hoping your sticks and rubbers bask in that sun.
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The HoG25: The 25 Best (Starting) Pitchers of the Last 25 Years

The Iron Triangle of the House of Georges took a break from this series, but in the end it was inevitable: We are qualified, more than anything, to not be in agreeance. Sometimes, as evidenced by our efforts in the departments of NFL quarterbacks, American cinema, hey batter-batters, readin' books, and now, with pitchers, we are forced to come to some sort of consensus. We don't like it one bit, but we do it, nonetheless.

As I mentioned, today's topic for dispute is pitchers. Starting pitchers, to be exact. These guys have been, at some point or other(s), part of pitching rotations in the Bigs in the last 25 years. They are, as we so gloatingly determined, the best of the best. I mean, not to get all "Top Gun" here, but come on: If your guy's not on here, chances are he's like Slider: He stinks. Today we bring you numbers 25-11, and we know you don't need a reminder. We're certain you'll be back for tomorrow, and the top 10.

25. Jack McDowell

Cecil: I can't really lie about this -- Jack McDowell does not deserve to be on this list, not when Barry Zito and Jake Peavy and a whole fucking bunch of other worthy guys aren't. But I'll try and justify my pick anyway.

Black Jack McDowell. Do you think more of the pitching or the ill-considered rock & roll career? Of the intimidating mound presence for the Chicago White Sox or the bad guitarist? It's a tough call, unless you're from the South Side of Chicago, in which case you probably still wash yourself daily in a plastic commemorative Jack McDowell KFC bucket.

Jack McDowell's career statistics do not warrant inclusion, here. He won 127 games and lost 87. He only played for 12 years, the last three of which he spent stealing money in Cleveland and Anaheim. Aside from one Cy Young Award, in '93, he never won a thing. But he was, at one point -- and not every great pitcher gets to say this at the end of his career -- the most feared mound presence in the game.

From '90 through '93, McDowell was one of baseball's top three pitchers. Maybe the best. He won 73 games and only lost 39. He twice led the Majors in complete games and once in wins; he was an absolute draft horse of a pitcher. A draft horse with a mean streak, a draft horse that would kick you right in your stupid face. McDowell was the pitcher that guys created 24-hour illnessess to avoid.

Sure, that spurt of greatness proved to be nothing more. But it's enough that, for a little while, he was the Best.

24. Jimmy Key

Cecil: Jimmy Key. What, really, can any of us say about Jimmy Key? Jimmy Key pitched for the Toronto Blue Jays, mostly, but also the New York Yankees and the Baltimore Orioles. Jimmy Key was a lefthander. Jimmy Key was the subject of an ESPN promo right about the time ESPN was becoming insufferable. Jimmy Key has a fun name to say and write.

Jimmy Key also finished as one of the best 25 pitchers we've seen over the previous two and a half decades. Jimmy Key won no fewer than 12 games annually between '85 and '94 -- that's a pretty solid skein of quality pitching. During that stretch, Jimmy Key also took home an ERA title in '87, a year wherein he also led the American League in ERA+, WHIP and hits per nine innings. Good stuff, but Jimmy Key saved the best for the end, when Jimmy Key won Game 6 for the New York Yankees in the '96 Series and took home the lone championship of Jimmy Key's career.

Jimmy Key was never one of those guys who'd just blow your eyebrows off with heat. That's fine with me. My deepest sympathies lie with pitchers who get it done with guile; thus, Jimmy Key makes my team.

23. Dennis Martinez

Cecil: Dennis Martinez gets the hey-yo because he started off hot, cooled down thanks to the cocaines, regained his pitching mojo and ended up with 245 wins, a perfect game and a lasting legacy as a mound-bound badass. El Presidente.

Were the lifetime totals necessarily all that great? Nope. He never won a Cy Young, didn't hit any of the big career pitching milestones and didn't pitch in the only World Series any of his teams achieved, the Orioles '83 championship set. But his career win percentage is a respectable .559, he led the league in shutouts and ERA in his 15th season and, most importantly, we baseball fans remember him.

Now, that's not such a small thing, is it? There are plenty of players with great stats who are celebrated to greater and lesser degrees in greater and lesser cities across the country, but few and far between are the fellows who make it to that spot where, when you bring up his name in a bar among strangers, everyone says ah man, that dude. Dennis Martinez, yoked though he was to the Montreal Expos and Cleveland Indians, was one of those guys. We remember his Perfecto, his big-ass moustache. We remember that he played extraordinary baseball for 23 seasons. Dennis Martinez was the Motts.

22. Kenny Rogers

Cecil:
Love him or hate him, The Gam-- wait, what the fuck am I saying? No one loves Kenny Rogers, Baseball Player. Not his mom, not his high school coach, not any of his managers or teammates. The Earth will not love Kenny Rogers when it welcomes him to its sweet grasp, and might well spit his pudgy corpse right back upon a heretofore relieved and celebratory funeral party. Kenny Rogers is no good. Kenny Rogers is not welcome.



But, yet, he was a good pitcher. A consistent pitcher. A consistent pitcher with flashes of greatness. A consistent pitcher with flashes of greatness who happened to share a name with a famous pop-country singer who later opened a chain of chicken-roasting joints. Both men brought pleasure to the masses, but only one used pine tar.

Kenny Rogers, Baseball Player, won two World Series titles with two different American League squads, the Tigers and the Yankees, but I'll always think of him as a Texas Ranger. He was the epitome of the crafty soft-tosser, and did so well enough to pitch a Perfect Game. He played for 20 big league seasons. He was caught cheating on camera. That by itself should allow his inclusion here.

21. Andy Pettitte

Old No. 7: Pettitte has 227 wins and is 37 years old. Anytime a pitcher gets to this stage in his career people speculate about whether or not he can reach 300 wins. The conventional wisdom is that Pettitte is at the end of the line (he’s already contemplated retirement several times and has earned tens of millions of dollars in salary). If his body holds up and he chooses to keep pitching, there’s absolutely no reason he can’t hit 300.

Greg Maddux won 66 games after his 37-year-old season to finish with 355. Roger Clemens ended up with one fewer win and had 88 from 38 on. Nolan Ryan was a physical freak and pitched until he was 46, notching 93 of his 324 career wins after age 37.

Among fellow lefties, Randy Johnson has won 103 games since his 37-year-old season, Steve Carlton 44, and Warren Spahn tallied 111 wins after celebrating his 38th birthday.

Pettite has very good lifetime numbers. Along with that 227-133 (.631) record, he’s pitched almost 3000 innings, recorded 2134 strikeouts, and crafted a 3.90 lifetime ERA. Pettitte’s place in history, though, is based primarily on his excellence in October.

In post-season play, Pettitte has gone 14-9 with a 3.96 ERA. Those 14 wins are second-most all-time after John Smoltz, and Pettitte will get another crack at the playoffs this year (it looks like Smoltz will too, but it might not be as a starter). He’s tied for first in career playoff innings pitched and games started with Tom Glavine, and his 139 postseason strikeouts rank fifth all-time. Now obviously guys like Pettitte, Smoltz and Glavine (as well as guys like Jeter, Bernie Williams, Manny Ramirez and Dave Justice) are going to rank high on those lists—they played on perennial playoff qualifiers in the wild-card era. But Pettitte has been an October ace for the Yankees and the Astros, a guy you want on the mound in a big game.

And, if you believe Rocket, he never took performance-enhancing drugs. That’s the character witness I’d want in my corner. Baseball history will not misremember Andy Pettitte.

20. Dave Stewart

Cecil: Something I learned about Dave Stewart, stalwart of the late '80s Oakland A's staff that sliced 'n' diced the American League: his nickname, at least at the beginning of his career when he was still a reliever/occasional position player, was "Smoke." Maybe because he walked around the clubhouse with a Meerschaum pipe?

Whatever its provenance, the nickname fit -- the guy was an intimidating mound presence with wicked stuff who always showed up large on the biggest stages*, won a few World Series titles as the staff ace of a great team and, most interesting to my mind, reinvented himself more than a decade after he was first drafted -- in much the same way that his teammate, the former drunken starter Dennis Eckersley, became a dominant closer in the twilight of his baseball career.

Stewart's overall numbers aren't necessarily thrilling -- 168 career wins, lifetime ERA near 4 -- but his short stretch of brilliance, specifically the years 1987 to 1990, merits inclusion on this list. He won 20 or more games every single one of those seasons, led the league in numerous categories and was generally thought of as topping the short list of the game's best arms. Not bad for a dude who started off as a catcher.

*If you are allergic to cliches, please inject yourself with the House's complimentary syringe full of synthetic adrenaline. You're welcome.

19. Johan Santana

Old No. 7: As one of the myriad Mets to get hurt and miss the remainder of this season, Johan Santana is easy to think of as just another old, injured, massively overpaid big-city ballplayer. Appearing on the roster of the 2009 New York Mets will do that to a guy. Take a look at his body of work, most of which was posted as an underpaid and incredibly effective Minnesota Twin, and you’ll realize just how great Santana is.

He won the American League Cy Young award in 2004 and 2006. In the latter year he also took the pitching Triple Crown, leading the AL with a 2.77 ERA, 19 wins and 245 strikeouts. Santana’s 2006 Triple Crown is one of only eight such seasons since the mound was lowered in 1968, and the first by an AL lefthander since Detroit’s Hal Newhouser took advantage of rosters depleted by World War II in 1945.

Santana was completely dicked out of another Cy Young in 2005, when he finished third behind Los Anaheim’s Bartolo Colon and Yankee Mariano Rivera. Johan’s ERA was almost a full run lower that Fat Bartolo’s, and he led the league in strikeouts, WHIP, ERA+, and both hits and strikeouts per nine innings pitched. But Fat Bartolo won 21 games to Johan’s 16, giving the sweat machine the Cy. Just watch what happens in the Al this year -— C.C. Sabathia will win 20, while Zack Greinke finishes with 14 or 15, and C.C. will take the trophy despite Greinke being far better in every other statistical category. Cy Young voting is one of many fucked-up things about recognizing the best baseball players.

Had Santana rightly won that ’05 Cy Young, it would have been three straight. The list of pitchers who have accomplished that feat is incredibly short: Greg Maddux won four in a row from 1992-95, and Randy Johnson took four consecutive Cys from 1999-2002. No American League pitcher has ever won more than two Cy Youngs in a row.

Assuming Santana can recover from his surgery and wash the stink of the ’09 Mets off his career, he’s a slam-dunk Hall of Famer.

18. Bret Saberhagen

Bankmeister: I’ve tried to avoid homer picks here in this series of posts, but I couldn’t leave home without lighting the Sabes lamp. Does Bret Saberhagen deserve to be in the conversation with the rest of those included in here? If you responded that no, he did not, I would respect that answer. And I would respectfully disagree. To those of you that answered such, however, I would say that Bret Saberhagen was not your lights-out, kick-ass-and-take-names kind of pitcher. But he was pretty damn good for a decent stretch, good enough for three All-Star Games, two Cy Youngs, and a World Series MVP. In addition, he, for a little while, had a fairly decent mullet. And he played for three of the four favorite House of Georges ball clubs: the Royals, Rockies, and Red Sox. The Iron Triangle, in case you’re wondering, has forgiven him for that stint with the Mets. We know he didn’t really mean it.

I don’t mean to imply that two solid seasons makes a career for a guy, but I am interested in looking, for a moment, at those two Cy Young seasons, 1985, and 1989. In the first, Sabes pitched for 235 innings and earned himself a 20-6 record with a 2.87 E.R.A. He struck out 158 batters, walked 38, and tallied an impressive 1.058 WHIP. Four years later, he again lost six contests, but added three wins to ‘85’s total, shaved .77 from his E.R.A., struck out 35 more while walking all of five more. He managed this while tacking on 30 more innings and knocking .097 from the ol’ WHIP. Plus, he was still rockin’ the mullet.

All told, Saberhagen hung it up with 76 complete games, 13 shutouts, a career E.R.A. of 3.34, 167 wins, and over 1700 Ks. He didn’t accumulate all of those numbers with the mullet, but he was a pretty darn good pitcher, nonetheless.


17. David Cone

Cecil: David Cone has a simple name. David. Cone. Not too many syllables, there. Not too much to trip over. Say it quietly to yourself -- enjoyable, yes? David Cone.

Maybe that's why the Kansas City Royals selected him in the third round of the '81 amateur draft -- his pellucid name. Or, possibly, perhaps, it was they felt that he might become David Cone, death-dealing cyborg with the horsehide who would finish his career as one of the best strikeout artists of his generation. We'll give them the benefit of the doubt, because back then, they knew what they were doing.

Cone threw pure cheese, heat that could singe wood and cripple batting averages. He threw one of the only two perfect games in interleague history (the other being Don Larsen's '56 World Series win), struck out 19 batters in a game and his strikeouts-per-nine innings are in the top 20 in Major League history. He won 20 in a season two times -- including a ridiculous '88 season that only saw him take three losses -- led the majors in strikeouts twice, took home 5 Series titles with the Blue Jays and Yankees and the Cy Young Award in '94. He won that, by the way, whilst pitching for the same Kansas City franchise that had traded him to the Mets nearly a decade earlier. It was a strike-shortened season and he still won 16 games.

He was also, as I discovered in the course of doing my Coneian research, once traded for Jeff Kent and another guy. I didn't know that. David Cone was one of the best pitchers of the last 25 years, indisputably; the question is whether he was one of the best of the 20th century.

16. Orel Hershiser

Bankmeister: Orel Hershiser, to me, is a lot like Pedro Guerrero. He’s a household name, he was a member of some of those awesome ‘80s Dodgers teams, and he, in some regards, is underrated. I imagine that most baseball fans, if asked to list great Dodgers, would mention Hershiser before Guerrero, and perhaps that’s rightfully so. Statistically, the guy was a monster. In addition to being in three All-Star Games, winning a Cy Young, earning himself MVP awards in both League Championship and a World Series, Hershiser simply dominated batters.

The guy struck out over 2000, walked exactly half of those in which he fanned, and averaged 218 innings pitched across his 18-year career. Only twice in that span did he finish with a won-loss record below .500, and one of those times was in his final year in the Bigs, 2000, where he only pitched 24 innings. Throw a guy, a 17th-round draft pick no less, in a rotation with Rick Honeycutt and Fernando Valenzuela, and get production out of each of them, and you, my friend, will have a baseball team that’s very difficult to defeat. That’s just what some of those Dodgers teams were. Hershiser was also, as I recall, one of the first, along with Tommy Lasorda, to really begin doing endorsements, which kind of makes his face and name even more memorable. But that’s not what we’re focusing on. The rough focus of this post is to discuss great pitchers over the last quarter century. If you assemble a cast of the greatest pitchers of the last century, I’m confident he would make that list as well, ‘cause hey -– everything’s better when there’s a little Orel involved.

15. David Wells

Old No. 7: The lineage of fat players in baseball is long and distinguished. Babe Ruth was certainly the most accomplished fat guy in the history of the game, and fellow tubbies Tony Gwynn and Kirby Puckett join him in the Hall of Fame. Both Cecil and Prince Fielder combined big-time power with big-time big. John Kruk, Mo Vaughn and Dmitri Young manned the fat man’s favorite position, Fat Base. Most catchers are a little fat, which is fine. It’s rare to see a fat middle infielder, but Juan Uribe and Jhonny Peralta do their best to bring obesity to premium defensive positions.

Being chubby on the mound is apparently no detriment, because the list of overweight pitchers is as long as CC Sabathia’s belt. Sir Sidney Ponson, Sid Fernandez, Dennis Reyes and Rich “El Guapo” Garces put a lot of pressure on the rubber. Antonio Alfonseca had a serious spare tire, and the added weight of 12 fingers and 12 toes didn’t hurt -- Mark Grace calls him “El Pulpo.” Two of the fine nicknames in baseball lore are Hippo Vaughn and Jumbo Brown -— as you might expect, they were fat pitchers. In the running for greatest plus-sized hurler (excluding The Babe) is Fernando Valenzuela, and you can’t mention Fernando without his equally girthy imitator Teddy Higuera.

Which brings us to David Wells, both great pitcher and great eater. For a big fat fatty, Wells had tremendous balance. He could manipulate his boiler around his core to create maximum spin. Unlike merely chunky pitchers Roger Clemens and Curt Schilling, Wells did not have sizzling heat. His calling cards were his curveball, his control, and his extremely large trousers.

Wells played for nine teams over 21 major league seasons, and he never walked more than 62 batters. His career BB/9IP is 1.9, a brilliant figure. For a guy that threw so many breaking pitches, Wells painted corners like a guy who lived on a fastball. He was a winner, pitching for the Toronto team that won the Series in 1992 and the Yankee championships in ’98 and ’99. He appeared in 17 postseason series.

Let’s give a big fat round of applause to David Wells.

14. Bert Blyleven

Bankmeister: Bert Blyleven is an odd inclusion in this list because, when we were examining hitters, it was determined that hitters that played in most of, or all of the 1970s, should be, well, not quite avoided, but justified by their non-‘70s production if they’re to be included. Some were left out for this reason, while others simply could not not be included. Blyleven falls into this latter category. Hell, the dude was drafted in 1969, and already had a 15-year career under his belt by the time the time to be eligible for this selection came around. But that’s okay. He’s one of those guys whose late-career campaigns are noteworthy enough to include in such splendid company.

Let’s then, start with 1984, when, no longer a Minnesota Twin, Blyleven went 19-7 as a Cleveland Indian. Or say, 1989, when he went 17-5 as a California Angel. Let’s stop there for a minute. At age 38 Blyleven logged 241 IsP, struck out 131, and only gave up bases on balls to 44. His earned-run average was 2.73. Those are some pretty tight numbers for a guy who was, well, older than all of us are now when he put them up, but they’re but a fraction of his career totals, which look like this: 287 wins, a 3.31 earned-run average, nearly 5000 innings pitched, 3,701 strikeouts, and, wait for it, wait for it…60 shutouts inside of 242 complete games. In post-season play, Blyleven went 5-1 with a 2.47. He struck out 36 playoff batters, and only walked eight. The numbers produced and longevity displayed by Blyleven suggest nothing more than Cooperstown. He lost his fair share of games and gave up plenty of jacks, but he belongs in the Hall, and if you disagree, I’ll circle you, jerk.

13: Josh Beckett

Old No. 7: A baseball player can do a lot of cool things -— hit home runs, steal bases, save games, turn double plays -— but without a doubt the best thing he can accomplish is to win a World Series. A starting pitcher is in a unique position to do this almost singlehandedly.

Football teams have to win as a team. Great players, especially dominant running backs and quarterbacks, can get an inferior team most of the way there (see Elway, John) but can’t win it all without help. Great basketball players win championships, but the sport is littered with great players (Ewing, Barkley, etc.) that did not have the supporting cast to capture the ring.



Among major North American team sports, only a hot hockey goalie can influence a team’s championship hopes as much as a dominant starting pitcher. And among our 25 starters here, only Josh Beckett was the plow horse on two Series winners. Jack Morris pitched on three champions, but only in his 1991 postseason with the Twins could he be considered an indispensable element. The 1984 Tigers could have won with just about anyone in Morris’ rotation spot, and he was 0-2 in the 1992 Series with the Blue Jays.

Beckett was masterful in 2003 with the Marlins, at age 23. In the NLCS against the Cubs, he threw a complete-game shutout in Game 5 when Florida faced elimination. Following the Bartman Game (sorry Cecil), he came back on two days’ rest to shut down Chicago for four innings of relief as the Marlins came back from a 3-1 series deficit. In the World Series against the Yankees, he gave up only a bases-loaded walk in a Game 3 loss. But on three days’ rest he came back to win Game 6, the Series and the MVP with a complete-game five-hit shutout.

In 2007 he was even better with the Red Sox, going 4-0 with a 1.20 ERA in the playoffs, with 35 strikeouts in 30 innings pitched. After a complete game shutout of the Angels in Round 1, he beat the Indians twice in the ALCS to win the MVP and dominated the Rockies 13-1 in Game 1 of a World Series sweep. You might argue that the ’07 Red Sox were loaded and could have won without Beckett, but it needs to be noted that the pitching on that club was sketchy. Pedro was gone, and Curt Schilling was near the end of the line. Jon Lester had not yet matured, Daisuke Matsuzaka was erratic, and Tim Wakefield’s knuckler came and went. Boston’s second-most effective starter in the post-season was Paul Byrd. They needed Beckett to shoulder the load, and he did so.

As a regular-season pitcher Beckett has been sparkling as well, with 103 wins, a .602 career winning percentage, 8.5 K/9IP and 3.1 K/BB. He was completely dicked out of the 2007 American League Cy Young by CC Sabathia, but he so thoroughly owned Sabathia and the Indians in that year’s ALCS I doubt many people take that particular vote very seriously.

12: Dwight Gooden

Bankmeister: When the New York Mets were on the clock in Major League Baseball’s 1982 amateur draft, they, with the fifth overall pick, took Dwight Gooden. When he debuted with them in April of 1984, it would be the first of eight consecutive seasons in which he finished above .500 for the team. His final three seasons with the National League New York team, as well as two two-year stints with the Yankees and Indians, weren’t bad, but the Doc had lost a tiny edge. His run of seasons with Los Mets, however, put him among the ranks of one of the best pitchers of the ‘80s. From 1984-1991, Gooden went 132-53, and while he pitched for some really good Mets teams during that stretch, it should be noted that, from ’91-94, those New York campaigns were nothing shy of awful. This is evidenced by his return to +.500 performances in the first three of his four seasons in the American League.

There’s always a conversation regarding starting pitchers and Hall-of-Fame eligibility, and it’s one that, more often than not, is hinged upon total wins. Gooden retired at six wins shy of 200, a healthy gap removed from that coveted, frequently shoe-in notch of 300. There might be reasons to consider Gooden for enshrinement in Cooperstown, and if you don’t buy that, that’s fine. You are required, though, to note the importance of his inclusion on this list.

In the aforementioned window, Gooden walked 505 batters, which isn’t great; it boils down to roughly one-third of a free base per inning pitched. When it comes to strikeouts, though, he averaged nearly one per frame. If you consider that many big-league hurlers can go seven innings and not even tally three Ks, then Gooden’s ability to get guys to fan was impressive, especially in his first two seasons when he struck out a combined 544 batters. Gooden made All-Star Games those first two years, and also earned himself a Rookie of the Year in ’84, as well as an N.L. Triple Crown in ’85, an award that looked nice on the mantle, right next to his Cy Young. That’s pretty awesome, even if you’re Gary Sheffield’s uncle, and your ball club is completely loaded up on the devil’s dandruff.

11. Jack Morris

Bankmeister: Jack Morris was an American League workhorse. This is not to be confused with the warrior that was Steve McNair. No. It means that Morris, mostly as a Detroit Tiger, threw a hell of a lot of baseballs in his career, and did so with convincing success. The seven-time Cy Young candidate earned himself five All Star Game appearances, and a World Series MVP award after his lone season in a Minnesota Twins uniform. That post-season, he went 4-0 and fanned 22 batters while walking only 10 through 36 innings of service.

On the whole, however, Morris went 254-186 in his 18 major-league seasons. He struck out just shy of 2500 hitters, and from 1985-91, he pitched 91 complete games, 17 of which were shutouts. What’s more: he rendered nearly 1700 innings of service just in that span. Those, friend, are some mind-blowing numbers. In a seven-year frame, Jack Morris averaged nearly 243 innings per campaign, was good for roughly 13 complete games a season and a solid pair of shutouts. Considering that salaries were on their way, but not quite there, to the high numbers they are today, that is some serious work from one hell of a horse. And, you could argue that his earned income matched his production: as a 1985 Tiger, he earned less than 900 grand. That World Series MVP year? Close to a cool four mil. Morris made his cheddar in the early ’90s, but his entire career was a valuable asset.

There's that. If you enjoyed (Editor's Note: C'mon. You know you did.), stop back by tomorrow for the remainder.
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Friday Fiction Fix: "Dear Mr. Henshaw"

Today, ladies and gentleman, we bring you a very special edition of "Friday Fiction Fix." The concept behind this feature is to somehow tie sports and fiction together in a humorous way, an effort that, much like every other ounce of energy spent inside this House of Georges, goes largely unrecognized. Today will be no exception, so bare with us. In addition to this Sunday being Easter, it's also a very important day for reasons completely unrelated to religion. It is National D.E.A.R. day, which stands for Drop Everything And Read. This day was created by the one and only Beverly Cleary, who, if you had an upbringing like mine, has a major influence on many young American readers. The concept for the day originated, if I recall, within one of her stories, and became a reality, one that is celebrated on her birthday.

So without any further ado, let's get to the bit.

Mrs. Cleary will be 93 on Sunday.



She makes her home in Carmel, California, and in her life, she has won many awards, including the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award in 1975 and the 1984 Newbery Medal for today's FFF excerption, and the National Medal of the Arts in 2003. She has an elementary school named after her, a university chair named after her, as well as a college residential hall. She has published nearly 40 novels, many of which contain famous childhood characters such as Beezus, Ramona, Ralph S. Mouse, Henry, Ribsy, Socks, and of course, Leigh Botts, the boy who writes letters to Mr. Henshaw.

There are, as in any good book, a number of themes running through Dear Mr. Henshaw, one of which is the constant thieving of items from Leigh Botts' lunch, and since we have, this week, already touched on Joe Blanton and Sidney Ponson, why not throw a few more logs on the fat-pitcher fire.

In a letter dated December 4, he writes, "When I write a book maybe I'll call it The Great Lunchbag Mystery, because I have a lot of trouble with my lunchbag...Today I was supposed to have a deviled egg. Katy buys the smallest eggs for parties so half an egg can be eaten in one bite and won't spill on people's carpets...



At lunchtime when I opened my lunchbag, my egg was gone."

As the problem persists, Leigh begins to eat his lunch on the way to school, in order to avoid the thievage. Later in the month he writes, "If I eat my lunch on the way to school, I get hungry in the afternoon. Today I didn't



so the two stuffed mushrooms Mom packed in my lunch were gone at lunch period. My sandwich was still there so I didn't starve to death, but I sure missed those mushrooms."

After the first of the year, he has another issue:



"My little cheesecake was missing at lunchtime which made me mad."

Leigh begins to toy with the idea of putting a burglar alarm on his lunchbag, but realizes the impossibility of the notion, deciding instead to load his lunchbag with Scotch tape, which turns out to be more of a hassle than it's worth, so he's again on the lookout.

"Yesterday somebody stole a piece of wedding cake from my lunchbag.



It was the kind Catering by Katy packs in little white boxes for people to take home from weddings. Mr. Fridley noticed me scowling and said, 'So the lunchbag thief strikes again!'"

In February, the problem's still around: "By lunchtime I was hungry again,



and when I found my little cheesecake missing, I was mad all over again."

Eventually he discovers a way to begin building a battery-operated alarm, and obtains a black lunchbox. The first day he takes it, he discovers that his



"little slices of salami rolled around cream cheese are gone..."

Eventually, he gets the alarm, and installs it,



managing to keep even the most usual of suspects (Editor's Note: That's a Humberto up there, yo.) away from his pail, leaving him to write Mr. Henshaw and tell him that "several kids turned up with lunchboxes with burglar alarms."

If you'd like to examine a list of books by Beverly Cleary, you can do so, and even purchase them here. And don't forget, on Sunday, to Drop Everything And Read, even if it's just the TV Guide. Happy Easter, y'all.
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We Are Hot Chicks Wednesday: Quality Starts

It's an illusion. You think you've seen this one before, but you haven't. This feature, once heralded as our most famously "read," has nothing but unique content, top to bottom, every week. No joshin'.

Anyway, as you may have noticed, it's baseball season, and there're a few things to keep in mind as you begin plugging through these arduous spring months. They're simple things, like, for example, don't give Jim Thome a measty heater in the bottom of the eighth with two men on when trying to protect a one-run lead. Things like that. There's some other items to consider, and I've got faith in y'all, that you know just where to look.

Alexis Texas



A week ago this afternoon, Cecil climbed into the WAHCW saddle, and spoke of Texas. Texas, if you will, is that division opponent you're gonna see a hundred times before September closes. Get used to it. Adore it, even.

Ashlynn Letizza



The stance in the batter's box hasn't yet been renamed the Letizza stance, and it may never be. But the point is that you've gotta find a mix, a productive one, even that embodies what you've learned all your life, and what your hitting coach is telling you now. Listen.

Brittany Binger



When I was of the age that most big-leaguers are now, a binger was Michael Phelpsian, something you ripped from a "water pipe." A binger can also be a jack, or a heater. Depends on your perspective.

Jaclyn Case



If we're gonna talk stance, Jaclyn Case, in point, if you will.

Kagney Linn Karter



For you young pitchers: Every time you deliver a gem and it works, and you think to yourself, "I should give 'em another identical round sphere just like that last one," I'm hear to tell you to do it. Great successes often come in pairs.

Kaytee Bees



Some are born with the genes meant for delivering the off-speed pitch. Some are born with the genes, and the name, to get naked. Just sayin'.

Kerry Ann Cusumano



You're a pitcher. You gotta guy on base and your fielder ain't coverin' the bag 'cause he's focused on the hitter. You gotta do the same.



Now, if the base runner is one Kerry Ann Cusumano, that's a whole 'nother ball game. Do as you please.



And if she's leadin' off in a way that just ain't right, I'm not gonna lie: I see Tommy John surgery in your very immediate future. For reals.

Lauren Reese



You got someone hoggin' the plate? Give 'em some chin music. You know what I'm talkin' about.

Missy Robinson



One thing's for certain: If you're toein' that slab, you better have the look. Or else.

Natalia Salloum



With the look comes the necessity to deliver. And proper delivery preparation requires proper stretching. Don't skip it. Ever.

Nikki Rhodes



You gotta loosen up all those muscles. Even the ones you don't think you use in throwing fastballs.

Nikki Ryan



From the viewer's perspective, it might look like all fun and games out there, but it ain't.

Sara Jean Underwood



This shit is serious,



I guar-on-tee.

Sindi Bertherton



You never know what some folks are hidin' beneath the surface.

Sophie Rousse



There's always trickery and deceit simmering in someone's viles.

Lindsay Marie



But if you take one thing away from this lesson, o' youth of the MLB rotations, let it be this:



The only thing you need out there is some consistency.



You jive well with your catcher?



Good.



Make it so's you know when he's gotta poop.



Got a feeling you're aware when it's time to be okay with middle relief taking over?



Don't fight it.



Are you gonna stress out about your personal numbers?



I'm beggin' you not to.



Anxious you might let the team down?



Let it go.



Even when you've had consecutive great outings,



when that one blip comes up, fuh-get about it.



Your teammates already have.



They know the magic number's 162.



They have a rough idea of how many more starts you have to pop that blip like an annoying blister.



They're counting on you to do the same.



You gotta take that hill with every start you're awarded, and deliver your product.



No matter the occasion.

That's it for today, kids. Don't forget to fondle your rosin bag and stare longingly at the crotch that's 60'6" directly in front of you.

We'll be here all season.
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