History

Mickey Mantle matured on Aug. 14, 1960. The New York Yankees were embroiled in a tense pennant race with the defending American League champion Chicago White Sox and the upstart young Baltimore Orioles.

The Washington Senators were in Yankee Stadium for a doubleheader. The Yankees were in first place, but when the games had been completed, they were a third-place team.

The New York Yankees rarely allow emotions to interfere with winning.

After the Cleveland Indians won the 1954 pennant to snap the Yankees' record streak of five consecutive pennants and World Championships, general manager George Weiss, referred to by baseball writers as "Lonesome George," stole Bob Turley and Don Larsen from the Baltimore Orioles.

The Yankees won four consecutive pennants from 1955-58.

Today's New York Yankees' primary method of improving involves signing other team's former players for large sums of money, but that wasn't always how the past and future World Champions operated.

The 1954 Yankees won 103 games but finished eight games behind the record-setting Cleveland Indians, which was unacceptable. Yankees general manager George Weiss and his counterpart with the Baltimore Orioles, the brilliant Paul Richards, pulled off the biggest trade in baseball history.

It happened on Sept. 18, 1954, but it really happened before then.

The New York Yankees would go on to win 103 games, which would be the most the perennial World Champions would ever win under their greatest manager of all time, Casey Stengel, but the Cleveland Indians would be American League Champions.

On Sept. 12, the Yankees were in Cleveland to face the Tribe in a doubleheader before a record crowd of 86,563 paying customers. Yes, the Indians were a force during the early and mid-1950s.

You know how people say a picture paints a thousand words? Well when you're talking about Bob Feller, a thousands words is not nearly enough.

Robert "Bob" Feller was born in Van Meter, Iowa on November 3, 1918. He was never the smartest or most athletic but what he did have was a hard-working, farm-boy mentality, and his father who taught him everything in "life lessons." In 1931 his father built him a baseball field in which Feller called "Field of Dreams," and credits where he first learned to play baseball.

Baseball: America's national pastime, a game rooted in the past and in tradition. It's a sport where, more than any other, you look back at the dominance of yesteryear.

Talking points begin not with Barry Bonds, but Babe Ruth; not with Pete Rose, but Ty Cobb. Hank Aaron, Jackie Robinson, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams and Willie Mays are also the talk of many.

There are many traditions in baseball. Some are limited to one team or ballpark, while others are practiced and celebrated throughout the league.

Well, here we are.  Just one more trade until I discuss what I believe is the worst one in baseball history and for No. 2, I’ve picked a good one. 

May 31, 2004

An Interview with Ron Santo—The Cubs' No. 1 Fan

This is the first interview I ever had the privilege of doing, and it happened to be with a childhood hero. I can't tell you the thrill I had sitting in the radio booth with Chicago Cub great Ron Santo overlooking Wrigley Field. I thought with his passing, that fans of his and the Cubs would enjoy getting into his head a little bit.

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, there was a left-handed pitcher named Walter William Pierce. His friends called him "Billy."

At the age of 31, Billy had pitched for 11 seasons. He averaged 16 wins, 13 defeats, a 3.14 ERA and a 126 ERA+ over a 162-game season, but in those days, a season was 154 games.

The year was 2002.  The city was New York.  The beloved New York Yankees, having just endured a heartbreaking loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks in the previous World Series, looked to regain their stride by signing valuable free agents.  Among these free agents were first baseman Jason Giambi, a guaranteed home run hitter who had gained rock star status in Oakland in recent years, and pitcher Mike Mussina, who General Manag