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The 2020 Cleveland Indians

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I played Strat O Matic as a kid.

I studied the cards a lot. The best player in my set was a guy named Pete Reiser, who I had never heard of, even though I was a baseball fanatic. So I looked him up in my 1958 edition of the Baseball Encyclopedia.

For short periods he was fantastic. Why had I not heard of him? I went to the library and looked up everything I could on him, which wasnt much. Decades later with the advent of the internet, I devoured everything I could find on Reiser. Leo Duricher said that the only player he ever saw as good as Reiser was Willie Mays. Willie May's! Geesh, that's pretty darn good.

There was one problem, though. He kept running into walls, and refused to stop. Some of those walls were concrete. It didnt matter to him.

In his first full season in 1941 when he was 22 he put up 7.5 WAR. Then, splat after splat after splat. The guy was a kamikaze. He made Keven Keirmaier look like a slacker.

Anyway, I developed my Pere Reiser theorem. You will probably hear it from me from time to time. I applied it to Grady Sizemore before he got hurt and to Zimmer after I had seen him maybe a half dozen times. Naquin, too. (Some folks dont like my theorem, but that's okay with me.)

'A player has no value when he is sitting on the bench hurt.'

We all love the players who go all out all the time, but over the course of a 162 game season, all out recklessness is foolish and tends to diminish a players overall value by a lot...esp over the long term.

As counter initiative as it sounds, the harsh baseball reality is that those kind of players end up having more long term value in trades than on the field.

Even though I thought that Grady was headed to a short career, I would never have suggested we trade him. He was simply too popular. But I did propose trading Naquin right after his rookie season and Zimmer when he was a rookie. Neither are likely to provide us close to the value we would have received in return at those points in time.
 
When you guys talk about all these video baseball games, it all sounds like Greek to me.

When I was a kid, my cousin and I both had a bike, a bat, ball, and glove...and a town of 30,000 in which to find a baseball game.

All was good as long as we were home in time for supper. Dad could whistle with two fingers, and could be heard literally for a mile. We had to be home within ten minutes of that whistle. 'I didnt hear you' was not an excuse. A brown belt hung on a hook in Dads closet. It was his nuclear option...seldom used, but a great deterrant.

Kids today dont have one tenth the fun we had.
 
CATS44 said:
When you guys talk about all these video baseball games, it all sounds like Greek to me.

When I was a kid, my cousin and I both had a bike, a bat, ball, and glove...and a town of 30,000 in which to find a baseball game.

All was good as long as we were home in time for supper. Dad could whistle with two fingers, and could be heard literally for a mile. We had to be home within ten minutes of that whistle. 'I didnt hear you' was not an excuse. A brown belt hung on a hook in Dads closet. It was his nuclear option...seldom used, but a great deterrant.

Kids today dont have one tenth the fun we had.
Click to expand...
Ok....
 
CATS44 said:
When you guys talk about all these video baseball games, it all sounds like Greek to me.

When I was a kid, my cousin and I both had a bike, a bat, ball, and glove...and a town of 30,000 in which to find a baseball game.

All was good as long as we were home in time for supper. Dad could whistle with two fingers, and could be heard literally for a mile. We had to be home within ten minutes of that whistle. 'I didnt hear you' was not an excuse. A brown belt hung on a hook in Dads closet. It was his nuclear option...seldom used, but a great deterrant.

Kids today dont have one tenth the fun we had.
Click to expand...

I grew up doing both, playing outside and video games/reading at night. Every kid regardless of age can do stuff like that, but parents arent involved/arent allowing kids for one reason or another to be the same way.

BMAN said:
Ok....
Click to expand...

There is no sports going on (not sure what I am going to do with my life honestly) so why not get the insider info on all the new characters on the board haha
 
CATS44 said:
When you guys talk about all these video baseball games, it all sounds like Greek to me.

When I was a kid, my cousin and I both had a bike, a bat, ball, and glove...and a town of 30,000 in which to find a baseball game.

All was good as long as we were home in time for supper. Dad could whistle with two fingers, and could be heard literally for a mile. We had to be home within ten minutes of that whistle. 'I didnt hear you' was not an excuse. A brown belt hung on a hook in Dads closet. It was his nuclear option...seldom used, but a great deterrant.

Kids today dont have one tenth the fun we had.
Click to expand...
I grew up exactly as you did and played Strat o Matic with my friends and everyday we would hop on our bikes round up a group and head to nearest field and play ball.
Those were the best days,,I'd give anything to go back and spend another day with my buddies in the late 60's and 70's,,always thought we'd hook up in some nursing home and play Strat o matic again. The young people don't want to hear it but man those were the best days,,,not even mentioning how the music took off in those years.
 
WorldFreeB said:
I grew up exactly as you did and played Strat o Matic with my friends and everyday we would hop on our bikes round up a group and head to nearest field and play ball.
Those were the best days,,I'd give anything to go back and spend another day with my buddies in the late 60's and 70's,,always thought we'd hook up in some nursing home and play Strat o matic again. The young people don't want to hear it but man those were the best days,,,not even mentioning how the music took off in those years.
Click to expand...

I say late 80s early 90s, we had all of that AND we had NES. But then again, here is the thing...everyone looks back on the past fondly because that's when they were kids with no jobs, no bills, no responsibilities, the decisions you had to make had very little consequences.
 
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I can't hit a baseball at a level my ego will accept. So I stick to video games.

Come at me on the court or football field though
 
Since there is no baseball to discuss, another childhood story.

When I was nine or ten, I had a rather interesting LL coach. He handed out mimeographed sheets before each practice, outlining that practice schedule. He also insisted that every kid be there in time. To this day, he is the best coach at any level I ever had.

But that wasnt the interesting part. He was also gleefully profane, something I had never experienced. He never yelled at us kids, but his side remarks were usually hilarious...and at least R rated.

We had no idea what he did for a living, until one day he showed up three innings late for a game with his arm in a sling. He didnt say why.

But his pic was on the front page of our newspaper the next day. Turns out that he was now a local hero. He was a state liquor agent, had gotten into a gunfight during a raid, and saved a fellow officers life by charging in and shooting a bad guy.

Years later he was elected as the Cuyahoga County Sheriff.

Years after that I had his great nephew on one of my own teams.
 
Nice story Cats..

On a different note - I can't understand why people are not talking up baseball (or other sports) at this time.
I get that teams are not playing games but why should that impact people discussing/ debating/ learning? Games are not played in December & January yet there is Hot Stove talk going on a regular basis.

Why can't people view this as an extension of the Hot Stove season & continue discussions??
 
Bill and I went to a game when Dave Duncan played for the Tribe. The Tribe lost and Duncan struck out multiple times with men on base, but he did RIP a double up the LF alley.

After the game we were just hanging around outside and Duncan came out, dressed to the nines with TWO beautiful gals, his...and their...blonde hair flowing. He headed for a limo.

The few fans around called out to him...Nice game, Dave.

Not my cousin.

Nice swings, Dave.

Duncan stopped and glared.
 
And one more personal Tribe adventure.

The AA team used to play in Canton. Our company had box seats right behind the Tribe dugout. We could learn over the rail and look straight down into the dugout. If a player stood on the top step he could reach out to shake hands.

Joey Belle was playing a disinterested right field, and allowed two fly balls to drop while he jogged.

After a Tribe at bat, Belle started out to right without his glove....really. A coach called out to him and Belle trudged back to the dugout to get his glove.

Bill leaned over the rail and told him loudly.

I dont know why you are taking your glove, because you dont use it anyway.

I never want to see a look like that again. Given his history and future actions, we were very fortunate that Joey didnt come into the stands.
 
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