POINT TOTALS FOR WEEK 4

The weekly totals were remarkably close.  Well, except for Screech. 

 TOP 20 Hitters thru Sunday, 4/30/17

Breakdown of Top 20 hitters by team:

Bears 2; Blues 2; Cubs 2; Monarchs 2; Tigers 2; Tribe 2; Wahoos 2; Bombers 1; Bums 1; Chiefs 1; Redbirds 1; Senators 1; Skipjacks 1.   

A remarkably even distribution of top hitters.

TOP 20 Pitchers thru Sunday, 4/30/17

Breakdown of Top 20 pitchers by team:

Tribe 4; Bums 3; Cubs 3; Blues 2; Bombers 2; Senators 2; Tigers 2; Redbirds 1; Wahoos 1; Bears 0; Monarchs 0; Skipjacks 0; Chiefs 0.

This is where the separation occurs.  The Tribe has 4 in the Top 20 (actually the Top 11), the Cubs and Bums have 3 each, and there are 4 teams without a pitcher in the Top 20.

TOP 3 PLAYERS BY POSITION

PLANES, TRAINS & AUTOMOBILES

            Over the course of our 30+ years of trips to baseball stadiums, it occurs to me that we have had a number of memorable transportation issues.  I can only report on the trips that I personally attended, but here is my chronological list of noteworthy and probably unforgettable incidents involving planes, trains and automobiles.

1986 – It all started with the road trip to Kansas City in Scott’s RV for a weekend in July.  When the boys filled up the RV’s septic tank, no problem.  On a late Sunday morning before the game, B.T. emptied it right in the drains of the Royal Stadium parking lot, much like Cousin Eddie in the Christmas Vacation movie.  This earned the RV the nickname of the “Mobile Sewage Unit.”

1989 – A memorable trip to Milwaukee and Chicago in my pre-designated driver days.  After a raucous night at a festive watering hole, somehow McBlunder ended up with the keys to the van to get us back to our hotel.  It is possible that Blongo had been slightly overserved.  Or perhaps he was venting his frustration at not having raised enough donations for him to jump into the Chicago River earlier that evening.  Or maybe he was testing the strength and durability of the windows in the van by repeatedly using my head as a battering ram as he whizzed through traffic at 100 mph and the ramped shoulders of the Milwaukee interstate system.  In any event, we got back to the hotel and lived to tell about it.

Circa Sept. 1990 – The Mobile Sewage Unit makes another appearance. A group of about 6 was on the way from Omaha to a Sunday game in Kansas City, when an axle broke while we were speeding down the interstate.  Miraculously, Scott saved our lives and managed to get the MSU safely to the side of the road, where we waited for roadside help.  Despite some anti-Muslim discrimination from a family of Samaritans, we were able to survive and advance.  For years after, you could see a huge gouge mark on southbound I-29 where the axle went into the road.      

1992 – The trip around Lake Erie, which started by flying into Detroit and renting a van to get us to the game in Toronto that night.  Unfortunately, we ran into a monster traffic jam on the way to Toronto, in which all traffic on the interstate was at a virtual standstill.  Our driver, B.T., being of an entrepreneurial mindset, realized that there was a perfectly navigable lane of traffic that was not being used.  So he pulled over on the shoulder and raced past about 1,000 vehicles (a conservative estimate), all to the horror and outrage of every other motorist, trucker and one elongated passenger in the van.

1993 – California Dreamin’ Trip.  Because we had a large group, we rented a brand new, extra-long 15 passenger van to get us around Southern California, and I was the person authorized to drive according to our rental agreement.  Trouble started on the first evening when we were relaxing in the pool at our San Clemente hotel, and the hotel manager yelled at us that we had to move the van out of their front lot because it was too big.  Like a man on a mission, Magpie jumped out of the pool and proceeded to drive the van down the ramp into the hotel’s underground parking garage.  He didn’t get very far before the van’s roof was wedged into the ceiling of the ramp, so he threw it into reverse and gunned the accelerator to extricate the van, causing horrid screeching noises and massive damage to the entire roof.

            Two days later, I made a slight miscalculation in trying to navigate our boat into a parking spot in the Dodger Stadium parking lot, denting in both doors on the passenger side against a short concrete post.  Nice.

            Keep in mind that we had gone to San Diego and back on Friday, and there was beer and chew spilled all over the interior of the van, so that it absolutely reeked when we turned it in on Sunday.  However, E got the insurance on the rental agreement, so all we had to do was give them the keys and leave.  (He let me twist in the wind for a couple days, as I didn’t find this out until we turned it in).  The number of miles on the odometer when we started our trip:  4 miles.

1995 – Eagle’s Nest in Colorado.  A white knuckle experience for me.  As the designated driver, I had to drive up the one-lane, heavily rutted dirt road to get to the Eagle’s Nest after the game on the first day.  There are absolutely no lights other than the headlights, and the drop off on both sides of the road is precipitous.  It got better after the first time up.  When I was there in 2015, the road had been much improved.

2004 – San Diego.  Limos to the Delmar Race Track and Petco.  All good.

2006 – St. Louis.  Good and bad on the mass transit.  The bad:  Bob lost his wallet on the way in from the airport.  The good:  Screech makes a new friend, Skeezix, on the way back. 

2009 – New York.  Ted arranged for vehicles to pick us up at the airport and take us to Yankee Stadium for the noon game on Thursday.  However, our foreign driver was more than a little concerned that Ted wasn’t in our vehicle because he wanted Ted’s credit card information.  As we drove into the city, this concern became extremely distracting to our driver, as he was looking over his shoulder into the back seat as Mitch was trying to get Ted on the phone.  Distraction in heavy, rainy NYC traffic is not a good thing, as Johnny discovered when our vehicle pulled in front of a speeding cab and Johnny’s face was about six inches from the front of a New York cab that had to slam on the brakes to a screeching stop to avoid ramming us.  Johnny’s sharp demand to the driver: “FOCUS!”

2013 – Draft in Phoenix.  Who can forget the bicycle/rickshaw ride with Chelsea the Warrior sharply turning in front of oncoming traffic on a busy Scottsdale street?  With the number of our riders and standers, there is no good reason that thing didn’t flip over or flatten out with all of us spattered on the street to be run over.

            I had my own ordeal trying to leave at the Phoenix airport.  The extremely abbreviated version is that if you are checking out at an airport kiosk and need a baggage claim check (for golf clubs), make sure you also take your boarding pass before leaving the kiosk.  Otherwise, you may have to sprint between the security gate and the ticketing booth several times, brazenly cut in front of hundreds of people at both locations, and sweat through your Starter jacket to make your flight by about a minute before departure. 

            There are many more travel stories from the trips that I didn’t attend, but just as memorable to those who were there.

That is all for this year.  Good luck to all, and keep your ace pitchers off dirt bikes on their off days.