Lee Lowenfish

"Every season is different" goes the old sports adage that like most cliches survive because there is a lot of truth to them.  Getting the most annoying story out of my system early on, I didn't expect more than a .500 season from the Orioles and now that modest hope is fading. You have read many times on this blog that I never believed in the baseball acumen of "President of Baseball Operations" Mike Elias but as long as relatively new owner David Rubenstein believes that Elias, who has 8 years in a top role, is such a genius that he doesn't even need a general manager beneath him who just might just know a little more about analyzing pitching talent, the future seems bleak. 

 

For the next three nights (M thru W May 11-13) the Orioles do have a chance to avenge the embarrassing four-game sweep at Yankee Stadium earlier this month.  Perhaps it is a blessing that because the MLB schedule now limits head-to-head divisional matchups to only 13 a season, the Birds don't return to the Bronx until the last weekend of regular season.  Of course, there will be two series in Baltimore where if the Birds don't show more life, Camden Yards will likely become Yankee Stadium South.  But I still use the pronoun "we" and wear my Oriole jacket often and it leads to fruitful conversations with strangers who love the Orioles.  Like the young woman one-third my age who wondered, "What is Elias giving RHP Shane Baz a 5-year contract worth $65 million before he threw one pitch for us?"  So far his results have not been promising. I am tempted to shout, "Don't come back, Shane!"  (Stay tuned for more movie snark near end of this post.) 

 

To turn positive for a moment, we are only five games below .500 as I post on Monday morning May 11. Nobody in AL is comfortably above .500 except the first-place Tampa Bay Rays (who plucked 4 top prospects from the Birds in the Baz deal) and the Yankees. Yesterday on Mother's Day, we enjoyed a rare win over the improved Athletics. My boys did it mainly with pitching and defense - How about that?

 

In top of 7th inning after getting the first lead of the weekend on a clutch single by rookie outfielder Dylan Beavers, inexpensive free agent pickup center fielder Leody Taveras threw a one-hop strike to impressive 21-year-old rookie catcher Samuel Basallo to preserve the 2-1 lead. 37-year-old gritty RHP Chris Bassitt gave his best effort as an Oriole for 6 innings and the 2-1 score held thanks to a save by well-traveled interim closer Rico Garcia.  A native of Hawaii, Rico G wears #50 as a tribute to his home state and one of his heroes, former Mets outfielder Benny Agbayani.      

 

As for the overall outlook for MLB with a quarter of regular season games already as Mets broadcaster Howie Rose loves to say "in the books", Tampa makes their first visit to Yankee Stadium over the weekend of May 23 after sweeping the Bronx Bombers early last month at their domed dungeon called Tropicana Field that has been restored after severe hurricane damage.  The justly-maligned NL Central has all its teams over .500 as I post this in early May. The St. Louis Cardinals are nipping at the heels of the Chicago Cubs for first place and the Brewers after sweeping the Yankees this weekend are right in the mix, too. 

 

About 10 days ago, I watched FOX's Saturday "Baseball Night in America" and was impressed that the Cards started virtually an entire home-grown team with early Rookie of the Year contender second baseman JJ Wetherholt shining on both sides of the ball as the Cards beat the filthy-rich LA Dodgers.  Wetherholt is from the Pittsburgh area and I'm glad that the Pirates bounced back from a home sweep by the Cardinals to sweep the Reds. Pittsburgh is a great baseball town and the fans have suffered for so many years that they are still not drawing very well.  I hope many will return if the Buccos stay in contention.  

 

There have been many losses of eminent baseball people since I last posted.  I never had any real personal encounters with Yankee broadcaster John Sterling, 87, Atlanta Braves owner/champion yachtsman/media entrepreneur Ted Turner, 87, or Hall of Fame manager/former Yankee third baseman Bobby Cox, 84, but they certainly deserve to be remembered.  

 

Seattle broadcaster Aaron Goldsmith told on air last week a classic story about John Sterling whose love of the Great American Songbook was well-known. Goldsmith was a friend of slugger Matt Holliday and when Matt was a Yankee near the end of his stellar career, Goldsmith asked Matt if John Sterling was willing to narrate a tape that Aaron could use on his answering machine during the holidays.  Sure enough before Thanksgiving one year, Goldsmith received in the mail a tape of Sterling introducing Frank Sinatra singing "Happy Holidays". 

 

At the beginning of his career as a baseball owner in the early 1970s, Ted Turner was very brash, even putting on a uniform to manage a game during a long Braves losing streak. Soon he wisely let solid baseball people make the vital scouting and developmental decisions that led the Braves towards constant contention by the early 1990s. I devoted a chapter of my book on scouting BASEBALL'S ENDANGERED SPECIES to such Braves lifers as Bill Lucas - the unacknowledged first Black GM - and scouting maven Paul Snyder.  After a down 2025, the Braves are back in clear NL pennant contention. Atlanta just won a series in LA and are the only team above .500 in what so far must be called the NL Least. After a horrenous start, the Phillies have moved to only 3 under .500 under new manager Don Mattingly.  The Mets languish at 10 under .500 and show few signs of a rebound.

 

On a personal note, I had a moving experience on the last Friday of April, the 24th.  After a showing at the Ferguson Public Library in downtown Stamford CT of the 2013 bio-pic "42," the film that starred Harrison Ford as Branch Rickey and the late Chadwick Boseman as Jackie Robinson, I was part of a panel discussing the movie along with authors of two recent books about the crucial period of the late 1940s Keith Evan Crook who has written OPENING THE DOOR FOR JACKIE (McFarland) and Peter Eisenstadt, INTEGRATION AT SECOND BASE (U of Illinois Press).  Courtesy of author Crook, here is a YouTube link to the discussion that was hosted by Guy Fortt, president of the Stamford NAACP who over 40 years ago was the first Black firefighter in Greenwich CT.  

 

I never tire of discussing this period in American history which seemed hopeful for genuine and equitable social change.  As I say in the tape, 1947 was the high point of success in Branch Rickey's career even though the Dodgers lost a memorable 7-game World Series to the Yankees. Though there are some errors in the baseball history, I'm so glad that feisty Leo Durocher is an important presence in "42" and Chris Meloni does him justice. Understandably not in a film made for a mass Hollywood audience, we don't learn the later story after 1947.  In 1948, the Dodgers did not win the pennant and the signs of Walter O'Malley's coming takeover of the team were clearer than ever, reaching fruition after the 1950 season though the Dodgers returned to Series in 1949 and missed out on last day of 1950 season.  Rickey's post-Dodger career in Pittsburgh and later back to St Louis was not crowned by baseball success but I continue to find him a  fascinating figure, a grandfather that I never had I guess. Was delighted that several in audience remember fondly my bio BRANCH RICKEY: BASEBALL'S FEROCIOUS GENTLEMAN still in print from U of Nebraska Press. Hope you enjoy the link and can ride through some occasional sound glitches. Many thanks to Keith Crook for providing the link.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i03NKPZWp_M&t=17s 

 

 CLOSING NOTES:

**Ivy League Baseball Post-Season Tournament begins Fri May 15 at 12N with top-seed Yale hosting #4 Columbia followed at 4P by #2 Penn versus

#3 Brown.  Loser's bracket at 11A on Sa and winner's bracket at 4P  Tourney winds up either on Sun or a M 12 Noon game.  

Kudos to Columbia senior RHP Evan Kleinhans who has closed games, served as an "opener", and pitched 8 1/3 innings of shutout ball in a key late

regular season game at Cornell.  I have dubbed him "Every Day Evan" referencing the former Twins and Giants hurler Eddie "Every Day" Guardado.  

All Ivy League tourney games will be available on ESPN+. 

 

*"Grass Routes" is a fun MLBTV show that features a different minor league franchise each Sunday from 1-130P on MLBTV.  During a show about the Portland (Maine) Sea Dogs, a fan described his dream afterlife: "I don't want to be buried but bronzed holding an umbrella so the pigeons don't get me." 

During a recent show about the Asheville Tourists that play in McCormick Field that is over a century old, Connor Griffin, then a visiting minor leaguer and now the Pirates' 20-year-old wunderkind SS, expressed his genuine love of the game and the experiences he was having on the way up to the majors.  The show narrited by Jonathan Mayo is on every Sunday at 1P on MLB network

 

 TCM TIPS:

F May 15 630P "Baby Face" (1933) Barbara Stanwyck sleeps her way to the top and among the beaus discarded are uncredited Douglass Dumbrille and John Wayne. Black actress Theresa Harris is a friend of Barbara's and is treated in film as an equal.  I mention this film because it's directed by Alfred E. Green (1889-1960) who started in Hywd as silent movie actor and directed a lot of bio-pecs including the "Jackie Robinson Story" (1950).  BTW it should be watched along with "42" for different insights into that crucial period of our history.  Jackie Robinson played himself in the 1950 film quite convincingly though, of course, masking on screen his righteous disdain in real life for the racists in our midst.

 

Sa May 16 245A "Designing Woman" (1957) Vincente Minnelli tries to make Gregory Peck believable as a sportswriter. Doesn't work for me but Lauren Bacall/Dolores Gray are also in cast.

 

Su May 17 Noir Alley a little later 1230A and 1015A Hitchock's "Strangers On A Train" (1951) with some memorable footage at Forest Hills Tennis Club.

Robert Walker is out to get innocent Farley Granger. Also with Ruth Roman/and oh-so-reserved Leo G Carroll. 

Later on Sunday two memorable films that have nothing to do with sports but must be listed:

1215P "Humoresque" (1946) one of the best films about classical music with John Garfield/Oscar Levant/Joan Crawford

1030P "Moonstruck" (1987) J P Shanley's memorable script and Vincent Gardenia, who did play the NY Mammoths manager in "Bang The Drum Slowly", as

Olympia Dukakis's straying husband and of course Cher choosing Nicolas Cage over Danny Aiello. 

 

****Th May 21 330P. Joe E Brown in "6-Day Bike Rider" (1934) along with frequent pal Frank McHugh.  Joe E always deserves 4-stars. 

11P "Blazing Saddles" (1974). how can I fail to mention Mel Brooks' enormously politically incorrect hilarious classic!

 

F May 22 6A "Body and Soul" (1925) Paul Robeson as philandering minister

8P Gregory Peck tries his hand as "MacArthur" (1977) - not sure I can last through this one but Genl Douglas A is an important if flawed figure in our history.

How can I forget my remedial speech class in 3rd grade when I had to recite a poem in honor of MacArthur's young son returning from Japan after Truman fired his daddy:  "Arthur MacArthur/We welcome you home!"  Fortunately forget the rest of poem but not this ditty that Miss Frisch taught us: 

"Good, better, best/Never let it rest/Until the good is better/And the better is best."

 

That's all for now (whew!). Always remember:  Take it Easy but Take It, and Stay Positive Test Negative!" 

On Lincoln's Birthday Feb 12 - it also would have been my mother's 119th birthday - I received my second Pfizer vaccine.  I was in and out of Mount Sinai Morningside - the former St. Lukes near the Columbia campus - in less than 45 minutes, including the 15-minute waiting period after the shot to make certain there were no adverse reactions.  

 

I really feel for the enormous number of people that have had to travel tens to hundreds of miles for their shots. Let's hope that a more streamlined public health service can be created under our new national Biden administration.

 

The nurse who gave me the second shot was very business-like and helpful.  I didn't really expect the unexpected praise that I heard before my first shot - when the nurse, a newcomer to NYC from Albuquerque, thought I looked closer to 50 than 78. If only it were true.  If only. 

 

It was fitting that I received the Pfizer vaccine because it brought back memories of John L. Smith, the Pfizer president in the 1930s and 1940s who was also an actively involved chemist.   Smith was also the treasurer and the wealthiest partner of the Brooklyn Dodgers as the internal war between the other partners, Branch Rickey and Walter O'Malley, began to build. 

 

While working on experiments to develop penicillin, Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming became a friend of Smith and fascinated by American baseball. Smith was reportedly first diagnosed with lung cancer in 1946 but evidently went into remission.  

 

Gifted NY "Herald Tribune" sportswriter Harold Rosenthal loved to discuss science and medicine with John L. Smith.  He thought it a tragedy that mass production of the miracle drug penicillin or perhaps some other new invention did not occur until it was too late to save the life of Smith whose cancer returned and he died during the AllStarGame break in July 1950.

   

When Smith's widow Mary Louise awarded her voting shares to O'Malley, Rickey's departure was foreordained and he left Brooklyn for Pittsburgh after the 1950 season.  The tragedy for Brooklyn Dodger fans occurred seven years later when O'Malley uprooted the franchise for the greener pasture$ of Los Angeles. 

 

I discuss the story in my essay, "The Two Titans and the Mystery Man," in the Joseph Dorinson/Joram Warmund edited volume, SPORT RACE AND THE AMERICAN DREAM (M.E.Sharpe), and in my biography, BRANCH RICKEY: BASEBALL'S FEROCIOUS GENTLEMAN

(U of Nebraska Press).  

 

(This is not the time or place to discuss whether Robert Moses was also a culprit in the Dodgers departure to Los Angeles. Sure he was, but I do firmly believe had Smith lived, that wound in the heart of Brooklyn might have been avoided.)    

 

I dearly hope that the Pfizer vaccine will take hold in the marrow of yours truly.  If it does,

I dedicate its healing graces to loyal Brooklynite John Lawrence Smith, who lived near Ebbets Field and was a great supporter of baseball, amateur sports, and local charities.   

 

He was a rare owner who wasn't into baseball to make money but to provide service to the local community. Rex Barney, Dodger pitcher and later Oriole public address announcer, told me that

Smith would come into the Sunday clubhouse waving pennants to lift up team spirits.  

 

Speaking of special owners, longtime Oneonta minor league owner Sam Nader passed away on Monday Feb 8 at the age of 101. In the 1980s, I fell in love with the New York-Penn League franchise located in the Otsego County seat scarcely a half-hour south of Cooperstown.  

 

When I first saw games in Oneonta, the staff of Sam Nader, previously a four-term mayor of the city, included his wife Alice and his three children, Suzanne, John, and Alice Adele.   Sam supervised the cooking of hot dogs, and "boy, they are good," I remember his justified praise.  

 

Oneonta was where Don Mattingly and Willie McGee broke into pro baseball.  Oneonta was where Buck Showalter first played and then managed.  I'll never forget Sam telling me at the time that Showalter one day would be Yankee manager.   

 

In 1982 John Elway hit .318 as a O-Yank right fielder, and led the team in every offensive category, including stolen bases.  Elway and his father Jack, a renowned West Coast football coach, were not happy that the Baltimore Colts had drafted John for football.

 

They did not like the methods of Colts coach Frank Kush when his Arizona State Sun Devils played against John Elway qb-ing Stanford. (In a fascinating aside, Jack Elway later coached Stanford with middling success but coaching San Jose State he beat his son's Stanford twice.)

 

If only the Colts had known about the Elways' antipathy towards Kush, a new coach could have been named, Elway signed, and no more Colts move to Indianapolis in the middle of the night early in 1984. Ah, "If" history yet again.

 

It was John Elway's only pro baseball experience but it was a memorable experience for him and the fans. There were few home runs evelr hit in Oneonta's spacious Damaschke Field but it was a great place to watch pitching and defense and savor the beauty of the restorative hill behind the left field fence.  Adding to Damaschke's charm, it was located within the picturesque public Neawha Park. 

 

Sam Nader was the youngest of six children of Elias Nader and Rose Rajah who emigrated from a mountain village near Beirut, Lebanon in 1909. As Mark Simonson noted in a long and moving article in the Oneonta "Daily Star," updated on Feb 13, Elias did not pass an American eye exam in France so the couple traveled to Brazil for two years where they had cousins.

 

Once he passed the exam, they settled in Oneonta where another cousin already lived. The Naders grew up not far from the railroad tracks, nicknamed the "lower deck" of the town. Through hard work and grit and an endearing love of people, Sam rose to become a pillar of the community.  An affordable housing complex, Nader Towers, honors him, and the Oneonta airport is named after him. 

 

Oneonta had been without minor league baseball since 1952 when Sam led the forces to bring the Red Sox to town in 1967.  In a time of social turmoil, Sam thought that baseball would be a unifying force for all ages.  

 

When the Yankees expressed interest in coming to town, Sam leaped at the chance because he was a longtime Yankee fan. He developed a close bond with George Steinbrenner once he bought the Yankees in 1973.

 

When Steinbrenner in 1998 as a favor to then-Mayor Rudolph Guiliani agreed to move the franchise to a brand new $70 million plus stadium on Staten Island in 1998, the Boss wanted Sam to come along.  No way lifelong Oneonta native Nader would leave.  

 

In its last years it became a Tigers franchise, aiding most famously in the development of future Yankee and Met outfielder Curtis Granderson. After 2009 the franchise was moved to Norwich, Connecticut on Long Island Sound. 

 

As Mark Simonson notes, Sam once expressed very beautifully his parting advice to Oneonta players:  "When you leave here, leave with a pleasant memory, and if you go on, always remember us because we'll always remember you."  

 

The likes of Sam Nader will sorely be missed.  Please don't forget him at a time when not only is Oneonta long gone from the minor leagues, but the whole New York-Penn League has been disbanded as well as several other leagues and forty teams discarded in all.    

 

The Staten Island Yankees are defunct and its stadium now lies vacant. It is hard to envision much commerce flocking to the new shopping mall adjacent to the stadium.  

 

The owners of the S. I. Yankees are suing MLB for its abandonment. So are the owners of the Trenton Thunder whose Double-A franchise was moved to the more lucrative suburban Bridgewater NJ area and will play in the Somerset Patriots independent league ballpark.

 

MORE SADNESS IN THE NEWS:

We lost another special person in the world of sports last week with the death of basketball scout Tom Konchalski, 74.  I never met Tom but I would see him after games in the area. He always sat in the top row away from scrutiny. 

 

He never learned to drive but his knowledge of players was so encyclopedic that writers loved to volunteer as chauffeurs to be able to pick his mind.  His typewritten High School Basketball Report was must reading for coaches at all levels of the game.

 

He was responsible for many players getting chances at Divsion II and III schools.  He appreciated Jay Wright as much for his career playing at Bucknell than his national titles coaching Villanova.

 

Like so many great scouts, he never denigrated a player's ability. His most severe criticism was: "He wasn't a genuine fit" for a program.  

 

A fine column by Roger Rubin in newsday.com quoted from some of his pithy reports:

On Jamal Mashburn, who went to Kentucky (and whose son now is a Minnesota reserve): 

He has "the body of a blacksmith and the touch of a surgeon."  

 

On Anfernee "Penny" Hardaway:  "Dishes like Julia, delivers like Dominos."  

 

Another loss in the basketball world recently was John Chaney, 89, who brought Temple in Philadelphia to national renown.  I'm tired of learning about these departures, but at least these men lived full and rewarding lives. May our memories of them always be a blessing.

 

Before I end this post, here are some of my TCM recommendations for late Feb: 

 

Fri Feb 19 8P a classic 1950 noir "Gun Crazy" followed at 945p by a classic in women's awakening - "Thelma and Louise" with Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis (shortly before her

memorable take on Dottie Hinson in "A League of Their Own")

 

Sat Feb 20 12M, repeated Sun at 10A "Native Son" (1950) starring author Richard Wright in title role as Bigger Thomas. Remastered by Eddie Muller who will intro and outro film as part of Noir Alley series.

 

Sun Feb 21 3:15p  Billy Wilder's "The Fortune Cookie" (1966) first pairing of Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon with scenes shot on the Cleveland Browns football field at Municipal Stadium. Not vintage Wilder but hard to beat the Lemmon-Matthau timing. Matthau won Oscar for portrayal of shyster lawyer.  (I didn't have a vote - LOL.) 

 

Wed Feb 24 10A "Hollywood Canteen" 1944 USO film with soldiers returning on furlough to meet such movie stars as Bette Davis, John Garfield, Ida Lupino and Dane Clark.  Watch for Joe E Brown's dance and Jack Benny sparring on violin with Joseph Szigeti.   

 

Fri Feb 26 630A  Ernst Lubitsch's "Ninotchka" (1939) - Melvyn Douglas woos serious Russian comrade played by Greta Garbo.  Wonderful character actors Felix Bressart,  Sig Rumann add much to the flavor.  Billy Wilder worked on it and you can see how he learned from the master how to get comedy out of very serious material.

 

Later on Feb 26 at 5p Vincent Price in "The Mad Magician" (1954) - first time I will see it since it scared the hell out of me when I first saw on TV in the 1950s.

 

Sa Feb 27 12N  "Knute Rockne" (1940) Hollywood's take on the coaching legend starring Pat O'Brien with tramp athlete George "Win One For The Gipper" Gipp played by some actor named Ronald Reagan.

 

Sa Feb 27 12M repeated Sun at 10A - Robert Wise's "Odds Against Tomorrow" (1960) intro'd and outro'd again by Eddie Muller. One of the great NYC movies, jazz movies, and overall A-one movies.  Music composed by John Lewis of Modern Jazz Quartet. Harry Belafonte and Robert Ryan, genuine liberals off-screen, play bank robbers who hate each other for black-white reasons.  Ex-cop Ed Begley Sr. plays the mastermind. 

 

Su Feb 28  345p Blake Edwards's "Days of Wine and Roses" (1962) with Lemmon and Lee Remick as the alcoholic lovers and Charles Bickford as her stern father

 

month ends at 10p Martin Ritt's "The Front" (1976) - one of the best if not the best movie about the blacklist. Woody Allen fronts for Zero Mostel. Cast also includes Andrea Marcovicci and Michael Murphy.

 

That's all for now.  Always remember: Take it easy but take it!