2022: Play Ball — Bringing the great American pastime home by MediaNews Group Targeted Products

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A BAY AREA NEWS GROUP PREMIUM EDITION 2022

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PLAY BALL Bringing the great American pastime home

T H E BAY A R E A L E G ACY

T H E PA S S I O N AT E PA

A P O S T- P O S E Y E R A

The bespoke bat maker

G R E E K G O D O F WA L KS — AND BEER

CREDITS

COVER

SECTION EDITORS

PHOTO EDITING

ILLUSTRATOR

Jackie Burrell Laurence Miedema

Laura Oda

Sam Hadley

DESIGN

COPY EDITING

David Jack Browning Chris Gotsill

Sue Gilmore

Baseballs are scattered around one of the fields as Oakland Athletics players take batting practice during spring training at Lew Wolff Training Complex in Mesa, Arizona, in 2020.

Turning back the clock

D I A M O N D LO R E

BA S E BA L L CA R D R E N A I S S A N C E

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DIAMONDS BY THE BAY S TO RY BY L AU R E N C E M I E D E M A I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y D AV I D E B A R C O

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Players who got their start here have left a huge imprint on the game

he words were delivered more than 30 years ago on a movie set in an Iowa cornfield. But they resonate just as deeply today. “America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time,’’ James Earl Jones’ character, Terrence Mann, told Kevin Costner’s Ray Kinsella during their climactic scene in the iconic 1989 movie “Field of Dreams.” The game of baseball is part of our past, Mann added, then tugged at the heartstrings by suggesting, “It reminds us of all that once was good and could be again.” Let’s face it, it’s been a rough few years. Baseball’s never been perfect — the lockout this offseason was further proof of that — but it can be a terrific healer. Just look at how the Giants’ World Series runs in the early 2010s captivated the region, and they did it again during last summer’s unexpected breakthrough. The A’s ruled not only the Bay Area but were the biggest rock stars of the baseball world in the late 1980s. Who knows what the game would look like today if the Swingin’ A’s of the 1970s with their collection of colorful characters — and uniforms — never existed? But this isn’t about the teams. Few regions in the world can claim to have a larger imprint on the game than our Bay Area. The collective total of trophies, plaques and other hardware from

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area products could stretch a span of the Bay Bridge. Probably with a little left over. Hall of Famers? We’ve produced plenty of them. MVPs and Cy Young Award winners? Too many to count. The all-time home run king and the stolen base king grew up on opposite sides of the bay, and the guy who struck out more batters than any other left-handed pitcher is from Livermore. Bay Area-produced players dominated the early 20th century’s dead ball era, were in the starting lineup of the first-ever All-Star Game and have been at the center of some of the biggest on- and off-field moments in baseball history. ESPN recently ranked the top 100 players of all-time, and five of the top 24 players on that list learned the game on sandlots across the Bay Area. We’re thrilled to share our nostalgic look at the legacy of baseball in the Bay Area through the names and achievements of our hometown heroes. Similar to the Hall of Fame, we had a few guidelines to go by. Players who were born in the Bay Area and moved away before their formative years aren’t included. The same goes for all the players from the tremendous colleges in our area who grew up elsewhere. What we ended up with isn’t an all-time best list. Sure, all the stars are accounted for. But so are players who left an indelible mark on the sport as groundbreakers, one-hit wonders or unforgettable personalities. Just our way of helping to show how Bay Area baseball has marked the time.

Wally Berger San Francisco

The Mission High product was the National League’s starting center fielder for the first two All-Star Games and was one of the league’s top power hitters in the early 1930s. He hit 38 home runs in 1930, a rookie record that stood until Mark McGwire hit 49 in 1987. And he was teammates with Hall of Famer Joe Cronin on the 1922 Mission High team that won the city high school championship.

Barry Bonds finished his career with 762 home runs. DAN ROSENSTRAUCH/ STAFF ARCHIVES

Barry Bonds San Mateo

This Serra High alum is MLB’s single-season and career Home Run King, but suspicions of performance-enhancing drug use have kept him out of the Hall of Fame. Bonds was a seven-time MVP and 14-time All-Star with the Pirates and the Giants. He finished his career with 762 home runs and at his peak was such a feared slugger that he was intentionally walked with the bases loaded. ESPN recently listed him as the No. 8 player in MLB history.

Ernie Broglio

Cleveland for his production — he hit a .289 average with 23 home runs and 87 RBI — as well as his larger-than-life persona and backstory. Charboneau said he boxed bare-knuckled in box cars and warehouses to earn money as a teen and was able to drink beer through his nose because all the cartilage was removed after one of three times it was broken.

El Cerrito

He was a 20-game winner with the Cardinals in 1960, but the El Cerrito High product is best known for being the guy the Cubs got for future Hall of Famer Lou Brock in one of the most lopsided trades in MLB history. Broglio won seven more games before shoulder injuries ended his career. Left: Glenn Burke was the first MLB player to come out as gay to teammates and ownership while he was an active player.

Dennis Eckersley closes out a game for the A’s in 1995.

AP PHOTO

Glenn Burke Berkeley

The former Berkeley High star never became “another Willie Mays” as Mays’ contemporary and then-Dodgers coach Jim Gilliam once predicted, but he did leave an impressive legacy. Burke, who played for the Dodgers and A’s from 1976-79, was the first MLB player to come out as gay to teammates and ownership while he was an active player. Burke, who died in 1985 at the age of 42, also is credited with inventing the high five on the final day of the 1977 regular season. He ran onto the field with his arm raised to congratulate Dodgers teammate Dusty Baker, who had just hit his 30th home run, and Baker slapped Burke’s hand, creating a cultural phenomenon.

Joe Charboneau Santa Clara

The 1980 American League Rookie of the Year played just 70 games in parts of two seasons and is the oft-cited example of the sophomore jinx. The Buchser High alum was an instant sensation in

All-Star (he started for the AL in the first-ever game in 1933) spent nearly 50 years in baseball and, remarkably, was never fired or out of work.

Right: Brandon Crawford was named to AllEast Bay in 2005 and has won four Gold Gloves in the majors.

Joe DiMaggio San Francisco

GINA HALFERTY/ STAFF ARCHIVES

RON RIESTERER/STAFF ARCHIVES

AL’s Cy Young winner and MVP in 1992. He had two other top-5 MVP finishes and was runner-up for the Cy Young in 1988. He’s the first player in history with a 20win and 50-save season.

Ferris Fain Oakland

Brandon Crawford Pleasanton

The Foothill High alum grew up a Giants fan, and after last season, no shortstop has played more games for the franchise than the three-time All-Star. Debuting in 2011, he hit a grand slam in his first game, won his fourth Gold Glove last season and finished fourth in the NL MVP race. He was also a key contributor to two World Series championship teams.

Joe Cronin

The most recognizable player of his era remains a cultural icon — it doesn’t hurt that he was married to Marilyn Monroe — as well as being one of the greatest players of all time. “The Yankee Clipper” did it all in a Hall of Fame career that saw him win three MVP awards and make the All-Star team in each of his 13 seasons. He played his entire career with the Yankees, winning nine World Series titles and 10 AL pennants. His 56-game hitting streak in 1941 remains a MLB record. He dropped out of Galileo High and caught the attention of the Yankees while playing with the San Francisco Seals.

San Francisco

Cronin won prep city championships at Mission High and Sacred Heart (he transferred after Mission High burned down in 1922) before embarking on a Hall of Fame MLB career that included being a star shortstop, manager, general manager, AL president and member of the HOF’s board of directors. In all, the seven-time

Dennis Eckersley Fremont

The first-ballot Hall of Famer from Washington High was a successful starter — he was a 20-game winner and pitched a no-hitter — but is best known as the dominating closer for his hometown A’s. “Eck” was the

The five-time All-Star first baseman won consecutive AL batting titles in 1951 and 1952 but only played nine seasons because of knee injuries. The three-sport star at Roosevelt High still ranks 15th all-time in career on-base percentage (.424) but also was known for his brushes with the law, including getting busted in 1988 at the age of 66 for growing more than 400 pot plants at his Placerville home.

Curt Flood Oakland

The three-time All-Star batted over .300 in six of his 15 seasons and was considered by some during the era a superior defensive center fielder to Willie Mays (he won the Gold Glove seven consecutive seasons, from 19631969 with the Cardinals). But he’s best known for sparking the free agency movement. Flood sat out the 1970 season after refusing to report to the Phillies as part of a BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

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trade. He sued MLB and lost but paved the way for greater players’ rights. He played in the same McClymonds outfield with Vada Pinson and Frank Robinson but graduated from Oakland Tech.

Jim Fregosi San Mateo

This six-time All-Star from Serra High was one of the top all-around shortstops in the AL during the late 1960s and early 1970s and managed for 15 seasons, leading the Phillies to the 1993 World Series. He was a key part of the 1971 trade that brought Nolan Ryan from the Mets to the Angels.

Elijah ‘Pumpsie’ Green Richmond The El Cerrito High product broke the Boston Red Sox’s color barrier, 22 years after Jackie Robinson debuted with the Dodgers. Green spent parts of five seasons in the majors, and when he made his MLB debut on July 21, 1959, he became the first Black player for the Red Sox. Boston was the final pre-expansion MLB team to integrate. Green worked at Berkeley High for more than 20 years after his retirement from baseball.

Harry Heilmann San Francisco

The Hall of Fame outfielder debuted with the Detroit Tigers at 19, just two years out of Sacred Heart, and almost immediately was one of the best hitters of any era. He led the AL in batting four times from 1921-27, with averages of .394, .403, .398 and .396. He was one of six AL players to hit .400, and his career average of .342 is the 12th highest in Major League history and third among right-handed batters. Heilmann hit over .300 for 12 consecutive seasons.

Rickey Henderson Oakland

Born on Christmas Day, Henderson was the gift that kept on 8

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giving. He is the single-season and career stolen base king and the greatest leadoff hitter in MLB history. The former Oakland Tech student was a first-ballot Hall of Famer who played for nine teams over 25 seasons, including four separate stints with his hometown A’s. The ten-time All-Star outfielder was the AL MVP in 1990 and catalyst for World Series winners in Oakland (1989) and Toronto (1993). He had power to go with his speed, hitting 297 career home runs. His 81 home runs to lead off a game is an MLB record.

Keith Hernandez

Harry Hooper Oakland

Hooper wasn’t introduced to baseball until he left his family’s Santa Clara farm to attend St. Mary’s High, but he blossomed into one of the best defensive right fielders and leadoff hitters of the dead ball era. He was the only MLB player to lead off both games of a doubleheader with a home run until Rickey Henderson accomplished the feat 80 years later. After winning four World Series with the Red Sox from 1912-18, he served as the postmaster for Capitola for more than 20 years.

Millbrae

The Capuchino High and College of San Mateo grad turned into one of the all-time great draft success stories. The 42nd-round pick won 11 straight Gold Gloves at first base, was a five-time AllStar, shared the NL MVP in 1979 and won World Series titles with the Cardinals (1982) and the Mets (1986). He appeared in “The Boyfriend” episode of Seinfeld, which TV Guide once ranked No. 4 on the list of the greatest TV episodes of all time.

Jackie Jensen Oakland

The three-time All-Star from Oakland High won a World Series with the Yankees as a rookie and was the AL MVP with the Red Sox in 1958. He retired after 1961 at the age of 34 because of a fear of flying. One of the most accomplished college athletes in Bay Area history, “The Golden Boy” led Cal to the inaugural College World Series in 1947 and a year

St. Louis Cardinals’ Keith Hernandez watches a home run take flight in 1982. During his career, the Millbrae native won 11 straight Gold Gloves. AP PHOTO

later, led the Bears football team to the Rose Bowl. Jensen finished fourth in the Heisman Trophy voting after becoming Cal’s first 1,000-yard rusher that season.

Randy Johnson Livermore

The “Big Unit” dominated — and intimidated — hitters at Livermore High, USC and early in his pro career with a blazing fastball and erratic control. But the 6-foot10 lefty put it together after a 1992 conversation with Nolan Ryan, winning at least 17 games in eight of the next 10 seasons, earning him five Cy Young Awards. The first-ballot Hall of Famer won his 300th career game with the Giants in 2009 and ranks second to Ryan in career strikeouts.

George ‘High Pockets’ Kelly San Francisco Kelly helped the New York Giants win four consecutive NL pennants as a gifted defensive first baseman and one of the best hitters of the

early 1920s, leading the NL in home runs once and in RBIs twice. The San Francisco native dropped out of school to play semi-pro in Oakland and was in the majors at the age of 19. He was voted into the Hall of Fame in 1973.

swinging throughout a colorful and successful career as a player and manager. He was a key member of the Yankees’ 1950’s dynasty — he was MVP of the 1953 World Series — and also Mickey Mantle’s roommate and carousing partner. As a manager, he had famous battles with George Steinbrenner, Reggie Jackson and a Minnesota marshmallow salesman. He was typically an initial success — he revived the A’s with his BillyBall teams of the early 1980s, one of his five division winners — but at every stop was fired or left amid off-field controversy.

Mark Langston Santa Clara

Langston went to San Jose State after the Cubs drafted him in the 15th round out of Buchser High at the age of 17 and was the Mariners’ second-round pick three years later. He led the AL in strikeouts as a rookie, was a four-time All-Star and pitched a combined no-hitter in 1990. Won seven Gold Gloves and had one of the best pickoff moves of all time — when he retired, his 91 career pickoffs were an MLB record.

Gil McDougald San Francisco

Cincinnati second baseman Joe Morgan tips his helmet to the fans as he rounds the bases in a game in 1976. AP PHOTO

Cookie Lavagetto Oakland

Former Athletics star Carney Lansford has played in both the Little League and MLB World Series. AP PHOTO

The former Oakland Tech High student was discovered during a semi-pro game and went on to become a four-time All-Star and play in two World Series with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Lavagetto spoiled what would have been the first no-hitter in World Series history, collecting a walk-off, pinch-hit double with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning in Game 4 of the 1947 Series against the Yankees. That was the final hit of his MLB career.

Carney Lansford

Tony Lazzeri

The former Wilcox High star achieved a rare accomplishment by playing in both the Little League and MLB World Series, reaching Williamsport in 1969 with Briarwood LL, then playing in three World Series with the A’s, winning one in 1989. He won a batting title in 1981, just missed a second in 1989 and finished with a career batting average of .290.

The Hall of Fame second baseman was part of the Yankees’ famed “Murderers’ Row” in the late 1920s, along with Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Bob Meusel. The San Francisco native dropped out of Galileo High but was in the majors with the Yankees by the age of 22 and finished 10th in MVP voting as a rookie. He drove in over 100 runs seven times and was a member of the original AL All-Star team in 1933.

Santa Clara

San Francisco

McDougald was a basketball star at Commerce High and didn’t make the varsity baseball team until he was a senior, but he wound up being a key piece to the Yankees’ 1950s dynasty, playing second, third and shortstop. He was the AL Rookie of the Year in 1951 (Mickey Mantle’s rookie season and Joe DiMaggio’s last) and was a six-time All-Star and part of five World Series winning teams. He retired in 1960 at the age of 32.

Joe Morgan Oakland

Ernie Lombardi Oakland

The Hall of Fame catcher from McClymonds High was an eighttime All-Star who hit over .300 in 10 seasons. The two-time NL batting champ caught for Johnny Vander Meer’s back-to-back no-hitters in 1938.

Billy Martin Berkeley

Martin had a well-earned reputation as a fighter before he arrived at Berkeley High, and he kept

Umpire Bill Haller and Athletics manager Billy Martin argue during a game in 1982. RUSS REED/

A key piece of Cincinnati’s “Big Red Machine” of the 1970s, the Hall of Famer from Castlemont High was by any measure one of the greatest second basemen in MLB history. He was a two-time MVP, 10-time All-Star and won five Gold Gloves before spending more than two decades as a broadcaster. He was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1990.

Daniel Nava San Carlos

STAFF ARCHIVES

Nava hit the first pitch he saw in the majors for a grand slam in 2010 with the Red Sox, punctuating an improbable journey worthy of a movie. Undersized at St. Francis High, where he was a skilled defensive outfielder but rarely batted, he was cut as a walk-on at Santa Clara and served as the team manager. He went BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

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to the College of San Mateo, got bigger and became a JC All-American and returned to SCU, where he led the West Coast Conference in hitting but was not drafted. A year after being cut, he was rated the No. 1 prospect in the Independent League, and the Red Sox bought his rights for $1. Two years later, he made his dramatic debut and spent parts of seven seasons in the majors, winning a World Series ring with Boston.

High, the big lefty lived up to the hype. He went 17-5 as a 20-yearold rookie with Cleveland and retired after the 2019 season with the third-most strikeouts by a left-hander in MLB history and tied with Bob Gibson for the second-most wins (251) by a Black pitcher. The six-time All-Star led the majors in wins twice and won the 2007 AL Cy Young award.

Lefty O’Doul

El Cerrito

Marcus Semien

San Francisco

The St. Mary’s High alum followed his parent’s footsteps to Cal (dad, Damien, played football there) and enters this season as one of the majors’ top second basemen. He finished third in the MVP race with the A’s in 2019. Last season, he signed with the Blue Jays, changed positions and wound up starting the All-Star Game and setting a single-season record for second basemen with 45 homers. Signed a $175 million deal with the Rangers this winter.

The two-time batting champ and participant in the inaugural AllStar game has the highest career batting average (.349) of any player eligible for MLB Hall of Fame who is not enshrined but was inducted into the Japanese baseball Hall of Fame for his work promoting the game there before and after World War II. The hometown hero has a drawbridge near the San Francisco ballpark named after him. If the Tokyo Giants uniforms look familiar, it’s because the former New York Giant designed them. He managed the San Francisco Seals and was credited with developing Joe DiMaggio.

Willie Stargell Alameda

Vada Pinson Oakland

A trumpet player in the McClymonds High band, Pinson was persuaded to follow a career path in baseball instead of music and was one of the NL’s top all-around players in the 1960s. The two-time All-Star center fielder played 18 seasons and had more hits in his first five full seasons (985) than Hall of Fame contemporaries Stan Musial, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron and Frank Robinson, his high school teammate.

Dave Righetti San Jose

The Pioneer High product was the Giants pitching coach from 2000-17 and the chief architect of the dominating staffs that helped win three World Series titles after a successful career that saw the left-hander become the first MLB 10 PLAY BALL

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player to pitch a no-hitter and lead the league in saves during his career. “Rags” was the AL Rookie of the Year in 1981 as a starter and pitched a no-hitter for the Yankees on the 4th of July in 1983 but became New York’s closer in 1984. He made two All-Star teams as a reliever and set a then-MLB record with 46 saves in 1986.

Frank Robinson Oakland

The McClymonds High alum left indelible marks as a player and a manager and was elected to the Hall of Fame as soon as he became eligible in 1982. As a player, Robinson was named Rookie of the Year, won MVP awards in both leagues, had a Triple Crown season, won a Gold Glove in right field and was a World Series and All-Star Game MVP. In 1975, he

became the first Black manager in the majors and managed four teams in all, including the Giants.

Jimmy Rollins Alameda

The former Encinal High star was the leadoff man for Phillies teams that won five straight division titles, two NL pennants and a World Series from 2007-11. Rollins was a three-time All-Star, won a Silver Slugger and four Gold Gloves. He was on the Hall of Fame ballot for the first time this year and received 9.4 percent of the votes to remain eligible.

C.C. Sabathia Vallejo

Rated the top prospect in Northern California while at Vallejo

Teammates Frank Robinson, left, and Brooks Robinson celebrate after leading the Orioles to a 5-2 win in the opening game against the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series in Los Angeles, in 1966. AP PHOTO

Stargell wasn’t even the best player on his Encinal High team, but he developed into one of the NL’s most feared sluggers in the 1960s and ’70s and was a first-ballot Hall of Famer. Stargell, who has a street named after him in Alameda, was a seven-time All-Star and had six top-10 MVP finishes (he was second twice) before — at the age of 39 and as the leader of the “We Are Family” Pirates — he shared the award with Keith Hernandez in 1979.

Dave Stewart Oakland

Stewart joined his hometown A’s at the age of 29 and became one of the most dominating — and intimidating — pitchers of the late 1980s and early ‘90s. The former St. Elizabeth High student went 10-3 in 16 post-season starts with the A’s and Blue Jays, winning both of his starts against the Giants in the 1989 World Series. He had four straight 20-game seasons and top-4 AL Cy Young Award

Other notable Bay Area-bred players A L A M E DA

P E TA LU M A

Tommy Harper Chris Speier

Joey Gomes Jonny Gomes Spencer Torkelson

BERKELEY Augie Galan Chick Hafey Ruppert Jones Darren Lewis Claudell Washington

BOULDER CREEK

SALINAS Xavier Nady

CONCORD

S A N CA R LO S

Tom Candiotti

Daniel Descalso

DA LY C I T Y

SAN FRANCISCO

Don Mossi

Dolph Camilli Jerry Coleman Babe Dahlgren Dom DiMaggio Vince DiMaggio Danny Frisella Eddie Joost Mark Koenig Duffy Lewis Willie McGee Sam Mertes Mike Norris Ken Reitz Dutch Ruether Gus Suhr

G I L R OY L A R KS P U R Walter “The Great” Mails, right, southpaw pitcher of the San Francisco Seals, gets instructions from his new manager, Frank “Lefty” O’Doul, in 1935. AP PHOTO

Buddy Biancalana Chad Kreuter

finishes from 1987-90.

Bryan Shaw

LIVERMORE M E N LO PA R K Kevin Bass Bob Melvin

Sunnyvale

The five-time NL All-Star was one of the top all-around shortstops when he was healthy. In 13 seasons, he played in at least 100 games just eight times and hit 20 or more home runs in seven of those seasons. He was a baseball and basketball star at Fremont High and the seventh overall pick in the 2005 draft by the Rockies after starring at Long Beach State. Two years later, as a 22-year-old rookie, he helped lead Colorado to its only World Series appearance.

Alameda

In the early 2000s, the “D-Train” was one of the game’s biggest stars and dominant pitchers. The former Encinal High student with the unorthodox delivery was an immediate sensation as a 21-yearold rookie in 2003, making the All-Star team, helping lead the Marlins to a World Series title and

MONTEREY

SAN JOSE

Mike Aldrete

Ken Caminiti Kevin Frandsen

OA K L A N D

Dontrelle Willis Encinal High’s Dontrelle Willis won the World Series in 2003 with the Marlins as well as Rookie of the Year. DINO VOURNAS/ STAFF ARCHIVES

winning the Rookie of the Year award. Two years later, he was 22–10 with a 2.63 and was runner up for the NL Cy Young but never recaptured that success. Because of command issues and injuries, he won just 26 more games and made his final appearance in the majors in 2011.

R O H N E R T PA R K Brandon Morrow

Pat Burrell

Chris Gimenez

Troy Tulowitzki

P L E A SA N TO N Stephen Piscotty

Buzz Arlett Taylor Douthit Lew Fonseca Brian Johnson Von Joshua Ray Kremer Lee Lacy Lloyd Moseby Greg Norton Gary Pettis Bill Rigney Bip Roberts Joe Ross Tyson Ross Willie Tasby George Van Haltren Bill Wight

S A N M AT E O Gregg Jefferies Sam Tuivailala

S A N R A FA E L Jesse Foppert Jerry Goff Will Venable

S A N TA R O S A Scott A. Alexander Brandon Hyde Andrew Vaughn

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO Rich Bordi

PAC I F I CA

S U N N Y VA L E

Bob McClure

Bill Pecota

PA LO A LTO

WO O D S I D E

Alex Blandino Joc Pederson

Eric Byrnes

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Giants announcer calls her job ‘the gift that keeps on giving’

h, those glorious pipes. The upbeat personality. That joyfully melodic delivery. ¶ Fans attending San Francisco Giants games at Oracle Park know their experience just wouldn’t be the same without the voice of Renel Brooks-Moon booming through the speakers.

Q A

On the field, the Giants enjoyed an amazing 2021 season that a lot of experts didn’t see coming. Did you?

Renel BrooksMoon, public address announcer for the San Francisco Giants, has two bobbleheads in her likeness and three Tiffanydesigned World Series rings.

B Y C H U C K BA R N E Y

the ballpark, I could never Entering her 23rd season imagine myself doing this. with the team, the trailblazSo I’m endlessly grateful. ing PA announcer and forQ& A I’m not saying I don’t have mer Bay Area radio personstressful days or challenges. ality describes her third-level But when the mic goes on, booth at the ballpark as “my I’m that 2-year-old girl performhappy place.” With a view that includes McCovey Cove and her ing “The Twist” during a (companative Oakland, the cozy perch is ny) picnic. adorned with baseball mementos, including several Negro League You’ve been in the booth figurines that remind her “of the for World Series games, an shoulders on which I stand.” All-Star Game and much more. Brooks-Moon, 63, is one of only What’s your most memorable four current female PA announcmoment? ers in Major League Baseball, along with Marysol Castro (Mets), Seeing Barry Bonds break Amelia Schimmel (Athletics) and the all-time home run record. Adrienne Roberson (Orioles), and It was such a privilege to be a the lone Black woman handling part of baseball history. And that those duties. experience wasn’t just a single She also made history in 2002 day. It was a drawn-out, dramatic as the first woman to announce and emotional ride. … And by the a World Series — an honor that way, Barry should be in the Hall landed her scorecard in the Naof Fame, for crying out loud! tional Baseball Hall of Fame. What about the time you met President Obama as the team Any description of you rewent to the White House after quires the words “energetic” winning the World Series in 2012? and “enthusiastic.” How do you maintain that passion over a long season? Incredible. I spent much of the plane trip thinking about what I could quickly say It’s corny and cliche, but I to the president that would be absolutely love what I do. meaningful and profound. Then As a little girl who was raised at

of diversity — especially considering that the Bay Area is such a diverse place. Fortunately, the Giants have given me the freedom to say what I need to say.

he complimented me on doing a great job, and I just froze. It was an out-of-body experience.

Q A

What’s the most rewarding part of your job?

I love that I’ve been able to support, encourage and mentor young women coming up in broadcasting. I didn’t have that when I started out. It was a very lonely place.

You also have lent your voice to matters of diversity and inclusion in the Giants organization and baseball in general. How important is that to you?

My parents were raised in the Jim Crow South, and I’m a child of the civil rights movement. Diversity was something I was brought up on. I have now worked in two White male-dominated professions. It’s in my blood to fight for diversity. When I got to the Giants, I was frankly shocked by the organization’s lack

DAI SUGANO/STAFF

I can’t say that I did, but what a ride it was! They gave so many of us the life we needed to get through all the darkness the world was experiencing. It was a beautiful distraction.

You have been honored with two bobbleheads designed in your likeness. You also own three Tiffany-designed World Series rings. Which do you cherish the most?

C’mon man, that’s not fair! I never expected the bobbleheads or the rings. I know you don’t want to hear this, but it’s a tie. Clearly, this job is the gift that keeps on giving.

Q A

OK, so with the rings — do you ever let people try them on?

(Laughing) Yes, sometimes. I’ll take them to special events, and if I feel a special connection with you, I’ll give the ring over for a bit — with EXTREME supervision.

Q A

Favorite player?

Again, that is not even fair! I’ll throw out a few — Bonds, Pablo Sandoval, Rich Aurilia. Kenny Lofton, back in the day. The Willies (Mays and McCovey). And from the Oakland A’s — Reggie Jackson, Rickey Henderson. But there’s so many. C’mon, that’s impossible!

Your current contract runs through 2023. How long do you want to do this?

As long as they’ll have me. Many of my male counterparts have done it for decades. I hope to do the same.

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NOW, WHAT, BUSTER? The San Francisco Giants ponder what the post-Posey future will bring B Y K E R R Y C R OW L E Y

uring the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, Major League Baseball hoped to provide its fans with a meaningful distraction. Teams played in empty stadiums, the regular season lasted just 60 games, and positive tests forced frequent postponements, but the vast majority of the league pressed on as if life were supposed to look normal. Buster Posey couldn’t. After adopting identical newborn twin girls, Ada and Livvi, weeks before a rescheduled Opening Day, the Giants’ franchise player and his wife, Kristen, decided it was in the family’s best interest for Posey to skip the season. “From a baseball standpoint, it was a tough decision,” Posey said during his announcement two summers ago. “From a family standpoint and feeling like I’m making a decision to protect our children, I think it was relatively easy.” If anchoring three World Series title teams somehow failed to bring Posey’s contributions into focus, the star catcher’s year away from the Giants provided a clear view of all he offered the organization. “I realized we were lost,” president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi said that November. The Giants without Posey simply weren’t the same.

San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey warms up before Game 5 of the National League Division Series in San Francisco on Oct. 14, 2021. KARL MONDON/STAFF

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“We still managed to have a pretty good season, but I think we would have been a post-season team that year with the team leader and one of the best catchers in baseball on the team,” shortstop and longtime teammate Brandon Crawford said. Posey returned to the diamond last season, and it was as if he had never left. He hit .304 with 18 home runs, earned an All-Star nod and a Silver Slugger and appeared on multiple Most Valuable Player ballots after leading the Giants to a franchise-record 107 victories. But less than a month after a dream season ended, Posey donned a navy blue suit to a news conference inside Oracle Park and 16 PLAY BALL

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Above: Posey hits a double during the National League Divisional Series in 2021. Left: Walking with former manager Bruce Bochy, Posey and his family look out at the field where he played for 12 years as he arrives to announce his retirement. KARL MONDON/STAFF

announced he was once again stepping away from baseball. This time, it’s the end. “Physically, it’s much harder now,” Posey said last November as he announced his retirement from baseball after 12 seasons — all with the Giants. “It’s hard to enjoy it as much when there’s physical pain you’re dealing with on a daily basis. I halfway joke with our training staff about being done five years ago, but I don’t know how far of a stretch that’s really off.” At 34 years old, a player unlike any the Giants have had in their storied history said goodbye. Barry Bonds is the all-time home run king. Willie Mays might be the greatest player baseball has ever

Left: Posey retrieves a ball during the National League Divisional Series in 2021. Right: Posey tags out Los Angeles Dodgers’ Justin Turner at home plate during a game on Sept. 3, 2021. JOSE CARLOS FAJARDO/ STAFF

Brittany Smith’s daughter Samantha Smith gave Buster Posey a high five at Walnut Creek’s John Muir Medical Center in 2016, when Posey and his wife, Kristen, visited pediatric oncology patients. SUSAN TRIPP POLLARD/STAFF ARCHIVES

seen. But Posey, he’s the man who took the Giants to unprecedented heights. A franchise that had spent 51 years in San Francisco before winning a title claimed the World Series in Posey’s rookie season. Two years later, he won the MVP and a second ring. Two years after that, the Giants achieved dynasty status with their third championship in five seasons. “These players come around once a generation,” former teammate Hunter Pence said. “He’s a generational talent, and it was really incredible he was able to be a Giant his whole career. It’s definitely going to look different.” Posey is one of nine Giants who earned three World Series rings, but unsurprisingly, he still stands out from a crowd that includes franchise legends such as Tim Lincecum and Madison Bumgarner. “It’s one thing to be tied to three championships, but he was one of the best players on all three of those teams,” Crawford said. “I think that says even more about him. He was a huge cause for those championships. Nothing against a corner outfielder or reliever, it’s not like he had a minor part; he was the catcher and the one calling pitches.” Posey spent the first half of his career creating a lifetime of memories for the Giants fan base but devoted the second half to a far greater calling. In 2016, Buster and Kristen Posey announced they were focusing their philanthropic efforts to join the fight against pediatric BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

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San Francisco Giants catcher Joey Bart, heir apparent to Buster Posey, takes his first at-bat against the Washington Nationals after getting called up from the minors on Saturday, July 10, 2021. KARL MONDON/STAFF

cancer. With the help of Dr. Mignon Loh, the former UCSF division chief of pediatric hematology and oncology, the Poseys began the process of raising millions of dollars for research that often funded early-phase clinical trials that wouldn’t have launched without their financial support. “They’re both incredibly bright, very well informed and very inquisitive,” Loh said. “Buster and Kristen came to our hospital as well as other hospitals to visit with the children, interact with the families and every now and then, he’d get questions from parents and ask me to talk with them.” The Poseys held an annual fundraising gala at Oracle Park, visited with pediatric cancer patients at hospitals around the Bay Area and beyond and regularly met with Loh to learn about research initiatives and determine how to target their donations. “A generation of kids who have been diagnosed with cancer have greatly benefited from their efforts,” Loh said. “I know that, and I will always be grateful. The whole staff at UCSF will always be grateful to them because of their dedication to this community.” The efforts left a lasting impression on patients and their families but also on teammates who attended the annual galas and spent time around Posey in the Giants clubhouse.

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Posey made an impact on Joey Bart, his heir apparent at the catcher position. “You would learn the stories and conversations he had (with patients) and how strong they were — it’s really cool and very humbling,” Bart said. “The pain these kids go through, the adversity they face, for him to keep all of that in mind and play at an incredible level in the big leagues for so long, it speaks to him and the people around him.” Like his fellow Georgia native, Bart became a Giants first-round draft pick whose status as a top prospect has created immense hype. Posey’s decision to opt out in 2020 forced Bart to the big leagues ahead of schedule, but after spending nearly all of last season in the minors, he’s the player now ticketed for the starting catcher job. Fortunately for Bart, his teammates are realistic in their expectations. “Nobody can just step in and replace Buster Posey right away,” Crawford said. “I don’t think that even needs to be said. I think we have Joey, who is a top prospect for a reason, and hopefully, he can come in and learn at the big league level and try to fill the shoes the best he can.” As Bart prepares for his opportunity, he’s well aware of the legacy Posey leaves behind and expresses gratitude for the time

he spent tutoring a young player eager to learn. “I was anxious when I got drafted by the Giants, and the first thing I thought of was, like, ‘Wow, maybe I’ll get to go to big league camp and hang around (Posey) and watch what he does.’” Bart said. “The expectation I had, it always stayed the same. The way I saw him carry himself, watching him play and the way he acted on the field, off the field, he was always such a pro.” While his decision to walk away was relatively sudden, the reality is no amount of warning could prepare the Giants for a future without Posey. Zaidi jokingly asked Posey if his choice was “a sure thing.” Pence said Posey has been a “face of baseball,” and one of his former managers, Bruce Bochy, spent the minutes after Posey’s retirement news conference vouching for his Hall of Fame candidacy. As the Giants push forward into the future without Posey, the legendary catcher finds himself in a class of Bay Area athletes marked by the most exclusive company. “You look at the 49ers in the 80s, you think Joe Montana and Jerry Rice, because those were the best players,” said Crawford, a Bay Area native who grew up in Pleasanton. “Obviously, with the Warriors, it’s Steph (Curry) and Klay (Thompson) and Draymond (Green), because they were the best while they were winning championships. And you look at the Giants’ three titles, Buster was one of, if not the best player on the team during all three of those years.” The Giants existed long before Posey played in San Francisco and will exist long after his exit, too. Through an unrivaled career with the franchise, Posey ensured it’ll never look the same without him. San Francisco Giants pitcher Madison Bumgarner and catcher Buster Posey celebrate the team’s win over the Kansas City Royals in Game 7 of the World Series on Oct. 29, 2014. JOSE CARLOS FAJARDO/STAFF ARCHIVES

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Savvy scavengers from the skies Why those eighth-inning gulls gather at precisely their self-appointed hour is one of baseball’s great mysteries

B Y J OA N M O R R I S

he first ones float in slowly, silently, unobserved by most. They circle high above, watching, waiting and then glide in off the horizon to perch on upper railings and light standards, becoming ghostly sentinels. The crowd of baseball fans, intent on watching the opening innings of a game, are unlikely to notice the unusual visitors until, like a fury unleashed in the eighth inning, the skies fill with large and loud white-winged Valkyries, gleaming in the sun or luminescent in the lights that illuminate the night. The gulls have come. And they’ve come for your garlic fries. No one quite seems to know for certain why gulls — Western and California gulls, mostly — seem to know the Giants and A’s schedules nor why they show up en masse around the eighth inning. Is it the sounds, the smells, dumb luck? “Gulls are pretty smart and underappreciated,” says Scott Shaffer, a San Jose State University biologist who spends a lot of time with gulls. “They do a lot of interesting things besides pooping on cars and stealing food. If

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Above: Gulls descend upon the litterstrewn stands of Oracle Park in San Francisco. KARL MONDON/STAFF

Bottom right: The upper deck during an Athletics game proves irresistible for Bay Area birds. ARIC CRABB/STAFF

people could see what I see, they’d have a different view of gulls.” Shaffer’s view includes sneaking up on gulls on the Farallon Islands to slip tiny GPS trackers on them. Because gulls remember and recognize faces and distinctive clothing, Shaffer has to wear

disguises so the gulls won’t realize it’s “that guy” again. Shaffer then tracks the gulls as they fly about. He does other testing, too, that is not so savory, such as collecting their vomit to see what they’re eating, all in the name of research. The most amazing thing Shaffer has observed was a gull that seemed to travel at highway speeds, following a roadway from Berkeley to a recycling center in the Central Valley. He quickly figured out the bird had inadvertently hitched a ride on a recycling truck. At least he thought it was inadvertent, until the gull, which had flown back to Berkeley the next day at a more gull-like pace and route, did the same thing again. Scary smart. Theories abound about why the birds visit Bay Area ballparks, showing up for day and night games alike, and always around the same time in the game, no matter how slow play has been or how many extra innings it goes into. A common taunt aimed at pitchers taking too long between pitches: Hurry up, the gulls are waiting. The reverse is also curious. The gulls don’t bother with stadiums in the offseason or when the home team is away, AND they skipped it altogether last season when the stands were filled with cardboard cutouts. Food, obviously, is a big draw, but how do they know exactly when to come? Shaffer thinks the gulls are

As the crowds thin toward the end of a Giants game, Oracle Park turns into a buffet venue for hungry gulls with a taste for nacho cheese. KARL MONDON/STAFF

probably attracted by the crowds. The gulls likely have a few scouts — the early birds, if you will — that keep an eye on the stadiums for signs of activity. The birds have learned that the stadiums put out an extensive buffet. If they see activity, the scouts communicate to other gulls that the table is being set. Gulls aren’t shy about swooping in to take food, but they seem to wait for the eighth inning. Walnut Creek pediatrician Joanna Chin and her husband, attorney Byron Chin, describe themselves as gull hobbyists. Part of a volunteer group working to save Heermann’s gulls in Baja California, the Chins love gulls almost as much as they love the Giants — so a trip to the ballpark is a double joy for them. Their theory on the gulls’ eighth inning arrival: The birds have learned that the music played during the seventh-inning stretch is akin to a dinner bell, and the thinning crowd toward the end of the game gives the gulls more wing room to operate. Convinced that the Giants have the game well in hand (or irretrievably lost), fans head for the exit in an attempt to beat traffic. The smaller crowds mean less interference for the gulls, who swoop down to the bleachers, then make their way around and down to the field level sections to scarf down the snacks left behind. Garlic fries, hot dog remnants, spilled popcorn, even bright orange nacho cheese — the gulls attack it with glee. Gulls aren’t the only scavenging birds that visit ballparks, but they are perhaps the largest, loudest and most noticeable, and they show up in greater numbers, estimated in the thousands. The Chins are excited to take their 2-year-old daughter to her first Giants game this year, where they’ll teach her about strikes and foul balls, base hits and home runs and, of course, the gulls. Shaffer, a San Diego native and a Padres fan, probably won’t attend any games this season. Neither will the gulls he tracks on the Farallons, which have never made an appearance at either stadium. Well, there’s no telling when it comes to team loyalty.

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S TO RY BY J O H N M E TCA L F E

Red Sox legend M ‘Youk’ took on beer as a second career

PHOTOS BY DAI SUG ANO

Loma Brewing of Los Gatos is his newfound passion

any baseball players have second careers. Randy Johnson shoots concerts and African safaris as a professional photographer. Curt Schilling pursued video games, and David Eckstein teamed up with his wife to design sci-fi and comics-themed clothing for women. For former Red Sox slugger Kevin Youkilis, it’s beer. “I got to travel the country (as an MLB star) and just try different breweries,” he says. “When I got done with baseball I thought, ‘Hey, I don’t want to sit around all day. I’m looking to have a job.’” Folks throughout the world herald “Youk” for his two World Series championships and for helping lift the Red Sox from their slump. But around Los Gatos, people also know him as the owner of Loma Brewing Company, where you can find him doing boss stuff when he’s not hanging with his wife, Julie — sister of Tom Brady — or taking “coaching to another level” at Little League games. Baseball memorabilia isn’t plastered around Loma. The brewpub is understated in a way that, say, the Double D’s Sports Grille down the street is not. Youkilis and crew prefer to focus on their product, and so far that’s worked — Loma won the commercial brewery of the year award at the 2017 California State Fair and, with its restaurant and outdoor patio, draws crowds who seem only vaguely familiar with the owner’s pedigree. “He’s one of the very few that has done a very good job” running a brewery, says Doug Constantiner, founder of San Diego’s Societe Brewing and guest on Youkilis’ web series, “Happy Hour with Youk!” “One thing that’s really stuck out to me is the amount of questions he asks and the type of questions, and then he just listens. All he does is, like,

Opposite: Loma Brewing owner and former Red Sox slugger Kevin Youkilis opened his brewpub in Los Gatos in 2016. A glass of Sour Sport, a kettle sour beer at Loma Brewing, waits on a customer’s table.

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information gather.” Ethanol might run in Youkilis’ veins. His great uncle was a Prohibition bootlegger who trucked booze for the Seagram’s founder from Canada to Ohio. And Youkilis’ physique certainly sounds like that of a suds guzzler’s, to judge from the rather uncharitable descriptions from baseball insiders during his career: “roly-poly,” “thicker-bodied,” “more a refrigerator repairman, a butcher, the man selling hammers behind the counter at the True Value hardware store.” Dan Reineke, general manager at Loma, enjoyed plenty of beers with Youkilis when they played for the University of Cincinnati Bearcats. “But not good beer, that’s for sure,” Reineke says. “Cincinnati’s actually a cool, historically beer-centric town with German roots. It didn’t matter.” “Anything that was affordable and cheap,” says Youkilis. “Milwaukee’s Best, Natural Light, Little Kings — that was the worst one ever. Little Kings was a cream ale, and it was not good.” Youkilis found a new appreciation of beer in Boston. “I started opening up my palate by going to a liquor store called Marty’s in Newton, Massachusetts,” he says. “They had beers from all over the country, a lot of West Coast beers, and that introduced me to IPAs and different and newer things that were coming about.” (Owner Marty Siegal doesn’t recall Youkilis tootling among the shelves but says he wouldn’t have recognized him anyway: “I just don’t watch baseball.”) It was in Boston that Youkilis delved into making his own beer. “I homebrewed — once — with the current manager of the Minnesota Twins, Rocco Baldelli,” he recalls. “We homebrewed one IPA together, and it came out good. I’m big on statistics, so I was one for one and batting a thousand, so I stopped.” Was making an IPA for a starter project difficult? “I just cleaned

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Loma Brewing general manager Dan Reineke presides over the brewpub bar.

a lot and followed the directions, and it came out all right. I brought it in for a few guys to try, some trainers, and it was pretty cool. No one got sick, and no one died, so that’s a win.” When Youkilis opened Loma with his restaurateur brother Scott, he was prepared. “He came in with all these great names of core beers,” says head brewer Justin Peck. “So we have Youks Kolsch, Greek God of Hops — which is a play on his old nick-

Above: Loma Brewing’s IPAs include one dubbed Jew-jitsu. Right: From left, customers Jason Bottino, Eddie Aguilar, James Hanlon, and bartender Alex Maurer, have lunch at Loma Brewing.

name — and Jew-jitsu, which is also one of his original ideas, because he does jiu-jitsu and is Jewish.” Fans of Michael Lewis’ “Moneyball” will recognize the “Greek God of Walks” moniker, minted for Youkilis’ propensity to get on base. “I wish I could say I had” visited the brewery, says Lewis. “I only actually met him once, in the visiting clubhouse at the Coliseum, when he was on the Red Sox. Seemed like a great dude.” Also on the menu is the cucumber-lime hard seltzer Cougar Juice. Youkilis was once connected with a 2008 energy drink called SlumpBuster, which happens to be a rude term for a woman a baseball player sleeps with to break a string of bad luck. Could Cougar Juice carry similarly risque undertones? Not quite. “We’re in Los Gatos, so there are all kinds of cats and mountain lions around here,” says Youkilis. “And people are big into hard seltzer, so we’re just adapting and growing with the trends.”

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Venture into Loma, and you’ll see display bags of small-batch coffee — another trend Youkilis has pounced on. Someday it might compete with Dunkin’. “Coffee is something I’m doing personally on my own, because I don’t want to inundate my people too much with too many ideas right now,” he says. “The whole idea is to eventually move ‘Loma Coffee’ to the greater Boston and New England area. We’re looking for ways to connect with the community I got to play for and the fan base that was always so great to me.” Loma tries hard not to be a baseball brewery, but that hasn’t kept the baseball players out. “David Wells came here one time with Eric Byrnes. Nick Punto has been here and Kevin Frandsen. I’m trying to think of all the baseball players that’ve come through — Jay Gibbons? Jay Gibbons came through here,” Youkilis says. “Mitch Haniger comes in. We get a lot of 49ers coaches — oh, Shawn Estes came in here — and a lot of 49ers front-office people.” Youkilis has avoided any career-ending injuries at the brewery like dropping a full keg on his foot. “Yeah, that’s not happening,” he says. What has been devastating to business is the pandemic. “It’s been so stressful the past two years, I think I’d rather go back and face sliders.” But he has a bright vision for the future and plans to open a new brewpub and production facility next year in Manteca, where he’ll perhaps help start a company softball team. “When we get to Manteca, we’ll put a team together for sure, because we’re across the street from one of the best softball facilities in the state (Big League Dreams),” says Reineke. “Kevin won’t play,” he adds. “I’m out. I’m out,” says Youkilis. Details: Loma Brewing Company, 130 N. Santa Cruz Ave., Los Gatos; 408-5609626, www.lomabrew.com

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Above: Boston Red Sox’s Manny Ramirez, left is hugged by teammate Kevin Youkilis after Ramirez scored the game-winning run during a win over the Toronto Blue Jays in 2008. AP PHOTO/WINSLOW TOWNSON, FILE

Left: An interior view of Loma Brewing’s bar area.

Beer and baseball: Two American pastimes linked B Y J O H N M E TCA L F E

Here are some great California breweries with more connections to the game:

first time,” Hester says. The brewery now sells radlers in stores around the country and at its new Oakland taproom, also the site of the popular burger joint, Lovely’s.

S T R I K E B R E W I N G C O. , SA N J O S E

Two Pitchers Brewing Co.: 2344 Webster St., Oakland; 510-999-4939, www. twopitchers.com

Strike was founded by three former collegiate athletes, one of whom coached and another who played minor league for the Boston Red Sox organization. After their sports careers ended, they started a brewery with the “name being the least subtle nod to the sport,” says co-founder Drew Ehrlich. “Many of our beers have names that have some sort of tie to baseball — Two Seam, Triple Play, Lost in the Sun — or reference baseball in other media — Colossus of Clout, Run Like Haze, Haze on First?, etc.,” says Ehrlich. And they have more punny seasonal beers coming out in the future, like “Opening Haze (if baseball season ever begins), Fall Ball and Fireworks Night.”

A N C H O R B R E W I N G C O., SAN FRANCISCO

Anchor has partnered with the San Francisco Giants for more than a decade to make baseball-themed brews like Los Gigantes, a Mexican-style lager, and packaging featuring the team’s colors and logos. “Most significantly, in April 2012, Anchor Brewing unveiled Anchor Plaza at the ballpark in San Francisco, designed to mimic the feel of visiting the actual Anchor brewery taproom. It’s the ultimate venue for enjoying brews and baseball by the Bay,” says senior brand manager Rhys Carvolth. Two Pitchers Brewing Company co-owners Tommy Hester and Wilson Barr met while playing on the Williams College baseball team in Massachusetts.

Strike Brewing Co.: 2099 S. 10th St. Unit 30, San Jose; 669-342-6480, www. strikebrewingco.com

A L E S M I T H B R E W I N G C O., SAN DIEGO

T WO P I TC H E R S B R E W I N G C O., OA K L A N D

The founders of Two Pitchers met while playing on the Williams College baseball team in Massachusetts. “Playing might be a little generous, though,” says co-founder Tommy Hester. “We were pretty firmly stapled to the bench for most of our collegiate careers. During those long hours with no playing time in sight, we found a shared love of craft beer.” What they loved was light, aromatic and a perfect thirstquencher after a hot day of playing ball. “We came up with the idea to make craft radlers — small-batch beers blended with all-natural fruits and juices post-fermentation. The goal was to take this maligned concept and bring it into the craft fold for the

Anchor Brewing Co.: Available everywhere. To tour the San Francisco brewery, call 415-863-8350 or visit https://raiseanchor. anchorbrewing.com

AleSmith makes a Tony Gwynn Pale Ale .394 every year that “Mr. Padre” himself helped craft: He specified it should be “light with a kick.” And the brewery’s tasting room hosts a Tony Gwynn Museum with treasures like his “keepsake milestone baseballs and the notes he wrote on the ball calling out the pitcher and/or what type of pitch was thrown for that hit,” says Kristen Ballinger, marketing communications manager. “There are also personal items of Tony’s that are displayed, like shoes, his watch collection and boxing gloves.” The beer lineup at Oakland’s Two Pitchers Brewing include the Water Boy, Bayou and Radler. JANE TYSKA/STAFF

AleSmith Brewing Co.: 9990 AleSmith Court, San Diego; 858-549-9888, https:// alesmith.com

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BY L I N DA Z AVO R A L

ay what you will about baseball’s new age of analytics, but the Great American Pastime is still a game steeped in nostalgia, and that extends to the fans in the stands. They’ve been eating hot dogs since European immigrants started peddling these easily held mealsin-a-bun at East Coast stadiums in the 1890s. Baseball’s stars have been fans, too. The Great Bambino routinely downed four hot dogs as a between-innings snack in the 1920s and ’30s on his way to that 714-homer mark, giving rise to the saying, “Babe Ruth did it on hot dogs and beer.” Here in the Bay Area, many of today’s top sausage makers set up shop long before the San Francisco Giants arrived in 1958 and the Oakland A’s in 1968 — and descendants of those first butchers are carrying on the tradition. It’s a rich history that includes an Italian sausage maker whose recipe dates to 1908, Bavarian sausage makers who have been in San Francisco since 1926 and an East Bay frank favorite with Armenian roots that got its start in the 1930s. So if you’re watching the game at home, you can pay tribute to the culinary roots of the game while rooting for your team. Here’s a guide to some of the classics:

There’s no more historic ballpark food than the savory sausage-in-a-bun

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CA S P E R S FA M O U S H OT D O G S

San Leandro’s SPAR Sausage Co. is better known as the place that makes Caspers Famous Hot Dogs for East Bay restaurants and legions of home customers. These old-school, hickory-smoked dogs deliver that distinctive snap

E V E R G O O D S AU S AG E C O. From Germany’s Bavarian region came Jacob Rauscher and family, who started making OldWorld sausages in a San Francisco smokehouse in 1926. They were later joined by the Harlan Miller and George Ehrlich families. Today, their sports-centric descendants — president Don Miller coached baseball at Campolindo High in Moraga for years — fuel the fans of both the Giants and the A’s. At Oracle Park, Evergood supplies the popular Hot Link Sausage, the cult-favorite Pineapple Sausage and the Polish Kielbasa, which is served grilled and covered with peppers, onions and kraut.

Where to buy: Costco, Lunardi’s, Zanotto’s, Safeway, Nob Hill, Lucky, Raley’s, Nob Hill and other retailers. Find the full list at www. evergoodfoods.com. N E W YO R K S T Y L E SAU SAG E C O.

when you take your first bite. The signature recipe comes from two Armenian immigrant families who opened their first eatery in 1934. In 1989, they established the SPAR facility (named for the founders’ first initials: Stephen, Paul, Ardam and Rose) to keep the sausage-making all in the family. Where to buy: Besides grocery and specialty markets (Safeway, Lucky, Raley’s, Nob Hill, SaveMart, Diablo Foods), customers also may purchase the Caspers dogs, Polish sausages, hot links and chicken and all-beef franks at 688 Williams St. in San Leandro, but phone ahead for hours, 510614-8100. www.sparsausage.com CHIARAMONTE’S D E L I & SAU SAG E S

Talk about a time-tested recipe. Chiaramonte’s in San Jose has been making Italian sausages

Above: Hot dogs have been a baseball game staple for well over a century. GETTY IMAGES

Opposite: Jack Dorian and George Rustigian, co-founders of the Spar Sausage Company of San Leandro, supply all of the hot dogs for the venerable Caspers Hot Dogs chain in the Bay Area. STAFF FILE

since way back when “Tinker to Evers to Chance” was the game’s fierce double-play threat. Butcher Salvatore Chiaramonte brought the recipe with him from Sicily and opened the shop in 1908. Over the years, the original recipe — made in small batches from pork butt, with no additives — has spawned Hot and Garlic versions, and now, owner Lou Chiaramonte Sr. says, an Extra Hot version with jalapeños. He serves them in the shop with peppers, onions and sauce, but he enjoys a mustard-laced ballpark sausage, too. Where to buy: Only at the original shop where the sausages are made, 609 N. 13th St. in San Jose, which is open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday-Thursday, until 5 p.m. Friday-Saturday. 408-2950943. http://orderchiaramontesdeliandsausages.com

The largest maker of fresh Italian sausage on the West Coast, this Sunnyvale company recently celebrated its 70th year in business. The founding year of 1951 was a good one for the Giants, then still in New York, what with Bobby Thomson hitting the Shot Heard Round the World and Willie Mays taking Rookie of the Year honors. Patriarch Frank D’Ambrosio’s recipe is today’s Mild Italian Sausage, and it’s joined by Sweet, Hot, Calabrese, Basil & Garlic, Vino & Formaggio, Garlic & Romano Cheese and Louisiana style sausages, plus a line of Beer Bratwurst that includes one made with Gordon Biersch’s locally brewed Märzen beer.

and started making classic Portuguese linguica in 1967. Italian sausage and Spanish-style chorizo were later added to the lineup. Today, with Fernando and Rick Martins at the helm, fans can find their sausages at San Jose Giants, San Francisco 49ers and San Jose Sharks games. At home, you may want to think outside the box (batter’s or otherwise) and try one of Silva’s newer varieties, like the Bourbon, Bacon & Black Pepper smoked sausage. Where to buy: Whole Foods, Safeway, Costco, Food4Less, Walmart and others. Find the full list at www.silvasausage.com.

M OV E OV E R, C R AC K E R JAC K . N OW T H E R E ’ S BA L L PA R K B R I T T L E

As much as we love the seventh-inning song, we’ve moved beyond peanuts and Cracker Jack since trying the sweet-and-savory A Day at the Ballpark Brittle from Sweetdragon Baking Co. of San Jose. Creative candy-maker Hwayling Hsu was exploring a peanut-and-pretzel combination, but pretzels made her think of beer. So that went in the batch. And then someone in the commissary kitchen suggested adding a touch of mustard. Home run! Where to buy: Sweetdragon’s window is open for walk-up sales from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday and Saturday at 898 Lincoln Ave., San Jose. Find a list of other retailers or have the treat shipped to you at https://sweetdragonbaking.com.

Where to buy: Andronico’s, Safeway, Costco, Raley’s, Target, Walmart, Winco, Grocery Outlet, FoodMaxx, Nugget and many more. Find the full list at www. newyorkstylesausage.com. S I LVA SAU SAG E C O.

Also keeping it all in the family: the Silva Sausage operation, founded in San Jose and now based in Gilroy. Manuel Martins immigrated to the States from Portugal, by way of Argentina,

San Jose’s Sweetdragon Baking Company makes a variety of brittles, from Pumpkin Ale to A Day at the Ballpark. NHAT V. MEYER/STAFF

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Custom-crafted sticks of wood have Birdman Bats swinging in the big leagues S TO R Y BY J O H N M E TCA L F E PHOTOS BY DAI SUG ANO

ou know you’ve reached the big leagues when Yasiel Puig licks your bat. “He used them in the (2018) World Series and got an RBI hit, and that was a watershed moment for us,” says Cody Silveria, the bat maker for Birdman Bats, of the former Dodgers All-Star. “We felt like we made it. And he was licking his bats all the time — he’s famous for licking bats, you can look it up. He’s a strange cat, but it helps with the brand.” For all you golfers out there, Birdman Bats makes bespoke baseball bats in its Redwood City warehouse. What started as a hobby among a bunch of baseball enthusiasts has gone on to pollinate the highest levels of the sport. Professional players who have swung Birdman wood include Pablo Sandoval, Manny Ramirez, Ozzie Albies and Austin Slater. “They came by in spring training in 2020, before the pandemic, and handed me a couple of samples. I tried them and just really liked them,” says Slater, an outfielder with the San Francisco Giants. “I had been thinking about switching to birch — I had swung ash before — and I really liked the model they gave me and the way the ball came off the bat with their birch and their matte finish. You could talk to a lot of baseball players, and if you find success with a bat, you tend to stick with it.” Birdman owes its origins to a youthful fascination with baseball. Birdman Bats owner Gary Malec had already begun making his own bats when he played ball at City College of San Francisco.

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“I had made a few bats in high school — I grew up in Half Moon Bay — so I just made bats on a lathe for fun, like, glued three pieces of terrible wood together and chiseled them out,” says Silveria. “I was always drawn to wood as a kid. Even for my science-fair project I decided which type of wood absorbs the most water and why.” Silveria met up with one of Birdman Bats’ founders, Gary Malec, when they were both playing baseball for the City College of San Francisco. Malec also happened to be making his own bats. “Gary was making them by hand back then,” Silveria says. “I was proud of the first couple of Birdmans he made. If you had a bad day, and you knew you needed to hit, you always grabbed that lucky piece of lumber.

“Ours are supposed to make you feel like you did when you were a kid, with this youthful, funspirited energy.” Gary Malec, Founder of Birdman Bats

“They resembled logs with knobs on them, but they were still lucky, and they had a nice, thunderous crack when you hit with them.” At the time, Malec had just quit law school. “I wanted to be a player agent. I thought that would be a really awesome gig,” he says. “But when I went to law school, it just continuously showed it was not for me. It was just so expensive. They had debt-relief seminars at law school on how to cope with all the debt you’re taking on just going to school. That was really weird to me — it was a big alarm.” What did his parents think of their son giving up on his legal ambitions? 32 PLAY BALL

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Top: Vivid colors drip from the bats as they dry in the Redwood City warehouse owned by Birdman Bats. Above: Gary Malec’s brother, Mark, dips a bat into layers of color to achieve Birdman Bats’ distinctive “hydro-dip” effect.

“I went on a ride with my mom, and I told her, and I went on a ride with my dad and told him. So I told them separately,” he says. “I was so scared. But honestly, they were way more supportive than I thought they’d be. They were like, ‘If it’s not for you, it’s not for you.’” Malec fell back on his passion for making stuff. “I’m very mechanical, so I’ve been building things since I was little. I built my first frame-up car, motor and everything, when I was a sophomore in high school. It was a 1984 Jeep CJ7.” He had no training in woodworking but started chiseling bats as a hobby. He gave them to coaches and people on the city college’s baseball team and made a friend in Lars Anderson, a Bay Area native who played for the Red Sox from 2010 to 2012. “(Malec) wears a lot of hats and is a pretty impressively capable guy,” says Anderson. “I remember just destroying my computer in Japan (while playing for the Kochi

Top: Mark Malec checks on the bats in the drying room at Birdman Bats. Far left: Each billet’s weight is jotted on its end. Left: Birdman Bats employee Julio Munoz adds a touch of color to a custom bat.

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Above: Bats are hung to dry at Birdman Bats. Right: Birdman Bats owner Gary Malec quit law school to pursue his passion for baseball. Opposite page: The Birdman logo is based on a whimsical doodle Mark Malec drew in art school.

Fighting Dogs) by dumping water all over it, and sending it back to him, and he fixed it. There’s a lot of knowledge in that guy’s brain.” Malec tasked Anderson, now a co-owner of Birdman Bats, with using his connections to get bats into the hands of professional players. “Having been involved in the game for so long, that just opens up a lot of doors,” Anderson says. “Baseball is kind of insular, but once you’re in, it’s definitely a family.” He also had him conduct some industrial research. “There are no books on how to do this,” Malec says. “And other bat makers aren’t going to openly help you, because then you’re stealing their business. It’s a cutthroat industry.” Instead, he suggested that anytime Anderson, then playing in the minor leagues with the Dodgers, saw a broken bat, he should grab it: “Collect every model you can find, from every company. At

the end of the season, he had this big horde for me.” The Birdman team studied these bats to refine their own model. Bat manufacturers tend to get all their wood from the same mills. Birdman takes pains to pick choice lumber and doesn’t saw the wood. Instead, the company splits it with a hydraulic ax, which preserves the grain. “One of the factors that’s important to the durability of bats is the slope of grain, and that’s the orientation of the way the tree grew in comparison to the way the bat is produced from the wood,” says Patrick Drane, assistant director of the Baseball Research Center at UMass Lowell. “There’s a lot of different processes used for cutting the billets (unfinished blanks) and turning the bats out of those billets. But a splitting of the wood tends to help align the orientation of that slope of grain with the length of the bat,” says Drane. (For folks wondering, the center conducts all sorts of baseball-related experiments involving high-powered air cannons that generate collisions between balls and bats, walls and helmets. “It is fun,” he says.) The bats then get sanded down. They don’t have serial numbers; instead, they get “born-on” dates so you can track their lifespan. Malec has bats with 2017 dates that he’s consistently used and are still performing well. A bevy of customizations is sometimes added, such as special color schemes, personalized engravings and the Birdman logo, which is based on a goofy drawing Malec’s younger brother made in art school. “All these companies are, like, someone’s last name slapped on a piece of wood. That doesn’t make me feel much,” says Malec. “Ours are supposed to make you feel like you did when you were a kid, with this youthful, fun-spirited energy.” Anderson says, “You can see how they’re not mass-produced on some machine. It’s cool — kind of this handmade, functional piece of art.” And in case Puig and his wandering tongue come along, rest assured the bats are protected. “The bats are definitely not water-submersible,” Anderson says. “They are, however, waterproof, due to the coating they have on them.”

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‘Batter up!’ brings out some crazy great walk-up songs

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S TO RY BY J I M H A R R I N G TO N

I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y D AV I D J A C K B R O W N I N G

ans of every stripe have the city of Chicago to thank for deep-dish pizza, Italian beef sandwiches and the Smashing Pumpkins — and baseball walk-up music. ¶ The walkup song — the snippet of music that’s blasted as a batter approaches the plate — got its start in the Windy City in the early 1970s. It was the brainchild of Chicago White Sox organist Nancy Faust, who is credited on MLB.com as the originator of the genre.

“Now you call it walk-up music,” Faust said in an MLB.com article. “I just played intro music for whoever was coming up to bat.” The music did far more than merely identify the man heading out to bat. It fired up the batter and the crowd and psyched out the opposing team. It was a game changing idea, given that up until then, ballpark music was primarily a mix of the national anthem, organ standards and, of course, the iconic “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” A half century after Faust had the bright idea, walk-up music is now as much a part of the fabric of baseball as Cracker Jack and the crack of the bat. These are some of the all-time best walk-up music choices and the players associated with those tunes. (This list is focused solely on walk-up music for batters, not the equally entertaining music used to introduce relief pitchers. That’s why you won’t see Mariano Rivera and “Enter Sandman” listed.)

played this classic R&B-pop number from Oakland’s The Pointer Sisters to bring Harold Baines to the plate. It was a good fit for the shy White Sox slugger, whose Hall of Fame career included stints with the Oakland A’s from 1990 to 1992, as well as with the Texas Rangers, Baltimore Orioles and the team now known as the Cleveland Guardians.

Harold Baines, “He’s So Shy” This walk-up music list goes up to bat with a tip of the hat to the originator herself — Faust, who

David Ortiz, “Big Poppa” Of course, the man nicknamed Big Papi would turn to this Notorious B.I.G. classic for his

Manny Machado, “Gasolina” This home run hitter for the San Diego Padres has a number of good walk-up songs, including Kendrick Lamar’s “Humble,” but it’s this Daddy Yankee offering that fires us up the most. (We just don’t want to hear it if Machado is playing against our favorite teams.) Josh Reddick, “Careless Whisper” The outfielder’s choice of this silky Wham! pop ballad — pretty much the antithesis of the stereotypical walk-up song — further endeared him to A’s fans and helped cement his folk hero status in Oakland.

walk-up music. We’re hoping organizers will play “Big Poppa” in Cooperstown, when the Red Sox icon is inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame later this year. Mike Yastrzemski, “When the Levee Breaks” Who doesn’t like to get the Led (Zeppelin) out? San Francisco Giants fans certainly enjoyed hearing this great track played during the team’s blockbuster 2021 season, signaling that Yaz was on his way to the box. Chipper Jones, “Crazy Train” Opposing pitchers knew they were in trouble when this Ozzy Osbourne favorite kicked into gear, signaling that this Atlanta Braves great was ready to swing the lumber. Charlie Blackmon, “Your Love” You can’t go wrong selecting the best-loved tune from a band named The Outfield as your walk-up song. Just ask Colorado Rockies fans. Randal Grichuk, “Here Comes the Boom” Is that a threat? Well, let’s just say opposing pitchers were definitely feeling the heat when they

played the St. Louis Cardinals and heard this Nelly number blasting. Added points for Nelly being a St. Louis guy. Mark Canha, “Like a Virgin” This UC Berkeley alum raised plenty of eyebrows and a goodly number of giggles when he picked this particular dance-pop tune as his walk-up song with the Oakland A’s. Word is, Canha wasn’t playing it for laughs. The new New York Met is a big Madonna fan. Ken Griffey, Jr., “Hip Hop Hooray” Seattle Mariners fans will likely never hear this Naughty by Nature song again without having “Junior” — aka, “The Kid” or “The Natural” — come immediately to mind. Kris Bryant, “Warm It Up” The former Chicago Cubs player, who spent last season with the San Francisco Giants, found a certain symmetry in his walk-up choice: Kris Bryant with a Kris Kross song. Added bonus that Kris Kross makes us jump, of course. Ronald Acuna Jr., “La Player (Bandolera)” This power hitter, who won the National League Rookie of the Year Award in 2018 with the Atlanta Braves, turned to this groovy number from reggaeton music duo Zion & Lennox for his walk-up song.

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CRANK UP THE WAYBACK MACHINE The Bay Area’s rich baseball history predates the Giants and A’s by a looong shot

the baseball gods were to grant you a trip in their time machine to attend a game at any ballpark in Bay Area history, which one would you choose? As a historian of ’70s baseball, I find the prospect of witnessing the Oakland A’s in action at the Coliseum during their dynastic “Mustache Gang” years incredibly alluring, and I’d gladly risk the possibility of frostbite to catch the flamboyant John “The Count” Montefusco on the mound at Candlestick Park during the 1975 season, when he won the National League’s Rookie of the Year award. Going back a decade earlier, it would be pretty sweet to watch Catfish Hunter break MLB’s 46-year perfect game drought under the Coliseum lights on the night of May 8, 1968, or see Willie Mays, Orlan-

STORY BY DAN EPSTEIN I LLU S T R AT I O N BY DAV I D E BA R C O

do Cepeda and the rest of that incredibly loaded 1962 Giants squad take on the New York Yankees at the pre-enclosed (and even chillier) incarnation of the ’Stick. But while Giants and A’s history obviously gives us plenty of colorful and fascinating moments to pick from, the Bay Area’s rich baseball legacy began well before the arrival of major league franchises. The first baseball game in San Francisco may have been played as early as 1851, and the first “official” contest occurred on February 22, 1860, at a spot called Center’s Bridge, located near 16th and Harrison in the Mission district. That game, between the Eagles and Red Rovers, ended in a 33-33 tie, though the Eagles were awarded a forfeit win after the Red Rovers complained of shoddy umpiring and went home.

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Opening game of the Pacific Coast League with the San Francisco Seals against the Oakland Oaks. From left: Johnny Vergez, Oaks manager, umpire Henry Fanning, umpire Bill Doran, and Lefty O’Doul, Seals manager, on April 4, 1939. TOMMY MCDONOUGH/ STAFF ARCHIVES

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As baseball (or “base ball,” as it was known in those days) grew in local popularity, so did calls to establish uniformity of competition, and in 1866, the six-club Pacific Base Ball Convention became the Bay Area’s first official “league.” PBBC games occurred at a variety of sandlots in San Francisco and the East Bay, though the most games were initially played at the Pioneer Race Course, located approximately at Capp and 24th in the Mission — at least until Recreation Grounds, the city’s first “proper” ballpark, was opened near the present-day site of Garfield Square in 1868. The 1880s saw the construction of two 15,000-capacity ballparks in San Francisco — Recreation Park a.k.a. Central Park, which was located at Eighth and Market near City Hall, and the HaightStreet Recreation Park at Stanyan and Waller streets in the Haight. Early California League teams like the San Francisco Californias, the San Francisco Haverlys and the San Francisco Pioneers regularly played at these parks, as did their East Bay rivals the Oakland Colonels. Both parks were also the scene of exhibition games featuring major league teams from New York, Boston and Chicago. The Haight-Street ballpark closed in 1895, but Recreation/Central Park continued on as the city’s main baseball venue until it was destroyed by the 1906 earthquake. In 1903, the Pacific Coast League was born, and its two Bay Area charter franchises — the San Francisco Seals and the Oakland Oaks — delighted countless local baseball fans over the next 50plus years. The Seals won 14 PCL titles during their existence, and the Oaks five, and both teams contributed a wealth of great players to the majors, including Hall of Famers Earl Averill, Joe DiMaggio, Ferris Fain, Lefty Gomez, Billy Herman, Ernie Lombardi, Mel Ott, Albie Pearson and Paul Waner. In fact, the consistently high level of play exhibited throughout the PCL earned it a reputation as

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“the third major league,” though its attempts to officially join the American and National leagues were soundly rebuffed. The Oaks played the majority of their home games in Emeryville, first at Freeman’s Park at 59th Street and San Pablo Avenue, and then from 1913 to 1955 at the 11,000-capacity Oaks Park, located at 45th and San Pablo. In 1946, the intimate park was also briefly home to the Oakland Larks of the West Coast Baseball Association, a short-lived all-Black league. The

Above: Former major league player Frank “Lefty” O’Doul, then in his first season as manager with the San Francisco Seals, is flanked by his two outfield aces, Joe Martyn, left, and Joe DiMaggio, right, on July 11, 1935. AP PHOTO

Left: Former Oakland Mayor Lionel Wilson, shown here on Nov. 2, 1980, was also a gifted athlete. PENNI GLADSTONE/STAFF ARCHIVES

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Larks, who finished first during the WCBA’s lone season, featured two notable players on their pitching staff — Sam “Toothpick” Jones, who would go on to win 102 games in the majors, and Lionel “Lefty” Wilson, who would go on to become Oakland’s first Black mayor. The Seals, arguably the PCL’s premier franchise, also boasted what many considered to be the league’s premier ballpark. From 1931 to 1957, they played their home games at Seals Stadium, an elegant and intimate venue located at the corner of 16th and Bryant, not far from the site of that initial Eagles-Red Rovers contest in 1860. The concrete-and-steel Art Deco structure offered seating for 16,000 fans, clear sightlines, a gorgeous view of the Mission district from the grandstand and three spacious clubhouses — one for the Seals, one for opponents and one for the Mission Reds, the Seals’ far-less-popular local rivals, who only lasted from 1926 to 1937. (The park was also home in 1946 to the WCBA’s San Francisco Sea Lions.) Another unique feature of Seals Stadium was that its neighbors included the Lagendorf Bakery and the Rainier (later Hamm’s) Brewery, which meant that day games were often fragrant with the comforting scents of freshbaked bread and warm beer. “When we played in the afternoons at Seals Stadium, these big beer suds would come floating over the field,” Portland Beavers outfielder Nino Bongiovanni told PCL historian Dick Dobbins in the latter’s wonderful book, “The Grand Minor League: An Oral History of the Old Pacific Coast

Hugh Luby made his debut in the Pacific Coast League with the Oakland Oaks in 1938. He is seen here in September 1942 after breaking the league record with the most consecutive games. STAFF ARCHIVES

Above: Mark Sigmon, of San Leandro, a history professor at San Francisco State University holds a handmade Oakland Oaks scorebook from 1947 and baseball mitt.

ANDA

CHU/STAFF ARCHIVES

Left: Oakland Athletics coaches get a visit from San Francisco Giants star Willie Mays in 1968. From left: Manager Hank Bauer, Joe DiMaggio, John McNamara, Bill Posedel, Sherm Lollar and Vern Hoscheit. RON RIESTERER/STAFF ARCHIVES

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“When we played in the afternoons at Seals Stadium, these big beer suds would come floating over the field. It made you want to have a beer.” Portland Beavers outfielder Nino Bongiovanni to PCL historian Dick Dobbins in Dobbins’ book, “The Grand Minor League: An Oral History of the Old Pacific Coast League”

League.” “It made you want to have a beer.” For Lefty O’Doul, this was most certainly a feature and not a bug. A legendary character who liked to dress entirely in green off the field — and even drove a green Cadillac — the San Francisco native won the PCL’s Most Valuable Player award in 1927 (when he hit .378 with 33 homers for the Seals) before going on to win two batting crowns in the National League. He returned in 1936 to manage the Seals and bagged five PCL pennants during his 15-year stint as skipper. A goodwill ambassador to Japan before and after World War II, O’Doul was so vital to the growth of baseball in that country that he was enshrined in the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame, the only American to achieve such an honor. In 1958, after the arrival of the Giants (who played their first two seasons at Seals Stadium) spelled the end of the PCL in the Bay Area, O’Doul opened up his own restaurant and cocktail lounge in San Francisco’s Union Square neighborhood, where he was a regular, green-suited presence until his death in 1969. O’Doul was buried in Colma’s Cypress Lawn Memorial Park. His headstone, which is emblazoned with a baseball and regulation-sized bat, bears the epitaph, “He was here at a good time and had a good time while he was here.” If I had a ticket for that aforementioned time machine, I’d set the controls for Seals Stadium, somewhere during Lefty O’Doul’s managerial tenure. Though it would be fun to watch a 20-year-old Joe DiMaggio in 1935— his final year with the Seals, when he hit .398 with 34 home runs — it wouldn’t have to even be a specific game or season. I just want to sit in that grandstand, watch some classic PCL action, soak up the San Francisco sunshine, sniff the beery, bready aromas as they float by and listen to O’Doul as he hilariously harangues the umpires. That sure sounds like a good time to me.

Above: Oakland Oaks trainer Red Adams, left, gives Allen Gettel a shoulder massage after a workout on August 7, 1951. STAFF ARCHIVES

Left: The empty Seals Stadium in San Francisco is shown in this aerial view on June 13, 1957. AP PHOTO

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Churros, fireworks, seats for your pooch Minor league teams treat their fans to extras B Y L I N DA Z AVO R A L

he majors are perfectly fine. But baseball’s minor leagues have a history of stepping up to the plate when it comes to entertaining fans. (As if cheap tickets weren’t enough!) Most teams host heritage game days and base-running events for kids — besides scheduling several fireworks nights a season. And then there are the signature events. Here’s a roundup of fun ones:

SA N J O S E G I A N T S : D I A D E LO S C H U R R O S Churros are so popular with fans at the San Jose Giants’ Excite Ballpark that the team honors the sweet legacy on not one but several game days during the season. It’s all in tribute to Hipolito Cerda, the man who has been making them fresh for decades at his Olimpos Churros stand just off the third-base line. On Dia de los Churros, the players wear jerseys and hats featuring cartoon churro characters. Just how fabulous are these warm, cinnamon-y sticks? Some fans show up at games wearing shirts that say, “I’m only here for the churros.” Details: www.milb.com/san-jose M O D E S TO N U T S : P U P S & P I N T S

You, your best canine buddy, beer discounts — and a baseball game! At every Thursday home game, the Pups & Pints hangout at Modesto’s John Thurman

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A fixture at the San Jose Giants game, Hipolito Cerda drops fresh churros in the case at the Excite Ballpark in San Jose. The San Jose Churros are part of Minor League Baseball’s Copa de la Diversión initiative. “Copa de la Diversión,” or “Fun Cup,” is a season-long event series specifically designed to embrace the culture and values that resonate most with the participating teams’ Hispanic and Latino communities. JOSIE LEPE FOR BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

Field doubles as an off-leash dog park. When you’re ready to watch the game, you leash up and head to seating in one of the dog-designated sections. Keep in mind that if you decide to attend, you will need to sign a legally binding waiver that requires you to take responsibility for your pooch at all times. And no, the players batting cleanup will not be taking on that duty when it comes to your dog. Details: www.milb. com/modesto R A N C H O C U CA M O N G A Q UA K E S : ‘ S TA R WA R S ’ N I G H T

Cosplay will come to the Quakes’ LoanMart Field again this May 14 when the team hosts “Star Wars” night and plays the Stockton Ports for the fifth day in a six-game series. Fans can meet and take selfies with Darth Vader, Chewbacca and other characters, make crafts and participate in a costume contest. After the game, stick around for a fireworks spectacular set to John Williams’ stirring “Star Wars” theme. Details: www.milb.com/rancho-cucamonga S TO C K TO N P O R T S : A S PA R AG U S N I G H T

When you’re the Asparagus Capital of the World, you can’t ignore those springtime stalks. The A’s Low-A affiliate celebrates Stockton’s biggest crop with Asparagus Night festivities that in the past have included Ports players in dark-green jerseys emblazoned with asparagus, asparagus trivia on the Banner Island Ballpark scoreboard, asparagus mascot races

and, of course, deep-fried asparagus, bacon-wrapped asparagus and more. Mark April 30 on your calendar for this year’s event. Details: www.milb.com/stockton FRESNO GRIZZLIES: TAC O T R U C K T H R OW D OW N

This promotion leaves Taco Tuesday in the dust. What started as a fan food event inside Fresno’s Chukchansi Park in 2001 has now grown into the team’s signature event and the Fresno food competition of the year. After taking the 2020 pandemic season off, the Taco Truck Throwdown returned in 2021 with 18 food trucks and live music, attracting more than 8,000 attendees. Look for taco mania twice this year, first Taco Days from July 22-24 and then the Throwdown, likely in October. Details: www.milb.com/fresno

Above: Chewbacca confers with the umpires at “Star Wars” Night at the Rancho Cucamonga Quakes’ LoanMart Field. The next one is scheduled for May 14. PHOTO COURTESY OF THE RANCHO CUCAMONGA QUAKES

SAC R A M E N TO R I V E R CAT S : MARVEL NIGHT

Storytelling rules in Sacramento. Look for the Marvel Comics heroes to take the field at the River Cats’ Sutter Health Park this season for a fan promotion called Marvel’s Defenders of the Diamond. On the still-to-be-determined date, players for the Giants’ Triple-A affiliate will wear Super Hero-branded jerseys, and fans will get a chance to participate in themed activities. Marvel is planning to create a special minor-league comic book, too. Also in the works in West Sacramento are a Wizarding Night and a Princess and Pirate Night. Details: www.milb.com/sacramento R E N O AC E S : LO S C O R A ZO N E S D E R E N O

Again this year, the Aces will celebrate Latino contributions to Reno’s culture and to the game of baseball by becoming Los Corazones de Reno. From May 5-8 and again on Sept. 15, the team’s name will change, and players will take the field in jerseys and caps emblazoned with a heart milagro. Fans at Greater Nevada Field can purchase logo apparel and enjoy music, giveaways and a Los Corazones menu of esquites served in a helmet cup, street tacos, margarita specials and more. Details: www.milb.com/reno

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California’s love affair with baseball comes alive in a multitude of books S TO RY BY DA N E P S T E I N I L L U S T R AT I O N BY JEFF DURHAM

iven California’s impressive Major League Baseball legacy, it’s kind of mind-blowing to realize that until just 63 years ago, a “western road trip” in MLB parlance meant a team making a stop in St. Louis by way of Chicago or Milwaukee. Of course, the Giants and the Dodgers transformed MLB geography forever by moving west from New York following the end of the 1957 season, their successful relocations to San Francisco and Los Angeles paving the way for MLB franchises in Oakland, Anaheim and San Diego. Since then, the Golden State has produced some of the most iconic teams in MLB history, including the Koufax-and-Drysdale Dodgers, the Oakland A’s “Mustache Gang” and the three-time World Series champion Giants of the 2010s. But California’s baseball legacy extends far beyond its major league franchises. Organized baseball has been played in San Francisco since at least 1860, and the Pacific Coast League — which was founded in 1903 and existed in various incarnations until it was disbanded in 2020 — has a fascinating history all its own. And there have been numerous iconic MLB players whose California upbringing indelibly shaped their personalities and careers, even if they never played a game for any of the state’s MLB teams. Not surprisingly, this wealth of source material has resulted in an abundance of great books on California’s many connections and contributions to the national pastime. Here are some essential California baseball reads, arranged in alphabetical order, covering everything from sandlot teams to world champions.

“A Band of Misfits: Tales of the 2010 San Francisco Giants” by Andrew Baggarly (2011) Baggarly captures the anticipation, memories and celebrated relief of the season when it finally came together for the Giants and their fans, and more than five decades after moving to the West Coast, the Giants finally brought a World Series title to San Francisco. “Baseball in San Diego: From the Padres to Petco” by Bill Swank (2004) The Padres didn’t join the majors until 1969, but a PCL team of the same name had been a popular San Diego fixture since 1936, and Swank’s small but lavishly illustrated book pays nostalgic tribute to the city’s deep baseball roots.

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“The Best Team Money Can Buy: The Los Angeles Dodgers’ Wild Struggle to Build a Baseball Powerhouse” by Molly Knight (2015) Knight’s deeply insightful behind-the-scenes look at the Dodgers’ 2012-2015 seasons — a tumultuous and exciting period in which the team finally slipped the grip of shady owner Frank McCourt and began their run of eight straight NL West titles. “The Big 50: San Francisco Giants: The Men and Moments that Made the San Francisco Giants” by Daniel Brown (2016) Longtime Bay Area sportswriter Brown offers the living history of the Giants, counting down from No. 50 to No. 1, from Willie McCovey and Will Clark to the roller-coaster that was Barry Bonds to the team’s run of three World Series, titles capped by Madison Bumgarner shutting down the Royals in the 2014 Series. “The Bilko Athletic Club: The Story of the 1956 Los Angeles Angels” by Gaylon H. White (2014) Powered by beer-swilling, larger-than-life slugger Steve Bilko, the 1956 Angels were a colorful team that completely crushed their PCL competition. White’s book nicely captures the low-budget thrills of L.A. baseball in the days right before the Dodgers arrived. “Billy Ball: Billy Martin and the Resurrection of the Oakland A’s” by Dale Tafoya (2020) Tafoya captures the colorful Martin’s homecoming to the Bay Area in 1980, instantly reviving a foundering franchise and fan base with his aggressive style of play that came to be known as Billy Ball, followed by the inevitable breakup. “Bo: Pitching and Wooing” by Maury Allen (1973) In 1962, a year after the Angels

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joined the American League as an expansion team, rookie pitcher Bo Belinsky tossed the team’s first nohitter. Unfortunately, Bo was more interested in chasing Hollywood starlets than throwing strikes, but his too-short MLB career makes for a deliciously entertaining biography. “Dock Ellis in the Country of Baseball” by Donald Hall (1976) Though most famous today for his LSD-fueled no-hitter, Ellis was a charismatic and complex competitor who needed a poet

like Hall to truly do him justice. Dock played briefly for the A’s in 1977 but grew up in Gardena, and Hall’s book vividly explores his L.A. roots. “Dynastic, Bombastic, Fantastic: Reggie, Rollie, Catfish and Charlie Finley’s Swingin’ A’s” by Jason Turbow (2017) The 1971-76 A’s were one of the most exciting teams of all time and also the most fractious — battling each other as hard as they battled owner Charlie O. Finley and their on-field opponents.

The Oakland Oaks — including manager Johnny Vergez, Bill Rigney, Bill Raimondi and Marv Gudat — did their spring training in Napa in 1942. STAFF ARCHIVES

“Home Team: The Turbulent History of the San Francisco Giants” by Robert F. Garratt (2017) Though the Giants won three World Series championships in the 2010s, their first fiveplus decades in San Francisco were filled with strife and disappointment. Garratt delivers the definitive history of the Bay Area’s first MLB club, with plenty of emphasis on their long-burning rivalry with the Dodgers. “If These Walls Could Talk: Oakland A’s: Stories from the Oakland A’s Dugout, Locker Room, and Press Box” by Ken Korach and Susan Slusser (2019) The longtime broadcaster and longtime beat writer team up to share the perspectives of A’s players, coaches and front office executives in times of greatness, as well as defeat. “Japanese American Baseball in California: A History” by Kerry Yo Nakagawa (2014)

Turbow’s roaring history of the A’s dynasty reads like eye-popping fiction, but it’s all true. “From The Stick to The Cove: My Six Decades with the San Francisco Giants” by Mike Murphy and Chris Haft (2020) Murphy, the beloved longtime clubhouse manager, reflects on more than six decades of incredible memories, from his start as a bat boy and meeting his idol, Willie Mays, to unexpected celebrity encounters to his role as a father figure for more recent

generations of Giants. “Home Field Advantage Oakland, CA: The City that Changed the Face of Sports” by Paul Brekke-Miesner (2013) The Oakland native details how race, class, world wars and geography conspired to produce several athletes from this relatively small city who literally changed the face of American sports. The book features Rickey Henderson, Frank Robinson, Ernie Lombardi, Joe Morgan, Curt Flood and many more.

Head of the Nisei Baseball Research Project, Kerry Yo Nakagawa wrote this illuminating study that reveals how baseball (which was first introduced to Japan in the 1870s) helped Japanese Americans assimilate into U.S. culture, while also examining the important role baseball played for those imprisoned in California’s incarceration camps during World War II. “Joe DiMaggio : The Hero’s Life” by Richard Ben Cramer (2001) Pulitzer Prize winner Cramer presents a portrait of the complicated, enigmatic life of the native San Franciscan, the son

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of an immigrant who became a cultural icon. “Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant ’Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big” by Jose Canseco (2006) The former Bash Brother openly discussed his steroid use and made the then-controversial claim that 85 percent of players used performance-enhancing drugs — the book came out before the Mitchell report. Canseco implicated multiple players but definitely had a score to settle, so some of the stories may be a little suspect. “The Last Baseball Town” by Chuck Hildebrand (2009) Between 1960 and 1987, the Silicon Valley city of Campbell produced a whopping 14 youth baseball World Series teams and sent 10 players to the big leagues. Hildebrand’s excellent book explains how this middle-class suburb became synonymous with baseball excellence — and why that excellence ultimately slipped away. “Lefty O’Doul: Baseball’s Forgotten Ambassador” by Dennis Snelling (2017) O’Doul was a two-time NL batting champ, but as Snelling’s massively entertaining bio reveals, the San Francisco native’s postplaying career was even livelier He managed his hometown’s Seals to five PCL championships, opened a San Francisco watering hole that was so successful, it lasted decades after his death, and was so popular as a baseball ambassador to Japan that he’s now enshrined in that country’s baseball hall of fame. “Lights, Camera, Fastball: How the Hollywood Stars Changed Baseball” by Dan Taylor (2021) The Hollywood Stars were rarely the best team in the PCL, but they were easily its most glamorous, with a roster of celebrity stockholders that

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included George Burns, Clark Gable and Cecil B. DeMille. As Taylor’s history of the Stars reveals, they were also the PCL’s first team to broadcast home games on television, the first to have groundskeepers sweep the infield during the game and the first to wear batting helmets. And they also wore shorts for four seasons! “Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game” by Michael Lewis (2003) The most influential baseball book of the 21st century, “Moneyball” showed how the Oakland A’s front office — led by general manager Billy Beane — employed advanced statistical analysis to keep the team competitive despite its limited budget. Despite howls of derision from baseball traditionalists, the book (and Beane’s success) inspired similar “sabermetric” approaches in front offices across the majors … as well as a film starring Brad Pitt. “Mover & Shaker: Walter O’Malley, the Dodgers, & Baseball’s Westward Expansion” by Andy McCue (2014) Reams have been written about the Dodgers’ move to L.A., but this is the best book out there on the man behind it. McCue cuts through the myth and vilification that surrounded O’Malley during his life (and afterward) to paint a rich and nuanced portrait of one of the most significant figures in California baseball history. “Mustache Gang: The swaggering saga of Oakland’s A’s” by Rob Bergman (1973) Bergman covered the A’s for the Oakland Tribune from the moment they arrived in 1968 through the three straight World Series titles, and here he pulls no punches in taking the readers along for the Swingin’ A’s wild ride to their first title in 1972 and what it was really like playing for Charlie Finley.

“The Pacific Coast League 1903-1988” by Bill O’Neal (1990) More than just a minor league, the PCL stretched from San Diego to Seattle in its heyday, delighting West Coast fans with its charismatic players and high — if not quite MLB — level of play. O’Neal’s book remains the definitive work on this fascinating chapter in baseball history. “Sandy Koufax: A Lefty’s Legacy” by Jane Leavy (2002) Still the definitive portrait of “The Left Arm of God,” Leavy’s book offers up a detailed account of Koufax’s mound greatness, while also providing insight into why the Dodger southpaw’s legend continues to resonate even among fans who never saw him pitch.

“San Francisco Year Zero: Political Upheaval, Punk Rock and a Third-Place Baseball Team” by Lincoln Mitchell (2019)

Mark McGwire and Jose Canseco of the Oakland Athletics celebrate during a 1990 game in Oakland.

1978 was a harrowing year of tragedy and political upheaval in San Francisco, but there were also some bright spots — including a burgeoning punk rock scene and a Giants team that spent much of the summer atop the NL West — and Mitchell ties it all together in this compulsively readable tome.

Chavez Ravine.

“Stealing Home: Los Angeles, the Dodgers and the Lives Caught in Between” by Eric Nusbaum (2020) Nusbaum’s book digs into the human toll of the Dodgers’ move to L.A., diligently dissecting how a combination of the “Red Scare” and a hunger for a major baseball franchise led the city to sell out three Mexican American communities in and around

OTTO GREULE JR./GETTY IMAGES

“Ted Williams: The Biography of an American Hero” by Leigh Montville (2004) The man who aspired to be “The Greatest Hitter Who Ever Lived,” Williams grew up in San Diego and played his first two seasons of pro ball with the PCL Padres, experiences which loom large in Montville’s revealing bio. “The Ticket Out: Darryl Strawberry and the Boys of Crenshaw” by Michael Sokolove (2006) An often-heartbreaking look at how the members of the 1979 Crenshaw High Cougars — a tremendously talented high

school team that featured future MLB All-Stars Darryl Strawberry and Chris Brown — ran headfirst into the realities of being poor and Black in urban America. “The Wrong Stuff ” by Bill Lee and Dick Lally (1985) The first MLB player to publicly advocate the use of marijuana, the Burbank-born Bill “Spaceman” Lee was never shy about letting his California freak flag fly, and “The Wrong Stuff” remains one of the most hilariously left-of-center baseball reads ever printed. Dan Epstein is an award-winning journalist, pop culture historian and avid baseball fan who has written for Rolling Stone, FLOOD, Mojo and dozens of other publications. He is the author of the acclaimed “Big Hair and Plastic Grass: A Funky Ride Through Baseball and America in the Swinging ’70s,” “Stars and Strikes” and “The Captain & Me: On and Off the Field with Thurman Munson” (with Ron Blomberg).

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SPORTS QUIZ Bay Area baseball trivia rounds all the bases

B Y J OA N M O R R I S

ay Area baseball fans have a lot of favorite moments, from watching a slow, arcing ball seemingly float over the wall to dot racing on the jumbotron. But no matter which team you’re rooting for, you’ve got to love the trivia associated with the game. We’re not talking stats, the lifeblood of the baseball fan. We’re talking good ol’ push up your sleeves and rummage in the brain files to dredge up those memories of what makes Bay Area baseball so distinctive. Step up to the plate and take a swing at these questions. (Then check your answers on page 70.)

1st

2nd

Inning: There’s still a raging debate over who invented the high five. Was it outfielder Glenn Burke, who played for the L.A. Dodgers before a short stay with the Oakland A’s — or basketball’s Derek Smith? No one knows for sure, so instead we’ll ask whose moves replaced both the handshake and the high five and might have been a precursor to the COVID elbow bump?

Inning: OK, we promised no stats, but we couldn’t resist this one: Martinez native Joe DiMaggio had a staggering hitting streak in the majors, managing to get on base in 56 consecutive games. No one has touched that record. But what was Joltin’ Joe’s record eight years before landing in the majors, back when he played for the San Francisco Seals of the Pacific Coast League?

A. San Francisco Giants father and son, Bobby and Barry Bonds B. Oakland A’s pitcher Dennis Eckersley C. San Francisco’s Willie Mays and Willie McCovey D. Oakland’s Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire

A. 55 consecutive games B. 12 C. 61 D. Who knows? They didn’t keep records back then.

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3rd

Inning: In the late 1970s, baseball teams got into mascots to a ridiculous degree, launching everything from a giant San Diego Chicken to the furry green Phillie Phanatic. The mascots certainly annoyed some fans, but none more so than the one San Francisco developed as an anti-mascot to poke fun at mascot mania. His career came to an infamous end when he was tackled by two San Diego Padres, and the actor inside the suit sued the team for damages. What was the name of the mascot? A. Crazy Crab B. Lou Seal C. The Old Fisherman D. The Mayor of Frisco

Bengie Molina, right, hit 16 home runs for the Giants in 2008, including this three-run shot against the Diamondbacks. But it was a home run Molina hit that season against the Dodgers that was a Major League first. AP PHOTO

4th

Inning: When the Oakland A’s were still in Philadelphia in the first half of the 20th century, Hall of Fame pitcher Rube Waddell roomed with his catcher, Ossie Schreck. When they were on the road for away games, penny-pinching teams housed their players in shared rooms — often with just one shared bed, as well. So when contract time came around, Schreck demanded that Waddell’s contract include a clause forbidding him from doing one thing in bed. What was it? A. He wasn’t allowed to snore. B. He had to stop stealing the covers. C. He couldn’t eat animal crackers. D. There was a strict no-passing-gas clause.

5th

Inning: Oakland A’s outfielder and base-stealing phenomenon Rickey Henderson did something that threw the A’s finance office into a tizzy. What was it? A. Sent their supplies and equipment budget into the red, when Rickey began keeping all his stolen bases as mementos. B. He framed his million-dollar signing check without cashing it. C. He kept returning money to them, because he thought they were accidentally overpaying him. D. That extra E in his name threw the accountants into disarray. Whenever they wrote out a paycheck to “Ricky Henderson” — which was routinely — the bank bounced them back.

David Ortiz hit 23 home runs against the Oakland A’s during his Hall of Fame career with the Red Sox and Twins, but the Coliseum wasn’t one of his most productive stops. He only belted nine homers and hit .233 in 65 games in Oakland. ANDA CHU/STAFF ARCHIVES

San Francisco Giants mascot Lou Seal boxes with Philadelphia Phillies mascot Phanatics during Game 3 of the National League Championship Series in 2010. JOSIE LEPE/STAFF ARCHIVES

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6th

Inning: David Ortiz, the Boston Red Sox slugger and newest inductee to the Hall of Fame, might have been good at navigating the bases, but he didn’t do so well when he was a Minnesota Twin facing the Oakland A’s. What Bay Area standard got him so fouled up, Big Papi and a few of his teammates almost missed the game?

and win the game. C. No reason. Elephants are just cool. D. The elephant exhibit at the Philadelphia Zoo was such a favorite with A’s players when the team was based in the City of Brotherly Love, they convinced owner Connie Mack that an elephant would be a great mascot.

8th

Inning: Ball boys have a long and often underappreciated role in a number of sports including, of course, baseball. In 1992, the San Francisco Giants began employing “spry seniors” to serve in the role and called them “ball dudes.” The glass ceiling for ball boys was broken in 1993, when then-67-year-old Corinne Mullane was afforded the honor. What was her title?

A. They got caught in a massive traffic jam coming across the Bay Bridge. B. They got on the wrong BART train and almost went to Richmond instead of the Coliseum. C. On a sightseeing jaunt, they drove across the Golden Gate Bridge and couldn’t figure out how to get to Oakland from there. D. They got stuck on Lombard Street when a car broke down in front of them, and a traffic nightmare ensued.

A. Ball duchess B. Ball dudette C. The Queen of Diamonds D. Ball girl

7th

Inning: San Francisco Giants catcher Bengie Molina entered the record books in 2008, when he became the first major league player to hit a home run, but not get credit for the run scored. How did that happen?

9th

Inning: The Oakland A’s won the World Series in 1972, but the team also achieved a first with something no other team had done for 50 years. What was it?

A. He tripped while rounding second and was knocked unconscious. A pinch runner was substituted and actually scored the run. B. An earthquake disrupted the game, which was suspended until both teams were available to resume play two months later. By then, Molina had left the team, and another player got credit for the homer. C. The ball hit the right field wall and was initially ruled a single. When the umps used instant replay, they changed the call to a home run. Molina had gone to first, then was replaced by a pinch runner, who went on to score the run. D. A gull stole the ball, and in the confusion, the run didn’t get counted.

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Extra innings

10:

Former Giants infielder Chris Brown once missed a minor league game because of an eye injury. What was it and how did it happen? A. He strained his eyelid by “sleeping on it funny” B. He got punched in the eye by the opposing team’s mascot after asking “What are you supposed to be?” C. His own teammate accidentally hit him while tossing a ball into the stands for a young fan. D. He got a black eye sliding into home.

Inning Stretch: Why is the Oakland A’s mascot an elephant?

A. In 1902, the then-New York Giants manager called the then-Philadelphia team a white elephant. The A’s owner thought it was so funny, he adopted the elephant as the team’s mascot. B. When the Ringling Brothers Circus pitched its big top in the field next to the Oakland stadium one game day, an elephant got loose and ran into the stadium. The resulting game delay gave the A’s a chance to regroup, rally

A. Nearly all the players sported mustaches or other facial hair B. The A’s had notched the highest number of wins in half a century C. Instead of drinking Champagne to celebrate the victory, they drank soda and ordered pizza. D. All the players were over age 40.

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Rickey Henderson isn’t an Oakland native — he was born in Chicago in the back seat of a car on the way to the hospital — but his ties to the city run deep. The first ballot Hall of Famer graduated from Oakland Technical High, was drafted by the A’s and spent four different stints with the team, spanning parts of 14 of his 25 seasons in the Majors. OTTO GREULE JR./GETTY IMAGES

11:

Babe Ruth, who pitched and batted left handed but signed autographs with his right, played a 1924 exhibition game in what tiny Northern California hamlet?

A. Dunsmuir B. Cupertino C. Gilroy D. Crockett

12:

The A’s were only in their fourth week of existence in Oakland when Jim “Catfish” Hunter threw a perfect game on May 8, 1968, the first perfect game in a regular season in the majors in 46 years. How many fans actually witnessed the feat? A. 33,496 B. 48,322 C. 12,115 D. 6,298

13:

What former tennis star is a minority owner of the Dodgers and has a relative who played a decade for the Giants? A. John McEnroe B. Jimmy Connors C. Billie Jean King D. Bobby Riggs

14:

The Giants weren’t always Giants. They started out in 1883 as the New York Gothams. Why the name change? A. The creators of “Batman” threatened to sue for misappropriation of the name of the caped crusader’s city. B. In an emotional speech after a particularly convincing win, playermanager Jim Mutrie congratulated his teammates, calling them “my big fellows, my giants.” The name stuck. C. Simple. When the team moved to San Francisco in 1958, the name didn’t fit, so they picked “Giants.” D. The team was sponsored by The Giant Dynamite Co.

15:

Sportswriter Ernest Thayer’s classic baseball poem, “Casey at the Bat,” was published in 1888 by the San Francisco Examiner and set off a heated debate that exists to this day over the identity of the real Casey and the Mudville team. A town near Thayer’s childhood home, Holliston, Massachusetts, says it was the inspiration. But a California minor league team also lays claim to it — and well, you know we’re going with the home team. Name the city and the team. A. The San Francisco Seals B. The Stockton Ports C. The San Jose Starlings D. The Pittsburg Pirates

So, how’d you do? Flip to page 70 to check your score.

Above: Eighteen-year-old Joe DiMaggio crosses home plate for the San Francisco Seals of the Pacific Coast League in 1933, his first full year as a professional ballplayer. He had a hit in a league-record 61 consecutive games that season. Left: Jim (Catfish) Hunter in action as he pitched a perfect no-hit, no-run, no-anything game against the Minnesota Twins on May 8, 1968. It was the first perfect game pitched in the American League in 46 years and was thrown in the 11th baseball game ever played at the Coliseum. AP PHOTOS

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Trade o mania A pandemic-fueled surge in baseball card collecting brought a forgotten hobby back to frenzied life B Y L AU R E N C E M I E D E M A

It’s

a clear, crisp, late-January day in the middle of the Major League Baseball lockout, but the hot stove is on fire. “What’s it going to take to get me Ohtani?” a voice from across the table inquires. “I’m willing to overpay for that guy.” A few feet away, a small group watches with great interest as numbers are traded and then punched into cellphone calculators. In the end, negotiations for another of the game’s biggest stars fall apart before it really gets serious: “I’d love Trout, but you’re just asking too much; people are starting to figure out he’s kinda overrated.” No, this isn’t a scene from baseball’s winter meetings. Welcome to the world of baseball card collecting 2.0. Those colorful cardboard treasures have existed in one form or another With so many cards out there, how do you decide what to collect? One Bay Area shop owner suggests, “Buy what you like. Then you can never go wrong.” JOSE CARLOS FAJARDO/STAFF

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Above: Fans were lined up outside of Lefty’s Sports Cards in Burlingame for hours to have memorabilia signed by former San Francisco Giants players Travis Ishikawa and Matt Duffy in January. Right: Timothy Wong, of San Francisco, holds up baseball cards signed by Ishikawa and Duffy, who were teammates on the Giants’ 2014 World Series championship team. Ishikawa also won a World Series ring with the Giants in 2010. SHAE HAMMOND/STAFF

since the late 1800s. They were a pretty big deal in the early 1960s and a REALLY big deal in the early 1990s, but they were mostly forgotten at the start of this century, because they were barely worth the cardstock they were printed on. But if you haven’t collected since the days when chewing gum came with your packs, let alone before the age of serial-number autograph cards, you may be surprised to learn the hobby is enjoying a historic revival. It’s one nobody saw coming — and it was fueled by, of all things, the COVID-19 pandemic. “The lockdown put us kind of all in a place where we had to sit down, stay home and do nothing,” recalled Keane Dasalla, a memorabilia collector and vlogger from Fremont. “It didn’t take long before everything kind of went crazy.” Jim Bernardini opened Lefty’s Sports Cards in Burlingame in 1987 and has seen it through the Bash Brothers, the Loma Prieta earthquake, two Gulf Wars, the baseball strike, 9/11, the stock mar-

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ket crash and three Giants World Championships. But the pandemic era has been something else. “We’ve had some ups and downs in our industry over the years,” said Bernardini. “This is an up. For the first time, we are debt-free.” Vintage cards. New releases. Prospects. Everything took off, virtually overnight. “Five years ago, I was telling people the hobby would be dead in 10 years,” said Ray Krause, who has owned and operated MVP Sportscards in Pleasant Hill since 1991. “Basically, everybody who used to collect who were in their 20s, 30s and even 50-year-olds jumped back in.” They were not alone. CLEANING UP

Baseball card collecting began showing signs of life in the mid-2010s, with the emergence of instant-impact rookies from big-market teams like Mike Trout, Kris Bryant, Cody Bellinger and Aaron Judge. Then a couple of seemingly

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unrelated events brought the real heat. The pandemic created an abundance of spare time during the lockdowns as well as an influx of spending money from stimulus checks. Around the same time, several prominent social media influencers started turning their attention — and their followers — from buying and selling sneakers to sports memorabilia. The final element was nostalgia, which baseball is practically built around. Extra time meant more screen time for many. But we all know people — or are those people — who, during the pandemic, began rummaging through closets and sheds to organize and declutter. For many, hidden — or simply forgotten — under those old sweaters and school papers were cardboard treasures. Jenny Starks from San Francisco said she was a big collector as a kid. Her dad gave her rookie Joe Montana and Jerry Rice football cards for her 16th birthday, but “I kind of forgot about them,” she said. “Then I decided to get my old cards out. Everybody else was doing it.” Practically everyone has heard the collecting horror stories about someone’s childhood stash that might have been worth thousands — Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle cards almost always seem to be involved, right? — that was thrown out or lost during a move or spring cleaning or simply because the collector had outgrown the hobby. Modern collections, by and large, didn’t meet the same three strikes and you’re out fate. Millions of cards have been safely stored away because parents and kids alike swore that “one day, these will pay for college or a down payment on a house.” During the pandemic, some of those bold financial claims actually came true. Or at least helped pay some bills and cover some Starbucks runs. “I saw (some of the prices vin-

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tage cards were getting) and said, ‘Wait, I have a stash of cards in the closet, let me look into those,’” Vanson Nguyen of Alameda said of his return to the hobby, which included rediscovering a Mookie Betts rookie card worth more than $100. “I was a collector in the early 2000s, and I got back in during the pandemic because I was looking for a community. I found it. I’m a kid again. But to be clear, I’ve always been a kid.” B I G L E AG U E B U S I N E S S

Interest in the hobby was surging by the late spring of 2020. By the end of the year, eBay reported that more than 4 million sports cards had been sold on the site,

an increase of 142 percent from the previous year. Card shops couldn’t keep up with demand. It wasn’t just the volume of cards being bought, sold and traded that was off the charts. Prices for cards, and especially unopened materials, suddenly made the Bay Area housing market appear reasonable. At least two dozen baseball cards are believed to have been sold for more than $1 million since the spring of 2020, including a legendary Honus Wagner T-206 card that went for a record $6.6 million. It wasn’t just vintage or rare autograph cards that were getting huge bucks. Take Trout’s 2011 Topps Update card for example. It has been

Fans and speculators alike have had their eyes on rookie cards of Giants catcher Joey Bart, like this one at Lefty’s in Burlingame, for some time. But interest is rising with Bart expected to take over behind the plate following Buster Posey’s retirement. SHAE HAMMOND/STAFF

one of the most valuable baseball cards since the Angels star debuted and was going for about $500 in February 2020. A year later, collectors were asking for — and getting — $2,500. “The hobby was just on fire,” said Dion Noriega, a card dealer for The Card Attic and promoter from Vallejo. Even the popular grading services that for a fee will determine and log the overall condition of a card, which can increase value significantly, weren’t ready for the boom. The two largest, PSA and Beckett Grading Services, suspended operations temporarily when they faced a backlog of more than 11 million cards. Many cards submitted last year still haven’t been processed.

When the pandemic hit, card shop owners were understandably concerned. In the 1990s, most towns had multiple card shops. There are about 1,000 left nationwide, including about a dozen in the Bay Area. The pandemic wiped out many small businesses, but card shops largely survived. Many thrived even though customers couldn’t come inside the doors for most of the card boom. But owners had to hustle. Krause of MVP Sportscards stayed in touch with customers via email and delivered orders to doorsteps. Bernardini and his staff at Lefty’s would pack up phone and online orders, spray the plastic covering with disinfectant and then leave the cards at the front of the store

for the customers to pick up. As it did for everyone else, mail and delivery orders became a lifeline. As prices soared — it wasn’t unheard of to “flip” a $40 box of cards for nearly 10 times that — new products became scarce. Not only were kids and adults being priced out, hoarding was a big problem. Almost overnight, the retail store displays that for years were overflowing with boxes and packs of sports cards were reduced to empty wire racks. “It was like the toilet paper problem all over again,” Starks said with a laugh. NEW SEASON AHEAD

The hobby was at its hottest last August, when prices for some of the most valuable cards on the secondary market doubled — or much more — from just months earlier. Demand for new products was so high that finding unopened packs of cards was virtually impossible, unless collectors were willing to spend like the Los Angeles Dodgers or New York Yankees. Major retail stores stopped selling packs of cards because fights were breaking out in the aisles and

Ray Krause, who has operated MVP Sportscards in Pleasant Hill since 1991, was among the many who didn’t see the pandemicfueled card boom coming. “Five years ago, I was telling people the hobby would be dead in 10 years.” JOSE CARLOS FAJARDO/ STAFF

parking lots. “They’d cut in front of you and start taking everything off the shelves,” said Dominick Rodriguez of Newman, describing one of his card-purchasing experiences. “Then you go outside to the parking lot, and they try to sell it to you for twice as much!” Tempers — and prices — have started to cool, leading some investors to leave the hobby. But it wasn’t only finances that had people flocking back to the hobby. There’s more reason to believe the card market will remain healthy. “The joy of opening the packs, we enjoy doing that together,” said Jeff of San Mateo while attending a card show with his youngest son, David, adding that he wasn’t a big collector growing up, but “I wish I had kept them; Mom kind of threw them out.” Collectors have never had more access to cards — just type in “Buster Posey Topps rookie card” on eBay and see how many results pop up. Even social media sites like Instagram and Facebook are places fans can buy and trade cards online. And there are the old standbys — neighborhood hobby shops and card shows, which are beginning to pop up

again as COVID-19 guidelines loosen. Hundreds of collectors gathered for a two-day show on the concourse at Serramonte Center in Daly City in January, with the tables bustling with activity as names big and small were bought, sold and traded. One of the first big shows in the region was staged last April in Fairfield by Noriega. He figures about 3,000 collectors showed up for the 75-table event. Because of COVID-19 restrictions, only 100 people could be in the building at a time, and the wait to get in for some was 2½ hours. “They weren’t happy to wait that long, but they all stayed,” Noriega said. “You couldn’t find product anywhere else.” Collectors are still on the hunt. Topps released this season’s Series I cards in mid-February, and with budding superstar Wander Franco’s rookie card as the centerpiece of the set, the site was sold out within 24 hours. “I still get new people to the hobby about every day,” Krause said. “A lot of people who got into the hobby during the pandemic had fun and will stick with it. The guys who were trying to become instant millionaires without actually doing any work are all starting to leave.” Many returnees to the hobby are now parents themselves. They want to share their card memories as well help make new ones by chasing after cards of the stars of this generation — Shohei Ohtani, Fernando Tatís Jr. and Ronald Acuña. Will the cards of today pay for college tuition and down payments down the road? Is another bust like the post-90’s era on the horizon? Who knows? Why worry? “Collectors who love the hobby are going to stick with it, no matter what,” said Union City’s Craig Queyrel, owner of Vintage Cards & Collectibles in Newark. “My advice has always been buy what you like. “Then you can never go wrong.”

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M BY JON BECKER

Our nation turns its lonely eyes on the vanishing art of the stolen base

ajor League Baseball may never see a man stealing bases quite like Rickey Henderson or Duane Kuiper ever again. Now that you’ve probably reread the previous sentence, we’ll explain their unlikely connection on the basepaths in a moment. First, it’s important to recognize baseball’s fascination with home runs has done more than just lead to an obsession with exit velocity and launch angles. It’s essentially causing the sport to power down on another appealing aspect of the game: the stolen base. For fans who enjoy the art of the steal, the 2021 season brought more disappointment than ever. For the first time since the MLB began counting stolen bases in 1886, its yearly number of steals has declined for four consecutive years. Worse yet, last year’s total stolen bases were the fewest in a full major league season in nearly 50 years. It’s no secret why the stolen base is steadily disappearing from the game — the numbers no longer add up, say the analytics guys. A risk-averse mentality has taken over the thought process of baseball’s decision-makers. From the front office to the dugout, the message is clear: The risk of getting thrown out on the bases really isn’t worth it. After all, one more out means one less chance to hit a home run.

Left: Rickey Henderson stole a modern day record 130 bases for the Oakland A’s in 1982. Last season, the Kansas City Royals led all Major League teams with 124 stolen bases. MLB hasn’t had a player steal 70 bases in a season since Boston’s Jacoby Ellsbury in 2009. TOM DUNCAN/ STAFF ARCHIVES

Rickey Henderson holds the MLB career and single-season records for stolen bases but also holds the record for being caught. Here, he tosses his helmet after being picked off by Texas’ Kenny Rogers during a 1990 game. ROY H. WILLIAMS/ STAFF ARCHIVES

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Henderson spent most of his career with the A’s, and it was Oakland’s executive vice president, Billy Beane, who played a significant role in putting stop signs up across the majors. “It’s not exactly revolutionary,” Beane once told ESPN. “If you’re last in the league in steals, you’re also last in the league in caught stealing, too, and you’re saving yourself a lot of outs. If you break it down, which is more valuable: a potential out or one more base?” If this kind of caution had been in play in the 1980s and ’90s, life would have been much easier for opponents having to deal with Henderson, baseball’s most accomplished base thief ever. The Oakland-born Hall of Famer terrorized teams on his way to a Major League record of 1,406 career steals, including a record-breaking 130 bags with the A’s in 1982. At the risk of bombarding you with more numbers, consider that in Rickey’s heyday in ’82, there were 3,379 home runs hit and 3,176 bases stolen MLB-wide. Last season, there were nearly three times as many homers (5,944) as there were stolen bases (2,213). Henderson acknowledges he played a different game in a different era. He told Sportsnet there’s no way he could come close to duplicating his stolen base numbers if he played today — and not just because he’s now 63 years old. “The kids today, they say ‘How’d you do it?’ And I say, I couldn’t do it the way they’re doing it now because they’re making your call, they’re making the decision before you’re making decisions … They’re too worried about giving up an out,” Henderson said. In previous eras, even the threat of a stolen base was considered a weapon. “I would have much rather

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Above: Rickey Henderson led the the American League in stolen bases 12 times during his 25 seasons in the Majors, including 1998 with the A’s when, at the age of 39, he swiped 66. DOUG DURAN/STAFF ARCHIVES Left: Rickey Henderson became MLB’s all-time stolen base king when he stole No. 939 to pass Lou Brock on May 1, 1991, in Oakland. Henderson ended his career with 1,406 stolen bases. The A’s Elvis Andrus’ 317 career steals were the most of any player in the majors last season. MICHAEL MACOR / STAFF ARCHIVES

faced (Mark) McGwire or (Jose) Canseco in a clutch moment than I would to play defense with Rickey Henderson on base — 100 percent,” Braves Hall of Fame third baseman Chipper Jones told Athlon Sports in 2019. “Those guys had holes. They could be pitched to. Rickey could dominate a game. I felt the same way about Jose Reyes in his heyday. When he got on base, he wreaked havoc, and it was disconcerting to have him on base.” Considering baseball’s current trends, it seems unfathomable that either of Henderson’s records will be broken anytime soon. To wit, the Kansas City Royals led the majors in stolen bases last season with fewer steals than Rickey had by himself in ’82. The Royals’ 124 steals were not only six fewer than Rickey’s total in ‘82, they represented the lowest MLB-leading total by a team in a full season since 1963. Thievery, though, can have its conse-

quences. Rickey’s record-breaking run on the bases contained a fair share of missteps. He still holds the MLB career record with 335 times caught stealing during his 25 seasons. He was thrown out 42 times in 1982, which remains a single-season record. Hall of Famer Rod Carew, who played first base for the Angels during Henderson’s reign of terror on the bases, always said there was an easy way to figure out whenever Rickey was about to steal — not that it helped a lot. You just had to keep your ears open for the man speaking in the third person. “He’d say, ‘Rickey’s gotta go,’” and he’d be off, Carew said. Henderson’s success rate of 75 percent in ’82 wouldn’t quite measure up in today’s game. A general consensus of teams nowadays is that only something closer to an 80 percent steal rate is acceptable. Using that as a gauge, there’s little chance a base stealer such as Kuiper, the beloved Gi-

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ants announcer and former second baseman, would be given a green light to attempt many steals now. Kuiper struggled to steal a base well before teams began studying pitchers’ pitch sequencing or delivery time to the plate or a catcher’s “pop time” to catch and throw to a base. Kuiper stole 52 bases during his 12-year career but was thrown out 71 times — nearly 60 percent of the times he tried to steal. His 42.3 percent success rate on stolen base attempts is the second-worst percentage in Major 68 PLAY BALL

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League history for players who attempted at least 100 steals. Since his former Cleveland teammate, Buddy Bell, holds the all-time record for lowest stolen base percentage (41 percent) among qualifiers, maybe Cleveland’s managers are the ones to shoulder the blame for turning Kuiper and Bell loose so often. Given the correlation between stolen bases and home runs, perhaps there’s a bit of irony that Kuiper’s lone home run in 3,379 career at-bats came on the same night in 1977, when Lou Brock passed Ty

Duane Kuiper, right, here with longtime broadcasting partner Mike Krukow last season, stole 52 bases in his career, but was thrown out 71 times, among the lowest success rates in modern baseball. KARL MONDON/ STAFF ARCHIVES

Cobb to (temporarily) become the all-time stolen base leader. While homering can be challenging for some, A’s shortstop Elvis Andrus said last season he couldn’t understand why it’s been so difficult for players to steal bases, even with today’s heightened obstacles. “It’s not that hard. Stealing bases isn’t rocket science,” said Andrus, whose 317 career stolen bases were the most of any player in the majors last season. Andrus’ beliefs were validated during the 2021 postseason, when

base stealers enjoyed a record-setting time. Whether it was picking on slow pitchers, poor catching or just utilizing fast runners for a change, teams stole a combined 45 bases, good for the sixth most ever in a single postseason. And the 91.8 percent success rate — compared with the 75.7 percent rate in the regular season — was an all-time record for a single postseason. The Giants and A’s weren’t the league’s busiest base stealers last season, but they were among the most successful at getting away

“ When he got on base, he wreaked havoc, and it was disconcerting to have him on base.” Former Braves third baseman Chipper Jones on Rickey Henderson

with it. The A’s 88 stolen bases were tied for seventh in the Majors, but their 81.5 percent success rate ranked fourth. Much of the credit goes to Starling Marte, who arrived in a midseason trade and did a tremendous Henderson impersonation, swiping 25 bases in 56 games. He was only caught twice. The Giants were 16th in the Majors in stolen bases (66) but were only caught 14 times and ranked third in success rate (82.5 percent). Nonetheless, there’s no real expectation we’ll see a change in the game’s dynamics this season. More likely, we’ll continue to see the kind of modest stolen base numbers turned in last year, which were further illuminated by the Dodgers’ Trea Turner winning the National League title with just 32 steals. It was the fewest steals needed to win the N.L. crown since Willie Mays swiped 27 bags for the Giants in 1959. Henderson, by comparison, stole at least 32 bases in 20 of his first 22 MLB seasons, including in 2000 with the Mets and Mariners, when he was 41 years old. Chicago White Sox manager Tony La Russa doesn’t need to be convinced there’s still room for smallball in today’s game. Whether it’s a well-timed stolen base or merely a productive out that moves a runner up a base, the Hall of Famer believes the little things can make a big difference. “I’ve seen guys get the leadoff man on base three or four times a game, never get him over, always trying to hit a two-run homer, then lose the game by a run,” La Russa said. “Then if a manager tries to play for a run, the metrics guys say, ‘Hey, the percentages are against that.’ But the percentages are the averages; that’s why I say the variability, the dynamics of what happens on an everyday basis, it’s actually easier to win now than ever.”

Left: Starling Marte provided the A’s a huge spark on the bases after he was acquired in a July trade, stealing 25 bases in 56 games and getting caught just twice. In all, he swiped a MLB-best 47 bases between the A’s and the Marlins. NHAT V. MEYER/ STAFF ARCHIVES

Bottom: Austin Slater was a big reason the Giants ranked third in the Majors in stolen base percentage in 2021. Slater stole 15 bases and was thrown out just twice, and his 86.66 success rate led the National League. RANDY VAZQUEZ/ STAFF ARCHIVES

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HITS OR STRIKES? Answers to the Bay Area Baseball Trivia quiz

B Y J OA N M O R R I S

11.

A — What set the A’s apart, at least in the beginning of the season, was all the facial hair, from Reggie Jackson’s mustache to Rollie Fingers’ handlebar.

10.

A — Chris Brown strained his eyelid by “sleeping on it funny.” Sometimes the truth is stranger than the fiction. A — The little town of Dunsmuir hosted the mighty Babe Ruth in an exhibition game. Tickets were $1.10, and the mayor declared a half-day holiday so the entire town could turn out.

Did you strike out, get on base or hit a walk-off homer? Here are the answers to the Bay Area Baseball Trivia quiz that starts on page 54.

12.

D — Only 6,298 people were in the stands that day, although if you ask people now, that number grows by a factor of 10.

D — Oakland A’s Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire, known as the Bash Brothers, began smashing their forearms together at home plate after hitting homers or scoring. It was just something that looked cool, but it ended up earning them their nickname when they posed for a poster, riffing off The Blues Brothers.

A’s reliever Rollie Fingers is mobbed by teammates after closing out the Reds in the 7th game of the 1972 World Series. RON RIESTERER/STAFF ARCHIVES

B — Befuddled by the BART map, Ortiz and some of his teammates ended up on a train bound for Richmond. Who knew BART could be confusing?

C — The amazing Joe DiMaggio showed his potential while playing for the San Francisco Seals, hitting safely in 61 consecutive games.

C — Giant’s Bengie Molina was replaced on first by a pinch runner, who rounded the bases when the single was changed to a home run.

A —The one and hopefully only Crazy Crab. The Padres were not his only assailants during the 1982 season. The giant orange crustacean was regularly attacked by Giants fans, too, who threw beer bottles and other objects at him. Crazy survived, though, and made several cameo appearances since then.

7th

Inning Stretch. A — The Philadelphia A’s had bought up the contracts of a lot of talented and highpriced players, which may have triggered a bit of envy from the New York Giants’ manager, who predicted the team was going to be a white elephant, an expensive, useless object no one really wants. Owner Connie Mack was amused and adopted the elephant as the team mascot.

C — Waddell routinely ate animal crackers in bed, leaving crumbs in the sheets, much to his roomie’s dismay.

B — Henderson framed the check — without cashing it — as a reminder that he had made it in the big leagues. The A’s ended up issuing a duplicate check to balance the books.

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Oakland A’s mascot Stomper and his partner Grady dance it out before a game in 2004. DAI SUGANO/ STAFF ARCHIVES

B — Corinne Mullane became the first “ball dudette.”

13.

C — Tennis legend Billie Jean King became part owner of the Dodgers in 2018, but says she and her brother, pitcher Randy Moffitt, “grew up bleeding Dodger blue” as kids. King admired her brother’s skill playing for the Giants but insisted he played for the wrong team.

14.

B — It was Jim Mutrie’s heartfelt utterance, calling his teammates his giants, that gave the team its name two years after its founding.

15.

B — The Stockton Ports claim title to the legend. Before incorporating in the 1850s, the town was known as Mudville — and in 1902, the team was called the Mudville Nine. Case closed.

Opposite: San Francisco Giants’ Buster Posey catches a pitch during spring training at Scottsdale Stadium in 2020. RANDY VAZQUEZ/STAFF ARCHIVES

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