Monthly Archives: November 2021

MLB

2021 CBA Wishlist

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The Collective Bargaining Agreement that governs the relationship between Major League Baseball and the Major League Baseball Players Association expires at 11:59 p.m. on 01 December 2021. If a new agreement is not in place, the thirty owners can break a labor peace that has existed since 1995 and lock out the players. MLB owners locking out the people most responsible for creating public demand for the league’s entertainment product would match recent trends in other North American pro sports leagues’ negotiations with player unions, including the 2012–13 NHL lockout, 2011 NBA lockout, 2011 NFL lockout, 2004-05 NHL lockout, and 1998-99 NBA lockout.

The consensus assessment of the 2016 CBA seems to be one that turned out heavily skewed in favor of the interests of owners, one in which the MLBPA was out-negotiated, due in part to untimely death of executive director Michael Weiner. Consequently, MLBPA has hired a new lead attorney, Bruce Meyer (formerly of the NHL Players’ Association), to assist Weiner’s successor Tony Clark and sweat the fine details. The owners are represented by a labor issues committee chaired by Dick Montfort, the Rockies’ owner who makes fans of his team yearn for competence rivaling the late Brezhnev/Andropov/Chernenko era Soviet leadership. Meanwhile, Commissioner of Baseball Rob Manfred has been at turns viewed by players (and fans) as adversarial, avaricious, dismissive, meddlesome, & neglectful. Manfred has been involved on MLB’s side of labor issues since the 1980s; his legal team is headed by MLB COO Dan Halem, lead negotiator of the 2016 CBA.

Let’s say you were the Baseball Ombuds — some hypothetical job with the distinct charge to do what you view is in the best interest of baseball. The CBA governs the sport’s economics, labor issues, and rules, including when and under what conditions new rules can be imposed. Of course, negotiations involve parties making concessions to reach an agreement that can be durable for a number of years, but let’s give ourselves the freedom to dream of a CBA that governs the 2022–2026 seasons.

What changes or additions would you like to see to the next CBA that balance the needs and interests of fans, players, and owners, and which create the conditions for an appealing on-field product with a sustainable business model? What needs fixing, and how do you propose fixing it?

Keeping Track

1970 Rewind: Game Thirty-four

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MINNESOTA 5, KANSAS CITY 4 IN KANSAS CITY (10 INNINGS)

Date:  Tuesday, May 19.

Batting stars:  Cesar Tovar was 2-for-4 with a walk.  Rich Reese was 2-for-4 with a walk.  Paul Ratliff was 2-for-4.

Pitching star:  Ron Perranoski pitched two shutout innings, giving up two hits and a walk.

Opposition stars:  Jackie Hernandez was 2-for-3.  Joe Keough was 2-for-4.  Bob Oliver was 2-for-5 with a home run (his seventh) and four RBIs.  Dave Morehead pitched nine innings, giving up four runs on nine hits and five walks and striking out three.

The game:  With one out in the first, Mike Fiore and Amos Otis singled and Oliver followed with a three-run homer, putting the Royals up 3-0.  The Twins got on the board in the second when Harmon Killebrew walked, went to second on a Reese single, took third on a ground out, and scored on another ground out.  The Twins tied it in the third.  Tovar led off with a single and Rod Carew walked.  A double play followed, but Killebrew had an RBI double and scored on Reese's single to make it 3-3.

That's where it stayed until the eighth.  Fiore walked with one out, went to second on a ground out, and scored on Oliver's single to put Kansas City ahead 4-3.  The Twins tied it in the ninth when Leo Cardenas singled, went to second on a wild pitch, took third on a ground out, and scored on Tovar's single.

The Royals had men on first and second with none out in the bottom of the ninth, but did not score.  In the tenth, Carew led off with a single and Tony Oliva followed with a bunt single.  Killebrew struck out, Reese flied out to center with Carew taking third, and a wild pitch brought home the go-ahead run.  The first two Kansas City batters in the bottom of the tenth went out.  Keough then singled to center, but was thrown out trying to stretch it to a double.  The out went 8-5--my guess is that it was a bloop single to short center, that both Carew and Cardenas went out to try to catch it, and it was a heads-up play by third baseman Frank Quilici covering second that ended the game.

WP:  Perranoski (3-1).

LP:  Future Twin Tom Burgmeier (0-1).

S:  None.

Notes:  Jim Holt was in left field in place of Brant Alyea.  Paul Ratliff was behind the plate in place of George Mitterwald.

Charlie Manuel pinch-hit for Bill Zepp in the ninth.  Rick Renick pinch-hit for Holt in the tenth.  Frank Quilici then entered the game at third base, with Bob Allison going to left and replacing Killebrew in the batting order.

Carew was 1-for-4 and was batting .411.  Oliva was 1-for-4 and is batting .324.  Killebrew was 1-for-4 and was batting .317.  Tovar was batting .301.  Zepp retired the only man he faced and had an ERA of 1.98.  Perranoski had an ERA of 1.47.

Holt was 1-for-4 and was batting .158.

Luis Tiant started and pitched 7.2 innings, giving up four runs on eight hits and three walks and striking out three.

This was the best year of Bob Oliver's career.  He batted .260/.309/.451 with 27 home runs and got the lone MVP vote of his career.

The Twins had now won six in a row and nine of eleven.  The Angels were hot, too, so the Twins were not able to put any distance between them.

Record:  The Twins were 24-10, in first place in the American League West, a half game ahead of California.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–November 8

Bucky Harris (1896)
Tony Cuccinello (1907)
Wally Westlake (1920)
Joe Nossek (1940)
Ed Kranepool (1944)
John Denny (1952)
Jerry Remy (1952)
Jeff Blauser (1965)
Eric Anthony (1967)
Henry Rodriguez (1967)
Jose Offerman (1968)
Edgardo Alfonzo (1973)
Nick Punto (1977)
Bryan Shaw (1987)
Yasmani Grandal (1988)
Giancarlo Stanton (1989)

Bucky Harris was a star for the franchise when it was in Washington in the 1920s.

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Keeping Track

1970 Rewind: Game Thirty-three

MINNESOTA 7, KANSAS CITY 5 IN KANSAS CITY

Date:  Monday, May 18.

Batting stars:  Rod Carew was 3-for-5 with a two-run homer, his second.  Cesar Tovar was 1-for-2 with three walks, a stolen base (his twelfth), and two runs.  Leo Cardenas was 1-for-3 with a two-run homer (his fourth) and a walk.  Harmon Killebrew was 1-for-4 with a home run (his twelfth) and a walk.

Pitching star:  Ron Perranoski struck out two in two shutout innings, giving up one hit.

Opposition stars:  Joe Keough was 3-for-4 with two runs.  Ex-Twin Jackie Hernandez was 2-for-3 with two RBIs.  Amos Otis was 2-for-5 with a two-run homer, his fourth.

The game:  The Twins took the lead in the second when Rick Renick singled and Cardenas followed with a two-run homer.  The Royals came right back to tie it in the bottom of the second.  Keough singled and scored from first on a Rich Severson double.  Severson advanced to third on a pickoff error and scored on Hernandez' single, making it 2-2.

The Twins took the lead in the fifth when Tovar walked and Carew followed with a two-run homer.  Kansas City cut the lead to 4-3 in the sixth when Keough singled, went to second on a ground out, took third on a wild pitch, and scored on a Hernandez single.  The Twins went back up by two in the seventh when Tovar walked, Carew singled, and Tony Oliva had an RBI single.

The Royals again came back in the seventh.  Paul Schaal reached on an error and Otis hit a two-out two-run homer to tie it 5-5.  In the eighth, two walks and two wild pitches put men on second and third and Charlie Manuel had a pinch-hit sacrifice fly to put the Twins ahead.  Killebrew homered for an insurance run in the ninth.

WP:  Bill Zepp (1-0).

LP:  Mike Hedlund (2-3).

S:  Perranoski (10).

Notes:  Renick was at third base, with Killebrew at first and Rich Reese on the bench.  Reese pinch-hit for Renick in the eighth and went to first base, with Killebrew moving to third.  Frank Quilici took over for Killebrew at third in the ninth.

Jim Holt replaced Brant Alyea in left field in the seventh.  Manuel pinch-hit for George MItterwald, who was making a return to the lineup, in the eight inning.  Paul Ratliff pinch-hit for pitcher Zepp in the eighth.  Ratliff stayed in the game to catch, with Perranoski coming in to pitch.

Carew raised his average to .419.  Oliva was 1-for-5 and was batting .326.  Killebrew was 1-for-4 and was batting .319.  Renick was 1-for-2 and was batting .313.  Zepp struck out the only man he faced and had an ERA of 2.03.  Perranoski had an ERA of 1.57.

Mitterwald was 0-for-3 and was batting .184.

Jim Kaat started and pitched 6.2 innings, giving up five runs (three earned) on nine hits and a walk and striking out three.  Bill Butler started for Kansas City and pitched six innings, giving up five runs on six hits and six walks and striking out one.

The two pitchers who got the decisions combined to pitch one-third of an inning and face three batters.  Zepp, as noted above, struck out the only man he faced.  Hedlund faced two batters in the eighth and walked both of them, with the first coming around to score the go-ahead run.

Perranoski had appeared in fifteen of the Twins' thirty-three games, pitching 28.2 innings.

Hernandez had ten RBIs in 1970.  Twenty percent of them came in this game.

Infielder Rich Severson was in his rookie year.  He appeared in nearly half of the team's games, getting 240 at-bats and batting .250/.300/.317.  He was back in AAA for most of 1971, getting just 33 at-bats with the big club.  He was in AAA in 1972 and 1973, then he was done.  He did not hit a lot in AAA either, batting .254 with an OPS of .637 over four seasons.  He passed away in 2016 at the relatively young age of seventy-one.

Carew had six consecutive multi-hit games.  He was 17-for-28 over that span, raising his average from .328 to .419.  The .419 would be his high point for the season.

The Twins had won five in a row and eight of ten.

Record:  The Twins were 23-10, in first place in the American League West, a half game ahead of California.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–November 7

Chris Von der Ahe (1851)
Ed "The Only" Nolan (1857)
Bill Brubaker (1910)
Dick Stuart (1932)
Jake Gibbs (1938)
Jim Kaat (1938)
Joe Niekro (1944)
Buck Martinez (1948)
Willie Norwood (1950)
Guy Sularz (1955)
Orlando Mercado (1961)
Russ Springer (1968)
Todd Ritchie (1971)
Glendon Rusch (1974)
Esmerling Vasquez (1983)
Danny Santana (1990)

Promoter/entrepreneur Chris von der Ahe, referred to as "Bill Veeck with a handlebar mustache", owned the St. Louis franchise from 1882-1899.

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