Jamie Moyer, This One's for You

"Cy stalled off the Grim Reaper again and pitched great baseball for the Blues last year. This season he is still in fine form, according to McGuire, who relies on him to hold down the main post of all his slabmen.

"And what is the secret of all this? "Old Cy says he doesn't know whether it's due to farming, wood chopping, chewing tobacco, or an occasional indulgence in the brew of the hops, which Cy is partial to.

"Says Cy 'Just outdoor life, moderation and a naturally good arm. I don't know that I take any better care of myself than any other pitcher does, it just happens, this thing of lasting.'"

The National Game, Alfred Spink, 1911

At age 44, Young would go 7-9 in 1911, his final season.

Tris Speaker and the Dangers of the Automobile

"Speaker is the greatest of the present day CF...there never has been but one man was his superior: Lange."

"He has the rough complexion of someone who has spent most of his life in the open air. He has heavy, buddy, bloodshot eyes, not the kind one would imagine could pick out a good ball and paste it to the far corner of the field, or could start after the ball at the crack and judge to an inch where that ball might land. He has a voice like rumbling thunder and his softest words sound like the growl of a mastiff. He has large, powerful hands, freckled."

"Most of the Boston players live together in an apartment house on Huntington Avenue. Many of them like to loll around their rooms..not so with Speaker who gets out and roams around as if he has nothing else to do." "Recently he bought an automobile. He has learned the mechanism of the machine and now spends his mornings speeding on the suburban roads. And doubtless this same automobile has affected his batting eye. Hans Wagner who owns and operates an automobile had to stop riding it because his batting fell off to nothing. Speaker could easily bat .400 if he would leave the automobile alone."

Alfred Spink, The National Game, 1911.

Zeke Is Not Forgotten

“Remember the farmer who stood in front of the hippo’s cage for twenty minutes and then said ‘There ain’t no such animal?’ He should see Zeke.” So wrote columnist Bill Henry upon seeing rookie Zeke Bonura at White Sox camp in Los Angeles in 1934. “Zeke has legs like Jim Londo’s (wrestler of the era) chest, weighs 220 pounds on the hoof and scampers around first base with astounding agility.”

Born Henry John Bonura in New Orleans in 1908, his nickname comes from the phrase “What a physique!” His parents, Enrico and Rosa Bonura, were among numerous turn of the century Sicilian immigrants who created a new life for themselves in New Orleans. His father was a prosperous fruit wholesaler, a fact that Zeke used in his legendary yearly contract holdouts, saying that he’d just go home and work for his dad’s business if the team didn’t meet his demands. He was known as the “Banana King” and “Banana Nose” for both his family business and his quite large Sicilian proboscis. Attending St. Stanislaus College Prep School in Bay St. Louis, MS, Bonura captained the football, baseball, basketball, and track and field teams. He was scouted by Notre Dame’s Knute Rockne. In 1925, at 16, he tossed the javelin 213 feet and 10 ½ inches to defeat Olympic gold medal winner Johnny Myra in the A.A.U. javelin championship, and he remains the youngest ever to win an A.A.U. track and field event. Bonura played baseball, basketball, and football at Loyola University in New Orleans.

He began his professional baseball career with his hometown New Orleans Pelicans of the Southern League (1929-31), later moving to the Dallas Steers of the Texas League, where he won the MVP in 1933. As a 25 year old rookie for the White Sox in 1934, Zeke belted 27 HR, most ever by an Italian-American until Joe Dimaggio came along and most ever for a Chisox rook until 1983 when Ron Kittle slugged 35. (There’s a bar bet for you!) In 1936, Zeke set the Sox franchise RBI record with 138, a mark that lasted for 64 years up until Frank Thomas drove in 143 in 2000.

Many sources disparage Bonura’s fielding as a first baseman, claiming that he was legendary for intentionally letting all but the easiest balls go by. One source even refers to him giving the “Mussolini salute” to groundballs, perhaps telling more about the anti-Italian-American sentiment of the time than about Bonura. Despite all of this, Zeke led the AL in fielding percentage three times during an era where Lou Gehrig was among his peers. Perhaps, there is some vindication for the Banana King, who is rated as a B+ fielding first baseman by Bill James in Win Shares!

Bonura, unfortunately, is no longer a well known name, and it might surprise many baseball history buffs to know that his park-adjusted OPS+ of 121 (bbref) ranks him squarely in the company of Tony Perez (122), Gil Hodges (120), Mark Grace (119), Pete Rose (118), and Andres Galarraga (118) and a shade behind Hall of Famers Jim Bottomley (125) and George Sisler (124).

On August 26, 1935, quite astonishingly, Zeke stole home with two outs in the bottom of the 15th inning to beat the Yankees. Apparently, he had mistaken a sign for “run on any hit ball” to mean “steal home.” His interest in Sox owner J. Louis Comiskey’s daughter, set in motion his trade to Washington for Joe Kuhel in 1938. With the Senators, Zeke would become a fan favorite of FDR’s Vice President, John Garner.

Bonura served in the Armed Forces from 1941-45, effectively ending his major league career. Master Sergeant Bonura received the Legion of Merit Award from General Eisenhower for his contributions to staff morale in Algeria, where he organized 1,000 baseball teams.

Upon leaving the armed forces, Bonura played several seasons in the low minors and managed in the minor leagues. In 1953, he managed a youngster named Roger Maris, capturing the Northern League pennant for Fargo-Moorhead.

Zeke never married. In retirement, he was renowned for raising pedigreed beagles. He died in New Orleans on March 9, 1987 and is buried in a typical New Orleans above ground tomb in Metairie Cemetery.

Manny Mota: Does Retrosheet Back up My Memories?

As a kid in the 70's, I was a huge Dodger fan and Manny Mota was my favorite player. As I remembered it, when the game was on the line in the late innings and a runner was in scoring position, the sight of #11, Manny Mota, swinging two bats in the on-deck circle created great drama and optimism in Dodger Stadium. If I rely on my memory, I imagine that he laced a beautiful line drive almost every time one was needed.. But, how often did he actually bang out a game tying or game winning hit?

Looking at Mota's 1974 stats, I noticed that he had 16 hits and 16 RBI. I thought that was pretty unusual and I visualized most of those 16 RBIs as game winners.

Enter the new reality check: Retrosheet.org. I looked through the play by play for each of Mota's 52 pinch hit ABs in 1974 and found that he had only one GWRBI (game winning RBI) in 10 situations where a basehit would have put the Dodgers ahead. His one success was a "walk off" single to score Dave Lopes in the bottom of the 9th in a "Businessman's Special" vs. the Braves on Wednesday, June 26, 1974. (In the 9th, Joe Ferguson had tied the game at 4-4 with a HR. Mota was hitting for LHB Bill Buckner vs. LHP Tom House.) In the next day's Los Angeles Times, Ross Newhan explained that Buckner was sent to the plate with Lopes on first. However, Alston pinch hit for Buckner during his at-bat after Lopes stole second:

With Lopes on second and the count 1-1 on Bill Buckner, manager Walter Alston sent up the right-handed-swinging Manny Mota, who took one pitch and then singled sharply to left. Lopes, who was again running with the pitch, dodged the ball as it darted toward left and easily scored the winning run....Of his decision to use Mota for Buckner who had previously doubled and singled and is hitting .331, Alston said: "I know Buck is hot but he hasn't been up that many times against a left-handed pitcher. I didn't want to use Mota while Lopes was still on first because Manny isn't the type of hitter who'll score a runner from first and I didn't want to just waste him."

Mota batted in six situations in 1974 where a single would have tied the game and he succeeded three times. Thus, he was 4 for 16 in game tying or game winning situations, a .250 average. Many of his other ABs were situations where he was simply hitting for a pitcher in the 8th or 9th inning, often when the game was not even close.

That wasn't nearly as good I remembered it, so, I decided to click through all of Manny's other PH AB from 1975 through 1982, when he was primarily a late inning pinch hitting specialist. Aha! 1976, that was the way I remembered it! Five game winning and two game tying hits in twelve tries. On May 22, 1976, he hit a walk off sacifice fly to beat the Astros in the 14th. Then, for an encore, he beat the Astros again the next day with a single in the bottom of the tenth! Overall, as shown below, I found that Mota came through almost 30 % of the time with game winning or game tying hits with runners in scoring position from 1974-1980.

Year GTRBI GWRBI F-GT F-GW GT+GW RBI GT+GW AB Success Pct.
1974 3 1 3 9 4 16 .250
1975 0 2 4 9 2 15 .133
1976 2 5 3 2 7 12 .583
1977 1 0 5 2 1 8 .125
1978 0 2 2 2 2 6 .333
1979 1 2 1 3 3 7 .429
1980 0 1 2 1 1 4 .250
74-80 7 13 20 28 20 68 .294

You could look it up. Here are the dates of the thirteen times Mota drove in a game winner-- play by play for each one can be found at Retrosheet: 6/26/74 ATL, 4/28/75 ATL, 7/18/75 PIT, 5/1/76 STL, 5/22/76 HOU, 5/23/76 HOU, 8/18/76 NYM, 9/13/76 ATL, 5/22/78 SDP, 8/24/78 PHI, 4/21/79 SFG, 8/4/79 SFG, 9/24/80 SFG.

I haven't compared Mota's success rate to other pinch hitters, but I think it would be hard to find someone who did as well over such an extended period. To compare Mota to other pinch hitters, I took a look at their career numbers with runners in scoring position (RISP). Retrosheet shows Mota with 970 career AB with RISP. Here's full career RISP data for him and other notable pinch hitters, (not limited to PH AB)

(Data available from 1960 to present):
Player AVG OBP SLG
Manny Mota .314 .384 .394
Jerry Lynch .296 .383 .504
Tommy Davis .286 .332 .386
Smokey Burgess .284 .400 .436
Terry Crowley .282 .392 .430
Jose Morales .282 .342 .446
Vic Davalillo .275 .321 .363
Greg Gross .267 .368 .334
Lenny Harris .253 .303 .319
John Vander Wal .242 .371 .423
Mark Sweeney .241 .361 .431
Dave Hansen .239 .372 .386

Of the top career pinch hitters I checked, Mota does not have the best OPS, but Mota is the one most likely to drive in those runners with a single. However, Alston might have liked to have had Lynch if the winning run was on first base!

Two Inside the Park Homers in One Game?

Retrosheet also helped me prove that one of my Mota memories was almost accurate. I incorrectly remembered seeing Manny Mota and Willie Davis hit back to back inside-the-park homeruns. As it turns out, on June 11, 1972, while attending Camera Day at Dodger Stadium, I did see Mota hit an inside-the-park homer in the third and Davis hit one in the fifth, two in the same game vs. the Pirates. According to the Los Angeles Times account of the game, Mota drove his into the left field corner and Rennie Stennett fell down attempting to chase it down. (Stennett who was primarily a second baseman, did play 48 games in the OF in his career, and apparently not well.) The drive by Davis was to nearly the same place down the RF line, perhaps as classic a match-up as could be imagined, with one of the speediest players in the game motoring around the bases and one of the greatest arms of all time, Roberto Clemente trying to throw him out.

And, one more Mota Retrosheet Moment:

In 1973, at age 10, I called Bud Furillo's KABC talk radio show and advocated using Mota full-time in LF instead of platooning him. For much of his career he had a reputation for only hitting LHP.

Well, guess what? Retrosheet's career splits show there wasn't much of platoon differential: .308 .350 .387 vs. RHP
.302 .362 .392 vs. LHP

With the game on the line, I'll take Mota as I remember him or as he really was.