Tony Womack may be a great guy. He may work very hard. He’s a far better baseball player than I’ll ever be. But he’s not a good ballplayer at this point. He hasn’t really done anything very successfully on a baseball field since he eliminated the Cardinals from the playoffs in 2001. Which, as you might imagine, still rankles.
And now he’s a Cardinal.
But at least he has a purple Lamborghini!
As the folks at the Cardinals Birdhouse say, “How can you not like a guy who has a purple Lamborghini?
One more politics post before I leave it behind like Bonds blowing past Willie Mays.
There are a couple of sites that allow you to search FEC records to see who has donated what to whom. This one lets you search for any contributions made to presidential campaigns this election cycle. One entertaining feature is that you can search by ZIP code and see what your neighbors are giving.
This site has, for some reason, the 1997-98 and 2000 election cycles. It seems to be much more comprehensive, too, including contributions to PACs and congressional campaigns.
So what’s this have to do with baseball? You can look up ballplayers! And owners!
Since I spend most of my time worrying about the National League Central, I thought I’d look up the owners of the teams in that division.
Cardinals: I already knew that Bill DeWitt, Jr. of the Cardinals was a Forest Ranger or Space Pirate or whatever Bush called people who raised a certain number of billions for him. But he’s also given thousands in soft money to the Republicans and thousands in direct money to John Ashcroft.
Cubs: Owned by the Tribune Company. If you read the Chicago Tribune’s editorial page any time between, say, the Lincoln administration and today, you already know where their money is going.
Reds: Owner Carl Lindner gives insane amounts of money to both party central committees, but on balance, the GOP takes home more of the money Reds fans (not to mention the residents of Cincinnati who funded that ballpark) cough up. Sadly, for both Lindner and the GOP, attendance at Reds games wasn’t helped quite as much as they hoped it would be by the new park.
Houston: Owner Drayton McLane likes to give to Tom DeLay. And Elizabeth Dole. And Craig Biggio, if you count extending his expensive contract beyond the point when he will be a good player a political contribution.
Pittsburgh: Pirates owner Kevin McClatchy is an oddity among MLB owners. He mostly gives to Democrats, in amounts in the low thousands of dollars. He did, however, write one check to Rick Santorum, for $250. The very smallness of the check in relation to his other donations makes me imagine him wrinkling his face in disgust as he wrote it, considering it a cost of doing big business in Pennsylvania.
Milwaukee: Ah, yes. Have you heard me rant about Selig? Well, despite his union-busting and serial lying, Allan H. Selig is on the same side as me here, with him and his family members giving across the board to the Democrats.
What’s most interesting in this is that nearly all these owners have given–freely, I’m sure–amounts ranging from $1500 to $7500 to the Office of the Commissioner of Baseball Political Action Committee. I guess that committee is one of the ways MLB convinces people like James Sensenrenner to lob softballs at the Commissioner during congressional hearings.
Oh, and ballplayers? Turns out they just don’t give much to anybody, despite having loads of the ready. I suppose that shouldn’t surprise me. Al Leiter, noted Republican and boyishly cute pitcher, did give to Jim Bunning’s senate campaign. From which filing I learned that Al’s full first name is Alois.
And Tony LaRussa gave to a Democratic congressional candidate, which doesn’t surprise me, seeing as he’s a vegetarian and animal-rights activist.
Weirdest of all so far? Steve Garvey, noted conservative first baseman, gave Bill Bradley $1000.
That’s it for politics, unless Jim wants to go through the rosters of all current teams in order to see which players donated to legislators who have supported Amtrak?
Me taking off my shirt to reveal “Kerry for President” would likely result in a lot of votes for Bush, or Nader, or Lyndon LaRouche, not to mention a constitutional amendment against taking one’s shirt off in public.
I’d kind of like to keep politics out of this in order to focus on the baseball, but then, I was the one who named the trip “baseball-related program activities,” wasn’t I?
Because I’ve been more or less obsessed with the presidential race for months now, I was thinking today about how we could do our part during our trip in getting Bush out of office. I’ve got a few ideas.
1) We could have friends and relatives and coworkers pledge money for each of several types of discrete baseball event we see. For example, people could pledge to give the Kerry campaign a quarter per single, fifty cents per double, maybe a dollar per triple, and seventy-five cents per home run. A nickel per strikeout. A penny per swear word overheard in the bleachers at Fenway. Two dollars per extra inning. We could really go nuts and have the truly flush pledge $25 per beanball, $50 per ejection, $100 per menacing confrontation around the mound, and $200 per legitimate brawl. A no-hitter would come in around $500, and a perfect game would cap the person’s legally allowable election cycle donation at $2,000. A Brewers or Tigers win would force the person to split his or her donation of $4,000 between the Kerry campaign and the Obama campaign.
And since the Bush campaign has names for people who are able to bundle huge amounts of cash (I have a name for them, too, but it’s inappropriate for a website on such an all-American topic as baseball.), maybe we should name ourselves when we hit $50,000 raised. Suggestions, Jim?
2) We could paint “Kerry for President” on our chests and take off our shirts. This tactic would be likely to get us more attention at the games which include female hangers-on. Maybe we could coax Morganna the Kissing Bandit out of retirement?
Since it’s late March, it must be time for plenty of baseball programming, even on non-sports channels. Tonight on the Travel Channel was, I swear, “Pat Sajak’s American League Ballpark Tour,” followed immediately by “Pat Sajak’s National League Ballpark Tour.” Each one highlighted what somebody decided were the five most unique stadiums in each league, including two of the parks set for this trip, Fenway Park and PNC Park.
The other four NL parks: Dodger Stadium, Coors Field, SBC Park, and Wrigley Field; the other four AL parks were Kauffman Stadium, Safeco Field, Oriole Park at Camden Yards, and The Ballpark in Arlington. The SBC Park segments were taped last year, so Pat Sajak in his introductions had to point out several times that it was “formerly known as Pac Bell Park,” which is what everyone was calling it.
The best segment was the man who was redoing the 778 metal scoreboard number plates for Fenway Park, using paper stencils individually cut by hand, so that no two examples of the same number would look exactly the same.
Oh, by the way: it’s now 22 weeks until the first game on the itinerary.
What is it about “baseball” and “road trip” that seem to go together? The first “improved” roads in the United States (for bicyclists) go back to the beginnings of organized baseball. The Model T goes back to when the World Series was first getting started. Numbered U.S. highways go back to Babe Ruth’s home run record. The Interstate highway system goes back to Roger Maris’s home run record. The first oil embargo goes back to the Oakland A’s dynasty of the early 1970s. And certainly it’s no coincidence that, in 1998, Mark McGwire hit 70 home runs to match Interstate 70, which runs through St. Louis, while Sammy Sosa hit 66 home runs to match U.S. 66, which used to start (or end) in Chicago. (Unfortunately, Barry Bonds ruined everything by only hitting 73 in 2001, a number which has nothing to do with any highways in the Bay Area. If only he’d hit 80, or 101…but that would have required some serious steroid usage.)
Levi and I are doing a road trip this year. The basic plan: I will fly to Chicago to meet up with Levi. Then, since he doesn’t own a car, we will rent a vehicle. The “ground rules” for this trip are that it will involve a Red Sox home game (at Levi’s request), an Expos home game (could be their last season in Montreal), and a Pirates home game (I lived in Pittsburgh during what turned out to be the waning days of Three Rivers Stadium, and I want to see their new home).
But we’re also going to see as many other games as possible in a short period of time. Thus, once the preliminary schedules came out, I went through the schedules of the possible teams involved, drawing lines on graph paper to show when each team would be home (dates on the X axis, teams on the Y axis), and managed to come up with four potential itineraries to present to Levi. And they are…
Itinerary #1 (9 games in 10 days, 15 different teams)
Saturday May 22 Astros at Reds (night)
Sunday May 23 Brewers at Pirates (day)
Monday May 24 Angels at Blue Jays (night)
Tuesday May 25 Braves at Expos (night)
Wednesday May 26 A's at Red Sox (night)
Thursday May 27 (DAY OFF)
Friday May 28 Braves at Phillies (night)
Saturday May 29 A's at Indians (night)
Sunday May 30 Orioles at Tigers (day)
Monday May 31 Astros at Cubs (probably day)
Itinerary #2 (10 games in 10 days, 15 different teams)
Saturday July 17 Brewers at Cubs (probably day)
Sunday July 18 Yankees at Tigers (day)
Monday July 19 Expos at Pirates (night)
Tuesday July 20 Marlins at Mets (night)
Wednesday July 21 Blue Jays at Yankees (night)
Thursday July 22 Twins at Red Sox (day)
Friday July 23 Marlins at Expos (night)
Saturday July 24 Devil Rays at Blue Jays (late day)
Sunday July 25 Royals at Indians (probably day)
Monday July 26 Cubs at Brewers (night)
Itinerary #3 (9 games in 9 days, 12 different teams)
Sunday August 22 Pirates at Cardinals (day)
Monday August 23 White Sox at Tigers (night)
Tuesday August 24 Red Sox at Blue Jays (night)
Wednesday August 25 Dodgers at Expos (night)
Thursday August 26 Tigers at Red Sox (night)
Friday August 27 Brewers at Phillies (night)
Saturday August 28 Cardinals at Pirates (night)
Sunday August 29 White Sox at Indians (probably day)
Monday August 30 Pirates at Brewers (night)
Itinerary #4 (9 or 10 games in 9 or 10 days, 16 or 18 different teams)
Monday August 30 Astros at Reds (night)
Tuesday August 31 Mariners at Blue Jays (night)
Wednesday Sept. 1 Cubs at Expos (night)
Thursday Sept. 2 Angels at Red Sox (night)
Friday Sept. 3 Orioles at Yankees (night)
Saturday Sept. 4 Mets at Phillies (night)
Sunday Sept. 5 Frederick Keys at Wilmington Blue Rocks
Monday Sept. 6 Twins at Orioles (probably day)
OR Brewers at Pirates (late day)
Tuesday Sept. 7 Brewers at Pirates (night)
OR Royals at Tigers (night)
Wednesday Sept. 8 Royals at Tigers (night)
And so now, the ball is in Levi’s court (whoops, wrong sport there with that metaphor) to pick one of these. Since his favorite team is the Cardinals, I’ve got a feeling he’ll go for #3, but maybe he’ll surprise me. Obviously, it partly depends on the amount of vacation time involved, and #1 and #4 both include holidays while #2 and #3 do not. I actually have reasons for liking all four of these itineraries, so I don’t really care which one eventually gets chosen.
Just as long as Levi hurries up and picks, since tickets for some teams go on sale in February (except for the Yankees, which are already on sale).
thatbob:“I actually have reasons for liking all four of these itineraries.”
I wish you would share those reasons.
The season may be over, but my radio station jingle collecting continues. Here’s one I just acquired, circa the early 1960s, back when cheering baseball fans sounded a lot like ocean waves or static or something like that.
Here’s 50% of the items that came in the mail today (in the most nondescript envelope ever, with an indication that it contained “your requested dated material”)…
Yes, it’s vertical, which I had previously thought was an orientation reserved for football and hockey season tickets. (Bleacher section 36 is in dead center field, if anyone’s curious. Looking forward to seeing Johnny Damon’s back!)
Actually, as it turns out, that error message is the modern equivalent of “your telephone is not compatible with the Bell System,” or something like that. I thought the problem was that the Phillies’ web site was too busy, but the problem seems to have been that their ticketing process was incompatible with Macintosh web browsers. Everything worked perfectly on my PC at work, so we now have 12th-row upper-deck seats to see the Phillies vs. Brewers at the new Citizens Bank Park.
Turns out the modern equivalent of a busy signal is the message “DTWP001E: Net.Data is unable to locate the macro file err_bad_user_init.d2w.” (I got up ridiculously early this morning and have been looking at this, online and related gibberish, for hours now.)
