Refurbishing in progress (since 2014)
Stay tuned. Grab a sandwich. Check your emails. Play with the dog. We’ll be with you as soon as I can dig my van out of that snow pile.
Obituaries
When I think about Bob Lanier, I think three things: Great player on a team with no directionHuge feet (size 22 shoes)Airplane! Lanier was the...
Gino Cappelletti was the Paul Hornung of the AFL, a hybrid player who could beat you from any direction. Primarily a kicker, defensive back and...
Paul Vance was a prolific songwriter and producer who wrote over a thousand songs that made it to vinyl. He is best-known as half of...
Doug’s Biography in 1,000 Players
301 Larry Jackson P 71 302 Tony Oliva RF 31 303 Roy White LF 32 304 Joe Tinker SS 27 305 Harold Baines RF 32 306 Sam Rice RF 33 307 Hanley Ramirez SS 28 308 Roy Oswalt P 72...
Vida Blue came up from the minors in 1970 to get some experience. On a day the Twins could clinch the division over the second place Oakland A’s (Blue’s team) Blue threw a no-hitter at the Twins to stave off...
Rabbit Maranville the lowest ranked of the position players I have in my hall of fame. I have him in more because he was an interesting character. He wasn’t a good hitter. He had three seasons where he was an...
Don Mattingly peaked from age 23 to 28 and was a dominant player from 1984 to 1986. He could definitely be described as the best player in baseball from 1985 to 1986 as he finished first and second for the...
Brian Giles is the third player in a row to lead the league in one key statistical category in his career and all three led in walks. Bill James once said you can see from close ranked players similarities you...
After playing primary shortstop for the Texas Rangers for six years, he was moved to third base as the Rangers signed Bert Campaneris. I don’t know if this was the best move because Campaneris was going to be 35 years...
Brian Downing started as a fair hitting catcher with minimal power and later turned into a good hitting left fielder with power. The first year he hit 20 homers was 1982 when he turned 31. He did work out with...
Terry’s Latest
I just downloaded a vulgarity governor app on my phone - it's really cool; it changes all my profane words to gosh. For example, if I say "gosh" it changes it to "gosh." I mean when I say gosh it......
Rick Ankiel, 0.1. Players with at least 40 home runs and 40 games pitched: Babe Ruth (714, 163) Rick Ankiel (76, 51) Johnny Lindell (72, 55) George Van Haltren (69, 93) Cy Seymour (52, 141) Ruth (93), Seymour (61) and Van...
Terry, July 8, 2021 A few new rules, for a better game: Let the pitchers have the spider tack. Let ‘em all have the ‘roids. Shrink the strike zone two inches and lower it to the bottom of the knees....
Is death itself disturbing? Or is it the realization that death is coming despite you putting every human molecule of your will into surviving? Three disturbing scenes I've seen in movies: A 13-year-old girl who just had her first kiss...
April 7, 2022 AL EAST Winner: Tampa BayWild Card: TorontoWild Card: Boston Toronto has a loaded lineup, what could be a pretty good infield defense and an imported rotation full of veterans who they hope will stay healthy surrounding top prospect...
Obituaries
When I think about Bob Lanier, I think three things: Great player on a team with no directionHuge feet (size 22 shoes)Airplane! Lanier was the prototypical 20-10 player; he averaged 20.1 points and 10.1 rebounds over his 14-year career. He...
Gino Cappelletti was the Paul Hornung of the AFL, a hybrid player who could beat you from any direction. Primarily a kicker, defensive back and wide receiver, he scored 42 career touchdowns and an AFL record 1,130 points in the...
Paul Vance was a prolific songwriter and producer who wrote over a thousand songs that made it to vinyl. He is best-known as half of the Vance/Pockriss writing team that wrote “Leader of the Laundromat,” “Catch a Falling Star, “Tracy,”...
If I set out to compile a list of the best musical families, several obvious names would come first (and then the Interweb would flood me with dozens of others): the Jacksons, the Carter/Cash family, the Osmonds (stop laughing), the...
I feel like she was too famous for one of my usual obits ... it would take me weeks to write a proper obituary for Loretta Lynn, and a book publisher to get it distributed. So how about ten things...
Book Reports
A group of us were having our men’s group and talking about men displaying their emotions and it being Ok for men to cry. While this is more acceptable in society now, I think some people are judgmental about it....
Chuck Cunningham was a character on a show that started in January 1974 and lasted 11 seasons. He was the older brother of the Cunningham family the main family of the show. The star of the show was Ron Howard...
Terry July 3, 2021 “If This Goes On — " is the story of a revolution to wrest control of the United States back from a fundamentalist totalitarian regime, founded by Reverend Nehemiah Scudder, that sprouted up after WWIII destroyed Europe...
Gary Fletcher’s Latest
A group of us were having our men’s group and talking about men displaying their emotions and it being Ok for men to cry. While this is more acceptable in society now, I think some people are judgmental about it....
Halfway home, just above Emerald Bay, I overtook the worst driver in the world. Ross MacDonald / Gone Girl I’ve always considered Ross MacDonald, known for his series of Lew Archer detective novels, a great writer with a unique,...
My wife and I are an adventurous couple. Unfortunately, there's been this covid-19 thingy that has curtailed our wild lifestyle. Maybe you’ve heard of it? Anyway, for the last year and a bit, there’s been no Bingo, no Casinos and...
I loved my father. Fathers and sons playing catch – what is it about throwing that baseball back and forth in the yard, anyway? We did so many other things together, after all. So many things shared and remembered by...
I’ve noticed in the last couple of years that while writing I tend to skip over little words like ‘the’ and ‘and’ and the like. I also sometimes skip over letters. For example, the word ‘look’ turns into ‘lok.’ It...
