Here's your boy, YouTube user "Classic Baseball on the Radio," if you want to sync up the Mets' radio to the video:
Here are some baseball-y ads from Sports Illustrated this year on which I might comment:
And here are the World Series rosters for Oakland and New York--as pictured with the Mike Andrews Sporting News in our kitchen--and I definitely plan to comment on all of this stuff:
Go, A's!
Man, think how disappointed all those ESPN Classic viewers were to be watching the seventh game of the 1973 World Series than, say, a Clemson-Wake Forest basketball game from 2015 or some of the other features ESPN Classic offers now.
ReplyDeleteCool. Lou Rawls did the National Anthem at an NFL game at Candlestick Park earlier this Sunday afternoon and then performed it at this seventh game in Oakland.
ReplyDeleteBert Campaneris made the cover of the Oct. 22, 1973, Sports Illustrated, and this made me ecstatic. But then Ron Fimrite's report on the first two games of the World Series--focusing on all of the errors and gaffes of the A's and Mets--is headlined "Buffoonery Rampant," and that's a letdown.
ReplyDeleteHere's Game 1; I didn't think it was so bad. The Hank Aaron-Joe Garagiola segment before Curt Gowdy's live telecast from Oakland is a pretty neat idea. Garagiola pretends to be Aaron, and Aaron asks him some of the more common or curious questions he's heard during his pursuit of Babe Ruth's home-run record. They seem to be enjoying themselves so much.
ReplyDeleteHere's Dick Green to lead off the bottom of the third of scoreless Game 7 ...
ReplyDeleteIt's amazing how slight all of these dudes are. John Milner is the Mets' first baseman and rising young power hitter. Per his 1974 Topps card, he was 6 feet and 180 pounds. He's smaller and less bulked up than most kids playing small forward for high-school basketball teams in 2019.
ReplyDeleteBert Campaneris--quite possibly the slightest of all these slight dudes--homers to right field, and the A's are up, 2-0! And now here's Reggie Jackson, and he homers to right field, and the A's are up, 4-0! And isn't this Clint Eastwood celebrating in the stands with Charlie O. Finley?
ReplyDeleteHere is Roger Angell's description from "Five Seasons." Angell was a huge Mets fan, and this was one of his favorite seasons. To me, this is as good as it gets for sports writing:
Delete"Now, in the third, in the space of a bare minute or two, Holtzman doubled and Campaneris homered on the very next pitch; Rudi singled and, after an out, Reggie Jackson homered to deepest right-center field -- four hits, four runs, one World Championship. The moment Jackson hit his shot, he dropped his bat at his feet and stood stock-still at the plate, watching the ball go, more or less in the style of Sir Kenneth Clark regarding a Rembrandt. I thought he could be forgiven this gesture; he was, after all, the big gun of the A's, and he had shot us down in the end."
Here, by the way, are today's batting orders for the Mets and A's ...
ReplyDeleteWayne Garrett, third baseman
Felix Millan, second baseman
Rusty Staub, right fielder
Cleon Jones, left fielder
John Milner, first baseman
Jerry Grote, catcher
Don Hahn, center fielder
Bud Harrelson, shortstop
Jon Matlack, pitcher
Bert Campaneris, shortstop
Joe Rudi, left fielder
Sal Bando, third baseman
Reggie Jackson, center fielder
Gene Tenace, catcher
Jesus Alou, right fielder
Deron Johnson, first baseman
Dick Green, second baseman
Ken Holtzman, pitcher
This 1973 Series actually reminds me a lot of this year's series between the Nats and the Astros. The Nats, like the 1973 Mets, got very hot down the stretch and rode that momentum all the way into the World Series. The A's were staggered by the Mets, but stopped their offense cold to win it all. In the last three games of the 1973 World Series, the Mets scored only five runs. Houston is basically doing the same thing to Washington now.
ReplyDeleteBut then the Nats found a way to score in Games Six and Seven!
DeleteHere's Henry Aaron (and Gladys Knight) on tonight 1973's Flip Wilson Show.
ReplyDeleteGladys Knight, as a barbecue-restaurant server named Mildred: "I see you must be quite the ladies man."
Henry Aaron, as himself, at a dinner in his honor at the restaurant operated by Flip Wilson: "Why is that?"
Gladys Night's Mildred: "Every time I pick up the paper, it says you're chasing some babe."
Henry Aaron: "That Babe is Ruth."
Gladys Knight: "Well, if you can't get Ruth, try Mildred."
I freaking love television.
And now here's a lovely performance of "Midnight Train to Georgia," with Gladys Knight and the Pips actually singing along with Flip Wilson's show orchestra.
ReplyDeleteThat song was No. 1 on American Top 40 last week, but it's No. 2 this week.
ReplyDelete