WALKING AMONG LEGENDS

By George Devine, Jr.
Fox Sports Radio for Love of the Game Productions

KANSAS CITY, MO–A couple of weeks ago, when the Bay Area’s John Madden joined the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, OH, the coach turned commentator and pitchman suggested the busts of the enshrined talked to each other at night. Friday, when I visited Kansas City’s Negro League Baseball Museum, I wondered if legends who occupy a special place in the history of America’s pastime also converse after the visitors and the lights go out.

And like John Madden suggested during his acceptance speech in Canton, I also suspected these legends cast in bronze might even play against one another. At the Negro League Baseball Museum, the legends actually take their respective positions on the diamond. Satchel Paige stands the tallest, right smack in the middle of the diamond, ready to read the signal from his catcher Josh Gibson while Cool Papa Bell trolls left field. Any imaginative baseball fan must wonder if they switch positions at night, maybe take turns standing in against Paige.

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Baseball: Watch Those Predictions
by Glenn Dickey
Aug 16, 2006

BASEBALL IS the most unpredictable sport, with quite different results from day to day, as we were reminded in the very first A’s series this year, when the Yankees scored 16 runs in the opener but the A’s won the next two games.

By midseason in an NFL season, the contenders are clearly separated from the pretenders. It didn’t take that long for the 49ers and Raiders last season. The 49ers were clearly going nowhere after the first four games. The Raiders insisted they would be in the playoffs but, since they were on the losing side of the ledger from the first game, they were fooling only themselves.

In baseball, though, early results can be misleading. The A’s seemed totally out of the race in May but by the end of August, they were leading the AL West, though they slipped back in September. The Cleveland Indians, too, had a great midseason run and for a time, looked like the best team in baseball – but like the A’s, they missed the playoffs.

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August 15, 2006

Marty —

It’s Hank Masler from the Chamber. Nick Swisher is here in City Center signing autographs and suddenly it dawned on me that I never sent you the short story that I wrote following our interview at spring training. So here it is — complete with the photo I used. Thanks again, and I hope all’s well with you.

Hank Masler

Hank Masler
Communications Manager

Oakland Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce
475 14th Street
Oakland, CA 94612-1903

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Felipe Alou has been a baseball man since he started playing ball as a kid in the Dominican Republic.
Now he is towards the end of his baseball career
and he knows that a good manager is as good
as the talent he has on the field.
Prior to a game I sat down with Felipe and conducted an interview in Spanish(which here I
translated into English)

By Amaury Pi-González

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With seven weeks to go in the baseball season it’s easy to get giddy if your team is in first place or crestfallen if your favorite nine is trailing the leaders.

The baseball season is a marathon race with many twists and turns ahead.

Take a look at the A’s schedule in September and you quickly see why “the stretch” drive will be a real test for Oakland.

Road trips to Tampa Bay (they actually win at home), Minnesota (one of the best home records in the majors), Seattle and Anaheim pose a serious challenge.

At home the A’s face the White Sox, Texas, and Angels along with the Orioles and Indians.

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Inside Baseball with Marty Lurie, Shooty Babitt & Bruce Magowan – Harden: Time to Shut him down for the year?, Mets: Pitching problems?, Mark Buehrle: Still on a slump?, Wild card: Phillies or Astros?, Hot in LA: Dodgers’ have won 14 out of 15.
Segment one : Marty, Shooty & Bruce.
Segment two : Marty, Shoot, Bruce & Roxy Bernstein (In Arizona, the New Voice of the Florida Marlins).
Segment three: Marty, Shooty, Bruce, Mike Madeiros (from WholesaleAutosRUs).
Segment four : Mark Gonzalez (calling from Chicago), Vince Cotroneo, Shooty & Bruce.
Segment five : Marty, Shooty & Bruce.
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Inside Baseball with Marty Lurie & Bruce Magowan – Crosby & Harden: Will they ever get healthy?, What careers were shortened by injuries? , the wild Wild Card race.

Segment one : Marty & Bruce.
Segment two : Marty & Bruce.
Segment three: Marty & Bruce.
Segment four : Marty & Bruce.
Segment five : Marty & Bruce.
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Barry Zito might be the toughest to replace of all the free agents who have left the A’s over the years.

When Zito is on he pitches with great confidence

You can see that look on Zito’s face every time he faces a team in the AL West. Zito pitches against the divison like they are little leaguers. Zito is 40-13 lifetime vs. the West.

The Mariners haven’t hit Zito in years. The Rangers are Zito’s cousins. The Angels consistently flail harmlessly at Zito’s offerings.

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CROWD BEHAVIOR seems to be getting worse at baseball games, as Milton Bradley can certainly attest.

Bradley was taunted by fans in Boston and Baltimore during the A’s recent trip through the east. Manager Ken Macha sat him down for the final game of the Red Sox series, concerned there would be another incident.

Bradley is known for his short fuse, and fans were trying to get him to explode. This has long been typical of Red Sox fans, who are at best tied with Philadelphia fans for the most obnoxious in baseball, but Orioles fans have never had that reputation. Maybe they wanted some entertainment, which they weren’t getting from their team’s play.

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ZITO’S DAY

There’s no crying in baseball. There are no curtain calls in Oakland. But those of us at the A’s-Blue Jays game last Saturday challenged tradition to show our affection for Barry Zito.

Mind you, the ovation was partly a last-ditch effort to remind Zito (and Billy Beane) how much he means to us. Let me count the ways he has won us over these past six years: cerebral interviews, wild clubhouse celebration dances, and of course, that jaw dropping, feat-of-physics curveball. We did not want to lose all of that come Monday at the trade deadline.

Click below for Alexa’s first article for Loveofthegame! [Read more →]