Wednesday, February 08, 2012

Moore Of My Usual (Meaning Both Puns And Box Score Research)

I'm a big Michael Moore fan. I'm reading his current book, which is a collection of stories from his past, going all the way back to his birth--and beyond, as he even tells his family history. His great (x6) grandfather fought alongside Ethan Allen in the Revolutionary War days, which is special to me because ol' Ethan is my great (x8) grandfather. You may know him as the guy who surprised the British in the middle of the night at Fort Ticonderoga. (See, I even have night-owl roots.) Sadly, you're more likely to know him as a furniture store.

But back to Michael's book. In a story about the Detroit riots of 1967, he talks about his family venturing into the city shortly after calm had been restored to see a Tigers game. Of course, I had to find the game he went to. He said it was against the White Sox, a Thursday night game which Detroit lost, 2-1. So I headed for the Tigers' 1967 game log on retrosheet, and it turns out Michael had his facts right. The riots happened in late July, and the only home loss to the White Sox by a score of 2-1 on a Thursday night after that was August 10th, 1967.

It was the finale of a four-game split, and Moore's memory of the nice black man who helped get his father's wounded car to a gas station saying the game was a stinker is correct if you're a Detroit fan. The Tigers gave up the tying run in a 7th-inning rally started by a dropped fly ball, and then stranded the bases loaded in the bottom of the 8th after having given up the lead in the top half.

Chicago manager Eddie Stanky made a controversial decision to bring in starting pitcher Gary Peters to face Norm Cash in the 8th with three on and two out. As the caption below his picture (left, Windsor Star, 8/11/1967) says, "he knew best," as Peters struck Cash out. The author of the accompanying UPI article wondered if this would cost the White Sox down the line. I'm not sure it did, as Peters kept his ERA right about where it was the rest of the season. He did throw in two bad performances against the Red Sox a few weeks after this, but those were sandwiched around an 11-inning shutout, also against Boston, which kept the White Sox a game out on September 1st in the incredible four-team race that year. But Chicago, as well as Detroit, would come up just short in 1967, with the Impossible Dream coming true on October 1st.

So Michael saw a pretty important game, considering the Tigers would end up one game out of first place. Funny, he didn't mention the Tigers left fielder, Willie Horton....

Comments:
Just got the e-mail: I won the OD/Yanks lottery! Which is really funny since I already got these games in the digital sale, then had a chance to buy more with the SRO packs.... I'd gladly trade this win in for winning the Monster sale. Oh well, I can always buy more Yanks games, right? Or maybe now that I've got more time to think about it, I'll see if anyone I know wants OD or 100th anniversary game tix and I could get 'em for them.
 
I won that too! I'm hoping for the Apr 20th, 100th anniversary day. Briefly had a panicked moment as I'd used 4 different email addresses (me, gf, mom & dad) to increase my odds, but unlike in other years, the email didn't say "Dear Andria" or whatever to let me know whose name was connected to it-- just a warning that if the billing data didn't match what I originally entered the tickets would be immediately cancelled, and I couldn't recall who matched which email. Thankfully I found that all the info was actually encoded in my browser history, so the dream is alive.
 
Nice. I usually just stick to entering myself, and reminding my mom to enter. This year I forgot to remind her and was banking on one entry, and so far I'm 1 for 1. But like I said--this is the ONE year I didn't care about the Yankee lottery, since not only did I get what I wanted already, but I already turned down a chance to get more.
 

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