It's actually 31 years later.

Based on what I've read about it (which granted isn't much), Jim Bunning is on the short list of worst Senators of all time and would have been a disaster as a President. John Tener was not only a baseball player, he was President of the NL and governor of Pennsylvania. Monte Ward could work out good as well.

I think something should be said about the fact that he and Scott Boras said he wouldn't sign for less than $10 million, but Philadelphia took him anyway even though they weren't going to give him $10 million. He made himself persona non grata in Philly for life for that.

Wow! No one loves Major League? Mike Ferrin mentioned "The Slugger's Wife" in his comment about Damn Yankees. That movie stood for years as the movie I attended with the fewest people in the theater, at 5. I wonder if we could do a 10 least favorite baseball movies list.

You can't necessarily blame it on the French to point out the "European roots" of baseball. It could have been the French Canadians. They might still be mad at Bud Selig for the Expos.

Sadly, we can now add Greg Halman to the list. Apparently stabbed by his brother. Who knew the Netherlands was a dangerous place? http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/45383682/ns/world_news-europe/

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Kirby Puckett yet. I don't know that anyone else ever got glaucoma in the middle of their career, much less a Hall of Famer.

I believe technically, they have never fired a GM before now, because MacPhail came on board when Carl Pohlad became owner, and Calvin Griffith was his own GM, and Clark Griffith in the Senators days.

I don't know if this is what you have in mind, but I know at least two times pitchers broke their pitching arms while pitching, Tony Saunders and Dave Dravecky. And there is the minor league first base coach who died who got hit by a baseball, which made all the base coaches wear helmets on the field, only they wear the ones without earflaps. There could be an instance in the future where they get hit and killed where the earflap would be. It could also happen to a runner who has his earflap on his right side, too. On the other hand, I don't know when a runner has ever been hit by a ball.

Then there are the embarrassing drops. It was the day before high school graduation and a number of us classmates went to the Kane County Cougars game and some long forgotten player on the opposition hit a pop foul right at me. Naturally, I try to barehand it, I get my hand on it and drop it and I spent the rest of the night getting heckled by the drunks near us. One of my friends goes "so are you going to drop your diploma tomorrow?". I have been to numerous games in numerous ballpark since and never been close since.

Edwin Rodriguez didn't get fired, he resigned.

Since no one mentioned a Twin, I thought I would mention Kent Hrbek. Good power hitter, good defensive 1B, finished a close second to Cal Ripken in the 1982 Rookie of the Year race and second to Willie Hernandez in the 1984 MVP race. One of the most consistent players year in and year out, and also a fun guy to be around. Eventually had his number retired by the Twins. I thought he did a hunting and fishing show at some point after his baseball career.

I think Gabby Hartnett would be a better Cub to have than Stan Hack, considering he's in the Hall of Fame. Of course, Cubs history seems to begin with the day Ernie Banks joined the club, so it's probably a moot point.

I got to meet him as a kid at one of the local pizza joints in one of St. Paul's suburbs. An awesome experience and an awesome man. Useless fact of the day: Harmon Killebrew is both the only Harmon (as a first name only) and the only Killebrew in MLB history. Not sure how many there are like that.

I'm surprised no one called her out for calling The El a subway. And that isn't even the worst T-shirt involving Albert Pujols they sell outside Wrigley Field either.

I thought it was fairly well known that Tom Glavine was drafted by the LA Kings in the 4th round of the 1984 NHL Entry Draft (http://www.hockey-reference.com/draft/NHL_1984_entry.html). The odd part about that is that he was drafted ahead of Brett Hull and Luc Robitaille, both Hockey Hall of Famers. I also remember seeing an article in Sports Illustrated a long time ago with a picture of Orel Hershiser in hockey gear. He went to Bowling Green in Ohio, presumably to play college hockey.

I'm sure you meant to say Alan Ashby for Astros catcher.

one more I forgot, Doug Gwosdz, the Human Eyechart.

The most bizarre use of alliteration is Yam Yaryan, who appears right before Carl Yastrzemski. I myself was always fond of Kirby Puckett.

You must be making a really good prediction for how Ron Mahay will turn out this year.

Just something I remember, whenever the Cubs are on the radio, they always play their theme song at the beginning of the broadcast which goes "We've got the power, we've got the speed". It never mentions OBP or walks. It is ingrained in the culture.

We haven't seen the last 300 winner. Someone, probably Joe Maddon, will reverse the over reliance on the bullpen, and its also possible in the future that we could re-enact 1968 as well. I personally think Roy Halladay could do it, and possibly Johan Santana, but if anyone else does, they haven't made it to the majors yet.

The Trop was also known as the Thunderdome and was the home of the Tampa Bay Lightning of the NHL as well. I also recall that the Twins, before Carl Pohlad bought the team, were considering a move to Tampa as well.

What there really ought to be is a limit on number of pitching changes per inning. It ought to be a maximum of 1 in the middle of the inning, with the exception of allowing for injuries. That would lower the number of pitchers on the roster because they wouldn't feel like they have to use all of them.

Billy Werber, the oldest living ballplayer (he\'s 100). He\'d be interesting since he played with the Babe (I believe the last living ex teammate). Anyone who played in the 30\'s or 40\'s. If any ex-Negro Leaguers are still around, that would be good, too.

Willy Taveras is the new Juan Pierre, complete with the \"played for Colorado\" and managed by Dusty Baker bits.

New York Yankees, 6/170, 11/21

The A\'s came back to win in 1929, not the Cubs.

There is a book I saw once at the local Borders bookstore which explains the \"code\" of baseball, but I can\'t remember what it was called. I remember looking through it and the author interviewed many past and present Twins. The same author also wrote a similar book about hockey and why they have fighting in hockey. I\'m sure it can all be explained in this book, but I think it is all silly. Maybe if players got arrested for fighting in the game and had to face charges in a real court of law, it would all change.