I’ve learned a lot about minor league baseball this season, but the most interesting might be something I just discovered about ten minutes ago: major league teams and their minor league affiliates are like the characters on Friends* – sooner or later, they all end up dating one another. *Yeah, Friends. My pop culture references are so timely. The backup example was Beverly Hills 90210. Almost immediately after the season ended, what I’m assuming...
Midwest League
Obama doesn’t need the Goldklangs to win another BobbleElection
The eyes of the nation were focused on Davenport, Iowa, on Saturday night, as Iowa’s first unofficial election ahead of the 2008 Presidential Election was held at Modern Woodmen Park prior to the Quad Cities River Bandits’ 6:00 p.m. game against the Burlington Bees. The result of the “Bobble-Election” was an emphatic show of support for the Democratic Party, as Barack Obama defeated John McCain in a landslide, taking 1,000 votes to McCain’s 575....
Now Batting, for the United States of America…
Usually, OMDQ puts one of these columns up to denote the Major League arrival of one of the Bus League faithful. But Lt. Jonathan Johnston is no ordinary player. A 2006 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Johnston had already spent a year on active duty before the Oakland A’s took a flyer and selected him in the 42nd round of the 2007 first-year player draft. His .317 senior-year batting average for Navy no...
Loek Van Mil is a Tall Glass of Grolsch
Every once in a while, a search term comes up often enough that I feel compelled to research the subject and “answer” the potential readers who are blindly wandering the back alleys of the internet searching for obscure facts about minor league baseball. This week, I’ve seen “Van Mil, Snappers” come up a few times, and it rang a bell with me immediately. I mentioned Dutch prospect Loek Van Mil in an early link...
GAC! (Part 2)
A couple days ago, I noticed that Clinton’s Ian Gac was leading the Midwest League in batting average (still is), homeruns and runs batted in, and wondered out loud if any player has ever won that league’s Triple Crown. An article on MiLB.com talked about Moe Hill, who was the first to take all three titles in 1974, and another source mentioned Joey Meyer in 1984, but I wasn’t sure if those were correct, or...
GAC!
Extra P put Ian Gac and his nine homeruns on the Z-Meter last week, but the pressure was apparently too much and Gac-Man immediately stopped hitting the ball out of the park. Until tonight. Gac homered twice and drove in six runs, adding to his league-leading totals in both categories (11 and 32, respectively). His 32 RBI are second-best in all of minor league baseball, trailing only Jesus Guzman of AA Midland. The game...
“I now have a favorite Tiger”
When I was in junior high school, the coolest speaker we ever had was a guy who had either climbed or attempted to climb either Mount Kilimanjaro or K2 a few years before. I think there was a movie based on his adventures – possibly “K2″ – but can’t be sure. As you can tell, it wasn’t the most memorable experience of my life. I hope the kids at Riverside Middle School in Grand...
Spotlight on A Ball – 4/7/2008
Confession time: I am a Kansas City Royals fan. I haven’t lived in Kansas for more than a decade, but I’m one of those loyal die-hards who roots for his team through thick & thin (and thin, and thin). The Royals have tried to survive at the MLB-level by bringing in late-career retreads like Juan Gonzalez and Mark Grudzielanek for years – a strategy which has not really worked. But the farm system has...
Spotlight on A Ball – 3/31/2008
With 300+ minor league teams in these United States, OMDQ and I will need some way to focus our energies, and this is one way we figured to do it. Monday is “A” ball day. That will include Rookie League and every form of A ball. Wednesday we’ll check out the AA clubs, and then on Friday on up to AAA. We’ll also develop a few weekly features to slot in on the other...
Jay Bruce on Video
OMDQ and I have been talking a lot about Jay Bruce recently, because he has been anointed as the best Bus Leaguer around by a couple of influential publications. I thought I’d hit YouTube and find the Zapruder film on the guy before he blows up in Cincy next year. First, here he is a couple of years ago in Dayton A ball. I admit I used this video just so you could get...
Bus Leagues Photos
2012 05 14 Scranton Wilks Barre/ Empire State Yankees vs Pawtucket Red Sox
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