Rita and I head to Phoenix later this week to visit friends of long standing, Diana and Larry Brewer. Sixty years ago this month (that would be January of 1958), the #1 record that Diana and I and our classmates were dancing to at Van Horn Teen Town was “At the Hop” by Danny and the Juniors. Three years later, I fixed Diana up on a blind date with my college fraternity brother Larry Brewer. They are still dating (and long married).
You will not be surprised with the selection for Lonnie’s Jukebox at the end of this post. But first some baseball, including the Royals’ version of Danny and the Juniors.
Cactus League Spring Training: Rita and I will be too early to catch spring training in Phoenix, but the likes of Pat Titterington, Jack Campbell, Dave Matson and Steve Roling will be reporting back to Hot Stove. For another take on baseball and Arizona, I yield the floor to George Will:
He added that “Not all holes, or games, are created equal.”
Nor are all teams. For example, the rebuilding Royals and the surging Yankees.
Royals Pitching – Danny (Duffy) and the Juniors: Based on projections, the Royals have one “ace” on the pitching staff: Danny Duffy. And that assumes he is not traded. The depth chart below predicts the lineup and pitching for the 2018 Royals, showing rough numbers for zWAR (a projection of relative player value by respected stats analyst Dan Szymborski). Duffy’s zWAR of 3 is good, but the four starting pitchers with a zWAR of 1 would be slotted as the fifth starter in a strong rotation. Translation: The Royals are projected to have four fifth starters.
To put this in perspective, here is the depth chart for the 2018 New York Yankees:
Royals Hitting – Today and Yesterday: The Royals depth chart is not any better for non-pitchers. A big drop after Merrifield and Perez. There will be an uptick if the Royals sign free agent Eric Hosmer. Not so much with the resigning of Alcides Escobar.
Let’s look back one more time at four free agents: Eric Hosmer, Mike Moustakas, Lorenzo Cain and Alcides Escobar. All four played for the Royals from 2011 to 2017, although Cain played a lot in the minors in 2011 and 2012, as did Moose in 2011. The cumulative WAR (as calculated by Baseball Reference) and the number of games they played for the Royals were as follows: Hosmer 14.1 (1048); Moose 11.4 (836); Cain 25.7 (713); and Esky 9.8 (1105).
I am pointing this out as a farewell thank you for the great play of Lorenzo Cain. His combination of defense, base running and hitting resulted in a cumulative WAR far above the others. On a per game basis, his WAR is more than double that of Eric Hosmer (also a very good player – all the more proof of just how good Cain has been). Thank you Lorenzo! Best of luck on your return to Milwaukee.
Hall of Fame: The votes came in last week, and the Hall of Fame will be adding Jim Thome, Chipper Jones, Trevor Hoffman and Vladimir Guerrero. No surprises. In an ongoing saga, some are still on the outside looking in: Pete Rose (gambling), Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, etc. (steroids), Curt Schilling (conspiracy theorist) and by far the biggest omission, players’ union head Marvin Miller (guilty of gaining rights and big money for the players).
One-Line Defining Moments: Hot Stove reader Bill Carr sent me an interesting piece from ESPN. Sportswriter Sam Miller and some baseball friends have come up with one-line defining moments for each season of baseball since 1903 (the year of the first World Series). The criteria for the moments range from incredible achievements (individual or team) to big plays to turning points in baseball history. It’s an entertaining exercise, and you can see the whole list and criteria here.
First, let’s look at those that might have included the Royals: the three ALCS series with the Yankees (1976-1978) and their four World Series years (1980, 1985, 2014 and 2015). Plus one random event from 1983.
1976: … free agency began
1977: … Reggie Jackson became Mr. October
1978: … Bucky Dent got his middle name
1980: … Rotisserie Baseball was invented
1983: … the pine-tar game happened
1985: … Dwight Gooden, 20 years old, had a 1.53 ERA
2014: … Game 7 ended with Madison Bumgarner a hero … and Alex Gordon stuck at third
2015: … Jose Bautista flipped the bat
Since the Royals lost to the Yankees those first three years and to the Phillies in 1980, I can’t complain about the Royals not getting a mention. For those not in the know, I will explain the 1978 entry. The Yankees and Red Sox ended the season in a tie for the AL East. In the one-game tie-breaker, the Red Sox took a 2-0 lead into the 7th inning. The light-hitting Bucky Dent came up for the Yankees and hit a 3-run homer. The Yankees went on to win 5-4. To this day, Dent is known to Red Sox fans as Bucky “Fxxking” Dent. The Yankees then went on to beat the Royals in the ALCS for the third straight year. New York Fxxking Yankees.
The most memorable moment in 1983 was no doubt provided by George Brett and his bat. And 35 years later, the bobble-head will be handed out when the Royals play the Yankees on May 19.
For 1985, I would have picked the I-70 World Series, but Dwight Gooden was pretty special too (more on that below). The entry for 2014 is (sadly) spot on. For 2015, I strongly disagree. I think Bautista’s bat flip in the ALDS was eclipsed by the Eric Hosmer slide in Game 5 of the World Series.
Babe Ruth is on the list eight times, but oddly not for his 60 homers in 1927. Two entries were not Ruth at his best: 1925 – missed two months with maybe syphilis; 1926 – ended the World Series by getting caught stealing. The entry for 1929 is that the Yankees put uniform numbers on their players – Ruth No. 3, Gehrig No. 4 [Trivia: This reflected their positions in the batting order]
I took a close look at 1941 because I wondered if it would be Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak or Ted William’s .406 batting average. It was nicely finessed by merging the two feats, saying they “coexisted.” The same approach was used for 2017 to honor two extreme body outliers “in the year of that photo, the year of that MVP race, the year of that ALCS.” 2017: … It was the year not of Judge or Altuve, but of Judge and Altuve.
Erratum: When I saw the above one-line entry for 1985, I gasped. In Hot Stove #64, I wrote of Bob Gibson’s astounding ERA of 1.12 in 1968, the best in the live-ball era (1920 and after). I said it was far ahead of second place, and it still is, but I had the wrong pitcher in second place. It is not Greg Maddux with his 1.56 ERA in 1994. It is Dwight Gooden’s 1985 season with the Mets when he had an ERA of 1.53. The Hot Stove fact checker (that would be me) missed it. So I’ll try to make up for that with some other (accurate) facts on Gooden’s dominance in 1985. He went 24-4 with 16 complete games. He walked 69 batters and struck out 268; Gibson in 1968 walked 62 and struck out the same 268.
Gooden was Rookie of the Year in 1984, followed by his dominant Cy Young season in 1985. After that, he began an enduring battle with cocaine. He played 16 seasons in the majors, winning 194 games, but fell far short of his Hall of Fame potential.
The Chiefs and the Super Bowl (February 4): In 2016, the backup quarterback for the Chiefs was Nick Foles. He started one game and got some playing time in two others. In 2017, Foles moved on to the Philadelphia Eagles to back up young star Carson Wentz. After Wentz was injured late in the season, Foles took over and led the Eagles to the Super Bowl. Some even more useless Super Bowl Chiefs trivia: In the first two games of the 2017 season, the Chiefs beat the now Super Bowl rivals: 42-27 over the Patriots and 27-20 over the Eagles. It’s hard out there for a Chiefs’ fan.
The Oscars (March 4): First, Oscar Gamble. He played for seven teams in a 17-year career in the majors (1969-1985).
Next, the Academy Awards nominations are out, and Rita and I are pleased that three of our favorites from the Telluride Film Festival are up for best picture: Shape of Water, Lady Bird and Darkest Hour. Some thoughts:
Best Picture – Of the nine nominees, my vote is for Shape of Water. Runner-up: Lady Bird. [I acknowledge Telluride bias, but they really are my favorites in the race.]
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri is in the mix and has good momentum from prior awards. Two films covered the 1940 Battle of Dunkirk, one from the perspective of the battle on the beaches in France (Dunkirk), the other from the planning in London (Darkest Hour). I preferred Darkest Hour, but Dunkirk is getting more buzz in the Oscar race.
Director – I want a tie between Greta Gerwig (Lady Bird) and Guillermo del Toro (Shape of Water). Glad to see the nomination for Jordan Peele for the very good Get Out.
Actor – Gary Oldman as Churchill in Darkest Hour. I am pausing here to stretch my Danny and the Juniors theme. Daniel Day-Lewis is nominated for his role in Phantom Thread. He has said it will be his last film. In Oscar history, all other male actors are junior to Daniel Day-Lewis. He is the only man to win Best Actor three times: My Left Foot (1990), There Will Be Blood (2008) and Lincoln (2013). The only other person at this level is Katherine Hepburn who won four Best Actress awards.
Actress – I give my nod to Saoirse Ronan as Lady Bird, while Rita would vote for Sally Hawkins (Shape of Water). The favorite is Frances McDormand (Three Billboards) who has won the Golden Globe and SAG awards. Margot Robbie was also good in the title role of I, Tonya. We enjoyed The Post, but Meryl Streep is unlikely to win her third Oscar for Best Actress (she has three total Oscars, one in a supporting role).
Supporting Actor – Richard Jenkins (Shape of Water), but both nominees from Three Billboards were very good (Woody Harrelson and Sam Rockwell). I did not yet see William Dafoe in The Florida Project. Rockwell has already won the Golden Globe and SAG awards.
Supporting Actress – Allison Janney (I, Tonya), edging out Laurie Metcalf (Lady Bird).
Original Screenplay – An embarrassment of riches: Shape of Water, Lady Bird, Get Out, The Big Sick and Three Billboards. I hope all of them win.
Animated Feature – Coco (which I have not seen) will win, but just want to repeat how much we liked Loving Vincent.
[Pronunciation Trivia: Saoirse Ronan hosted Saturday Night Live and taught us how to pronounce her first name. It rhymes with inertia (Sertia).]
See you at the Oscars.
Lonnie’s Jukebox – “At the Hop”: I am returning to my 45-rpm vinyl collection for the record that was #1 for seven weeks in January and February of 1958 – “At the Hop” by Danny and the Juniors.
Johnny Madara, one of the songwriters for “At the Hop,” said he was trying to do something that featured a piano as played by Jerry Lee Lewis in his first hit, “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On.” At the initial recording session, Madara first played the Jerry Lee 45-rpm record to set the tone for the musicians. The original cut was titled “Do the Bop,” but when Dick Clark of American Bandstand heard the demo, he suggested they rework the lyrics to incorporate the current “hop” dance scene. Good idea.
“At the Hop” was released in November of 1957, as was a new song from Jerry Lee Lewis, “Great Balls of Fire.” Jerry Lee and Danny and the Juniors each got a slot on American Bandstand, and both records started climbing in the charts. “At the Hop” hit #1 in January, but “Great Balls of Fire” peaked at #2, blocked from #1 by the record inspired by Jerry Lee’s first hit. Jerry Lee never had a #1 record. Play “At the Hop” here and don’t miss the lip-synching video.
“At the Hop” gained new life at Woodstock in 1969. The four-day festival was scheduled to end on Sunday, but rains that day delayed the performances. The acts continued to play overnight into Monday, leading to an incongruous final two: the doo-wop of Sha Na Na and the blues/soul/rock/jazz of Jimi Hendrix. That last morning is most remembered for the Hendrix classic version of “The Star Spangled Banner.” But as Danny and the Juniors sang in their second hit, “Rock and Roll is Here to Stay,” golden oldies still had their appeal. Sha Na Na sang ten songs, beginning and ending with a cover of “Get a Job” by the Silhouettes – the song with the refrain that gave Sha Na Na its name. One of their songs made it to the documentary movie of Woodstock – a rousing version of “At the Hop.” See it here. No lip-synching.