Word: hitters
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...Francisco 5, Montreal 1 (first game) Montreal 4, San Francisco 0 (second game, Charlie Lea pitched a no-hitter for the Expos...
Every batter can expect to hit .300, every pitcher to win 20 games. Of course, springtime hopes die of heat exhaustion in August. The pitcher who has lost his stuff is unlikely to find it, and the lifetime .262 hitter will, in late summer, fight a slump to salvage .250. Last year's losers will probably be this year's as well...
...baseball's most colorful and innovative franchises. Finley was one of the first proponents of the designated hitter. He tried out orange balls. He brought a mule into the ballpark as a mascot, installed a mechanical rabbit to bring baseballs to the umpire. He gave the game the garish doubleknit uniforms that became commonplace. He harassed his managers by telephoning strategy to the dugout, yet installed a 16-year-old fan as vice president. For all his buffoonery, Finley was as shrewd a judge of talent as any in the sport since Branch Rickey. Roll the names over...
...guile and grease, relays and rundowns are only a part of a manager's game. More difficult is instilling in a pitcher the wholly implausible belief that he can throw a ball past a hitter, or to convince a batter that he can hit a ball traveling 90 m.p.h. A good manager can impart confidence in myriad ways: leaving a pitcher in the game to work his way out of trouble, letting a batter swing away on a 3-0 count, praising on the bench, and doing the dressing down in private. Says Baltimore's Earl Weaver...
...left-handed shortstop steps up to the plate. It's a tie ball game--two-all in the fifth--and the infielders shout encouragement to the pitcher and heckle the diminutive hitter. Cheers resound from the batter's bench--"Come on Dr. longball, hit another homer. "The infield, hearing this, takes a few steps back. The pitch: a swing. it's a hit, not a crackling liner that sends the second baseman diving. But rather a dainty dribbler that leaves the third baseman stymied in her shoes as the softball slowly scoots along the third base line and comes...