Quote:
Originally Posted by NYY #23
Good news all around with this update, at least for me.  Its nice to see some Yankee success after having so many rough years. 2 out of 3 isn't bad. Be interesting to see how long they can keep it up.
It's nice to see Gehrig hit his 400th, and Joltin' Joe coming out strong. Hopefully he has a long and successful career in Sacramento.
I must confess I've been anxiously awaiting an update the past few days. Glad to see one tonight.  |
It's a good time to be a Yankees fan. The Yankees showed a lot of grit by winning a tough divisional battle with
Al Simmons basically missing half a season. He seems to have recovered fully, and his skills remain intact.
The Yankees are still a fairly young team, with the exception of a couple of their pitchers and their third baseman. Simmons will be 33 when the 1936 season starts, and he still has lots left in his tank.
Buck Leonard and
Brian Whaley will be 28;
Bill Swift will be 27; they're in their primes.
Rudy York and
Frank Crosetti are even younger, and look like they'll be very good.
I was on a short family vacation last week, so that's why I wasn't posting for a while.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ifspuds
Well, nuts. Losing Chuck Klein is rough -- the Yankees dodged one there! Glad to hear he should be okay, though. Two pennants in a row... Portland fans are going to start getting complacent, but I don't think we mind. |
Both the Beavers and the Yankees had to play the Series without one key player. Simmons hurt his knee on August 26 and completely missed the postseason.
The Beavers have certainly established themselves as one of the elite teams in the major leagues, at least over the past few years. They enter every season as one of a handful of teams with a realistic chance to win the World Series. I'd put the Yankees, the Senators, the White Sox, and the Oaks in that category right now.
For a while, the Beavers had rotten luck with their draft picks, but recently, guys like
Josh Gibson, Ray Dandridge, and
Roy Weatherly have developed into the kinds of players the team hoped they'd become. More importantly, they became good while guys like Klein and
Pat Caraway were still stars. And the addition of players like
Paul Baker and
Mike Christensen--whom nobody expected to be as good as they've been--has been the final piece of the puzzle.
Quote:
Originally Posted by William Foster
Kansas City has been absolutely awful throughout. Come the 50's I'd imagine they'd be considering relocation although its hard to say where considering the PCL was added. Miami, Atlanta or Denver maybe. Haha the Miami A's..
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The A's have endured some lousy seasons, that's for sure. They haven't won 80 games in a season since 1922 (!), and won 54, 59, and 58 games over hte last three years. They are one of four teams who have never made the playoffs; the Cardinals, the Braves, and the Giants are the others. Only one team--the Braves--have won fewer games in their history than the A's.
I'm still shaking my head over KC's decision to draft
Russ Bauers instead of
Bob Feller. To be fair, Bauers did pitch well for York (A) last year: 10-3, 2.08 in 14 starts. Still, BA ranks him no better than fifth among the A's top prospects, and he's not considered among the top 100 prospects in the game. You'd like to do better than that when you have the #2 pick in the entire draft.
In 1935, the Athletics drew fewer fans to their home games than all but three teams: the Giants, the Cardinals, and the Indians. Just over 1.4 million fans came out to Municipal Stadium to see the A's (Portland, incidentally, had the best attendance, just over 3.3 million).
There are a few good players wearing Athletics green right now, however.
Jimmie Foxx, who tied
Wally Berger for the American League in home runs with 34, is one of the game's top sluggers.
Buzz Arlett drove in 128 runs, second only to Berger. Buzz can do exactly one thing--hit the ball--but he does that very, very well.
Gene Schott, a former #1 overall pick, looks like a keeper, too. If the A's can steal a page from the Beavers' playbook and start making their early draft picks count on a more consistent basis, they could, like the Beavs, turn things around.
As far as relocating them goes, I'll have to wait and see about that.
Thanks for the comments, everybody. I really enjoy it when people stop by and post in my threads.