The Daily Dose/August 6, 2020
By Gaylon Kent
America’s Funniest Guy
Leading Off
Notes from around our human experience…
OH, JESUS H: It’s not often we have a story to tell regarding a person featured in our popular On This Date segment, but today we do, so we are going to tell you about it.
Deep Background: On this date 53 years ago Brooks Robinson of the Baltimore Orioles hits into his fourth career triple play, a major league record that still stands, a feat which is noted below. Robinson played for the Baltimore Orioles from 1955-77 and is in the Baseball Hall of Fame, on virtually every shortlist of the game’s greatest third basemen.
Yeah, Yeah, Whatever: One day, ages ago in Las Vegas, my buddy Chris Schultz and I found ourselves dispatched to the local JC to umpire two games at a fantasy baseball camp. Pete Rose was the headliner, but Amos Otis, Ken Griffey, Sr, Darrell Evans and others were there and mere mortals paid good dough to spend a few days at camps like these. The quality of play is generally low, but they pay well and it’s a harmless enough way to earn a couple of game fees.
Yeah, Yeah, Whatever II: As it was, I had the first plate and early on I found I needed some baseballs, so I announced this fact to both dugouts, a pretty standard procedure in amateur games. The next batter completes his at-bat and then I hear a voice behind informing me he has baseballs for me. I turn around and – sweet mother of Christ – it’s Brooks Robinson.
Oh, dear me. Thank you, Mr Robinson, that’s very nice of you.
Mr Robinson smiled.
It’s Brooks, and I’ll have them for you all game.
We shook hands.
Well, I’m Gaylon, and thank you.
He did, too. Incredibly, Brooks stuck it out the whole way and every time he came out I thought damn, I must’ve done something right along the path that got me here because you simply do not have Hall of Fame third basemen as your ballboy and it was easy to be aware that these couple of hours would never be experienced again.
Dry, Technical Matter: There are a couple of other memories from this game, too. A former Boston Red Sox pitcher whose name I forget actually pitched. He was long past his prime, of course, but he could still pitch. He knew where every pitch was going and that was a treat to see.
Second, Jon Warden, a member of the 1968 world champion Detroit Tigers, had a funny line after I called a pitch a ball that had been at the belt. It had been inside, but Warden couldn’t tell that.
A pitch comes in at the pecker, you best be calling that a strike.
Famous Final Scene: Towards the end I thanked Brooks one last time, adding that what was a routine day for him was a day I’ll never forget. He said I was welcome, that he’d enjoyed it, too, thanked me and Chris for our hard, good work and that was that, the game ended and Brooks Robinson wasn’t my ball boy anymore.
The Bottom Line: Let me tell you something, good luck topping that: Brooks Robinson was my ballboy! The very best part of officiating is being at your best when it’s needed, but this is a strong #2. If Beyonce or a certain porn star ever make On This Date, I’ll have a story for you, then, too.
Today At The Site
Writing worth reading. Usually.
The Diary of a Nobody: Some guests annoy Sparrow. Today’s Diary.
Some guests are really starting to annoy me when it comes to our modest, complimentary breakfast offering…Some have taken to lurking in the lobby waiting for me to put it out and one ding dong even asked why I didn’t have it out a few minutes earlier…I wanted to smack him…Because it starts at 0630 nimrod!!!…As it was, I graciously told him I wasn’t allowed to put it out early, true enuff, and that “they” wanted it out only as close to 0630 as possible and it was entirely possible the guest might have been left with the impression I’ve been violently protesting this policy every hour on the hour for weeks.
Backstairs at the Monte Carlo: The hammer gets laid down in the hotel.
Some kid in a three-day beard wonders why he has to leave. His tone is confrontational.
“Because I’m telling you to, sir.”
“You’re just a fucking security guard,” he said dismissively.
“Officer,” I said, holding up a finger. “We’re security officers.”
He didn’t think that was funny, though I could see OMP smile.
Click here for the first two months of complimentary entries.
Criminals, Courtesans and Constables/Chapter 9 – The Nick: Our hero, after several years on the lam, gets nicked.
I got nicked completely by accident.
I left me flat and petted Constable the cat goodbye for the last time before heading out for me excursion, as I called them. I did these from time to time, leaving mid-morning and heading out and stopping at places that interested me.
The first suspicion I had something was wrong came while I was walking down the boulevard…
Click here to read the first four chapters with our compliments.
After the complimentary excerpts hook you, click on the button to read all three of these American classics for only $4.99, a steal.
On This Date
History’s long march to today.
In 1965 – President Lyndon Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act of 1965, two days after it was passed by Congress. The act prohibited discrimination in voting and protect rights guaranteed by the 14th and 15th Amendments to the US Constitution. The act prohibits, among other things, polls taxes and literacy tests that Blacks and other non-English speakers were sometimes unable to pass. The act has been amended and reauthorized five times over the years, most recently in 2006.
In 1967 – Brooks Robinson of the Baltimore Orioles establishes a new major league record for the most career triple plays hit into in a 4-0 win over the Chicago White Sox in the second game of a doubleheader. Robinson’s 5th inning grounder turned into the fourth triple play of his career, breaking the record of three established by Joe Start and later tied by Deacon McGuire and George Sisler. The record still stands.
In 1988 – Steve Winwood is at #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for the second of four consecutive weeks with Roll With It. It was the fifth of six Top 10 hits for Winwood and his second and final #1 song (Higher Love, one week, 1986). The song also went to #1 in Canada, peaked at #53 in Great Britain, at #30 on Billboard’s soul chart and was Billboard’s tenth biggest song of the year. It was also the final #1 song of Casey Kasem’s 18-year first stint as host of American Top 40.
Quotebook
The wisdom of the ages. Whatever.
…he understood what people would do long before they themselves knew…he could predict the future because he entirely understood the present. – Gore Vidal, Creation
Answer To The Last Trivia Question
It’s not who you know, but what you know.
The song which has spent more weeks at #1 on any Billboard singles chart is You Say by Lauren Daigle, which is currently in its 94th non-consecutive week at #1 on the Hot Christain Singles chart. If first hit #1 on that chart in July 2018 and also peaked at #29 on the Hot 100 in March 2019.
Today’s Stumper
Cheaper than Trivia Night at the bar.
Steve Winwood first hit the Billboard Hot 100 as the lead singer of what group? – Answer next time!
