Yes, I DID go out and buy me a WHITE SOX SHIRT yesterday! Couldn’t watch the final game with nothing White Sox on!!!
It was a very intense game! A battle of the pitchers. My favorite WS stat was this, WAIT! I will make it a quiz, and see who is the first to post the answer in the COMMENTS! You MIGHT even win a prize!!
Q: What White Sox Player became the FIRST baseball player IN HISTORY to win TWO World Series Games on the same day AND on his birthday??? (same day because Game Three went into the 14th inning and into the morning hours)
Finally, THEY WON! This is me with the family I watched the game with. (Not pictured is Sara, who isn’t a baseball nut like the rest of us.)
Did I convert to being a White Sox Fan and desert my Cubbies? Nope. I decided to have an AL favorite team and an NL favorite team. Now all I have to figure out is which team is in which league. (See what a serious baseball fan I am?)
All I’m wondering is, when the Astros lost, did they all go in the clubhouse and pour Minute Maid over their heads?
I think the Kidologist may have made a mistake here. I couldn’t track down any White Sox player who celebrated a birthday during the World Series. I checked the active roster as well as the 40-man roster and … nobody. (http://chicago.whitesox.mlb.com/NASApp/mlb/team/roster_40man.jsp?c_id=cws)
Congratulations to the White Sox. My only question now is: Will THE BIG HURT (Frank Thomas) get a World Series ring?
White Sox World Series trivia:
Mark it down: Oct. 26 was the birthday of William ”Kid” Gleason, manager of the 1919 White Sox, whose reputation was forever blackened for conspiring with gamblers to fix the outcome of the ’19 Series. Oct. 26 was also the anniversary of the death, 74 years ago, of the Old Roman, Charles Comiskey, the original owner of the White Sox. Comiskey’s refusal to pay his players an honest wage is often held up as a reason they consented to be corrupted. And it also was the 76th birthday of Roland Hemond, the Rhode Islander who served as White Sox GM for 14 seasons (1971-85), then came back five years ago as a special adviser to White Sox’s Kenny Williams, baseball’s only African-American general manager.
“Roland’s the guy who broke me into this business,” White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf said, “and taught me baseball. I think it’s very fitting that we won on Roland’s birthday.”
(from Boston Globe’s http://www.boston.com)
Nice shirt! I went out and got myself a one of the AL champoinship shirts. Then the morning after they won I fought the crowd at Sports Athourity to get a World Series Hat (I have a collection of over 100 hats). A few days earlier I had given my white sox hat to the girl I babysit (she had White Sox day at school) and I haven’t seen it come off her head yet!
Bandwagonner! I was too when the Angels won.
As a correction — Gleason was not involved with the 1919 throwing of the Series. There were eight players banned from baseball, Gleason was not one of them.
The eight men included the great “Shoeless” Joe Jackson; pitchers Eddie Cicotte and Claude “Lefty” Williams; infielders Buck Weaver, Arnold “Chick” Gandil, Fred McMullin, and Charles “Swede” Risberg; and outfielder Oscar “Happy” Felsch. Weaver never took money and Jackson was given money, but many believe he did as to not look dumb by his teammates. Jackson homered and played hard in the series — making his involvement with gamblers questionable. Also, it has been written that Babe Ruth modeled his swing after Shoeless Joe.
Karl, as for your trivia question. There are not current White Sox pitchers with birthdays that allign with Game 3 or 4 of the World Series. AND, if you go back and look at the World Series the Sox appeared in during 1959, 1919, 1917 and 1906 (they won the AL in 1901, but the Series didnt begin till ’03), no pitcher won games 3 and 4. Also, no other game in WS history went 14 innings except a game in 1916 that Babe Ruth won. But he didnt win the following day. The longest Sox game was a 10 inning game 6, but the same pitcher did NOT win in game 7.
Karl, I think you wrote your trivia question incorrectly. Damaso Marte won the 14-inning Game 3 and Freddy Garcia won Game 4 this year.
Thank you to http://www.retrosheet.org and baseball-alamanac.com for postseason info!
The correct answer was: Roland Hemond
But YES, I misstated the question (by accident, I misunderstood the announer who said it on TV) I should have said
Q: What member of the White Sox CLUB became the FIRST PESON IN HISTORY to be a part of TWO World Series Victories on the same day AND on his birthday??? (same day because Game Three went into the 14th inning and into the morning hours)
I didn’t mean pitcher, by ‘who won’ – when I said ‘won’ I was referring to the entire team, but I was still wrong, it wasn’t a player.
THANKS Jordan and Mr. Frank for all the baseball facts. Hope I didn’t take up too much of your victory celebrating time! :)
how convenient to pick a favorite AL team during the playoffs of ’05. let me guess, your favorite team before then was the red sox? or how about the yankees?
so who do you root for when the “crosstown RIVALS” play one another? the team that has the best stats for the season?
bandwagon fans make me sick.
RE: “bandwagon fans make me sick.”
Ouch Jennie. :) I’m not a bandwagon fan. I’ve never been a fan of the Red Sox or the Yankees. I live in Chicago and grew up in Chicago. Just questioning whether I should switch to Soxes… at least I am honest about my thoughts of switching. I’ve been a Cubs fan my whole life… does that obligate me to never change? Can a person ever turn from a childhood mistake a choose a team that they like better? I was a Cubs fan because my Grandpa was. That was the only reason. Maybe I need to mature in how I choose. Like, which teams colors I like better. :) I do like black/white better.
Anyway – GO CUBS! For my grandpa’s sake, and little brother. (Who writes for MLB.com) As for Cross Town Rivals… I usually pick a team to root for at the beginning of the game and stick with that team no matter what happens. Same when I watch any game where I don’t care about either team, you gotta pick one to enjoy watching.
Sorry I made you sick. I’m sure you’ll feel better when (not if) the Cubs finaly get their taste of a World Series Championship!