This site is to share events,simulated and historical,experienced and learned,during my re-creation of classic baseball seasons. See the links below for previous replays. And the memories are not just for the summertime as I am also replaying the NFL and AFL seasons of the Super Bowl era using Second and Ten Football.
The current baseball replays are 1968 and 1920 using Diamond Mind Baseball,and a 1968 AFL and NFL football replay. Enjoy!
I’ve mentioned before that one of the benefits of this replay project is the discovering of new music. My 1966 replay introduced me to the Beach Boys’Pet Sounds in its entirety;1967 introduced me to Jefferson Airplane’s Surrealistic Pillow and Moby Grape. No new discoveries to report for 1968 as of yet. I am currently reading Rob Kirkpatrick’s 1969:The Year Everything Changed. I just finished a chapter covering the new music of that year:the precursor of punk rock,The Stooges and MC5. However,most of 1968′s biggest albums,The Beatles’White Album (November),Rolling Stones’Beggar’s Banquet (December),and Jimi Hendrix’s Electric Ladyland (October),all came out after baseball season. I also have all three committed to memory from my high school and college days. But I have re-discovered an artist who performed at the Monterey Music Festival and grew in popularity in the spring of 1968,posthumously.
Otis Redding died on December 10,1967 in a plane crash. Years later,Don McLean would pen a hit song about the day Buddy Holly died in a plane crash in 1959. He called it “the day the music died”. Three members of Lynryd Skynyrd were killed in a 1977 plane crash,but that band plays on. Otis was silenced on that day in December,1967 and we all truly lost a great talent. Like Hendrix,he was popular in Europe before making a splash at Monterey. Three days before his death,he recorded “Sittin’on the Dock of the Bay”. He whistled the last verse,meaning to come back and fill it in with lyrics. He did not get the chance to do so.
“Sittin’By the Dock of the Bay”was released in January,1968,and became a number one song,the first posthumous number one single in U.S. chart history. Redding’s popularity in the U.S. among white audiences took off. Three Otis Redding albums were released in 1968. Some recommended lesser-known tracks are “Nobody Knows You When You Are Down and Out”,“Cigarettes and Coffee”from his first album,The Soul Album,released in 1966,and any live rendition of “Shake”. Members of Otis’band who went on to further glory:Issac Hayes (‘a bad mother…shut yo mouth’who died three years ago today),and Steve Cropper and Donald “Duck”Dunn,best known for their work with John Belushi and Dan Ackroyd on the Blues Brothers album and movie. Otis Redding is now known as the King of Soul. Listen to his music which (apologies to Mr. McLean) will never die,and you will agree Otis is king.
Otis Redding’s 70th birthday will be celebrated the weekend of September 9,2011 in his hometown of Macon,Georgia.
Replay update:1968 baseball will be updated when play reaches the end of July (currently July 19). Still intrigued with the depth and fun of Out of the Park Baseball 12 while toying with 1901 and 1920 replays. I mentioned on Twitter recently my next baseball project will be OOTP12,likely 1920. I will continue the 1968 NFL and AFL football replay now the NFL is back in session. Stay tuned for a football update here.
Thank you for following! Happy 40th birthday to SABR!
The prevailing thought among baseball fans is that the All-Star Game is not what it used to be even though “this time it counts”since 2002. It is true a generation ago the starters played most,if not all,of the game. Players,not so distant from the public from a pay scale perspective,took pride in the game against the “other”league. The All-Star Game was a fan’s chance outside of the World Series to see Willie Mays face Denny McLain or other inter-league match-ups. All of this is true,but a cursory review of newspapers from 1968 reveal that generation was not enthralled with its’All Star Game either. It seems there will always be someone to complain.
The 1968 All Star Game was a novelty in two respects. It was the first All Star Game played indoors in Houston’s Astrodome,and it was the first night game since Philadelphia in 1943 and Pittsburgh in 1944. A twilight start in Anaheim last year,combined with a 15 inning game,brought the game into Eastern homes on prime evening television time. The 1968 game started at 8:15 p.m. EDT on NBC. Commentary in the Chicago Tribune opined the All Star game lost its luster when baseball created two All Star games beginning in 1959. “The production has been moved to after dark in hopes of recapturing the once-great enthusiasm. This is as futile as trying to recapture a lost love. The All-Star baseball game ain’t what it used to be,and you know who to blame for ruining it? It was a group of professional athletes whose greed was great,”commented David Condon. “The double All-Star game was originated because the players themselves,milking the club owners for increased pension benefits,insisted that the extra game be played to shore up the pension fund.”Bob Addie explained in his Washington Post column “It used to be the players received 60% of the All Star gate receipts for their pension fund. This was later raised to 95%,but the percentage was then erased as baseball agreed to pay $4.1 million a year to the pension fund. Continue reading All Star Thoughts,1968 Not Too Far from 2011 »»
I just completed my 25th vote for this year’s All-Star Game. Unlike the NCAA Tournament for which I believe one should only submit one bracket,I use my full allotment of 25 online votes (per email address). Back in the day, I was the guy getting handfuls of ballots from ushers,littering the aisles with chads,and stuffing the Gillette ballot boxes at the ball park. My philosophy is to vote for the most deserving from this season with a nod to career numbers and a touch of home team bias. I usually try to pick a dark horse candidate from a lesser known team in hopes that my ballot stuffing could work. Back in 1984,I recall stuffing ballots for Minnesota’s Tom Brunansky. He finally made it in 1985,his only selection though not as a starter by the fans. Oh yeah,one more self-imposed rule post-1996,no Yankees.
Frank Howard is a first time All Star starter with a first half performance that had the Capital Punisher in Triple Crown contention. There have been two consecutive Triple Crowns in the American League - Frank Robinson (1966) and Carl Yastrzemsk (1967). Howard leads the majors with 18 home runs,leads the AL with 50 RBI,and is second in the AL with a .322 average.
The 1968 All Star Game will be played on July 9th in the Houston Astrodome. My selections from the replay vary a little from those of the players and managers back in 1968. Fan voting was not reinstated until 1970. The main difference between my replay and reality are the starters. Denny McLain (14-4,1.68) and Bob Gibson (14-2,1.24) are the clear choices to start the replay All Star Game. Real life starter Don Drysdale did not have the consecutive shutout inning streak to boost his All Star starting selection,and Luis Tiant (9-4,1.99) is having a fine replay,but not better than McLain.
Harmon Killebrew is second in the AL with 16 home runs,but is batting only .188. Baltimore’s Boog Powell is third with 12 HR with an above average .265 mark,but I stayed with Killebrew in deference to his career thus far (and for sentimental reasons with his recent passing). Another .265 batter,Luis Aparicio of the White Sox,does get a starting nod over his real life counterpart,Jim Fregosi of the Angels. Two-time replay All Star Fregosi started my 1967 All Star Game in front of his home fans,but this season Jim is scuffling at .211 and is skipped over for the team in favor of a replay favorite,Detroit’s Dick McAuliffe,who is only a .222 hitter but is second in the AL with 43 runs scored. California’s lone representative is bonus baby outfielder Rick Reichardt,an inspirational story as Rick had his kidney removed in 1966. Other real life American League All Stars who will be missing from the replay are Boston’s Gary Bell and Jose Santiago,Detroit’s Don Wert,and Baltimore’s Davey Johnson. In their stead are Detroit’s Earl Wilson,1967 AL replay Cy Young winner,Boston’s Reggie Smith,the leading hitter in the American League,and McAuliffe. Continue reading 1968 Replay All Stars Announced »»
Angels'rookie Tom Murphy,the sixth overall pick in the January secondary draft,pitched the first no-hitter of my 1968 replay.
After many close calls,a no-hitter has finally been registered in my replay of 1968,the famous “Year of the Pitcher”. A rookie,Tom Murphy of the California Angels,wins his first major league game in style with a no-hitter against boyhood hero Mickey Mantle and the New York Yankees. The feat draws comparisons to starlet magnet Bo Belinsky in the Angels clubhouse,and one can only imagine what would have been going through teammate Rickey Clark’s mind. Two and a half weeks earlier,Clark missed out on no-hit glory by one strike. But this remarkable feat is no guarantee of future glory,Murphy joins St. Louis Browns’pitcher Bobo Holloman as winners of their first major league game with a no-hitter. Holloman’s no-hitter came in 1953,the first of only three victories against seven defeats in his only major league season.
So where did the first no-hitter of the season rank in game scores? Murphy’s gem registered a 77,not even in the top ten pitching performances to date,by pitching game score standards. Earlier,I took a look at pitching game scores in the 1968 and 1967 replays. On June 8th,Sam McDowell surpassed JIm McGlothlin’s season-best effort with a two-hitter against the defending champion Tigers which scored an 84. By the way,only one no-hitter in this replay to date,but ten one-hitters have been pitched.
The replay site has been updated through games played on Wednesday,June 19th. The June 20,1968 edition of the New York Times noted that major league players voted for the All-Star game starters yesterday. The sealed votes will be forwarded to the Commissioner’s office where the ballots will be counted. The results will be issued next Tuesday,coinciding with the next scheduled update of the web site. The managers in my replay,Mayo Smith of the Tigers and Red Schoendienst of the Cardinals,will pick the pitchers and the rest of the 25-man squads. Fan voting for the All-Star starters,discontinued after the 1957 Cincinnati ballot stuffing incident,would not start again until 1970.
