Saying farewell to the Say Hey Kid

Willie Mays died last night at age 93, news that most Americans woke up to today. So did I, by checking the text my daughter sent me last night shortly after I’d dropped off to sleep. Although I never saw Willie play in person, I saw him play on TV in many an All-Star game […]

City-connecting with friends old and new

With few exceptions, my reaction to the funky City Connect uniforms that Major League teams are wearing has ranged from revulsion to loathing, On Friday, I finally got to see the Phillies’ City Connect uniforms in person, and my stance on the alternative togs is starting to soften. As we hung out at Comcast LIve […]

The thrill of a walk-off win

Last weekend, I left Bill Clarke Field a few innings before Princeton scored a walk-off win against Harvard. On Saturday, I got a second chance, as Princeton defeated Penn with a walk-off 3-2 victory. With the score 2-2 in the bottom of the ninth inning, Jake Kernodle hit a grounder to the Penn second baseman, […]

On a winter’s day, a warm well of baseball history

As snow blanketed New Jersey and much of the Northeast on Friday, I headed to the Princeton University campus for a wonderful treat: a special class showcasing rare and unusual baseball artifacts and memorabilia donated to the university over the years. The class was part of Wintersession, the annual between-the-semesters opportunity for students, faculty and […]

princeton-Harvard football: a classic matchup

Princeton and Harvard have faced off in football since 1877, and I got to watch the 115th meeting Saturday at Princeton Stadium. The Tigers beat the Crimson 21-14 after scoring what turned out to be the winning touchdown with about a minute and a half left in the game. One hundred years ago, a good […]

The daily challenge and pleasure of Immaculate Grid

For roughly a year running, I played Wordle _ The New York Times’ puzzle _ virtually every day. And then along came Immaculate Grid, a daily sports challenge from Baseball Reference, one of my go-to sources for information on baseball players and their stats. Throughout July and August, I stopped playing Wordle and instead got […]

Two Princeton ballplayers drafted BY San Francisco Giants

The Major League Baseball Draft isn’t hyped like the NFL and NBA drafts, the televised spectacles where those expecting to be drafted appear on national TV in thousand-dollar suits in anticipation of million-dollar contracts. No, the baseball draft is a lower-key affair, devoid of the immediate fawning talking-head commentary that oozes from the football and […]

Just a bit outside: ChatGPT and Baseball

After a long wait to gain access, ChatGPT finally let me in on Friday, and I suddenly found myself challenged to enter a scenario to see what this newfangled Artificial Intelligence phenomenon could produce. My instincts, not surprisingly, took me immediately to baseball. As Friday was opening day for the Princeton baseball team, on the […]

Every desk needs a baseball

Office trends have come and gone over the years of my career, from fax machines to Zoom screens, but one constant has been baseball. Not in the James Earl Jones/Thomas Mann sense from “Field of Dreams.” I mean literally a single baseball. Years back when I was working in San Francisco, a PR firm sent […]

This season counts

I spent a relaxing Sunday sitting on our back patio, listening to snippets of four baseball games late in the afternoon, Phillies and Mets on my portable radio, Giants and Brewers on my iPhone, a home-brewed ale in my glass. During the Phillies game against the Cardinals, play-by-play announcer Scott Franzke referred to the statistics […]