Shorts

I’m hoping to start writing posts about my trip to Japan soon. I’ve just been distracted by the Olympics. So now for the rest of this post, I’ll be distracted by baseball.

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The White Sox hit 4 consecutive home runs yesterday. That’s only happened 6 times before, making it rarer even than an unassisted triple play. If only one of them had been hit by Ken Griffey. Or, really, if only they’d been hit by any other team in baseball.

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Mark Kotsay hit for the cycle yesterday for the Braves, but the Cubs still won the game! It was just the second cycle in Atlanta history. The Cubs won every game against the Braves this year, the first time they’ve done that since the teams started playing each other in 1876. (The Braves were in Boston then.)

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Geek Baseball Fact #1: For a while Boston had both an American and National League team. Back when most team nicknames were exactly that, nicknames given to teams by the fans and sportswriters, both teams were known as the Red Socks, because they both wore red socks. Boy, that would be confusing. Then one year, for some reason, the National League team officially adopted the nickname “Braves” adding an Indian to their uniform. The American League team jumped at their chance and officially adopted the nickname “Red Sox” spelling it the way Chicago had spelled White Sox.

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Geek Baseball Fact #2: The Chicago National League Ballclub was originally nicknamed the White Stockings by fans and sportswriters (because they wore white socks) and dominated the early years of the National League (we’re talking the 1870’s and 80’s here; 1885 team pictured above). By 1900 the team had long since gone by other names. When Charlie Comiskey started up his Chicago American League Ballclub, he wanted to name his team after those great teams of the 1870’s and 80’s, but he didn’t want to be confused for them either, so he changed the spelling and called his team the “White Sox”.