For some reason, Don Carman's name popped into my head today. One of those bursts of disconnected thoughts while driving (yes, in my car, man) today. Yes, the unheralded Philadelphia Phillies pitcher of the mid-80s or so some how crept into my mind. So I decided to put fingers to keyboard (the new version of putting pen to paper) and see what his name brought up in a Google search. Boy was I shocked when I saw so many occurences of his name (1,120,000 results to be exact)! Being the good guy that I am, here's a quick summary of what I found...
Take for instance, this news story from ABC in Philly. Apparently, Mr. Carman was going through his garage and found a box of 200 letters. He replied to all of them, and one happened to be to a kid who had requested an autograph on a baseball card. He courteously signed the card and sent it back to the guy... 16 years after receiving it. That's pretty cool!
I also like this list of cliches and wisecracks that Carman used when responding to questions from reporters. My personal favorite is: "We need two more players to take us over the top: Babe Ruth & Lou Gehrig." If you played for the Phils during the time that he did... I think even Ruth and Gehrig might have needed more help to get that team over the top.
And surprise, surprise... even Don Carman has his own Wikipedia page. He really must have made it big time! If the following statistic from that page is true, then I owe Carman some big props:
Carman held All-Stars Craig Biggio, Ken Griffey, Jr., Jeffrey Leonard, Pete Rose, Larry Walker, and Matt Williams to a .025 collective batting average (1-for-40)
And lastly, if this little anecdotee is true, then I'm about to go out and find where Carman lives and meet him at the bar...
Till next time, keep the Philly Sports Quest alive!
No comments:
Post a Comment