Correct answers acknowledged in the comments. You have 24 hours. Go!
1) Who was the youngest Atlanta Braves All-Star? Who was the oldest?
2) Other than Tony Gwynn, who was the only position player to appear in at least one NL game every year from 1982-1998?
3) What did Rico Carty carry in his back pocket during games?
4) What position player had the highest single-season WAR (BBRef version) in Atlanta Braves history?
5) Who holds the Atlanta Braves single-season record for walks taken?
6) Two former Atlanta Braves hail from Hawaii. Who are they?
7) Whose Atlanta record for stolen bases in a single season did Otis Nixon break?
8) The top two Atlanta Braves in career defensive WAR are, of course, Andruw Jones and Andrelton Simmons. But who is third?
9) Who is the oldest living former Atlanta Brave? Who is second?
10) Since 1988, three former Atlanta Braves went on to finish in the top 5 in Cy Young voting with a different team. Who are they?
BONUS:
11) Rowland Office accomplished something four times that no other 20th or 21st century major league player accomplished more than twice. What was it?
Clarification on #11 — should read 20th or 21st century player. #2 I’ve asked here before. Enjoy (or ignore).
1.) Earl Williams?
3.) Rico carried his wallet in his back pocket. What a character.
8.) My guess would be Glenn Hubbard.
Great post, Sansho.
1. Jason Heyward, Chipper Jones
4. JD Drew?
9. I think Henry Aaron has got to be one of the two there.
10. Jason Schmidt and two other jabronis
@1, I have just updated #11.
2 – Dale Murphy?
4 – Andruw?
10 – 2 jabronis = Wainwright and Bedrosian?
6. Tyler Yates; ???
6..
Mike Lum
can never expect to overcome
the place of his birth
his subsequent substantial girth.
I didn’t use the internet:
1) JHey, Aaron
2) Dale Murphy
3) Wallet
4) Hank Aaron
5) Chipper
6) Tyler Yates and Shane Victorino (he does own us)
7) Ralph Garr
8) The Lemmer
9) Hank Aaron and Phil Neikro
10) Jason Schmidt, Adam Wainwright and Bob Walk
11) Lead the league in double plays by an outfielder.
Smitty is I think right about everything except Mike Lum for no 6. Victorino was never a Brave?
@5, Wainwright never pitched for Atlanta as near as I can tell. And Bedrosian won the award in 1987, which is outside the parameters.
I’ve found one of the other two jabronis using the internet, and I can say with full confidence that I’ve never heard of him before in my life.
Edit: And there’s the other jabroni. Not a total unknown, but pretty far down the obscurity hole.
Wow, some of these are toughies. I’m interested to see if Smitty is as close as his answers some. Most of them make sense.
@9
I know, but he does own the Braves, so that has to count for something.
Smitty’s answers, while eminently reasonable, are mostly incorrect. He has one correct answer and 4 partially correct answers. Wallet is the correct answer for #3 (congrats, roadrunner), and Lum and Yates are the Hawaiians (Sam and blazon).
1. Jason Heyward and Phil Niekro
Tough questions. Here’s my initial responses w/o using the internet:
1. Rafael Furcal/Aaron
2. Terry Pendleton?
3. wallet
4. Aaron
5. Chipper
6. Mike Lum and…no idea
7. The Roadrunner?
8. Either Glenn Hubbard or Mark Lemke. I’ll say the Lemmer.
9. Hank Aaron
10. Jason Schmidt, Adam Wainwright, John Burkett
11. Most conjugal visits in locker room
BOOOM!!!!!!
Partially correct answers will not be acknowledged until all correct answers are somewhere in the thread. Everyone so far is wrong on #2, #4, #5, #7, #8, and #11.
Actually, since the first answer to #9 is Ken Johnson, I’ll go ahead and reveal it. Hank Aaron (Edward) is in fact the second oldest living Atlanta Brave. I wanted him to be the oldest, and it looked for most of my research time that he would be, but then ol’ Ken popped up. Not that I wish the man ill, but that sorta took the steam out of that particular question….
bravemarine Says: Your comment is awaiting moderation.
1. Heyward; Aaron
2. T Pendleton
3. Wallet; hat tip roadrunner48; I’d forgotten that
4. JD Drew
5. Chipper
6. Mike Lum; Tyler Yates
7. Ralph Garr
8. G Hubbard
9. Aaron; H Wilhelm
10. J Schmidt; K Millwood; P Niekro
Bonus: Inside the park homer and triple in same game
2. Ozzie Smith? (although I feel like LaRussa may have forced him out earlier than 1998)
Ozzie retired after 1996 (age of 41.) The answer is Willie McGee, Ugliest Man In Baseball.
How about Lonnie Smith for #4? #2 is going to bother me all day.
2. Brett Butler
edit: shoot, I forgot the Len Barker trade
Sansho, I can’t imagine my answer at #14 isn’t correct–although it was my second guess. Doubt that’s fair.
when the dust has settled too easy a question for sansho…
What Atlanta pitcher made what hitter very angry for his choice of what pitch he threw successfully to prevent him setting what new MLB record?
Edward, in that it is not completely correct, it is not correct!
Ozzie and McGee are 1) not correct (McGee played for the Red Sox in ’95), and 2) were never Atlanta Braves anyway.
OK, I’ll check back later to see what progress has been made.
OK, lets try again: #2 is Rafael Belliard?
Looks that way, yes. Didn’t think Belliard broke in that early. Got 2 at bats in ’82.
#1– Heyward and Hoyt Wilhelm
I missed this horrible bit of news from September:
Anyone wants to complain about Yasiel Puig or Jose Bautista or Carlos Gomez getting demonstrative when they hit one, go watch the YouTube Smitty links @29. That’s a cool bit; Raffy Belliard’s 2nd career homer. But wait, and let the next video queue up. It’s the 5 run comeback against the Reds from 1993. It’s the entire 9th of that game; normally highlight reels only show you Gant’s final HR at bat, but this one you get to see Damon Berryhill lead off with a double (?!), AAA shortstop Chipper Jones strike out in his second ML at bat, and then…the Ryno.
Go watch that Ryan Klesko at bat. Watch the release when he connects. Do not complain to me about “bat flips.”
7 Brett Butler? Hank Aaron?
2 Ozzie Smith?
#8 Clete Boyer
5 Darrell Evans, the walking man.
#4 I bet it’s Darrell Evans, my all-time favorite.
For 8, I’ll actually guess Jason Heyward.
@30
WHAT?!?! The land of no fun…
Maybe 4 is Javy Lopez in his monster year.
5 JD Drew.
8 Chipper
11 hit for the cycle.
@31, it is known that the Klesko bat-flip is the gold standard. My favorite is the HR he hit at Wrigley that went out of the stadium near the big scoreboard. Gawd I miss having guys like that. I need to start a movement to bring roids back.
@38
Ever since being forced by security to sit down during a playoff game during the Dodgers series a couple years ago and witnessing fans being thrown out of their seats by the same security guards and forced to stand back in standing room only space in the concourse for refusing to sit down during the same playoff game, I’ve assumed there are no ends to which the Braves/Turner Field employees won’t go to reduce the ballpark experience.
@41, You were in right field, too?
LOL! I was in right field for that too!
@ 31, I just watched that video. Those were great times to be a Braves fan. The thing that struck me, was when they showed the players on the bench. When I compare them to the current Braves squad , I become a little nauseous. There is such a long way to go to get close to a team like that.
Is #7 Jerry Royster?
Thanks for that video Smitty! What great memories!!
Here’s the one Sam mentions.
Damn.
My five-year-old has been practicing that move for a few years now. We call it the Klesko.
@DOBrienAJC: #Braves like their chances, but also know another team could swoop in and make enormous offer in coming months. https://t.co/jEyShNurgS
@ClaussetTim: @DOBrienAJC Dave, wondering if you’ve heard of Kevin Maitan, and if so, what’s your take on the Braves getting him?
Thought this was already a done deal
snowshine with correct answers to #1 (Heyward, Wilhelm) and #2 (yep, Rafael Belliard had a 17-year major league career…I hope he named a wing of his art gallery for Bobby Cox), and roadrunner48 scores again with Darrell Evans @5 (but not @4, bledsoe…he and Chipper each fell one short of the leader). Evans’ 9.0 in 1973 edged out Lonnie Smith’s 8.8 in ’89.
@50
It’s a handshake agreement, but nothing binding. We dealt three guys who might have shown up either in the big leagues or on the top 20 prospects list to get enough money to get Maitan, so I hope it works out.
I thought Bledsoe had it right with Evans for #4. If it’s not Evans, then I would guess it’s Jimmy Wynn.
@43
I was, in fact. A couple sections to the foul pole side of our bullpen in the terrace level. Game 1 of that series.
@44
LOL…is it possible we were all sitting within feet of each other?
@54, We must have been within 20 ft of each other. What a miserable game. The Braves had that awful DJ scratching all game long for no good reason, and it was such a tease when I thought we’d gotten to Kershaw.
52—Nothing binding, but the Braves would be crazy to let anyone outbid them for Maitan. I really can’t see it happening; they’ll pay whatever it takes, IMO.
@55
Wow…crazy!
I had honestly completely forgotten about the awful DJ thing. Thanks for making me recall that…heh.
Yeah, that game was not my favorite in-stadium memory as a Braves fan, that’s for sure. We lost; I had to deal with fascist security telling me to sit down at a freaking playoff game; and that section, I discovered that night, is awful as far as atmosphere goes. You can’t hear the crowd at all because you’re trapped between the two-tiered stands just to your left and the Chop House/open end of the stadium to your right. Unfortunately, you could still hear the stupid DJ.
Puig for Teheran. Make it happen, Cop.
How about Coppy for two minor league pitchers coming off of TJ and a laptop? The arrogant little twerp.
Maybin to Tigers for Ian Krol and Gabe Speier, couple of lefties. Clears more payroll.
@60- Mallex: “And the door for me!” #alanisforever
Do we really want Puig? I mean he’s very likely a clubhouse problem and head-case. But maybe we need some of that? Lol. Entertain me damnit!
We really want Puig, but not for Teheran or Miller.
A pretty straight salary dump of Cameron Maybin. We just got back Ian Krol, a hard-throwing lefty reliever who can’t find the strike zone, and Gabe Speier, a 20-year-old in Single-A. Both are fairly well-traveled already: Krol went from the Athletics to the Nationals in the Mike Morse-AJ Cole three-team trade, then went to Detroit in the Doug Fister deal. Speier went from the Red Sox to the Tigers in the Porcello-for-Cespedes deal.
There’s a chance either of these guys could eventually be a decent bullpen asset, but they’re basically “just a guy” guys of the sort that we’ve aggressively traded away.
The thing that struck me, was when they showed the players on the bench. When I compare them to the current Braves squad , I become a little nauseous. There is such a long way to go to get close to a team like that.
It bears noting that the 1993 Braves’ $47.2m payroll was the second highest in baseball, and the highest in the NL. Only the eventual World Champion Blue Jays had a higher total salary commitment that year, clocking in at a whopping $51.9m.
Good lord. Someone put Peanut on a goddamned treadmill!
@64, the fact that the headline is about the $6M saved tells us all we need to know. More cold-water for the crew that thought we were going to trade our huge stable of “just-a-guy” for anything good.
Mallex Smith’s timeline appears to be accelerated, which is good (I think). Either that or Puig will play CF.
Well, I hope there is more to come.
We got back junk.
roadrunner, the Toy Cannon is correct! I dimly recollect Milo Hamilton’s exasperation at Wynn’s patience at the plate, and it colored my perspective at the time of Wynn’s one season in Atlanta. Fact is, he’d always been a patient hitter, and he’d reached the point in his career where he probably couldn’t pull the trigger as he once did.
OK, here are the as yet unanswered questions:
7) Whose Atlanta record for stolen bases in a single season did Otis Nixon break?
8) The top two Atlanta Braves in career defensive WAR are, of course, Andruw Jones and Andrelton Simmons. But who is third?
10) Since 1988, three former Atlanta Braves went on to finish in the top 5 in Cy Young voting with a different team. Who are they? (Jason Schmidt is one.)
BONUS:
11) Rowland Office accomplished something four times that no other 20th or 21st century major league player accomplished more than twice. What was it? (Hint: he did it in four CONSECUTIVE seasons, while nobody else has done it more than twice, even non-consecutively.)
Jeffrey Loria hating you puts you on the fast-track to saint-hood.
I like this deal. It opens the door for Mallex Smith
Gerald Perry for Nixon sb record’??
Why rush to start the clock on mallex?
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/sunday-notes-eatons-pop-rules-brewers-cubs-more/
I guess Gabe is a starter whose working in relief while recovering.
#7 Sonny Jackson?
@73
Correct! A modest 42 SBs for Perry in ’87 was good enough for the record for a few years.
We got 6 million dollars? I LOVE 6 million dollars!
#10 Doyle Alexander, Jason Schmidt, and Millwood
@69, are you counting Wainwright? I’m assuming the endpoint you picked excludes Bedrosian.
Matt Harrison?
I wouldn’t be surprised if McDowelll turns Krol into our primary lefty specialist.
I imagine we’ll pick up a reliever in the Rule 5 draft too like we did last year. If Darren O’Day is looking at $7-9M per, then sign me up for the “spaghetti against the wall” approach.
I think he’s a reverse-split guy.
@80
Correct about excluding Bedrosian (he won the Cy, so I thought I’d make it tougher than that). Not counting Wainwright — the two remaining answers pitched for the big club. (No on Harrison.)
The guy to get in the Rule 5, according to a long tweetstorm from Mets prospect guru Jeff Paternostro, is Wuilmer Becerra, whom the Mets have unaccountably left unprotected.
Tweets by jeffpaternostro
If only just for the name…
He hit pretty well in A ball.
Answers!
1) Who was the youngest Atlanta Braves All-Star? Who was the oldest?
A: Jason Heyward was 20 in 2010. Hoyt Wilhelm was one day shy of 48 the day of the 1972 ASG.
2) Other than Tony Gwynn, who was the only position player to appear in at least one NL game every year from 1982-1998?
A: Rafael Belliard. This is my favorite baseball trivia question. “You could win a lot of bar bets with that one”, people used to say (ironically, before bar bets were instantly provable…now that they are, nobody says it).
3) What did Rico Carty carry in his back pocket during games?
A: His wallet.
4) What position player had the highest single-season WAR (BBRef version) in Atlanta Braves history?
A: Darrell Evans, 9.0 WAR in 1973.
5) Who holds the Atlanta Braves single-season record for walks taken?
A: Jim “The Toy Cannon” Wynn, 127 in 1976.
6) Two former Atlanta Braves hail from Hawaii. Who are they?
A: Mike Lum and Tyler Yates.
7) Whose Atlanta record for stolen bases in a single season did Otis Nixon break?
A: Gerald Perry, 42 in 1987.
8) The top two Atlanta Braves in career defensive WAR are, of course, Andruw Jones and Andrelton Simmons. But who is third?
A: Bruce Benedict, 9.8.
9) Who is the oldest living former Atlanta Brave? Who is second?
A: Well, looks like I botched this one. Frank Bolling (84) and Billy O’Dell (82) are both alive and older than Ken Johnson (a younger 82). The new reckoning has Aaron fourth on the list (a spry 81).
10) Since 1988, three former Atlanta Braves went on to finish in the top 5 in Cy Young voting with a different team. Who are they?
Jason Schmidt (2nd in NL voting in 2003 and 4th in 2004), Duane Ward (5th in AL voting in 1993), and the redoubtable Marvin Freeman (4th in the NL voting for the Rockies in 1994…the only member of the Rockies to receive a Cy Young vote until Jeff Francis got a single 3rd place vote in 2007.)
BONUS:
11) Rowland Office accomplished something four times that no other 20th or 21st century major league player accomplished more than twice. What was it?
Office’s hit totals from 1975-’78: 103, 101, 103, 101. Nobody else has gotten 101-103 hits in a season more than twice in their careers. Really disappointed nobody got this one. It was staring right at you!
Thanks for playing — I’ll work up another quiz sometime this winter. I’ll try not to skew so old next time, but I promise you’ll still have to know your stuff.
@85 – Can we call him Yecogi?
Marvin Freeman. And to think that I was going to guess Zane Smith, but I thought it was too crazy.
Meh, I can’t get mad about trading Maybin for live arms. Krol is the new Avilan, so let’s hope he can get lefties out.
Either he’s the new Avilan, or he’s the new Veal.
@84
said Jeff Paternostro
as with every young batter most grow
but Wuilmer Becerra they say
has declined so he’s yours for twenty five K.
sansho
Great quiz, thank you..hard these days saturated with so much easily accessible digital data to come up with questions like that which force us to think with no recourse.
But you did not answer my question @25…when you do see what you can remember about the terminology of the actual pitch in question…technically it was one thing but in the slang of the day, another. I’m still not sure i’ve remembered it right. Regardless, it sure made the hitter mad, he’s still talking about it up here!
According to Bill Shanks, Braves re-signed the good David Carpenter.
blazon — my guess is you’re thinking of Pete Rose’s boorish post-game press conference after Larry McWilliams and Gene Garber halted his 44-game hitting streak in ’78. Acted like nobody had ever thrown him a change-up before, and couldn’t even be bothered to know McWilliams’ name. Was that it?
So Chasen Shreve and one year of DC for Banuelos. Even though Shreve had a good year in NY, I can get behind that.
New thread.