Category: Chapter News

Sixteen chapter members and guests, gathering for the first time since the passing of chapter founder Bill Gilbert, paid tribute to him on Saturday and remembered his contributions to our community.

We had an empty chair, a World Series edition Astros cap and some fresh garden flowers at the head of the table in Bill’s remembrance. We owe so much to him, not least of which his hand in creating our vibrant baseball community. May he rest in peace.

Jan Larson recounted how Bill contacted SABR members in the Austin area for regular lunch meetings, starting in 2003. Three years later, the group officially became a SABR chapter. Later, Bill worked hard to create the chapter’s annual winter meeting, starting in 2007 and has become a recurring signature event for the chapter every January since.

As we sometimes do at our monthly meetings, we had a trivia quiz; this one supplied by Jim Baker. The theme of the quiz was teenagers who have played in the big leagues, and it was won by Tom Thayer, earning him the prize of the movie poster from the baseball movie, “Bang the drum slowly.”

In addition, Dan Walsh brought his collection of baseball stadium postcards to share with the group. It included major and minor league team stadiums, and even a few from Japanese ball clubs.

The next chapter meeting will be the World Series Watch Party at Jim Baker’s house on Saturday, Oct. 27. World Series Game 4 is scheduled for that evening. More details to follow next month.

A dozen chapter members and guests endured the dog days of summer with large slabs of baseball talk and sides of post-season prognostications on Saturday.

The group gathered at County Line on the Lake for delicious barbecue, meeting for the 141st consecutive month. A wide range of professional team logos were represented at the meeting, including the Astros, Dodgers, Indians, Rockies and the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters of Nippon Professional Baseball.

Ryan, who attended the Sabermetrics, Scouting and the Science of Baseball conference in Boston earlier this month, sported a shirt from the conference – a periodic table of baseball statistical abbreviations. While he’s bummed at the tough season his Orioles are having, he’s hoping his team will hold on to secure the first pick in next year’s draft. Meanwhile I sported an Ichiro Suzuki shirt that featured a chart showing his 1,000th, 2,000th, 3,000th, and 4,000th hits. Jan grabbed one of his many caps and sported one of the Washington Nationals, a team rapidly fading from contention.

Speaking of contention, some in the group see the Boston Red Sox as the strongest team in the American League while the National League is a complete toss-up. One attendee said he hoped the Oakland A’s and Seattle Mariners slip past the Houston Astros for playoff qualification, though there were others who disagreed with this outcome!

The group also welcomed first-time Tom to the group. He’s an Indians fan, just like another Tom in the group, so we all agreed that this will help us remember his name. Jeremy traveled the furthest to join us for lunch, having driven from San Antonio and planning on taking in a Round Rock Express game that evening.

Ira shared how much he enjoyed touring Wrigley Field during a trip to Chicago earlier this month. He said he was surprised at how close second base looked from the center field bleachers.

Next meeting will be at 12:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 8, at Serranos (5030 W. U.S. 290 service road) in Southwest Austin. A request for RSVPs will be forthcoming.

A dozen chapter members and guests enjoyed an Italian lunch and caught up on the young season at the monthly meeting on Saturday.

Topics included the extended conversation on SABR-L about Ichiro Suzuki’s new role in the Mariners’ front office and whether his playing career is done, Shohei Ohtani’s early success as a two-way player and the early lead by the Martinezes in Jim Baker’s Predictatron contest.

We also welcomed new member Adam, who hails from Des Moines, Iowa. He shared with us that he’s a Chicago Cubs fan and worked in the front office of the Triple-A Iowa Cubs while in high school and college.

We also congratulated member and author Anne Keene for the publication in May of her book, “The Cloudbuster Nine: The Untold Story of Ted Williams and the Baseball Team that Helped Win World War II.” She’s planning on attending SABR 48 in Pittsburgh in June to discuss her book, which is available online and at local bookstores. In addition, her book was named as this month’s Statesman Select, making it the top recommended read in Austin. You can catch Ms. Keene discuss her book at BookPeople at 7 p.m. Friday, May 25. Click this link for more information: https://www.bookpeople.com/statesman-selects

This was the 138th consecutive month in which the chapter has meet, a streak dating to December 2006. Tom Thayer wondered when our streak might match Cal Ripken’s consecutive-game streak; Jim Baker calculated that we’re 208 years away from that!

With that in mind, our next meeting has been set for 12:30 p.m. Saturday, June 16, at Serranos in southwest Austin (MoPac and 290). Jan Larson will send out a request for RSVPs as we get closer to that date.

Nineteen Hornsby Chapter members and guests witnessed something at Dell Diamond that had never happened there before – a fog-induced delay of game. Fog rolled in quickly, making it difficult for fans to see outfielders and read the big board, but the Round Rock Express broke a 1-1 tie with the Colorado Sky Sox on a big five-run inning before the delay was called.

The fog delayed the game for about 30 minutes. Once the direction of the wind changed, the fog dissipated almost as quickly as it had blanketed the ballpark. The Express went on to win 6-1.

We probably should’ve known that we were in for an interesting night when the Express leadoff hitter, Jose Cardona, was called out on an automatic strike for taking too long to be ready to hit in the batter’s box. Without an announcement by the stadium announcer, we were left to decipher what had just happened. It wasn’t the only time that occurred.

Later in the game with Sky Sox second baseman Nate Orf on first, it appeared that Sky Sox third baseman Shane Opitz flied out to center. But the home plate umpire called a balk, wiping out the flyout to center and placing Orf on second. The at-bat for Opitz continued with a single. Later, Orf scored, but this caused confusion among our group as there was no announcement by the stadium public address announcer.

Other ominous happenings at the park included a seemingly friendly tug-of-war between Spike the mascot and kids. Shortly after the contest of strength began, Spike fell over and lost his head – literally! The mascot’s head popped off, bringing a quick end to the tug-of-war.

After enjoying a barbeque dinner at the Salt Lick, many of us made it through the gates in time for the Express giveaway – a replica of the Nolan Ryan statue that stands outside of the Dell Diamond and Globe Life Park in Arlington.

Many thanks to Frank Rechtorovic for sharing his before-fog and after-fog photos. Some members who recall many ballgames in San Francisco remarked that they had never attended a game in which fog suspended play. As we often say, you never know when you’ll see something at a ballpark that’s never (or rarely ever) happened before.

Before the Express’ five-spot in the 7th inning, we wondered if we might see the new extra innings rule that automatically places a runner on second. Alas, for better or worse, it didn’t come to that, but we think we got to see a pretty interesting game, nonetheless.

Next monthly chapter meeting will be at 12:30 p.m. Saturday, May 19, at Romano’s Macaroni Grill at the Arboretum in north Austin. Requests for RSVPs will be forthcoming in early May.

Ten chapter members and guests gathered for a Mexican lunch in southwest Austin on Sunday, Feb. 18, and welcomed back Monte Cely, freshly returned from the Caribbean Series. In return, Monte unleashed a Baseball Latinamericano trivia quiz on us.

Two-time Predictatron champion Raeanne Martinez won her first quiz at a monthly meeting, besting the field with 22 out of 28 points and securing a lucha libre mask as the grand prize from Monte (see photo above). Ira Siegel, like the rest of us, struggled on the quiz, but he did receive the last-place-finisher prize of a two peso note.

As all MLB teams are on the verge of full camp workouts, our discussions related much more to the coming season and less on 2017. The group discussed the most recent free agent signing — Eric Hosmer joining the San Diego Padres for an eight-year, $144 million deal. In some ways, the 11th hour signing suggests the overarching discussion happening in baseball – how to value a player’s worth in a long-term contract? It seems that the days of rewarding a player for past performance are over with as teams appear to prefer shorter term contracts that they think more accurately value a player’s worth in the next few seasons.

Monte also talked about attending the Caribbean Series and watching the team from Puerto Rico win it all. You can read more about Monte’s dispatches about Serie del Caribe 2018 by clicking on this link: http://www.sabrhornsby.org/2017/08/serie-del-caribe-2018/

This was the 135th consecutive month in which the chapter has had a monthly meeting, a streak that dates back to December 2006.

We’ve set the next chapter meeting for 12:45 p.m. Saturday, March 24, at County Line on the Lake on FM 2222 in North Austin. A request for RSVPs will be forthcoming in the mid March.