NEWSLETTER
If you woke up today hoping to follow some baseball, but realized that we’re still in December, I’ve got something for you.
I can’t offer any new baseball highlights (outside of the moments Brett’s been recounting), of course, but you can re-live some of the strangest, but real-est moments from the 2016 season.
At ESPN, in a wonderful annual tradition, Jayson Stark wrote about some of the strange but true feats from the 2016 season that perfectly articulate the meat of what makes baseball great, and the wild World Series Game Seven is chief among them.
It is certainly worth your time.
[adinserter block=”1″]
Among the other feats from 2016, Stark writes about Bartolo Colon’s memorable first home run (at the age of 42), and also his first walk (which took 281 plate appearances). Then, Stark discusses the improbable feat of Orioles backup catcher Caleb Joseph, who had ZERO RBI in 141 plate appearances this season.
There’s an absolute moon-shot home run from Trayce Thompson, a kick save from Zach McAllister, a header from Michael Saunders, the ridiculous timeout-swing-RBI-hit from Chris Coghlan and a bit more. You’ll definitely want to re-live some of these moments.
But we’re Cubs fans here, and the details and oddities from that World Series Game Seven win (from both teams) are truly mind-boggling. Each of Corey Kluber, Jon Lester, David Ross, Aroldis Chapman, Rajai Davis, Mike Montgomery, Michael Martinez, and Miguel Montero did something that either 1) no one had ever done before or 2) was so unusual given the trajectory of their season.
I don’t want to steal all of Stark’s thunder, but one great example: no one had ever hit a Game Seven home run on the final swing of his career until David Ross did it.
[adinserter block=”2″]
It’s easy to remember the overall outcome of that fateful Game Seven, but so many of the details would be completely unbelievable if they hadn’t happened right in front of us.
So head over to ESPN and read, listen, and watch some baseball during this cold December afternoon. And remember, it’s coming:
