Today in baseball, 30 years ago:
Rickey Henderson stole four bases in Oakland's 5-4 loss to Milwaukee to raise his total to 122 and break Lou Brock's single-season record of 118.
The record-breaking 119th steal came off pitcher Doc Medich and catcher Ted Simmons on a third-inning pitchout.
In '82 Henderson set the modern day record with 130 steals. He was caught 42 times for a SB% of .756. That's 172 attempts!
Also on this date (this is way cool):
In 1977, 35 years ago, Toby Harrah and Bump Wills of the Texas Rangers hit back-to-back inside-the-park home runs on consecutive pitches in the seventh inning as the Rangers beat New York, 8-2, at Yankee Stadium.
And ...
In 1978, Joe Morgan of the Cincinnati Reds hit his 200th career home run to become the first major leaguer to have 200 homers and 500 stolen bases.
LINK: http://www.todayinbaseballhistory.com/cgi-bin/today/today2S.pl
LINK: http://www.baseball-almanac.com/players/player.php?p=henderi01
= new reply since forum marked as read
Also didn't Rickey then say that he "was the greatest"?
...to remind us old, old, old fans that Henderson would erase Lou Brock's record...
........and Brock had broken Bump's dad's, Maury Wills of One Hundred and Four
(I don't have to look it up), after Maury had eclipsed the immortal Ty Cobb's 96.
Edit to add link:
http://cardboardgods.net/cardboard-gods-the-book/
Seeing the old card reminds me of this book. I picked up a copy -- signed by the
author -- when he came to Miltown to do a reading with a college friend.
Highly recommended:
