Leaftober

I spent much of October doing yardwork on the Ranch.  On the 8th, 19th, 21st and 22nd of the month I was fortunate to have practically ideal weather conditions; temperatures in the 70s, light winds, golden sunlight and brilliant autumnal foliage.  The combination of bright sunlight and vibrant leaves inspired me to document the scenery.  Plus, the photography gave me a breather from monotonous hedge & bush trimming and the carting away of nearly 900 black walnuts (yes, I counted).  My attempts to capture leaf luminosity with the sun as backlight met with more or less success.

I popped for a new roof this year.  Green is the third different roof color on the Ranch (first gray in 1962 then black in 1989) and is a better compliment to its forest setting.

This photo of the red maple leaf on the driveway is for my Canadian friends.

Pro tip: When you live in a forest, outsource your leaf removal.

Spot the bug sunning himself on the leaf.  No, that's not a challenge.  It's an observation.  Spot is the bug's name.  I asked.

On the 22nd of October passing clouds provided me the opportunity to capture the same scene in different contrasts.

Leaves scattered about the lawn in the side yard under passing cloud cover (above), and then 15 seconds later.....

.....Pow!  Bright sunlight.

A few years ago a red oak sapling materialized in the back yard among a grove of dying ash trees (#emeraldashborer).  I removed the ash trees, a painful thing for a baseball fan, to provide more space for the red oak to thrive.  So far, so good.

The first year that the red oak appeared its leaves blazed a vivid red in the fall.  Over the course of the the next few years its autumnal hue was closer to brown than red on the color spectrum.  This year saw a return to a deeper red.

Late last year I had the last of the mature ash trees removed from the ranch.  It was sad to see the ash trees removed.  In the earliest days of autumn, the uppermost leaves first turned purple before the whole tree progressively turned red then yellow.  Reliably it was the best fall foliage performance in my yard each season.  In place of the ash tree along the front walk, I planted a red oak sapling that also displayed an attractive red tint this fall (not photographed).

Roll the credits!

BC2020: Mike Y Dettori

 

Last Wednesday The Old Master of the Turf acquired for me, via special delivery from one of his cosa nostra of old school horse players, a copy of the Daily Racing Form Breeders' Cup Advance Past Performances.  It may or may not carry the longest title in print media, but it is certainly the most important publication you'll find at the newsstand.   There are still newsstands, right?  Our copies were acquired from the MVG racino.  I took some artistic liberty with the cover of my copy of the DRF, writing my name across the exercise rider's helmet.  I'm thinking now of the potential for sponsorship possibilities.

On Thursday DRF photographer Barbara Livingston captured a photo of Irish trainer Aiden O'Brien's stable of Euro invaders breezing around the Keeneland track in a tight, orderly formation.

A very cool 2-second video of the same scene was uploaded to social media by photographer Alex Evers which revealed the near synchronization of the workout.  There are quite a few stunning images captured by Alex from Keeneland this past week that he uploaded to his social media.  Artistic photographs of horses and particularly Keeneland are definitely worth a few minutes of your time.

In past years I'd spend a quiet, peaceful week with my DRF BC Advance in a leisurely deep dive of handicapping.  This year I had just 3 evenings and so my handicapping efforts were truncated and much more intense.  One longtime subscriber sought my guidance, I sent out via text message my picks (the critical element) listed in order of preference without showing my work (only of interest to hardcore handicappers).

The "F.D" was a notation to myself as a reminder that the jockey on the #6 horse in this race was the Italian-born Lanfranco "Frankie" Dettori, the greatest jockey in the history of mankind.  The final order of finish in this race was #3-#2-#9-#6 with the #8 horse running fifth.  This represented the closest I came to selecting the correct order of finish at this year's Breeder's Cup.  My wagers on this race were a superfecta box (#fail) and a WIN & PLACE bet on Dettori (#nope).

My bet of the day was on a different Dettori mount.  In the (turf) Mile Frankie was on the #3 horse, a 3-year old colt named Lope Y Fernandez.  The morning line odds were set at 30-1.

While the untrained eye might look no further than the consecutive 7th-place finishes in the two most recent races, an expert eye would observe those races (as well as the most immediately preceding effort) were against older Group 1 (or highest class) horses.  Think college player (the 3-year old horse) competing against the best professional players (older Group 1 horses) and you'll have a better understanding of how to conceptualize this kind of challenge for Lope Y Fernandez.  Additionally, those two 7th-place finishes were just 3 and 4 lengths behind the winners and the preceding Group 1 race versus older horses was a 3rd-place finish by less than a length.  

Close!  

The most significant items of note in the past performances of Lope y Fernandez I circled at left in the photo above; the 117 & 119 figures and the accompanying "fm" with each figure.  Those digits represent impressive TimeForm speed ratings (a European variant of the Beyer Speed Figures) and the "fm" denotes the condition of the turf course on those days; "firm."  European turf courses are generally softer than North American turf courses and European turf races held on a firm course are rare.  What could be learned from the past performances of Lope Y Fernandez is that this colt would relish a comparatively rock-hard North American turf course.  And that is exactly what Lope Y Fernandez got at Keeneland on Saturday afternoon.  With, again, morning line odds of 30-1.  I shared this critical information with another longtime subscriber (and horse player) to these digital pages.

I have included his replies, including a heads-up on a Violence horse entered in an undercard race on Friday at Keeneland, as a humorous illustration for how well my friends know me and my tendencies.  My largest wager of the day was a WIN & PLACE bet on Lope Y Fernandez and Dettori.

Lope Y Fernandez went off at odds of 18-1 and ran 3rd by only a length.  Check out the payout on your $1 superfecta;  $152,804.80!  I didn't have it.  The winner was Order of Australia, Circus Maximus finished second and you can see Order of Australia, Circus Maximus and Lope Y Fernandez in the Barbara Livingston photo and Alex Evers video shared earlier on this digital page.

With the limitations imposed by the ongoing global pandemic, The B Team convened at Mr B's command center for the day of watching and wagering.  

This was my perspective, preparing to watch the Mile.

There are certain advantages to not going to a track for wagering/watching horse racing but, rather, doing so from home.  The seats are more comfortable.  The buffet lines and lines at the concession stand are much shorter.  The food is generally better.  The restroom facilities are waaaayyyy cleaner.  The commute is shorter, the parking is more convenient.  No lines at the betting window.  However, as I recently experienced when I hit a big winner from the comfort of The Ranch, I miss that visceral experience of cashing a big winning ticket at a betting window and watching the cashier count out a tall stack of high denomination greenbacks. 

The NBC telecast utilized a multitude of autumnal scenes from Keeneland and horse farms throughout Lexington horse country.

Steve Haskin, formerly of The Blood-Horse, has long been the professional writer/handicapper I respected the most. Still do. 

 

".....you can hit six or seven favorites and lose your shirt.  You need at least one, possibly two, [big] price horses if you want to make money."  Whether it's Breeders' Cup Saturday or a Tuesday night at old Turfway Park, these are wise words to remember.  Mr Haskin went on to write;

Since the advent of the Breeders' Cup Dirt Mile, The B Team has consistently held that the Dirt Mile is the most difficult race to handicap on what is the most difficult day for handicapping.  Aside from the rare instances when a horse is a mile specialist, such as Wise Dan or the filly Goldikova, just about any type of horse - a sprinter, a router, a filly or mare - could steal this race.  Haskin's sentiment hits home for The B Team.

Earlier this year I learned of a new, to me, handicapper who really knows her stuff.  There are two horse racing networks - TVG and HRTV - that are available on satellite television which I don't have and also as a part of specialized cable television packages to which I've never subscribed and on which, evidently, the intelligent and talented Michelle Yu has long been employed.  Who knew?  Well, I guess millions of handicappers, but not me.  I was introduced to the wisdom of Michelle Yu when the Governor locked down Ohio for two months this spring and I was able to watch horse racing every day of the week on Fox Sports Ohio when I wasn't watching daily marathons of Magnum P.I.  Michelle was often a part of the telecast, giving viewers her brilliant insights and winning picks.  After I made my own selections for this year's Breeders' Cup, I then sought confirmation bias from Steve Haskin's column and from Michelle Yu who was featured on a Breeders' Cup handicapping podcast.

Roll the credits!

Year of the Puig, 2019

Anna and Maria both ditched school and joined me and Lou for their first-ever Opening Day!  Best Opening Day ever!  We got downtown early to watch the Findlay Market Parade.  Once the girls had the opportunity to experience the parade, we targeted the ballpark for a little batting practice and to enjoy all the pregame ceremonies, video highlights, player introductions, National Anthem and the flyover. 

I set a personal record that day when, despite eating ballpark junk food and drinking a couple of Coca-Colas (one later for dinner) and guzzling some H2O, somehow I managed a superhuman physiological feat by not visiting a restroom for a span of 15.5 hours.  TMI?  Hey!  It was 15.5 hours!  That deserves recognition.  For perspective, if you watched successively and without any break.....

Rogue One; A Star Wars Story
Star Wars
The Empire Strikes Back
Return of the Jedi
The Force Awakens
The Last Jedi
The Rise of Skywalker

..... that would take 15 hours and 45 minutes.  I was the Darth Vader of bodily functions that day.

On May 4th, the First Saturday in May, Lou and I skipped out on the Run for the Roses and instead attended that day's 150th anniversary of the first game in Reds history.

The oldest professional team in baseball marked the historic occasion by opening the new 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings Pavilion.  There were speeches by the Hall of Famer Marty Brennaman and team owner Robert (he lets me call him "Bob") Castellini.

As you may plainly see, it rained during the ceremony.  This pregame commemoration was attended by an assortment of Reds officials, dignitaries, leading citizens, humanitarians and at least one Renaissance Man.

That's my inside source deep within the Reds organization!  #unmasked

As part of the season-long observances for the Reds 150th anniversary they held an open house party at the ball yard for the general public.

Diamond Club!

Front row Diamond Club seats!

Dugout!

Me with my close personal friend Yasiel Puig!  Two wild horses!  I thanked him for being there.  He replied, "Oh, no.  Thank YOU for being here!"  #yearofthepuig #patentpending

Anna and Maria went to a few games with me in 2019.  Anna got to see the benches-clearing brawl between the Reds and Pittsburgh Pirates.

I captured the ball field reflected in Maria's sunglasses.

Lou and I popped for Club Seats on the night the Reds wore the 1976 Big Red Machine throwback uniforms, seated indirectly below the Reds broadcast booth.

Our seats were directly in front of Bob Castellini's luxury suite.  He was there that night with Mrs Castellini.  They were joined by the notorious Butcher of Cincinnati, Doc Hollywood.

This surveillance photo of the Castellini suite was taken following the ballgame.

One hot summer day in August I evaded the oppressive heat and humidity and chilled in the climate-controlled Riverfront Club.  I had the whole room to myself.

Roll the credits!

Ave Atque Vale Joe Morgan

In The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, published by The Free Press in 2001, the preeminent baseball analyst of this modern era - Bill James - ranked Hall of Famer Joe Morgan as the greatest second baseman of all-time.  This is part of what he wrote on that subject;

Who is the best percentage player in the history of baseball?  Whitey Herzog once said that he liked fast players because speed was the only thing in baseball that could be used both on offense and defense.  Mulling this over, I realized that there were "speed indicators" all over a player's batting, baserunning, and fielding records, and that, if one studied the record with that object, one could assess any player's running speed by distilling the pure speed from its impure measures - triples, stolen bases, GIDP [or Ground Into Double Play], defensive range, and runs scored as a percentage of times on base.

But re-thinking the issue a year or two later, I realized that Herzog's statement is not literally true; speed is not the only thing which is useful both on offense and defense.  A player has a second attribute which is useful either on offense or on defense:  intelligence.  In the same way that we can find a player's speed, I wondered, could we figure his "Baseball IQ" by looking at all of the things in a player's record that might indicate intelligence?

The problem with this theory is that intelligence is so generalized that it might be reflected everywhere in the player's record, rather than anywhere; anything a player does well might be expanded by intelligence or limited by stupidity.  One could be driven toward the conclusion that the most intelligent players are the best players, and the dumbest players are the worst players - a conclusion which is only half true, and useless when it happens to be correct.

I decided (a) to call the resulting category "Percentage Player Index," rather than "Baseball IQ," and (b) to use four indicators of how good a percentage player someone is.

The four indicators that make up percentage player index are:

1.  The player's fielding percentage, compared to period norms for his era and his position (30%).
2.  The player's stolen base percentage (30%).
3.  The player's strikeout to walk ratio (30%).
4.  The player's walk frequency in absolute terms, rather than compared to strikeouts (10%).

The best percentage player in baseball history, I concluded, was Joe Morgan.

--- Joe Morgan had a career fielding percentage of .981, as opposed to a norm for second basemen of his time of .977; I score that at .587 on the 30-percent scale.

--- Morgan stole 689 bases in his career, with only 162 times caught stealing, one of the best stolen base percentages in baseball history.  I score this .801 on that 30-percent scale.

--- Morgan drew 1,865 walks in his career, with 1,015 strikeouts; I score that at .612 on that 30-percent scale.

--- Morgan's rate of walks per plate appearances is the sixteenth-best in baseball history, 1,865 walks with 9,277 at bats.  I score that at .768 on the 10-percent scale.

Combining these factors, Morgan's overall rating as a percentage player is .677, the highest in baseball history for any player for whom complete data is available.

One problem here is that the National League didn't record caught stealing until 1951, so a lot of players (most players, in fact) are excluded from consideration.  Eddie Collins might well have been as good a percentage player as Morgan, but we can't know because we don't have caught stealing for about half of his career, and we don't even have strikeouts for the first seven years of his career.

Elsewhere in the the Abstract, Bill James lists the best players (year by year) for the decade of the 1970s:

1970 Carl Yastrzemski
1971 Joe Torre
1972 Dick Allen
1973 Joe Morgan
1974 Joe Morgan
1975 Joe Morgan
1976 Joe Morgan
1977 Rod Carew
1978 Dave Parker
1979 Fred Lynn

In a section of the Abstract wherein Bill James ranks the five best consecutive seasons, all-time, for players as an element of his overall Win Shares methodology for ranking players he lists:

1) Honus Wagner 1904-1908
2) Babe Ruth 1920-1924
3) Ted Williams 1941-1948 (war years interrupted)
4) Walter Johnson 1912-1916
5) Mickey Mantle 1954-1958
6) Ty Cobb 1907-1911
7) Tris Speaker 1912-1916
8) Willie Mays 1962-1966
9) Joe Morgan 1972-1976
10 tie) Eddie Collins 1911-1915
10 tie) Stan Musial 1944-1949

In a later section of the Abstract regarding the Win Shares system;

Leadership or Disruptive Behavior

Leadership is only obliquely measured by the Win Shares system, but real and sometimes significant nonetheless.  Players who are on-field and clubhouse leaders of outstanding teams, like DiMaggio, Ken Boyer, Bob Gibson, Carlton Fisk, George Brett, Hal McRae, Gil Hodges, Pee Wee Reese, Pete Rose, Joe Morgan - those players should be given credit for that, in evaluating their overall contribution to the team.

In ranking the 100 Greatest Players of All-Time, Bill James lists Joe Morgan as the 15th greatest-ever baseball player:

1) Babe Ruth
2) Honus Wagner
3) Willie Mays
4) Oscar Charleston
5) Ty Cobb
6) Mickey Mantle
7) Ted Williams
8) Walter Johnson
9) Josh Gibson
10) Stan Musial
11) Tris Speaker
12) Henry Aaron
13) Joe DiMaggio
14)  Lou Gehrig
15) Joe Morgan

 

In addressing this 15th-greatest ranking, Bill James wrote:

Rating Joe Morgan, I have him higher than anybody else does, although everybody rates him in the Top 60, and most people in the top half of that.  Joe Morgan in 1976 hit .320, and led the National League in on-base percentage (.444), slugging percentage (.576), stolen base percentage (60 of 69), sacrifice flies (12), and fewest GIDP (2).  He won the Gold Glove as the league's best defensive second baseman.  It seems to me that season, as a package, is the equal of anything ever done by Lou Gehrig or Jimmie Foxx or Joe DiMaggio or Stan Musial.  It wasn't even his best season; his best season was 1975.  He had three other seasons as good as 1976.

Morgan had a career batting average of .271.  How can I rate a .271 hitter ahead of Rogers Hornsby?  If you count his walks and stolen bases, Morgan accounted for 6,516 career bases, leading to 1,650 runs scored.  Hornsby accounted for 5,885 bases, leading to 1,579 runs scored.  Hornsby played in a league where teams scored 4.43 runs per game; Morgan, an average of 4.11.  Hornsby was an average fielder and a jackass; Morgan was a good glove and a team leader.  Maybe you know the statistics better than I do, but my reading of the numbers puts Morgan ahead, and I don't see any subjective reason to reject the numbers, and go with Hornsby.  I know a lot of people will never be able to get past the batting average, but I think Joe Morgan was a genuinely great player.

On a personal note, growing up as a T-Ball star in southwest Ohio in the 1970s in a family that was baseball-centric, the first thing outside the home that I became aware of being truly great and also that I became fanatical about - before Legos and Star Wars and horse racing and The Who and Rush - was the Big Red Machine.  Bench, Rose, Morgan & Perez (and Sparky, too).  That was an era when even the most die-hard fan of a baseball team likely did not have any Reds gear in the wardrobe.  The next time you see highlights from the 1990 World Series, scan the crowd and note how few fans are wearing anything red, let alone any Reds-branded gear.  You'll see scant few wearing red and a distinct minority wearing a Reds ballcap.  Look back at crowd scenes of Riverfront Stadium in the 1970s and you'll discover the same conditions.  As recently as 30 years ago (only a historian can get away with describing events of 30 years ago as "recent") Reds fans just did not sport much Reds gear.   Walking into Great American Ball Park on Opening Day 2019 and you would have been hard pressed to find anyone in attendance not wearing a Reds ballcap, a Reds t-shirt or a Reds jersey and likely all of the preceding at once.  

Back in the mid-1970s I did have a Reds ballcap.  It wasn't an adult-sized cap that looked funny on a little kid, it was a small ballcap for a small tyke.  I wore it a lot.  And it could have been a hand-me-down from big brother Lou.  Lou and I also had matching Reds rain jackets that were a 1970s ballpark giveaway (I still have them!).  Popular in the 1970s, for kids, were t-shirts with iron-on graphics.  I suppose iron-ons were an inexpensive, safer, more risk-conscious way for marketing departments to increase product visibility without wading into the then-uncertain world of brand-marketing fashion and - particularly - manufacturing.  I can still remember going into Grant City and Mom buying Cincinnati Reds branded iron-on packs.  Within the hour - because I couldn't wait! -  I had two, count 'em two, Reds iron-on t-shirts;  both featured the Reds wishbone "C" logo on the front, just like the Reds home jersey, and one shirt had on the back "ROSE 14" and the other shirt had "MORGAN 8."

Hail and Farewell, Little Joe!

The First Saturday in Maytember

It is not necessary to remind the loyal subscribers of this digital publication that the First Saturday in Maytember marks the annual running of the The Kentucky Derby.  If you should find yourself at loose global pandemic ends this Saturday around 7pm Eastern Standard Time, tune your 800-inch, 7G, 9-D Philco into the National Broadcasting Corporation and root my horse - a dark bay colt named Major Fed - home to victory and a blanket of roses.  Major Fed will wear the #5 saddle cloth on Saturday.

A few months ago, in one of the various Derby Future Pools that has serially been offered, I locked in a WIN wager on Major Fed at the hefty odds of 54-1.  Major Fed was sired by the great thoroughbred Ghostzapper, formerly the World's Top Ranked Horse in 2004.  I cashed a large WIN wager on Ghostzapper in the 2004 Breeders' Cup Classic (Lou and I wagered that day sixteen years ago from Players Row at Turfway Park, The Old Master of the Turf witnessed the race live at Lonestar Park in Texas).  

Last week, the lightly noticed Major Fed drew some attention with bullet workout.

In the spirit of full disclosure, and serving as a cautionary tale regarding Derby Future Pool wagering, Major Fed is not the only horse that I placed a Derby Future wager upon.  As you may plainly see in the first image in this posting, in the same pool in which I secured 54-1 odds in Major Fed I also locked in Modernist at 50-1.  Modernist failed to draw into the Kentucky Derby so that is dead money.  Back in 2019, in the initial 2020 Kentucky Derby Futures Pool, I placed a WIN wager on a son of Violence named Violent City.

145-1 odds!  Alas, that also is dead money.  Violent City faded from the Derby picture early in 2020.

Go Baby Go!

Roll the credits!