Craig Biggio - major league catcher
As some of you might remember, Craig Biggio used to get hit by pitches a lot - a long time ago. Last night he didn't get hit by any pitches, and the Astros lost 7-2, but tonight he's going to do something he hasn't done in a long time. Play catcher. But, back when Biggio played catcher he didn't really get hit by very many pitches - just 11 in his first 4 seasons in the majors. It wasn't until after Biggio switched to second base that he really started getting hit by pitches, so hopefully his walk down memory lane tonight will be historically accurate enough to include moving back to second base, and then getting hit by a few pitches.
(By the way, Craig Biggio is the only player who was ever a full time catcher to reach 3000 hits, and todays game will be the first time some with over 3000 career hits has played catcher in the major leagues since 1897 when Cap Anson did it. Anson and Biggio are the only 3000 hit club members ever to catch at all, and Anson caught 105 games.)
While Biggio will be catching for Brandon Backe, the Braves will have Jeff Bennett starting for them. This is Bennett's 2nd start this season, after not being in the league since 2004 when he made 60 relief appearances for the Brewers. Bennett walked Biggio the only time the two faced each other, and Bennett has only hit 2 batters ever.
Kerry Wood plunked Biggio on September 29, 2001, and Chuck James threw plunk 282 on September 29th 2006 - the same Chuck James who is expected to start tomorrow - for Biggio 2,849th and final career game.
1 Comments:
Now if you ask me, and plenty folk do now and again, Mama is in the kitchen fixin’ up some poke salat. She been in there for about three hours. As she works, she sings. Now I need you to get the correct visualization in your noggin’…. Mama is a traditionally built woman. She weighs in at pert near a half ton (gross or metric, don’t mater either way) so she is what you might call “a fat woman” but I’d be a mite careful saying that within earshot because she’ll come out swinging a skillet at your head if she hears that kind of talk. So, Mama’s in there in the kitchen a singin’ at the top of her healthy and slightly oversized lungs and the noise is reverberatin’ about the doublewide trailer. She went through all the hymns she knows, then went on to patriotic fare, then to the few songs she knows what they play on the radio, now she’s cycled back to hymns. You got the picture? Mama is in there a bellerin’ out Andrew Lloyd Webber show tunes and John Wesley hymns one after the other… it’s over. It’s finished The fat lady done sung. Lester was all caught up in the fact that with that game Craig “Target” Biggio will not finish his professional tenure in the major leagues with a demonic 666 doubles because he done got his 667th double and got off the evil number just in time. Lester was so caught up with that fact that he took to celebratin’ and he pulled out a bottle of corn squeezin’s and commenced to get himself pretty lubricated. Bernice and that stinkin’ sister of hers then started scoldin’ and fussin’ and yellin’ and hollerin’ at him so he commenced to go out back and chop a little on my woodpile. Now, understand, Mama was in the kitchen singing at the top of her lungs the entire time, Junior was out under the car port revving the engine in his truck, and the twins were gigglin’ and runnin’ and watchin’ the television machine up loud, so the double wide trailer was at full volume. That’s when Lester, naked as a jaybird except for my rubber frog giggin’ boots, went out to get away from the noise. He sat down on my woodpile and polished off two-quart jars full of the best corn squeezin’s in Chesterfield County. About the time Bernice realized he was outside perambulatin’ around in the nude, she went out there and started fussin’ at Lester. Then her stinkin’ sister went out and commenced to fuss at whoever was in ear shot (that woman just likes to fuss). I went in to get a camera to take a photograph of the television machine in case Target’s face was up there one last time and so I had the camera in hand when Mama called in and said that she could see Lester out the kitchen window and he had dowsed himself with the remainder of the quart jar of corn squeezin’s and was about to do some experimentation with self immolation. Bernice was earnestly attempting to get him to stop (not so much out of concern for Lester as much as she knew she’s have to nurse him back to health over the next few years if’n he went through with it). That stinkin’ sister of hers went around and around the woodpile fussin’ and snappin’ like a dog on a chain, the whole while Mama stood in the kitchen window and bellerd out a medley of hymns (Fanny J. Crosby, John & Charles Wesley, John Newton, etc) and I had the good sense to pause and snap a photographic record before Lester lit a match and exploded himself and my woodpile and the double wide. In the end he failed to get a match lit on account of Bernice hit him over the back of the head with a plank. (I’ll see if I can’t send the picture in for public inspection). I believe it’s done. The great and glorious attempt to unify the two plunk records has come to an inglorious conclusion. He might make a curtain call in the form of a pinch hit in the final game of the season, but this feels like the conclusion of an Ernest Thayer poem or somthin’ of that nature…
Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,
And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children snort;
But there is no joy in H-ville - mighty Target is three short.
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