Yankee4Life

Here is a nice sight. Giancarlo Stanton at the plate in the Bronx. FYI: These images I upload in this thread can be seen in its full size if you click on it.

Mark Belanger The most electrifying defensive shortstop of his generation, Mark Belanger set the standard by anchoring a great Baltimore Orioles infield for most of 14 seasons. During this stretch, Baltimore won 90 or more games 11 times with six postseason appearances capped by the 1970 world championship. Belanger and Ozzie Smith are the only shortstops to retire with fielding averages over .975 while averaging more than five fielding chances per game. Belanger used two tiny black gloves per season and broke them in with spit and coffee. He got upset if anybody touched them. Watching him have a catch with a teammate on the sidelines was striking. He never seemed to actually catch a ball; rather he redirected them into his throwing hand. Sports Illustrated once wrote: “Belanger would glide effortlessly after a grounder and welcome it into loving arms; scooping the ball up with a single easy motion, and bringing it to his chest for a moment’s caress before making his throw.” Belanger’s fielding prowess was due to the start-and-stop speed of an All-American high school basketball star, his lightning-quick hands, and what scouts called Belanger’s First Step. A student of pitch counts, locations, and batter tendencies, Belanger sprinted at odd angles for the big hop and is best appreciated in slow-motion video. His small glove transferred the ball to his right hand – the seams of the ball always aligned the same way – enabling him to uncoil a strong throw on his next left step. In 18 years, he never dove for a ball, insisting that an all-out sprint was faster and maintained the mechanics of the play. And he was supremely confident: He never wore a protective cup. Called “the greatest shortstop prospect in baseball history,” Belanger drew offers from many clubs but General Manager Harry Dalton was adamant: “I will never trade Belanger.” Playing behind Luis Aparicio, a seven-time All-Star and seven-time Gold Glove winner in his career thus far, Belanger showed uneven play in his rookie year of 1967. On April 30 he dropped Aparicio’s feed as a second baseman and allowed an unearned run to score to give Steve Barber a loss in what ended as a no-hit game. (Barber threw 8 2/3 no-hit innings and Stu Miller 1/3 in the loss.) The Orioles’ manager, Hank Bauer, still said Belanger “sparkled” and Bauer liked the fact that Belanger hit well when given consecutive starts. Aparicio had an off-year and Belanger became his late-inning replacement. In the same May 14 game in which Mickey Mantle hit his 500th home run, Belanger hit one off Yankee Stadium’s left-field pole, victimizing the Yankees’ Mel Stottlemyre. In 1969 bullpen coach Charlie Lau approached Belanger to offer batting tips. Lau kept track of every pitch Belanger saw that year, sending him up to bat with instructions to take and swing on specific counts, and encouraging him to expect certain pitches in certain spots based on previous batter-pitcher matchups. Belanger responded with his best batting season ever, won his first of eight Gold Gloves, and earned the nickname Blade for his silhouette as Baltimore rolled to a team record 109 wins. He hit for a .287 average with 50 RBIs. Belanger became a respected member of the team, offering an articulate clubhouse interview and buffering Earl Weaver’s rants. Between the foul lines he was no-joke, all business, directing fielders to shade right or left and approaching rookies and new players with the abrupt “We don’t do it that way” – a line he even used on Jim Palmer in 1978. Backed by veterans Brooks Robinson and Frank Robinson, Belanger became a leader on the team, replacing Davey Johnson as assistant player representative. Even in the loose clubhouse atmosphere after wins, Belanger elevated small talk into something relevant without being called a clubhouse lawyer. Late after games, Belanger was still in his canvas chair by his locker talking baseball through a haze of Marlboro cigarette smoke and sips of National Bohemian beer. When the team’s mock “Kangaroo Court” was in session, Belanger was often fined one dollar for ludicrous imperfections, to which he would exclaim: “I appeal!” In 1970 Charlie Lau signed with Oakland, and Belanger jammed his thumb in March. He was described as lost at the plate, batting “all-arm” without a clue. He developed “projection room eyes” from looking at so much film, but all he got for it was a .218 average and a mountain of broken bats. He did hit .333 in the American League Championship Series – in the opener against Minnesota, Belanger’s soft liner off pitcher Jim Perry’s glove was called the turning point, loading the bases for Mike Cuellar’s fourth-inning grand slam. Belanger hit just .105 in the World Series, but celebrated the Orioles’ victory anyway. The next year he rebounded to a more respectable .266 and captured his second Gold Glove. The tradeoff between Belanger’s lousy offense and great defense was usually one Weaver was willing to make, but he was not above trying to gain an edge. In September of 1975, Weaver often used Royle Stillman as the shortstop high in the starting lineup in road games, allowing rookie Stillman to bat in the first inning and Belanger to replace him in the bottom of the first. Stillman was an outfielder, and never played an inning of shortstop in his career, despite his six “starts” there in 1975. He hit 3-for-6 in these games. Belanger holds the American League career record for being pinch-hit for – 333 times. And if he wasn’t being pinch-hit for, he was sacrificing; his league-leading 23 sacrifices in 1975 were an Oriole record at least through 2009. In 1976, Belanger carried a .300 average into June and earned over a million votes in the All-Star balloting, making the team as a backup. When Peter Gammons wrote, “Belanger could be the first 140 lb. weakling to win the MVP award,” Belanger sought him out at Fenway Park and confronted him: “I’m 170 pounds, and I’m not a weakling.” The next year, writing for Sports Illustrated, Gammons called Belanger “the leader of the club.” One of the last players to represent himself and not use an agent, Belanger signed after 1976 for $60,000, a contract that was later extended through the end of the 1981 season.

Gardner safe at first Bases full of pinstripers

Except from me. I worry about everything with this team. Three-run home run by Didi in the 7th. It is freezing in New York but Gregorius is having a great day.

You just posted in a four-year-old thread.

No need to thank me man. Your work speaks for itself. And I did not forget guys like themewin and Hollywood. I have X box people that have not been done yet but they will be included too.

This week we take a look at a modder who created quite a number of minor league uniforms for Mvp 2005 and a full set of major league uniforms for Mvp Baseball 2004 and a modder who restored (colorized) the classic stadiums found in Mvp '05. And our behind the scenes modder is a guy whose work is very well known to anyone who has spent time playing Total Classics Phase 10. RAM RAM, or rambully (his original screen name) was a uniform modder who made a very good looking MLB uniform set for Mvp Baseball 2004 at the time that more well known uniform modders like KcCitystar and Umachines were creating total MLB sets themselves. RAM's MLB set has almost been lost to time on this web site since he made them for a game that gets very little attention anymore but his uniforms for that game, like the other modders mentioned here, improved the look of Mvp '04 immensely. When Mvp rolled around he went in another direction as he concentrated on making uniforms for the minor league teams in the game. Ram's Tacoma Rainiers -M's AAA - 2xlite Ram's Bakersfield Blaze - Rangers A- 2xlite Ram's Richmond Braves -Braves AAA- 2xlite Ram's Umpires 2xlite uni for Mvp 2005 Seattle alternate road unis by rambully (for Mvp 2004) Rusmur At first I was going to place Rusmur in the behind the scenes category but after thinking it over I decided that wouldn't have been the right place for him because even though people may not be familiar with his name these days, his work in the total classics and total conversion mods are very recognizable to anyone who has used these mods. Rusmur was the modder who restored the classic ballparks in the game and colorized them and when he did that those old stadiums almost looked brand new. It takes a lot to create a total conversion mod and Rusmur's input was a big part of it. Color restored Shibe Park Color restored Sportsman's Park v1.0 Color restored Griffith Stadium Color restored Classic Fenway Color restored Forbes Field Behind the Scenes Deadballfan Before there was a Total Classics, people like deadballfan used to create something called "team packages." These mods replaced minor league team slots in Mvp 2004 with classic teams from the past and they included the full team roster,logo and portraits. Many people are not aware of the fact that the first total classics was for Mvp 2004 and it included team packages from deadballfan and many others such as Trues,Jim825, AlexTony, Yankees763 and Fuzzone. These team packages were the predecessors of the total classics mod. You would have to download these separately to put in your game before Fuzzone had the idea of combining all of these team packages when he created the first edition of Total Classics. Without these complete team packages from people like deadballfan, this mod would look drastically different. 1894 Baltimore Orioles Team Pack for TC 10 This pack is designed to replace either the 2006 Detroit Tigers or 1962 NY Mets (your choice) in Total Classics 10. 1910 Philadelphia A's Package by deadballfan (for Mvp 2004) 1968 St. Louis Cardinals (for Mvp 2004) 1909 Detroit Tigers Package with Logos (for Mvp 2004) 1905 New York Giants Package w/Logos by deadballfan and Fuzzone (for Mvp 2004) Please note: I just provided the links so you can view the early work that made Total Classics what it is today. You do not need to download any of these team packages that you see here because they are all included in Total Classics Phase 10. Thank you.

That's right, but all I want to know is why he was watching the Red Sox?

Adrolis Chapman vs. Randal Grichit Call strike three. Yankees 4, Toronto 2.

Felipe Rivero pitching like Delin Betances here in Detroit. Meaning that he was wild and was walking everyone. Get lost, you're out of the game. Man it has to be cold in Detroit. Dixon Machado ties the game for the Tigers. 10 - 10 and we are going to the tenth inning.

Hahahahaha You bet!

You see you guys? I was nice and calm. Aaron Boone gets his first win as a manager as the Yankees win 6 - 1. Lazy Bradley, Jr grounds out to end the game. That team was winning 4 - 0 but the Rays scored six runs in the eighth to win 6 - 4!

I think so.

The first pitch of 2018. Jose Urena of the Miami Jeters pitches to the Cubs Ian Happ. Ian Happ homers on the first pitch. Jeter immediately fires an usher.

Great idea and let's keep this going. The TIgers game in Detroit has already been cancelled. The first game on the slate today is the Cubs at Miami at 12:40 EST. Then the Mets soon after. I want to see if they play that one. MLB TV is ready for a season's-long love affair. Yankees in Toronto at 3:37 p.m. I am not saying a word until Gary Sanchez has his first passed ball. That should happen by the third inning. Then all bets are off. Got to leave right now, going to go and get a sandwich so I can be ready for the games. Ham, cheese, tomato, light mayo. You can't go wrong.

Just when you think you've seen it all. Some guy hits a 250 MPH fastball.

Game 3, 1961 World Series. Yankees at Reds. Nice shots of Crosley Field. The Gashouse Gang

This week in this thread we draw attention to a modder that created mods for a very small minority of users in here and a modder who created a variety of mods for MLB2k12. And in a return to our behind the scenes modders we pay tribute to a guy who helped make editing your Mvp '05 simple and fast. kado456 I am confident in saying that most people who have been members here have not tried kado456's mods at any time for one simple reason.His mods were made for the original X-Box and to use them you needed to have a modified version of that console. He has made mods for Mvp Baseball 2005 and NCAA Baseball 2006 and if you are able to use his mods you'll discover he had a nice variety of choices for the X-Box gamer on Mvpmods. Stadiums, datafiles and team logos are some of the mods he has made. The X-Box games do not get a lot of attention here but the work kado456 did for it deserve as much recognition as its PC counterpart. Kado456's Minor League and Spring Training Stadiums v1 for the XBOX MVP Baseball 2005 MVPMods Xbox Overlay for MVP Baseball 2005 Pirate's Chase Field Conversion for the XBOX MVP Baseball 2005 Kado456's MVP 06 NCAA Baseball Datafile(s) Set v1.0 Kado456's Enhancement Pack for MVP 06 NCAA Baseball XBOX v1 DaSteelerz If you own MLB2k12 there is a very good chance you have some of DaSteelerz' mods installed in your game and if you have not you are missing out. He has created stadiums -many of which have had over 1,000 downloads- along with rosters, portrait packs and a series of graphic mods that have really brought out the beauty of the last PC game that 2k Sports made. Each mod looks professionally done and it is no wonder that his work is highly praised by 2k12 users consistently. DaSteelerz Lumina Graphics Mod (ENB+FXAA) 1.4 Petco Park 2k16 Marlins Park Tribute Edition 1.5 MLB 2K17 Roster 1.0.0 Fenway Park 2k17 2016 Wrigley Field Behind the Scenes rglass95 If you are a Mvp '05 game player you will have heard of Mvp Edit. It is,as the file description in the mod so aptly states, "THE definitive Roster Editor for MVP Baseball 2005." It certainly is. Consider this for a moment. This little utility has almost 30,000 downloads since rglass agreed to let Trues host it on this site back in 2008. Before then you could only download it from his website. To this day this mod has been practically a required tool for anyone who wished to tweak their rosters to their own choosing. Another thing that rglass did was when Mvp 2005 came out he made a profile that unlocked all the uniforms and stadiums that the game had. This was before the famous Katie Roy trick was discovered. But before that easter egg was brought to light this was how many users were able to access everything in the game right away, Rglass95 was a modder who did not make a lot of mods. He does have two sky modification mods he made for Mvp baseball 2004 but with Mvp Edit and the profile that I mentioned that helped others fully enjoy Mvp '05, his contributions to this game can never be discounted. Mvpedit 2006.2

Updated to 3-25 ...Even though the calendar says it is the last week of March, baseball in their inexhaustible wisdom has decided to begin the 2018 season this Thursday with a full slate of games while completely ignoring the fact that five cities have a very good chance of playing in temperatures in the thirties or not at all. Kansas City, Cincinnati, Baltimore, Detroit and the New York Mets all must be wishing they can be opening up on the road instead of at home because of this. And considering that a few days ago New York City got hit by another bad snowstorm it's going to be a minor miracle that they get the Mets game played. It's kind of hard to play baseball when your playing field is the same color as the ball. If the fans approach these games as if they are going ice fishing in Minnesota and not drink too much coffee I don't see any reason why they can't sit through four innings of baseball with no problem. Five at the most. ...Good news for Marlins fans. Their team opens up at home and there are a lot of good seats available. All of them, actually. ...I did not watch one Yankee spring training game because it is too early for me to listen to Michael Kay's voice and with Ken Singleton retiring at the end of the season it is only going to get worse. ...The Red Sox could not resist making head shaking news over the off season because that's just how things are done with them. These are the kind of people that can screw up a free lunch by complaining that they didn't get enough bread before the meal. Now they want to rename Yawkey Way, the street in front of Fenway Park, back to its original name which was Jersey Street. The reason why they want to do this is because current Red Sox owner John Henry said he was “haunted” over the racial past of the team. The Red Sox were the last team to integrate in 1959 when they had their first black player. Oh, I get it now. Change the name of the street and by magic people will forget this. What John Henry really needs besides a slap in the head is an exhaustive history lesson of Tom Yawkey and how he saved the Red Sox. Yawkey bought the Red Sox in 1933 after the worst period in their history. From 1920 (the year after Babe Ruth was sold) to 1932 (the season before he bought the team) the Red Sox finished in fifth place twice, sixth place once and dead last nine times. Once Yawkey took over the Red Sox started to improve and in 1937 posted their first winning season in years and in 1938 finished in second place behind the Yankees. Yawkey's money and willingness to spend it (buying Jimmie Foxx and Lefty Grove for example) made the Red Sox fun to watch again. Nothing like that was mentioned in their petition to rename the street. But since he was unable to resist sounding like an idiot by bringing this up to begin with what he said next confirmed it, at least for me. Asked if the decision were only up to him, he would rename the street "David Ortiz Way" or "Big Papi Way" after David Ortiz. He sure would. And I bet he never heard of someone named Ted Williams. But to know that meant reading more history about the team he owns. ...For a long time now it was my opinion that today's high school and college kids were only concerned about their phones, the latest on Facebook and themselves - not necessarily in that order. But after watching what those kids down in Florida have been doing after the latest school shooting my opinion has changed about them because of their stand against guns. They made Marco Rubio and the mouthpiece of the NRA look stupid because they did not accept their unabashed attempts to avoid answering their well thought out questions about what should be done to keep assault weapons out of the hands of people that have no business having them. The way I see it the only people who should have access to these kind of weapons are the people in the military or the police. If you don't fall into those two categories then you don't get one. I am a private citizen and I have no need for one and neither should anyone else. What business do I have owning something like that? I think the NRA is underestimating these kids because I don't think they are going to go away and if that's the case all I can say is thank God. What happened when something like this occurred in the past? Tears were shed, people got angry at the politicians and the NRA, new gun laws were demanded and then the lawmakers bided their time and shuffled their feet until the public stopped talking about it. It happened with Columbine and Sandy Hook and especially with Sandy Hook I still can not believe that no laws were passed that made owning a gun harder to have after what happened there. And then before long you'll hear that tired, stock cliche when one of them says they are sending their "thoughts and prayers" to the surviving family members and students. These people have turned what on the surface is a nice gesture into a dismissive, empty and callous statement, something that was not lost on those Parkland students. One comment that stood out to me was from a politician who I believe was from Florida. He said that the students who were demanding changes with the gun laws were just kids and not registered voters. In other words their opinions didn't matter. It was my hope that every one of those kids heard that or read about it because while it is true that they may not be voting this year some of them who are high school seniors will be as soon as next year and more and more of them will be when the 2020's arrive. Time has a way of sneaking up on you and before we all know it that generation will be the ones in charge and I just hope the NRA is unable to buy off those politicians like they have been for all these years now. ...I don't know why but I get a kick out of these waitress stories that I read on the internet where they try to get people to feel sorry for them for something that happened while they were at work. The latest one is from Florida and involves a poor, abused young thing who complained that she did not receive a tip on a takeout order when a nearby church called to order $735 worth of food from the Outback Steakhouse where she worked. According to this waitress they “take the order over the phone, put the order together, take payment and then take order to the car.” Then I gather that once this is finished they all have to go in the employee break room to sit down for forty-five minutes before someone passes out from this amount of work to avoid a trip to the emergency room. Before they had a chance to pull out of the parking lot and return to the church with their dinners this waitress jumped on Facebook to complain that she didn't get a tip because she really could have broken a nail putting the orders in the car and then where would she be then? Her weekend would have been ruined. A friend of hers told her to delete the post but it was too late, it was already viewed. The church called the next day to apologize to the Outback because they had a volunteer pick up their order because Outback’s delivery service was delayed and the person didn’t realize that a tip is customary on takeout orders. When the waitress came into work the next day she learned two things. First, the church was given a full refund of their order because of the post she made and in addition her services were no longer required. She found out the hard way that freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences. I don't know why anyone thinks whining on Facebook is a good idea. The funny part is that the church called the following day to try and straighten things out and leave a tip and not to get the waitress in trouble. Little did they know she took care of that herself. ...Like most people I am interested in seeing how this Stormy Daniels story ends up but when the subject turns to Melania Trump and how she is dealing with this scandal I can't help but wondering this. How is this a surprise to her considering this guy cheated on his previous two wives and what made her think that it wouldn't happen to her? ...How to be popular, Dept: A fourteen-year-old Vancouver girl threw a house party last week that she somehow paid for by using her parents credit card without their permission. When the police responded to a call that reported an “uncontrolled party” at a neighborhood home they witnessed nearly two hundred teens running away once they arrived. It was if someone made an announcement that a store in the mall was giving away free laptops but only for the first few hundred people. That's how fast the house emptied. Left behind was evidence of the destruction they caused to the house - to walls, furniture, and artwork all of which the girl's parents will be held accountable for to a tune of $20,000. That is where I would have lost it. If there was a military school for girls somewhere I would have sent her there. I would have called the police and had her taken away for theft of my credit cards. No amount of crying would fix this. She may as well apply at Burger King or McDonalds when she becomes working age because her college fund just got spent on one party. I hope they have the money to cover this or else their refrigerator and pantry will be pretty scarce for the next ten years or so. ...Goodbye Toys-R-US. I'm going to miss you like I miss Christmas movies. The last time I was in one of their stores was when my niece was very little and I bought her a toy that she was asking for. I can still hear the screaming of the kids while I was trying to find the damned thing. I don't know how much it cost but I would have paid anything to get out of there. ...It's been slow in the airline industry lately. No one's been kicked off a plane in awhile and the TSA people haven't been harassing any old people. Like a noisy child who's been too quiet for too long, I can't help but thinking something is going to happen. ...What the hell, Dept: Singer Katy Perry playfully gave a contestant on American Idol his first-ever kiss after she found out he had never kissed a girl before and because of that is facing some backlash because the guy said he was "uncomfortable" because he was saving it for "someone special." Just when you think you heard it all you discover that you haven't. As far as first kisses go getting one from Katy Perry is not going to keep you up at night tossing and turning. I personally like her as a brunette with longer hair instead of the short blond look but that doesn't mean you'd hear me complain if she decided to kiss me. Instead of crying about it I'd kiss her back. Maybe the guy was hoping for Justin Bieber instead. Who knows? ...Did you read where Eagles defensive end Michael Bennett, who at 6'4'' and 274 pounds, someone who certainly is no pushover but did just that to a sixty-six-year-old paraplegic woman in a wheelchair during last year's Super Bowl all because he wanted to run on the field when the game ended to congratulate his brother Martellus Bennett, who was a member of the victorious New England Patriots team who defeated the Atlanta Falcons in last year's NFL Championship game? The woman ended up suffering a sprained shoulder as Bennett shoved her aside just so he could be close to his brother. Bennett stated that he saw that the old woman had an autograph book in her hand and he was worried that she would ask him to sign it so he got away from her as fast as he could and it was just a reflex reaction that he tackled her like he would a quarterback.

I came across this very nice video today. Boston at New York on April 14, 1931. This short film has audio too and it's fascinating. April 14th was opening day for the Red Sox and Yankees. New York won the game 6 - 3. You can view the game information from Retrosheet right here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNe9OM43EZs

Stay tuned now. You've done some good work too. If someone would do me a favor and translate this for me I'd be grateful. What does ... mean? If it is a gentle reminder that I forgot this guy then that is all on me. I did and I will promise to fix that very soon.