by Bruce Nash
On the night of July 9, 2003, the 22,000 fans at Miller Park were looking forward to the Sausage Race as the Brewers and Pittsburgh Pirates finished six innings tied 1–1. Simon, who was not in the starting lineup for the Pirates, grabbed a bat and stood at the top of the steps of the visitor’s first base dugout to watch the wiener race. After a horse-racing fanfare, the four giant sausages were off. It was close from the start, and they were link and link until the final turn when Italian Sausage edged into the lead followed by Hotdog, Polish Sausage, and Bratwurst.
But then, as they sprinted by the Pirates’ dugout, Simon took a playful swing at Italian Sausage’s oversized head, knocking the giant encased minced meat to the ground. Hotdog then tripped and fell over Italian Sausage. Hotdog recovered and helped Italian Sausage up, and the two finished the race behind Polish Sausage and Bratwurst.
Simon thought his batting performance was funny. But it was no laughing matter.
Mandy Block, 19, who was inside the Italian Sausage costume, and Veronica Piech, who was inside Hotdog, both received medical treatment for minor scrapes and cuts. Then the sheriff’s deputies got involved and interviewed Simon. The next day, after he appeared in the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s Office, he was cited for disorderly conduct and fined $432.
Simon taking his cut at a sausageAssociated Press
Simon said he was just playing around when he swatted at Italian Sausage with the bat. “I thought at the moment they [the giant sausages] were trying to play with us,” he told reporters later. “They were running right next to the players. I’m a fun player, and I’ve never hurt anyone in my life.”
Mandy said she saw Simon holding the bat as she neared him. “I thought he was just going to fake me out,” she said. The blow to the costume’s head didn’t hurt Mandy because the bat hit the costume above her real head. “I don’t think he did it intentionally, like to hurt me. I think he was doing it as a joke.”
All she wanted was an apology and the offending bat autographed by Simon—both of which the player gave her.
But Italian Sausage was much more forgiving than Major League Baseball. Simon was suspended for three games and fined $2,000.
Later that season, Simon was traded to the Chicago Cubs for reasons unrelated to Sausagegate. When he returned to Milwaukee with the Cubs, his teammates playfully held him back during the Sausage Race while manager Dusty Baker guarded the bat rack.
In an act of forgiveness, Simon bought Italian sausages for a randomly chosen section of the crowd.
The incident had a lasting impact on Milwaukee fans. Many still wear T-shirts and display other memorabilia with the slogan “Don’t whack our wiener!”
MARIO MENDOZA
Infielder · Pittsburgh, NL; Seattle, Texas, AL · 1974–1982
Fair or not, Mario Mendoza unwittingly gave the game a batting statistic that bears his name—the Mendoza Line.
No player ever wants to sink below that line, the figurative boundary between batting averages above and below .200.
It used to be that when a player was batting under .200, he was called a “banjo hitter,” “ukulele hitter,” “Punch and Judy hitter,” or “buttercup hitter.” A player with a batting average so low he couldn’t hit his weight was known as an “out man.” If he did well during morning BP but not in a game, he was labeled a “ten o’clock hitter.” In more recent times, a hitter “on the interstate” meant that his batting average looked like an interstate sign; for example, .195 resembles I95 on a scoreboard.
But it wasn’t until 1980 that the standard for batting futility was so clearly defined with the Mendoza Line, named after a slick-fielding, weak-hitting journeyman infielder.
Mendoza, who had great hands and a quick release, played for the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1974 through 1978 in a reserve role. During his five years with the team, he batted as high as .221 for a season and as low as .180.
He spent his next two years with the Seattle Mariners, and it was during this time that his legacy—or at least the Mendoza Line—was born. As the starting shortstop in 1979, Mendoza hit a paltry .198 for the season, prompting his teammates to rib him about his hitting prowess.
According to a 1990 Sports Illustrated article, Mendoza believed that Mariners outfielder Tom Paciorek invented the term. Paciorek denied it and claimed that it was Seattle first baseman Bruce Bochte who came up with the idea for the Mendoza Line.
Regardless of who deserves the credit, the term hadn’t received any widespread play until 1980 when Kansas City Royals star George Brett was flirting with a .400 season. (He finished with .390.) Referring to the weekly list of players’ batting averages, Brett told the press at the time, “The first thing I look for in the Sunday papers is who is below the Mendoza Line.”
The name began to take hold in baseball circles, but it didn’t become firmly entrenched in the minds of fans throughout the country until ESPN anchorman Chris Berman began using the term on SportsCenter.
According to Mendoza’s friend, Mexican sportscaster Oscar Soria, “Mario said that when Chris Berman mentioned it and people started to laugh, he was angry. But now he enjoys the fame of the phrase ‘Mendoza Line.’”
NORM CASH
First Baseman · Detroit, AL · July 15, 1973
Having no luck hitting against fire-balling Nolan Ryan, Norm Cash chucked his bat and came to the plate wielding a table leg.
Ryan was pitching for the California Angels against the home Detroit Tigers, and he was on top of his game, much like he was exactly two months earlier when he twirled a no-hitter against the Kansas City Royals. Now he was gunning for his second no-no as he mowed down batter after batter in Detroit.
Cash struck out the first two times he faced Ryan, who ultimately fanned 17 batters. In his third plate appearance, Cash at least made contact, grounding out to the second baseman.
Going into the bottom of the ninth, the Tigers trailed 6–0 and had yet to get a hit off Ryan. Mickey Stanley led off the frame by grounding out to Rudy Meoli at shortstop. Then Gates Brown hit a soft liner that Meoli caught.
The Tigers were down to their last out. It was up to Cash, who had been handcuffed all day by Ryan, to break up the hurler’s no-hit bid.
Figuring his bat hadn’t helped him at all, Cash went into the Detroit clubhouse, grabbed the sawed-off leg of an old table, and sauntered to the plate with the leg on his shoulder.
After a good laugh, plate umpire Ron Luciano ordered Cash to get a real bat. Cash protested, “But, Ron, I’ve got as much chance with this as I do with a bat.”
Cash reluctantly retrieved a bat, but it didn’t do any good. He popped out to Meoli as Ryan recorded his second no-no of the year. On his way back to the dugout, Cash turned to Luciano and said, “See, I told you so.”
Cash wasn’t the first hitter to wield a wacky bat. In a 1929 game, Rabbit Maranville, of the Boston Braves, came to the plate with a tennis racquet, hoping to snap a personal batting slump against Dazzy Vance.
Like Cash, Maranville had no success in convincing the umpire to let him use his zany club. And like Cash, Maranville returned with legal lumber and promptly made an out.
LEN KOENECKE
Center Fielder · Brooklyn, NL · August 31, 1934
In one of the silliest cases of absentmindedness by a batter, Len Koenecke laid down a bunt—and then forgot to run.
Koenecke showed he could handle the bat in his first full season with the Brooklyn Dodgers by batting .320 and belting a team-leading 14 home runs in 1934. But bunting was another matter.
He forgot what to do during the second inning of a game against the visiting New York Giants. After Dodgers batter Sam Leslie beat out a single, Brooklyn manager Casey Stengel flashed the bunt sign to Koenecke as he stepped into the batter’s box. Koenecke squared around and bunted the ball about 3 feet in front of the
plate. Giants catcher Gus Mancuso sprang out of his crouch and pounced on the ball.
Thinking he had a good chance to nail Leslie at second, Mancuso fired the ball to shortstop Travis Jackson, who was covering the bag. But the ball sailed over Jackson’s head, so Leslie headed for third.
Meanwhile, back at home plate, Mancuso heard someone behind him cheering for the sprinting Leslie. The catcher turned around and, to his surprise, saw Koenecke still standing at the plate, acting as excited over the play as any of the paying customers in Ebbets Field. Koenecke was jumping up and down, rooting for his Dodger teammate to make third on the overthrow.
Stengel couldn’t believe his eyes. He began screaming his head off at the forgetful Koenecke. “Go to first, you idiot!” Stengel yelled. “Go to first!”
By this time, Giants center fielder Hank Leiber had run down the ball and heaved it to Johnny Vergez at third base. But Leslie beat the throw.
With the runner safe at third—and with Stengel raising a dust storm outside the dugout—Koenecke suddenly woke up and realized he was supposed to be running, not watching. He still had a bunt to beat out. So finally he took off for first. But Vergez threw him out by 60 feet.
The embarrassed Dodger hustled off the field and right into the dugout where he got a tongue lashing from Stengel that he never forgot.
KITTY BURKE
Nightclub Singer · July 31, 1935
It’s pretty obvious that no Major Leaguer would be caught dead wearing a dress to the plate. But one batter wore one, and turned the at-bat into an outrageous farce that left fans hooting and hollering.
Nightclub singer Kitty Burke hit a ball thrown by St. Louis Cardinals hurler Daffy Dean, becoming the only woman ever to bat during a Major League game. Her at-bat did nothing to advance baseball’s sexism barrier, but did much to advance baseball’s legacy of craziness.
Kitty’s infamous plate appearance occurred during a night game between the world champion Cardinals and the hometown Cincinnati Reds at Crosley Field, which two months earlier had been the site of the first Major League game under the lights. The game in which Kitty made her one and only appearance was played in a carnival atmosphere because night baseball was such a novelty. At the time, Crosley Field had a seating capacity of 26,000, but the game was oversold. As a result, more than 10,000 fans were herded onto the field to watch from a roped-off area in foul territory that stretched from behind home plate and down the foul lines to the outfield fences.
Kitty, a blonde blues singer and Cincinnati rooter, was among the fans on the field. She was standing only 10 feet away from home plate when the Cardinals’ Joe “Ducky” Medwick stepped to the plate in the eighth inning with St. Louis ahead 2–1. Kitty disliked the cocky player, especially since he had scored on his previous at-bat.
“You can’t hit a lick!” she shouted at him. “You couldn’t even hit the ball with an ironing board!”
Medwick fired back, “You couldn’t hit if you were swinging an elephant!”
In the bottom of the eighth, Kitty was still fuming mad over Medwick’s retort. So when the Reds’ Babe Herman headed toward the batter’s box, Kitty decided to take action.
“Hey, Babe!” she hollered. “Lend me your bat.”
Herman decided to play along, so he called time and offered his bat to the lady. “Go ahead,” he said.
Wearing a dress and high heels, Kitty marched up to Herman, took his bat and then stepped into the batter’s box while the crowd roared with laughter. Among the spectators was baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis. Neither he nor plate umpire Bill Stewart tried to stop the determined woman.
Kitty showing off her batting form
After taking a few practice swings, Kitty shouted to Dean, “Hey, you hick. Throw me a pitch!”
Dean stood on the mound, unsure what to do. By now the crowd was in hysterics and shouting at Dean to throw the ball. Finally, Stewart yelled, “Play ball!”
Rather than fire a fastball, Dean lobbed the ball underhanded. Kitty swung and hit a slow dribbler back to the pitcher. He fielded her tap and ungallantly threw her out. Kitty then ran back into the cheering crowd and into baseball history.
But you won’t find her name in any record book. Her appearance at the plate didn’t count, even though St. Louis manager Frankie Frisch made a half-hearted argument that Cincinnati should be charged with an out.
Kitty parlayed her at-bat into an act that she took on the burlesque circuit, billing herself as the only woman ever to bat in a Major League game.
After the contest, which the Reds won 4–3 in 10 innings, Herman told reporters, “That’s the first time a broad ever pinch-hit for me.”
“SILENT JOHN” TITUS
Right Fielder · Philadelphia, NL · September 26, 1905
Philadelphia Phillies right fielder “Silent John” Titus holds the unofficial record for the longest delay of a game by a batter while looking for the smallest piece of lumber.
Titus, a lifetime .282 hitter, attributed much of his success at the plate to lucky toothpicks. He always kept one clenched between his teeth when he batted. “Without my bitin’ on that ol’ toothpick, I ain’t able to hit nothin’ past the pitcher,” he once said.
Rival pitchers came to hate the sight of that ever present toothpick, none more so than Sandy McDougal, a rookie pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals. During a 9–2 loss to the Phillies, McDougal fired a ball straight at Titus’s mouth, trying to knock his toothpick right down his throat. Titus ducked safely out of the way. But to his dismay, he lost his toothpick.
Calling time, he frantically got down on all fours and searched for the sliver, but couldn’t find it. After a delay of nearly four minutes, the umpire ordered Titus to get up and bat. Instead, Titus rushed over to the Phillies dugout and begged his teammates for a toothpick. But nobody had one.
At that point, Titus knew he was a doomed man. He slowly trudged back to the plate . . . and struck out.
RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!
For the Most Outrageous Baserunning Boners of
All Time, The Baseball Hall of Shame™ Inducts:
MARV THRONEBERRY
First Baseman · New York, NL · June 17, 1962
Marvelous Marv Throneberry endeared himself to New York Mets fans with his self-effacing humor regarding his shortcomings as a fielder. But on this day, he showed the world that his baserunning skills were just as ridiculous.
At the Polo Grounds, the host New York Mets were trailing the Chicago Cubs 4–1 in the bottom of the first inning with one out and runners on first and second when Throneberry came up to bat. He whacked the ball into the deepest part of right field and, with his head down, chugged around first. Gathering all the steam of a hamstrung moose, the 6-foot-1, 190-pound Throneberry passed second and rambled to third. There he stood, huffing and puffing, reveling in the cheers from fans who rarely saw him run the bases. Stumble over them, yes, but seldom run them. The runners in front of him scored, making it a 4–3 game.
As the applause began to fade, Cubs first baseman Ernie Banks strolled over to first base umpire Dusty Boggess and said, “He didn’t touch first, you know.” Banks called for the ball and stepped on the bag. Boggess then called Throneberry out.
Not so Marvelous MarvNational Baseball Hall of Fame Library
Mets manager Casey Stengel stormed out of the dugout to protest the call. As he began arguing, second base umpire Stan Landes walked over and said, “Don’t bother, Casey. He missed second base too.”
Stengel glowered at Landes and then stared at Throneberry, who was still perched on the bag across the diamond. Exasperated, Stengel told the umpires, “Well, I know he touched third because he’s standing on it.”
Instead of having the tying run on third with one out, the Mets had no one on base and two outs. That was particularly galling for S
tengel because the next batter, Charlie Neal, walloped a game-tying home run, prompting the manager to burst out of the dugout. As Neal rounded the bases, Stengel pointed to each base, making sure that Neal didn’t commit the same baserunning blunder as Marvelous Marv.
Throneberry’s run that wasn’t hurt the Mets; they lost 8–7.
JIMMY ST. VRAIN
Pitcher · Chicago, NL · April 27, 1902
Jimmy St. Vrain lasted only 12 games in the Majors, but not before leaving a legacy of baserunning folly that you might see only in T-Ball.
The 18-year-old rookie had a problem finding first base. This was understandable considering he seldom made it to first, batting a weak .097 for the year.
A lefty on the mound, he batted right-handed. But that wasn’t working out for him. So, after St. Vrain struck out twice during a home game against the Pittsburgh Pirates, Chicago manager Frank Selee suggested the young hurler bat left-handed.
St. Vrain agreed to try, and on his next at-bat, he stood on the opposite side of the plate from where he was used to swinging. Wonder of wonders, he hit the ball. Okay, so it was a dribbler that went only as far as shortstop Honus Wagner, who was already playing in on the grass. That mattered little to the exuberant St. Vrain. He had made contact with the ball. In his excitement, he dropped the bat and took off on a dead run—toward third base!
Wagner fielded the ball and then stood for a moment holding it in stunned disbelief while watching St. Vrain race up the third base line. Wagner didn’t know where to throw the ball. To first for the out . . . or to third for the tag?
