Greatest 21 Days Baseball Profiles

Eric Parkinson had just been converted from a starter to a reliever and, for someone who had never been above high-A Salem, what better way to test that than in a exhibition game against AAA hitters ? As it turned out, Parkinson held his own. In two innings, he gave up a hit, a walk and registered two strikeouts, according to The Pittsburgh Press . "It was an incredible feeling," Parkinson told The Press afterward. "I thought I would be nervous, but I wasn't. (Salem manager) Stan (Cliburn) told me they swing and miss just like they do here and, by gosh, they do." Parkinson's showing against AAA hitters would never be better. He would also never face AAA hitters again , his career ending after only a brief stint at AA and well short of the majors. Parkinson's career began in 1989, when he was taken by the Pirates in the 22nd round of the draft out of Kellogg Community College. He played that year at rookie league Princeton , starting eight ga...

A native of Indiana, Tony Ochs went off to college in Illinois, at Southeastern Illinois College and he brought his bat with him . The catcher batted a stunning .531 at Southeastern , earning the title of the nation's community college batting champ, according to Southeastern. He continued after moving on to Memphis State. It was enough for Ochs to get noticed by the Cardinals , taken in the fifth round of the 1989 draft. But he never found his bat with St. Louis. He also never saw AA, let alone the majors. With Memphis State, Ochs showed some power. In one April 1988 game, Ochs' single proved the difference in a 2-1 contest, according to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune. The next month, Ochs hit one out, according to the St. Petersburg Times . In another game, a conference tournament game in May 1989, Ochs' home run was the only earned run off of Florida State's strong starter, according to the Orlando Sentinel . In all, he hit 13 home runs for Memphis State that...

Aubrey Waggoner batted .292 with two home runs and six stolen bases for the Birmingham Barons in April 1991. It was enough for Waggoner, according to The Chicago Tribune , to be named the White Sox' minor league player of the month. But, while Waggoner won the honor for the month, he was already in his fourth season playing for the AA Barons. Waggoners' was a career that would last for eleven seasons and one that would never reach the majors. Waggoner's career began in 1985, taken by the White Sox in the fifth round of the draft. He made single-A Appleton in 1986 and he first made AA Birmingham in 1988. He raced home that July 31 with the winning run on a bunt. But his batting average would rarely top .250, something The Tribune alluded to in April 1990, that he was noted mostly for his speed. That April he broke that mold, hitting a grand slam as part of an eight-run inning. He stayed at Birmingham into 1991, when he first saw AAA at Vancouver . It was the mon...

The Mariners didn't have room for Jose Melendez and the Padres were happy to take him. By 1992, his second year in San Diego, the right hander went 3-0 in April to begin a year with the Padres where he made 56 appearances and posted a sub-3 ERA. "He's awesome," Padre Manager Greg Riddoch told The Los Angeles Times that May. "He can start, long-relieve, middle-relieve, be the set-up man, go short if we had to. ... That's what makes him so good. He's so versatile." Melendez went on to a respectable career that spanned five seasons, but that year in 1992 was his best. Melendez' career began almost a decade earlier, signed as a free agent by the Pirates in 1983. His first playing time came in 1984 at short-season Watertown . He went 13-10 with a 2.61 ERA for single-A Prince William in 1986, earning him prospect status for 1987. He made it as high as AA Harrisburg with the Pirates before being taken by Seattle in the minor league draf...

It took Mike Dyer four seasons to make the majors. It took him five to get back . Dyer went 4-7 with a 4.82 ERA with the Twins in 1989, but nerve problems in his neck caused him to lose most of 1990 and 1991, according to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette . It took him until 1994 to make the majors again, with the Pirates. "I'm very happy with the Pirates," Dyer told The Post-Gazette in 1995. "They've given me an opportunity to pitch. It's a nice town. It's a nice stadium. I'd like to play here. "It's taken me a long time to get back." Dyer was taken by the Twins in the fourth round of the 1986 January draft. He made AA Orlando in 1988 and AAA Portland and Minnesota in 1989. With Orlando, Dyer went 11-13 with a 3.99 ERA. On June 22, Dyer pitched a complete game. But three first-inning runs sunk him and Orlando, they lost 3-1 . ''I was throwing lousy in the bullpen before the game and I just brought it on the field with ...

In the top of the 11th, Roger LaFrancois came to bat. His Boston Red Sox were tied with the hated Yankees 3-3. With one out, LaFrancois hit one to second. He legged it out for an infield single . An error, a ground out and a single later and LaFrancois was across with the go-ahead run in a game the Red Sox won 5-3. It was something anyone would wait a lifetime for. It was no different for LaFrancois. He had a lifetime for that moment, or at least 26 years . But he had also waited an entire season for that moment. LaFrancois spent that year of 1982 on the Red Sox major league roster. This, the final game of the year, was only the eighth in which LaFrancois saw any playing time. He had spent the other 154 games on the bench, as Boston's third-string catcher. Asked afterward by The Day of New London, Conn. , if the season was, in fact, lost, LaFrancois said no, he believed it wasn't. He'd met a lot of good people. He'd learned a lot from the hitting coach. There...

In his seventh major league game, Dann Bilardello knew instantly this moment was big . But the rookie catcher was careful to show the proper respect. He had just hit his first major league home run , off no less a pitcher than Tom Seaver. "This was a great moment in my life; hitting one off a future Hall of Famer is another bonus for me," Bilardello told reporters after the game . "I knew it was out when I hit it, but I didn't stand there and watch it. I didn't want to show up Tom." Bilardello was at the beginning of his rookie season with the Reds. The catcher played in 109 games that year, ending with nine home runs, but hit just .238. Bilardello would go on to play in parts of eight major league seasons , but never more than that year in 1983. Bilardello made the majors that year, having been taken by the Reds out of the Dodgers system the previous December. Bilardello was drafted by the Dodgers in the first round of the 1978 June draft. The...

Last Christmas, I asked for an received from my wife tickets to a minor league baseball game. To make it easy, I searched around and made a list of teams that offered packages geared toward Christmas, you know ticket coupons and maybe a cool extra or two. The one she chose (maybe it was just the first on the list) was Batavia, the short-season NY-Penn League affiliate of the Cardinals . And it turned out to be a pretty cool gift. The package itself included four passes to a game and an extra, a Muckdogs Baseball t-shirt. When I was looking through the Batavia schedule, with the promotions, I targeted this Saturday. How could we pass up Star Wars night ? But the real coolness of this gift could not be realized at the time, and through a different gift. Another gift I asked for and received from my wife last Christmas was another box of 1990 CMC cards. I had her get me one for my birthday in November. And I had so much fun opening it, I had her get me another one. It was a couple days ...

Reggie Sanders only had nine major league games under his belt in spring 1992, but he was already confident. "You see me, you're going to see an aggressive player, a player who truly loves the game," Sanders told The South Florida Sun-Sentinel that March. "You're going to see some speed, you're going to see me hit for average." Sanders went on to back up most of what he said, going on to become an All Star and play in 17 major league seasons for eight clubs. Sanders began his career taken in the seventh round of the 1987 draft by the Reds. He started at short-season Billings, then single-A Greensboro and Cedar Rapids in 1989 and 1990. At Greensboro, Sanders hit .289 with nine home runs. He also played a role in an early season brawl with Greensboro. An opposing player slid hard into second, resulting in Sanders pushing back. The benches cleared, five were ejected, including Sanders, according to a wire account . He also made the South At...

The Cubs were fighting for the National League East, but rookie reliever Kevin Blankenship apparently couldn't get that excited. He also couldn't get to the ballpark on time. With the Cubs heading down the stretch run of 1989, Blankenship overslept for a game. Then he was late for a physical. He also had just overstayed his welcome : There were apparently plenty of other marginal relievers who could at least show up on time. "I overlooked it," Cubs manager Don Zimmer told The Chicago Tribune of Blankenship's first infraction. The club had to wake him in his hotel room at 11 that morning. "I'm thinking to myself, 'How the hell could somebody oversleep a day game and show up at a quarter to 12?'" But, after the second infraction, showing up 15 minutes late for the physical, Blankenship was done. "I called him into my office and said, 'Go on home,'" Zimmer told The Tribune . "I sent him home," Zimmer added...

In spring training 1988, Pirates manager Jim Leyland liked what he saw in Pirates outfield prospect Julio Peguero . Peguero'd batted .285 and stole 23 bases the previous year at single-A Salem, The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette noted. "That kid's going to be a player," Leyland told The Post Gazette after that March 28 game. "He has a quick, short stroke, and he can run." Peguero's career didn't quite turn out as Leyland had hoped. His future in the organization didn't even turn out like the Pirates front-office had hoped, with a literal clerical error blamed for an early departure. But Peguero did make the majors, appearing in a grand total of 14 games , not for the Pirates, but for the cross-state Phillies. Peguero's professional career began in 1986, signed by the Pirates out of his native Dominican Republic. He made AA Harrisburg in 1989, returning to AA for 1990. He hit .277 for Harrisburg in 1990 and the Pirates were still hi...

My parents were in town a couple weeks ago and I always have to take them to a baseball game. I know this is father's day, but dad's never been the one into baseball. The baseball one's been my mom. She's been a Cubs fan as long as I've been a Cubs fan. And she watches the games whenever they're on. And for her, they're on almost all the time. For me, out here in Upstate NY, they're not, so I don't. So, anyway, we always try and take mom to a game. I had designs on going to Newark, to see the Newark Bears and CMC man Willie Banks. Nick over at Baseball Happenings alerted me that he's still playing. Banks is the only set member who I know is confirmed still playing . But that will have to wait. Banks, it seems, gets in games infrequently and it's difficult timing it right. So we settled on the new Can-Am League team in Pittsfield, Mass. The Pittsfield Colonials are the old American Defenders of New Hampshire. You might recall them as the team...

The Tigers' regular closer Mike Henneman injured, Jeff Kaiser found himself in line for his first major league save in August 1991. All he had to do, was get through Ken Griffey Jr . With Griffey representing the possible go-ahead run, this encounter would end with Griffey shattering his bat on his knee in frustration. A swing and a miss by the future Hall of Famer and Kaiser his first career save . "This kind of thing has happened all season, really," Henneman told reporters days later after a second rookie picked up a save. "We've been picking one another up. That's what makes a true baseball team." Kaiser was genuinely part of a major league team for his longest stint in years . He pitched in 10 games for the Tigers during that stretch run, as the Tigers fell seven games short of a division win. In his sixth major league season, Kaiser once pitched in 15 games in 1985 for Oakland, but since the left-hand reliever had only enjoyed brief stints in ...