Matt Christopher's Baseball Jokes and Riddles (3 page)

Ballplayers are a superstitious lot, especially when it comes to their bats and hitting. Orlando Cepeda believed that each
bat had only one hit—so after every hit, he got a new bat! And Wade Boggs gets rid of a bat when he feels he has used up its
supply of hits!

Many ballplayers have their rituals that they believe bring them good luck. Fay Dancer, center fielder for the Peoria, Illinois,
Redwings of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, would pry the glass eyes out of merry-go-round horses and
give them to fans to rub for good luck!

When Hall of Fame pitcher Grover Cleveland Alexander was accused of throwing an illegal beanball at a batter, he replied,
“All I did was throw a curve, but it kept following him!”

At old Griffith Stadium in Washington, D.C., in a game between the Senators and the Tigers, Detroit’s George Kell was up at
the plate. The pitcher was in his windup when the lights suddenly went out! When they blinked back on a few seconds later,
everyone on the field was lying down, protecting their heads! Only the pitcher and Kell knew for sure if the ball had been
thrown—no one wanted to get hit by a pitch or a line drive!

Stolen base specialist Lou Brock knew what to wear during a rain delay. He had an interest in a company that made the BroccaBrella,
a small umbrella worn like a hat!

In 1976, the White Sox tried out knee-length shorts, but quickly decided to go back to long pants—maybe their runners weren’t
sliding into bases! (Ouch!)

Before 1877, players risked serious injury when sliding into a base. It wasn’t until that year that the standard fifteen-inch
canvas covered bag was adopted—before then, some ball fields used flat stones or wooden stakes!

When the Boston Braves won their 1946 season opener against the Brooklyn Dodgers, not all of their 18,261 fans went home happy.
It seems the Braves had decided to spruce up Fenway before the game by giving the stands a fresh coat of paint. Cold, wet
weather prevented the paint from drying in some grandstand sections—so three hundred unlucky patrons took home more than happy
memories from the game! (The next day the team ran ads in the newspapers offering to pay the dry cleaning bills!)

What did the chicken say to the pitcher?

Baalk, balk, balk, balk, baalk!

Why were the players wearing armor at the ballpark?

It was a knight game!

What are the best kind of shoes to wear for stealing bases?

Sneakers!

What is the best kind of pitch to steal on?

A slider!

In 1967, future Hall of Famer Carl Yastrzemski was voted the best player in baseball by his fellow major leaguers. The ballots,
however, showed that while many of the voters may have excelled in baseball, their spelling left much to be desired! Written
in were such entries as:

Yaztremski

Yaztreszski

Yastremzminski

Yastremski

Yazstrememenski

Y’str’mski

(The smart ones played it safe and wrote:
Yaz
—
Boston!
)

Phillies first baseman Richie Allen wrote messages in the dirt as his way of protesting bad calls. Baseball Commissioner Bowie
Kuhn told the Phillies to make Allen stop. When he heard of Kuhn’s order, Allen wrote three more messages:
No, Why,
and
Mom.
When asked why he wrote
Mom,
he replied, “To say she tells me what to do, not the man up there.”