Former Dodger Pitcher Dies in Auto Crash

LA Times reporting:

Steve Howe, a former Dodger relief pitcher whose cocaine and alcohol abuse overshadowed and ultimately tarnished his major league baseball career, was killed early Friday morning when he rolled his pickup truck in an unincorporated area of Riverside County east of Palm Springs. He was 48.

Some of his accomplishments:

• National League rookie of the year with the Dodgers in 1980
• Howe helped the team win the World Series in 1981
• was an All-Star in 1982 and
  
• later pitched for three other major league clubs, including the New York Yankees.

A two-time All-Big Ten selection at the University of Michigan, Howe was 47-41 with 91 saves and a 3.03 earned-run average in 12 major league seasons.

the hard-throwing left-hander probably is best remembered for his drug and alcohol abuse, Howe's frequent missteps playing a large part in him falling short of his vast potential and making him a reviled figure among unsympathetic fans. He was suspended seven times for violating baseball's substance-abuse regulations.

Angel Manager Mike Scioscia, a former teammate on the Dodgers, remembered Howe before Friday night's game at Angel Stadium as a fiery competitor who "would blur that line of being cocky and confident and not care. He had that swagger…. "

"Clearly, he was a kid who never reached his potential, but for a short time he did. The feeling of regret, he never expressed, as far as I know."

Dodger announcer Vin Scully called the news "heartbreaking."

Added Scully before Friday night's game at San Diego: "The thing I remember about Steve Howe was how calm he always was, how low-key he could be in pressure spots. He always seemed detached from the crowd. I assume that's why he was able to be so successful."

Said Dodger broadcaster Rick Monday, a former teammate of Howe's: "He seemed to constantly struggle to figure out how to get his life in order. But no matter how bad things were, Steve always found a ray of sunshine."

Howe is survived by his wife, Cindy, daughter Chelsi and son Brian, a senior left-handed pitcher at Valencia High School.

Condolences and deep sympathy to his family. We mourn the passing of Howe.

Full article here.

Price of a Win: big money for playing a game

Making out like bandits:




Dodgers at #6: $1,169,563; 11th in total payroll: $83,039,00. Charts, more details at WaPo, entitled "What's a Win Worth?".

Key baseball history lives on in an old, decrepit house

"Not far from the growling interstate, across a wide-open space strewn with garbage, empty streets and little else, there stands a house. It is not a pretty house. The scalloped shingles on the sides are covered with peeling aluminum siding, and vandals have shattered the windows, pulled down the door and covered the front with swirls of graffiti."


"There is history in this house, even if the thousands who thunder past on I-95 never have heard of the man who built it -- James Henry O'Rourke -- or know that he was the first player to get a hit in the National League"-- in 1876!

Aerial view:

Full story here, at the Washington Post.

One fan's opinion: Baseball's Greatest Rivalry

"

There's only one great baseball rivalry: the Dodgers and the Giants. It's gone on longer than the Red Sox and Yankees, back to Charles Ebbets and John McGraw. It's happened on both coasts in New York and California. It's been more even-handed, since sometimes the Giants win, like in 1951 and 1971, and sometimes the Dodgers win, like in 1965 and last year. It's so intense that even when only one of the teams is in the playoff race at the end of the season, the team out of the race delights in spoiling the playoff chances of the other, which the Dodgers did to the Giants in 1937 and 1993 and the Giants did to the Dodgers in 1982 and 1991. Until last year, what the Red Sox and Yankees had was a slaughter, which the Yankees did consistently to the Red Sox. The Red Sox have now got to beat the Yankees out of a pennant about 10 more times before they're even.

"

From MSNBC/Newsweek

This is the one, fer sure.

This will be the ACTIVE site for the giants-suck.com blog, for some reason, the name wasn't available when we first set it up.

Hello Dodger Fans! Welcome to the NEW Giants-Suck.com BLOG!!!!

Welcome to our new Giants-Suck.com blog. We want your opinions, comments as well as ideas for topics and whatever you want to discuss. Eventually we may move it to the main home base website and use wordpress, but for now, we'll go with not only FREE, but EASY!


Okay this is the deal for now: it's up to you -- or rather up to all of us together. What should we discuss? What are the prospects for a division title / pennant / going all the way to the WORLD SERIES!!??!!!

Meanwhile, can we agree on this: the GIANTS SUCK! But--Who sucks the worst? Need we ask?

Let's delve deeper:

• What are all the different ways that the Giants suck?
  
• What are the many ways Barry Bonds sucks?
  
• All the different ways the Dodgers rule?
  
• What do the Dodgers need to do differently?
  
• Who needs some help on the Dodgers?
  

Here's another key question: Are 'Giants Suck' Dodger fans a different or special type of Dodger fan?


Meanwhile: back at our main site, we've got a whittled down version of the Giants v. Dodgers / Dodgers v. Giants games schedule on our main website: Giants-Suck.com.

There's the online version, the printable one-page version, and a downloadable PDF color calendar (163kb) with all dodger games through October 1, plus all the dates for special giveway promos and the giveaway days that are provided for kids only.

GO DODGERS! THINK BLUE