My Son, the General Manager

Old Wahoo told the kindergartner about the Tigers' victory over the Angels on Sunday, and I told him about how well Justin Verlander pitched. He was excited, of course, but as usual he was also worried: "I hope they don't trade him."

I agreed with him. Then the kindergartner offered this gem: "They should trade all the bad players and get all the good players." That logic is sound. Maybe he can be the general manager of the Tigers someday.

The kindergartner remembers the Curtis Granderson trade, which was not popular with many Tigers fans, both young and old. (Someone should have taken a poll of what elementary-school kids thought about the trade. I expect it would have received a big thumbs-down.) But even though it is early, Austin Jackson - a key piece of the trade - is excelling for the Tigers, while Granderson is struggling and on the disabled list for the Yankees.

An APBA Replay

Old Wahoo fondly remembers the summer of 1981. At age 8, I had just finished my second season of T-Ball, playing second base for the Reds, who won a dramatic playoff for second place (clearly my Little League highlight). 

I lived for baseball. I watched every game I could - loved the Game of the Week on NBC with Joe Garagiola and Tony Kubek. I was a baseball geek.

Of course, there was one major problem in 1981. A players' strike wiped out the middle part of the season, robbing six weeks of baseball from fans and causing the Cincinnati Reds to miss the playoffs despite having the best record in the National League.

But Old Wahoo's dad saved baseball that summer, at least for me, by ordering APBA Baseball, a dice board game that allowed fans to play their own ballgames and seasons with "real players" based on actual statistics. 

So during the strike, my dad and I replayed the 1980 season. My dad had played APBA as a kid, and now he was passing the fun on to me. 

Dad made up a schedule and pitching matchups for all the games, and then we dove in. Dad quickly taught me the rules - how the big, red die was the tens number, and the white die was the one - and how to use the various charts for each situation (i.e., bases empty, runner on first, etc.)

I wanted to play all the time, and soon I was playing games while Dad was at work, faithfully keeping score so we could keep season stats. 

(But Old Wahoo did skew the stats a bit. Chagrined to find out that Reggie Jackson actually struck out - a lot - I would sometimes give ol' Reggie a couple extra rolls until he came up with a roll of 66 - a home run - or at least hit a double. My dad, of course, was up to my tricks, and he would shake his head disapprovingly when I told him that Reggie had another two-homer game against the Orioles.)

We were true geeks, and I'm sure my mother and younger brother thought we were nuts. But it got us through the strike, and for baseball nuts, that was great.

Recently, the New York Times had an article about the annual APBA baseball tournament, and it took me back to the games with my dad. (The Times' baseball blog, Bats, also had a post about a 1956 APBA replay.)

With the fantasy sports boom, with all the technological challenges, it's hard to believe that the board game is still around at all. APBA has a computer game - my dad bought it, of course - but the traditional tabletop format remains its trademark.

Thanks to APBA, my dad and I bonded. My brother and I played catch with Dad after his work, and when it got dark, we played APBA.

It was the best.

The Iron Horse and Humility

Saturday marks the 70th anniversary of Lou Gehrig's famous "luckiest man" speech, and The New York Times ran a nice piece on it the other day.

Gehrig remains a hero, and his humility shines through in his speech, immortalized in the movie "The Pride of the Yankees." Humility always has been an undervalued trait. We want the big, controversial and larger-than-live stars instead of quieter, team-first, taking-care-of-business athletes, from Gehrig to Pete Sampras to David Robinson. I'd disagree with Bob Costas, who said at the end of the Times' article that Gehrig's humility  stood out even more in comparison to today's prima donna athletes, because it's not that new a phenomenon. In Gehrig's time, personality made headlines, and players like Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb and Dizzy Dean made names for themselves not only with their on-field performance but also their off-field antics. 

His speech was a lesson for all-time, a "Last Lecture" of the 20th century. Here's a man, feeling his once powerful body betray him in unknown ways and having his livelihood wither away, saying that he's thankful for all of the rewards in his life. 

It's a good reality check when the small stuff gets you down, whether it's the kids' selective hearing or some other nuisance. Remember the good in your life. Count your blessings. Cliched? Sure, but it's true.

Gehrig was a simple man in the best possible way - his family came first. Maybe he wasn't the smoothest operator (even though he had movie-star looks), but he loved his wife, was devoted to his mother and took his job seriously. For all his accomplishments, his 493 home runs and his .340 career batting average, the man knew what was most important. 

Lou Gehrig had it right. 

Managing Losing

Old Wahoo isn't sure Manny Acta is the best role model (after all, his Washington Nationals are 14-36 and owners of the worst record in baseball after Tuesday's victory over the San Francisco Giants), but I like the perspective he showed in this column by Thomas Boswell in last week's Washington Post. Failure can tear you down if you let it, but one failure doesn't mean the end. We have more than one act in our lives, or some mumbo jumbo like that, and I think that's applicable to these times, at least for me.

Boswell writes that some of baseball's greatest managers (Casey Stengal, Miller Huggins, Joe Torre) bounced back from horrible starts to their careers. 

Still, there's no guarantee that Acta will become a Hall of Fame manager or World Series winner, as I'm sure any Nationals fan (if there are any) would say.

A good day

Thanks to the sunny, spring weather, Old Wahoo has enjoyed the day. Alex and I already have played baseaball, continuing our game from yesterday. "I like all of the sports," Alex said after he played basketball and soccer yesterday in the back yard.

The funniest/grossest thing of the day came from Matthew, who proved again that he will eat anything, everything and any combination. At lunch, he dined on bananas, which he dipped liberally in his ketchup. Delicious. Of course, it didn't stop me from eating.