EPISODE 310: "Mallparks" - With Michael Friedman

University of Maryland physical cultural studies professor Michael Friedman ("Mallparks: Baseball Stadiums and the Culture of Consumption") cozies up to the pod machine this week for a thinking man's look into the evolution of the grand old American ballpark - and a provocative thesis of how designers of this generation of baseball stadiums are embracing theme park and shopping mall design to prioritize commerce and consumption over the game played inside them.

Mallparks: Baseball Stadiums and the Culture of Consumption - Buy Book Here

EPISODE 309: Minor League Monikers - With Tim Hagerty

El Paso Chihuahuas Triple-A baseball play-by-play broadcaster Tim Hagerty ("Root for the Home Team: Minor League Baseball's Most Off-the-Wall Team Names and the Stories Behind Them" and "Tales from the Dugout: 1,001 Humorous, Inspirational and Wild Anecdotes from Minor League Baseball") joins the show this week to spotlight some of the most memorable names and events in "forgotten" minor league history.

When Hagerty isn't calling games for the San Diego Padres top minor league affiliate, he can usually be found digging deep down a variety of research rabbit holes, in a never-ending quest to refine his encyclopedic "double-asterisk" knowledge of baseball factoids and historical lore.

For us, it's a callback to minor-league teams of yore like the: Tucson Toros, Huntsville Stars, Mobile (AL) BayBears, Portland Beavers, Hutchinson Salt Packers, Ilion (NY) Typewriters, Montpelier (VT) Goldfish, Kalamazoo Celery Pickers, Saskatoon Berrypickers, Greenville (MS) Cotton Pickers, Porterville (CA) Orange Pickers, New Orleans Baby Cakes, New Orleans Pelicans, Midland (TX) Cubs, Texarkana (TX & AR!) Casket Makers, Agua Prieta (Sonora, MX & Douglas, AZ!) Charros, Corsicana (TX) Oil Citys, Bluefield (WV) Blue Jays, Princeton (WV) Rays, and Pittsfield (MA) Astros - among others.

And, of course, we get Hagerty's take on the current state of MiLB, now that Major League Baseball is fully in charge - and where it's likely headed in the years to come.

          

Tales From the Dugout: 1,001 Humorous, Inspirational & Wild Anecdotes from Minor League Baseball - Buy Book Here

Root for the Home Team: Minor League Baseball’s Most Off-the-Wall Team Names and the stories behind them - Buy Book Here

EPISODE 308: Soccer Sojourns - With Thomas Rongen

American followers of the "beautiful game" undoubtedly know the name Thomas Rongen - but can easily be forgiven for not remembering just exactly how.

Of course, there's his current color commentary work for today's Major League Soccer Inter Miami CF - but fans of a certain age will recall the Dutch-born, mop-topped midfielder from his on-field (and in-arena) antics during the halcyon days of the old North American Soccer League alongside international greats like Johan Cruyff, George Best and Alan Willey on clubs like the Los Angeles Aztecs, Washington Diplomats, and two flavors of Strikers - Fort Lauderdale and Minnesota. 

Younger aficionados might place their earliest recollections of a fiery presence on the sidelines coaching a wide array of pro clubs ranging from successor ASL/APSL versions of the Strikers in the late 80s/early 90s, to early MLS sides like the 1996 Tampa Bay Mutiny, 1997-98 New England Revolution, 1999-2001 DC United, or even 2005's version of Chivas USA - not to mention his two stints helming the US Men's U-20 National team before and after.

However, most will undoubtedly know Rongen from his memorable turn as the head coach of the American Samoa national team during FIFA World Cup qualifying in 2011 - forever immortalized in the epically joyous 2014 documentary "Next Goal Wins", and soon to be refashioned as a major motion picture drama of the same name this fall - in which he wills one of the world's perennial soccer minnows into surprising respectability.

We cover all of it - and more - with one of the country's most endearing soccer personalities!

EPISODE 307: "Baseball's Wildest Season" - With Bill Ryczek

Sports historian Bill Ryczek (Blackguards and Red Stockings: A History of Baseball's National Association; Crash of the Titans: The Early Years of the New York Jets and the AFL) returns after a five-year absence to help us unpack the intriguing story of 1884 - arguably the wildest season in major league baseball history.

In his latest tome, "Baseball's Wildest Season: Three Leagues, Thirty-Four Teams and the Chaos of 1884," Ryczek details a fragile professional game pioneered by a still-fledgling National League that found itself not only challenged by a two-year-old lower-priced, Sunday-playing, beer-allowing American Association - but also an upstart third circuit called the Union Association whose president just happened to also own its most dominant franchise.

1884 saw the first incarnation of an inter-league "World Series" (the NL Providence Grays defeating the AA New York Metropolitans); the majors' first-ever African-American player (the AA Toledo Blue Stockings' Moses Fleetwood Walker); a (still-standing) record start to a season (the UA's 20-0 St. Louis Maroons) - and more drunken brawls, mid-season team relocations, player league-jumping, and underhand pitching than any time in big league history.

Baseball’s Wildest Season: Three Leagues, Thirty-Four Teams and the Chaos of 1884 - Buy Book Here

EPISODE 306: Miami Fusion Roundtable - With Joe Shaw, Jim Rooney & John Trask

With the 28th season of Major League Soccer well under way - featuring the debut of the league's 29th franchise (St. Louis CITY SC) and the expansion announcement of its soon-to-be 30th (San Diego) - it's hard to believe that the entirety of MLS was on the verge of collapse after just its sixth campaign in 2001.

Instead of pulling the plug entirely in 2002, two clubs - the charter 1996 Tampa Bay Mutiny and expansion 1998 Miami Fusion - were sacrificed, leaving Florida bereft of top-level pro soccer for the first time in a generation, and a league fighting to stay afloat for at least another season.

We'll tackle the Mutiny story on a future show - but this week, it's all about the surprisingly important four-season life of the Fusion - a team that never played in its namesake hometown, but left an indelible mark in South Florida soccer history.

Joe Shaw, host of the new podcast series "25 for 25: The Story of the Miami Fusion From Those Who Lived It", joins along with former club captain/fan favorite Jim Rooney and team assistant coach John Trask for a taste of what it was like in those exciting, but still-uncertain early years MLS's existence.

If you remember the original NASL's Ft. Lauderdale Strikers, or fancy yourself a fan of today's Inter Miami CF - you will LOVE this conversation!

EPISODE 305: "Goodbye Oakland" - With Andy Dolich

If anyone's qualified to weigh in with authority on the current Oakland A's relocation imbroglio, it is our guest this week - long-time professional sports marketing executive and Bay Area-based industry consultant Andy Dolich ("Goodbye, Oakland: Winning, Wanderlust, and A Sports Town's Fight for Survival").

Dolich spent 15+ years in the Athletics' front office from 1980-94 during the Walter Haas era - inheriting the remnants of Charlie Finley's parsimonious ownership, ushering in "Billy Ball", nurturing a promising farm system, and ultimately, reaping the rewards with a 1989 World Series championship over the market's "other team" - the San Francisco Giants.

But before we get there, we take an important introductory detour into Dolich's other exploits, replete with notable stops of keen interest to a certain little podcast - like the NASL's Washington Diplomats, the original National Lacrosse League's Maryland Arrows, and the NBA's Vancouver Grizzlies.

Goodbye, Oakland: Winning, Wanderlust, And A Sports Town’s Fight For Survival - Buy Book Here

EPISODE 304: Portland's CISL Pride & PSA/WISL Pythons - With Rob Hawksford

We answer some of our voluminous viewer mail this week, as listener Rob Hawksford joins for an intriguing look back at Portland, Oregon's pro soccer scene in the 1990s - when summertime indoor clubs known as the Pride (Continental Indoor Soccer League, 1993-97) and the Pythons (Premier Soccer Alliance, 1998 & World Indoor Soccer League, 1999) kept the sport alive after the collapse of the iconic outdoor NASL/WSA Timbers in 1990.

Starting out as a game-day volunteer for the Pride during the CISL's inaugural 1993 season, Hawksford quickly found himself on the payroll in subsequent summers doing a variety of front office jobs - including General Manager, where he helped the club change venues (from Portland's aging Memorial Stadium to the state-of-the-art Rose Garden in 1996), leagues (bolting with three other teams to form the PSA in 1998), and nicknames (Pythons).

In between, of course, a myriad of memories from one of the most interesting professional circuits in all of North American soccer - and a curious, but oft-forgotten footnote in Portland's long and storied "Soccer City USA" history.

EPISODE 303: The Huntsville Stars - With Dale Tafoya

It's a reassignment back to the minors again this week, as baseball writer Dale Tafoya ("One Season in Rocket City") joins the 'cast for a look back at the unforgettable inaugural 1985 season of the Southern League's Huntsville Stars - the Oakland As' talent-laden, then-Double-A affiliate that took both the city and the sport by storm.

Named after Huntsville’s celebrated space industry, the Stars became one of the biggest attractions in all of Minor League Baseball that season - boasting a dugout full of top Oakland prospects who would ultimately fuel the Athletics' big-league success later in the decade, including a 1989 World Series title sweep of the San Francisco Giants. 

Led by hot prospects/future MLB notables like Tim Belcher, Stan Javier, Luis Polonia, Terry Steinbach, and José Canseco, the Stars also featured a solid cast of gutsy minor-league role players who, despite never getting called up to "The Show," proved crucial to the team's championship that magical first season.

Though merely an opening chapter in Huntsville's baseball history now (the Stars moved to Biloxi, MS in 2015 to become the Shuckers; the Southern League's Rocket City Trash Pandas brought minor league ball back to the nearby suburb of Madison in 2020), the team and their story is one worth remembering.

One Season in Rocket City: How the Huntsville Stars Brought Minor League Baseball Fever to Alabama - Buy book here

EPISODE 302: The NHL's Colorado Rockies - With Greg Enright

With the New Jersey Devils still in contention in this year's NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs, we turn the dials on our George Michael Sports Machine back to the late 1970s/early 1980s with hockey historian Greg Enright ("Rocky Hockey: The Short but Wild Ride of the NHL's Colorado Rockies") - for a deep dive into the Newark, NJ-based franchise's tenuous six-year incarnation as Denver's Colorado Rockies (1976-82).

It's a story that traverses four separate owners, six different coaches, a constant threat of relocation, a terrible lease arrangement in a state-of the art (McNichols) arena, one meager (1978) playoff appearance (despite finishing 21 games under .500), an iconic logo - and a bombastic (1979-80) season full of sour "Grapes."

If you consider yourself a fan of the Devils or even today's Colorado Avalanche, you'll love Enright's book - and this conversation!

Rocky Hockey: The Short but Wild Ride of the NHL’s Colorado Rockies - Buy book here

EPISODE 301: "Last Comiskey" - With Matt Flesch

Long-time Chicago White Sox fan and unwitting basement documentarian Matt Flesch joins the pod this week to discuss the story behind his extraordinary new three-part YouTube documentary "Last Comiskey" - a video love letter to the South Siders' final 1990 season in the venerable park once known as the "Baseball Palace of the World.”

From Dan Day Jr.'s review on "The Hitless Wonder Movie Blog":

"The 1990 Chicago White Sox were not a championship team - they didn't even make the playoffs. But the 1990 season was one of the most notable and dramatic in White Sox history. It was the last season the team would play in venerable Comiskey Park, and it was a season that saw the Sox go beyond low expectations and challenge the defending champion Oakland Athletics for supremacy in the Western Division of the American League. 

"The scrappy Sox of 1990 didn't have overwhelming stats, or a roster filled with All-Stars--their most famous player was 42 year old veteran catcher Carlton Fisk. The team only hit a total of 106 home runs (their leading power hitter was Fisk, with only 18). But they played a brand of baseball that focused on "Doin' the Little Things" (the team's slogan for that year). The team also had budding young stars Robin Ventura, Jack McDowell, Ozzie Guillen, Sammy Sosa, and Frank Thomas, who made his Major League debut that season. 

"The exciting division chase between the White Sox and the Athletics coincided with the season-long celebration of the original Comiskey Park, a legendary ball yard that sadly didn't get its proper respect until it was getting ready to be torn down. 

"'Last Comiskey' covers all of this in spectacular and entertaining fashion, by featuring talks with Sox players, team & stadium employees, fans, and local journalists who covered what went on in the 1990 season. The series gives a 'regular guy' view of what happened with the White Sox in 1990, along with recreating the sights, sounds, and ambiance of Old Comiskey Park."

Last Comiskey - Watch Here

EPISODE 300: The "NASCAR 75 Years" Roundtable

We celebrate our 300th trip around the track with a special roundtable conversation on the colorful history of NASCAR racing - with award-winning stock car reporter-historians Kelly Crandall, Jimmy Creed, Mike Hembree, and Al Pearce ("NASCAR 75 Years").

In addition to looking back at some of the most iconic moments in the circuit's first 75 years, we also get an inside look at how their new historical opus came together - as well as honest assessments of where NASCAR stands in the American pro sports landscape in 2023, and some hot takes on what's in store for the sport in the years ahead.

Whether you are a NASCAR diehard or a casual fan, you will enjoy this (beautifully designed and extensively illustrated) book - as well as this conversation!

NASCAR 75 Years - Buy book here

EPISODE 299: Charles Stoneham's New York (Baseball) Giants - With Rob Garratt

We point the Good Seats Wayback Machine back a hundred years to the Roaring '20s - for a look at baseball's then-New York Giants and their larger-than-life owner Charles Stoneham - with baseball biographer Rob Garratt ("Jazz Age Giant: Charles A. Stoneham and New York City Baseball in the Roaring Twenties"). 

From the dust jacket of Jazz Age Giant:

"Short, stout, and jowly, Charlie Stoneham embodied a Jazz Age stereotype—a business and sporting man by day, he led another life by night. He threw lavish parties, lived extravagantly, and was often chronicled in the city tabloids.

"Little is known about how he came to be one of the most successful investment brokers in what were known as 'bucket shops,' a highly speculative and controversial branch of Wall Street. One thing about Stoneham is clear, however: at the close of World War I he was a wealthy man, with a net worth of more than $10 million.

"This wealth made it possible for him to purchase majority control of the Giants, one of the most successful franchises in Major League Baseball. Stoneham, an owner of racehorses, a friend to local politicians and Tammany Hall, a socialite and a man well-placed in New York business and political circles, was also implicated in a number of business scandals and criminal activities.

"The Giants’ principal owner had to contend with federal indictments, civil lawsuits, hostile fellow magnates, and troubles with booze, gambling, and women. But during his sixteen-year tenure as club president, the Giants achieved more success than the club had seen under any prior regime."

Jazz Age Giant: Charles A. Stoneham & New York City Baseball in the Roaring Twenties - Buy book here

EPISODE 298: The Asheville Tourists - With Ryan McGee

ESPN multi-platform writer/reporter/host Ryan McGee ("Welcome to the Circus of Baseball: A Story of the Perfect Summer at the Perfect Ballpark at the Perfect Time") joins us this week to reminisce about his early-career experiences as a $100-a-week intern with 1994's Class A South Atlantic League Asheville Tourists - a proud minor league baseball team in the heart of North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains.

Asheville's history with minor league ball dates all the way back to 1897 (think Moonshiners, Redbirds and Mountaineers), and its venerable 99-year-old (and twice-renovated) McCormick Field has seen multiple teams across numerous leagues sport the Tourists nickname - with legendary future Hall of Famers like Ty Cobb, Lou Gehrig, Babe Ruth, and Jackie Robinson in the club's rosters at one time or another.

In 1994, however, the "Sally League" Tourists were a consolation prize of a job for the newly minted University of Tennessee communications grad McGee, who, after bombing an interview for an entry-level gig with his long-coveted ESPN, instead settled in for a life-altering and lesson-teaching summer of literal "inside baseball" - with often hilarious results.

Join us for a look back at a quintessentially classic old-school minor league baseball season - and hear how McGee ultimately parlayed the experience into a second chance at the "Worldwide Leader in Sports" - with very different results.

Welcome to the Circus of Baseball: A Story of the Perfect Summer, At the Perfect Ballpark, At the Perfect Time - Buy book here

EPISODE 297: The Cincinnati Mohawks - With Eric Weltner

It's more International Hockey League (1945-2001) memories this week as Episode 181 guest Eric Weltner returns for a look back at one of minor league hockey's most dominant, yet curiously ephemeral franchises - the Cincinnati Mohawks (1952-58).

Not to be confused with the middling AHL team of the same name that pre-dated them by three years, the IHL Mohawks were the class of their circuit during the 1950s - winning an incredible six consecutive regular season crowns and five Turner Cup championships during their brief six-year existence. 

No wonder, since the Mohawks constituted the primary farm team of the NHL's then-supreme and talent-overloaded Montreal Canadiens, who themselves were busy monopolizing multi-consecutive Stanley Cups during the decade.

Weltner's new film "The Mohawk Monopoly" looks at the curious story of the Mohawks' incredible, yet short-lived run, their revered home ice at the Cincinnati Gardens, and the team's place in a long line of professional hockey franchises that called (and still call) "The 'Nati" home.

Mohawk Monopoly Trailer from editfreak cut/fx on Vimeo.

Mohawk Monopoly - watch the film here

EPISODE 296: "Bill & Sue's Excellent Adventure" - With Bill Craib

In 1991, twenty-something baseball fanatics Bill Craib and Sue Easler did something no one else had ever done before - they went to a game at all 178 major and minor league baseball parks in one season.

Craib and Easler drove nearly 54,000 miles and shot home-movie-style video (remember VHS?) at each stop - selected footage of which was featured on a segment that became known as "Bill & Sue's Excellent Adventure" on ESPN's weekly "Major League Baseball Magazine" program.

The couple became celebrities of the moment long before social media - spotlighted in major outlets of the day like ABC's "Good Morning America", Sports Illustrated, CNN, The New York Times - and prominently featured in local media wherever they stopped.

30+ years later, Craib ("In League With America: The Story of an Excellent Adventure") has finally written the book he intended to write then; a story about more than just baseball parks, but a tale about what it's like to chase a dream and have it come true - and, more deeply, a tableau of 1990s America as seen through the lens of its official pastime.

In League With America: The Story of an Excellent Adventure - Buy book here

EPISODE 295: "From the 55 Yard Line" - With Greg James (Vacation Special)

It's an early Spring Break hiatus for us this week - but not before sitting down for a very fun interview with CFL America blog/podcast publisher and friend-of-the-show Greg James - as a guest on his popular Sports History Network podcast "From the 55 Yard Line."

Tim and Greg go deep into the origin story of Good Seats Still Available, as well as a veritable audio potpourri of hot takes on what we've learned from doing the show over the course of nearly 300 episodes - and where we think pro football (and sports generally) might be headed in the years ahead.

Please enjoy this conversation we recorded a few weeks back - and be sure to check out all the other great podcasts across the Sports History Network!

Listen to “From the 55 Yard Line” here

Check out CFL America here

Check out Sports History Network here

EPISODE 294: California Dreaming - With Dan Cisco

We head West this week to pay a visit to the "California Sports Guy" Dan Cisco ("California Sports Astounding: Fun, Unknown, and Surprising Facts from Statehood to Sunday"), and stir up a rich bouillabaisse of little-known factoids about defunct, previously domiciled and otherwise forgotten teams and leagues who once called the Golden State home.

Discover the reason why Oakland was chosen as an inaugural franchise in 1960's American Football League debut - and why its original name was  hastily changed to "Raiders" just weeks before its first game.

Follow the move of the Pacific Coast League's original Hollywood Stars to San Diego in 1936 to become the Padres - and how a talented young player named Ted Williams unceremoniously ended his pitching career there before making it to the bigs.

And learn which legendary NBA basketball helped launch the International Volleyball Association's Irvine-based charter Southern California Bangers franchise in 1975 - and ultimately become the league's commissioner two years later.

PLUS, we make a bevy of unsolicited suggestions for Cisco's inevitable revised edition (and you can too)!

California Sports Astounding: Fun, Unknown, and Surprising Facts from Statehood to Sunday - Buy book here

EPISODE 293: Shooting the WHA - With Steve Babineau

Legendary Boston sports photographer Steve Babineau ("Behind the Lens: The World Hockey Association 50 Years Later") joins the pod this week to discuss his new, lovingly-curated collection of largely never-before-seen images of the colorful 1970s challenger hockey league that helped kick-start a life-long love for photography - and a 50+ year career behind the lens shooting some of the game's biggest stars.

A teenaged "Babs" was there at the old Boston Gardens on October 12, 1972, when the inaugural puck was dropped in the history of the New England Whalers (vs. the Philadelphia Blazers, on the second-ever day of WHA action) - unwittingly capturing some of the very first images of the revolutionary circuit that would ultimately give minor-league journeymen, NHL elder statesmen and even fledgling junior hockey phenoms (like a 17-year-old wunderkind named Wayne Gretzky) a chance to not only play, but creatively thrive.

And that guy Gretzky?  Well, we'll let Babs tell you that story!

Behind the Lens: The World Hockey Association 50 Years Later - Buy book here

EPISODE 292: Minor League Baseball's New York-Penn League - With Michael Sokolow

On the eve of the most significant changes to Major League Baseball's rules and scheduling, we continue our lament of 2021's radical streamlining of the minor leagues and obsess about the demise of its oldest circuit - the New York-Penn League - with City University of New York history/philosophy/political science professor Michael Sokolow ("Bush League: The Brooklyn Cyclones, Staten Island Yankees, and the New York-Penn League").

A staple of upstate New York and interior Pennsylvania summers dating back to 1939, the Class D-turned-Short-Season-Class-A NYPL represented 82 years of small-market America's pastime in the cradle of its historical birthplace - until MLB's grand realignment plan led to its disbandment in 2020. 

We talk about the league's history, what led to its ultimate demise, as well as explore two of the NYPL's most curious teams - the New York Mets-owned Brooklyn Cyclones (originally the St. Catherines [ON] Blue Jays, and now part of MiLB's High-A South Atlantic League), and the former Oneonta, NY-relocated Staten Island Yankees (now reincarnated as the independent Atlantic League FerryHawks) - in an attempt to bring the "big time" minor league game to New York City's outer boroughs.

+ + +

PRE-ORDER "Bush League: The Brooklyn Cyclones, Staten Island Yankees, and the New York-Penn League" from SUNY Press/Excelsior NOW!

Bush League: The Brooklyn Cyclones, Staten Island Yankees, and the New York-Penn League - Pre-Order book here

EPISODE 291: The Savannah Bananas - With Jesse Cole

We channel our inner yellow tuxedo this week for a revealing conversation with the inimitable minor league baseball impresario Jesse Cole - and a look into the phenomenon behind his ground-breaking Savannah Bananas franchise - as it migrates from its collegiate summer Coastal Plain League roots into an audacious (and already sold-out) cross-country barnstorming tour featuring its own wildly entertaining brand of "Banana Ball."

+ + +

PRE-ORDER Jesse Cole's new book (with Don Yaeger):​ ​​"​Banana Ball: The Unbelievably True Story of the Savannah Bananas​"​

BUY Jesse's inspirational best-sellers: "​Fans First: Change The Game, Break the Rules & Create an Unforgettable Experience​"​ AND ​"​Find Your Yellow Tux: How to Be Successful by Standing Out​"​ NOW!

          

Banana Ball: The Unbelievably True Story of the Savannah Bananas - Pre-Order book here

Fans First: Change the Game, Break the Rules & Create an Unforgettable Experience - Buy book here

Find Your Yellow Tux: How to Be Successful By Standing Out - Buy book here