August Injury Report – Week 3

The following is a list of injuries to players which occurred between August 16th and August 23rd of the SP78 season, with injuries noted by date, team, player, and number of days or weeks missed. (Note: there were no injuries on the 16th)

August 17

NY-N: In the second inning of their game against the Padres, Mets third baseman Lenny Randle aggravated a prior injury to his hip when he stumbled into the visitor’s dugout chasing a foul ball off the bat of Fernando Gonzalez; he would leave the game and be out of action for the next five days.

TEX: In the top of the eighth inning of the Chisox-Rangers match-up at Arlington Stadium, Alan Bannister’s sinking line drive to center fell for a triple when Texas center fielder Juan Beniquez misjudged his diving attempt to make the catch and landed awkwardly on the outfield grass, straining his wrist. The injury would force him to miss the next seven games.

August 18

STL: Cardinals batter Mike Phillips suffered contusions to his right hand when he was struck by a pitch from Braves reliever Dave Campbell during the eighth inning of their game at St Louis. He was replaced by a pinch-runner and would sit out the next four games, but would return in time to participate in the SP78 40th Anniversary game on August 22nd.

August 19

LA: Citing a sudden tightness in his pitching shoulder, Dodgers starter Doug Rau asked manager Tommy Lasorda to remove him from their afternoon contest against the Mets after just one inning of work, after he surrendered a walk to batter Bobby Valentine on four pitches. Rau would miss his next start, and will probably miss one more before returning to the starting rotation later this month.

MIL: Brewers starter Lary Sorensen was the second SP78 pitcher lost to injury today, after he went 4.1 innings before developing a blister on his pitching hand and leaving the game, two outs before he would’ve qualified for the victory in an eventual 7-1 Milwaukee win over Detroit. The blister was deemed serious enough to keep him out of action for at least another start.

August 20

OAK: A long fly ball off the bat of Boston’s Jack Brohamer resulted in a collision between Oakland center fielder Glenn Burke and the outfield wall at Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum, resulting in a triple for Brohamer and a separated shoulder for Burke, who would be placed on the 30-day disabled list the following day. It would be his second month-long stint on the DL this season, after a collision with teammate Mike Edwards resulted in a thirty-day absence back in April.

August 21

LA: While charging in on a short pop fly off the bat of Montreal’s Ellis Valentine, LA left fielder Dusty Baker clipped shortstop Bill Russell as he backpedaled to make the catch; the ball dropped untouched, allowing Valentine to race to second with a double, while both defensemen remained prone on the outfield grass. Russell was not injured and remained in the game, but Baker was helped off the field with an unspecified leg injury, and will likely be out the rest of the month.

SF: The Giants also lost an outfielder to injury after a collision with a shortstop, as Terry Whitfield will be out for at least a week after running into teammate Roger Metzger as they converged on a shallow fly ball during the fourth inning of their game against the Mets at Shea Stadium. Whitfield was replaced by Jim Dwyer, while Metzger was unscathed and continued the game at short.

August 22

DET: Tigers outfielder Steve Kemp will miss the next few games after landing roughly on the hard Metropolitan Stadium turf while diving for a line shot by Roy Smalley in the fifth, which skipped past him and went to the wall for a triple. X-rays were taken of his right wrist and elbow as a precaution, but no breaks or fractures were found.

August 23

DET: After losing an outfielder to injuries yesterday, the Tigers will be without the services of two more players, after center fielder Ron LeFlore and second baseman Steve Dillard were both hurt when they collided during the second inning of their Game 1 match-up against the visiting Blue Jays. The batter, Roy Howell, made it to second on the play; LeFlore is expected to return to the lineup soon, but Dillard will be placed on the 30-day DL due to his injuries, which have yet to be specified by the team.

MIN: In the first game of a doubleheader between Texas and Minnesota, with Mike Hargrove batting in the sixth, Twins third baseman Mike Cubbage was injured when he chased a pop-up into foul territory and slammed into a metal railing near the Ranger dugout. Not only did he fail to make the catch, but his left knee struck the rail in the process, prompting his immediate departure from the game. There has been no report on what type of injury he suffered, but sources say he will be out for at least a week.

AL League Leaders Updated

The current League Leaders and Team Leaders for the American League have now been updated for games played through August 23rd, and can be found by scrolling down the right-hand column of this page. And like the National League leaders posted a month ago, most of the players and teams among the Top 5 categories have remained the same, with a few notable exceptions.

Royals third baseman George Brett moved into the Top 5 for batting average, displacing NY catcher Thurman Munson, and Twins star Rod Carew jumped from the fifth spot to first in the hits category; he’ll need 31 more to reach 200 for the fourth time in his career. Also, a pair of milestones were achieved, as Minnesota’s Roy Smalley was the first in the AL to reach the 100 RBI mark, and Brewers ace Mike Caldwell was the first in either league to reach 20 wins, with Jon Matlack and Scott McGregor close behind at 18.

M’s speedster Julio Cruz stole three more bases this past week, giving him 92 for the year…just four shy of Ty Cobb’s AL record of 96, established in 1915. Also during the week, A’s DH Rico Carty slugged three home runs to move within two of 30 and three of his 1978 total of 31; Don Baylor of the Angels still leads in that department, with 35. And though he’s struggled of late, going 1-2 over his last four starts, Yankees starter Ron Guidry still leads SP78 in earned run average, with 1.28.

Kansas City and Minnesota continue to dominate the team categories, while Baltimore still holds the lead in the team HR department, with 135, just nineteen away from their 1978 season total. And somehow, the Indians are still leading in team batting average and total hits, though they’re still mired in sixth place in the AL East; they also made the Top 5 in doubles and triples, as well as pitcher strikeouts.

The next league-wide update will take place in one SP78 calendar week, after games have been completed for August 31, 1978.

TWISP Notes #75

TWISP Notes
May 5, 2021

• Tigers second baseman Lou Whitaker returned from his 27-year suspension in Game 2 of a Detroit-Toronto doubleheader on August 23rd, and with his squad down by one in the last of the ninth, and the tying and winning runs on base, he stroked a triple to the gap to score both runners and win it for Detroit; it was his first hit of the game, and first since June 10th.

• Don Baylor of the Angels and Roy Smalley of the Twins went into their August 23rd games tied for the American League lead in RBI, at 99. With a solo home run off Rangers starter Dock Ellis in Game 1 of a doubleheader at Metropolitan Stadium, Smalley thus became the first AL player to reach 100; it was also the first time in his career he’d reached that milestone. Dodgers outfielder Reggie Smith still leads the major leagues, with 107.

• With a hit in both games of that Rangers-Twins twinbill, Texas designated hitter Al Oliver extended his hitting streak to 15 games, the longest current streak in the majors.

• After each sitting out a handful of days due to minor injuries, outfielder Steve Kemp of the Tigers, pitcher Larry Sorensen of the Brewers, and outfielder Juan Beniquez of the Rangers will return to action with their respective clubs on August 24th.

• While working on adding all SP78 player names to an Excel spreadsheet, so I could begin posting league leaders for every day of games played, I noticed the Montreal Expos had only three position players on their AAA team in Denver, and all three were catchers: Ed Herrmann, Bobby Ramos, and Jerry Fry. Ramos and Fry, who played only a few games between them in ’78, have horrible cards: Ramos strikes out 11-88 and Fry strikes out 11-76, while both are ‘E’ runners and have ‘C’ arms. The rest of the team is made up of five pitchers, all with PB ratings of 2-5.

• In a match-up between the Giants and Mets on August 23rd, SF pitcher Bob Knepper tied an SP78 record—shared with hurlers Tom Seaver of the Reds and Don Sutton of the Dodgers—for sacrifices in a game, with three.

• With its 146th game played, site AZ18 in Peoria, Arizona moved past site AZ7 into third place on the all-time SP78 games hosted list.

• Phillies slugger Greg Luzinski connected for his 30th home run—and first grand slam—of the season, in Philadelphia’s 7-1 win over the Padres on August 23rd.

• Also on the 23rd, Yankees outfielder Mickey Rivers drilled his first career grand slam, off Angels starter Chris Knapp, in a 6-0 New York win over California.

• In Kansas City’s 12-1 drubbing of Chicago on August 23rd, all nine KC batters who came to the plate in the ninth scored.

Fans! August 25th is Publix Back-to-School Night at Comiskey Park!

SP78 Flashback: Game #30

I’ve been working on adding game recaps to the site for a few months now, and this most recent one, featuring a Dodgers-Astros match-up from April 10th, had enough off-kilter aspects to it to make it interesting enough—and humorous enough—to share in a Flashback.

The game, the thirtieth of my SP78 season and played in 1980, had my brother Scott managing the Dodgers, his favorite team, and featured some managerial decisions that might seem a bit avant garde today (and probably even back then). But don’t think I’m using this recap to pick on or embarrass him: I made these same questionable decisions quite a few times during these early stages of my season, and I even mention one of them in the recap’s game notes.

So if you’re interested in discovering why, thirty-five years after he retired, LA reliever Terry Forster still wakes up screaming from nightmares of this game, click here.