Baseball Names You Should Know, Part Two

We continue with our list of some of the Baseball Names You Should Know Because People Often Mention Their Names as A Comparison And You Don’t Want to Look Stupid Asking Who They Are. I know that many of you have others. Write a comment at the end and I’ll post ‘em. Remember, these are not necessarily the greatest baseball players who every lived, but names who are mentioned often when talking about baseball history.

8. Nolan Ryan is one of my all-time favorites pitchers, though he retired before I really started watching baseball. He is best known for playing for the Texas Rangers and is best known for his record of being the all time leader in no hitters (seven!) and tied for first for one-hitters with 12 and another 18 two hitters. He threw fast balls that regularly went above 100 mph and he had a mean knuckleball. He pitched well into his forties, and was know as The Ryan Express. He had 5,714 career strikeouts. He also had 2,795 walks in his career, but hey, you got to throw a lot of balls to get a lot of strikes. He has been a spokesperson for Alleve pain medication, and I trust a man to know about pain relief when he has a pitching career like that.

9. Roberto Clemente was the first Latin American to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame and the only modern Hall of Famer for whom the mandatory five year waiting period was waived. That’s because he was elected posthumously in 1973 after being lost in an airplane crash while delivering supplies and aid to Nicaraguan earthquake victims. He was a native of Puerto Rico and was knows for his generousity and his charity work in his native country and other Latin American countries. He played his entire 19 season in the Major League Baseball with the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1955 to 1972 and was an All Star for 12 of those seasons. He won 12 Gold Glove Awards (tying with fellow outfielder Willie Mays) and was elected to the All Time Gold Glove Team at the All Star Game in 2007 (joining fellow outfielders Willie Mays and Ken Griffey, Jr.)

10. Joe DiMaggio Joe had the ultimate girlfriend and married her (Marilyn Monroe) and at one point when playing with the Yankees, he was roommates with pitcher Joe Page (another bad boy in the forties and here again in the new century.) And he's mentioned in the Simon and Garfunkel song "Mrs. Robinson." But that’s just baseball trivia. Joe DiMaggio played his entire career from 1936 to 1951 for the New York Yankees as a center fielder. DiMaggio was a 3-time MVP winner and played 13 times in the All Star game, he is also the only player in baseball history to be selected for the All-Star Game in every season he played. DiMaggio achieved a 56-game hitting streak during 1941 that has been called baseball's most mythic achievement. After going hitless for one game, DiMaggio hit in the next 16 consecutive games, for a total of 72 out of 73. He earned .325 lifetime batting average and the New York Yankees retired his number 5.

11. Satchel Paige was an African American pitcher who played with too many teams to list here but who was a legendary pitcher. He played for dozens of different Negro League Teams as well as in the Mexican and Dominican Republic Leagues. His career lasted from the mid-1920s until 1965. (Do the math!) He made his Major League Baseball debut with the Cleveland Indians at 42 years of age becoming the first black pitcher in the American League.

A great story I found on Wikipedia tell the story of Joe DiMaggio’s last stop as a minor league player in 1936 before going to the Majors “before joining the New York Yankees, and he was going to have to face one of baseball’s best pitchers: Satchel Paige. DiMaggio ended up going 1-4 with the game-winning RBI in the bottom of the tenth. A Yankee scout watching the game wired the big club that day a report which read, “DIMAGGIO EVERYTHING WE’D HOPED HE’D BE: HIT SATCH ONE FOR FOUR.”

Paige had a reputation for creative pitches, and was described as throwing a lot of pitches that “were not quite legal and not quite illegal". Pitches named the hesitation pitch, the four day creeper, the bee ball, the bat dodger, and the two hump blooper. His famous quote? “I only wish I got to pitch to Babe Ruth.”


12. Lou Gehrig Mostly, you know this guy because he contracted ALS which cut his baseball career short and ALS, a neurological disease, has been known as Lou Gehrig’s disease ever since. But before that, he had the record for the most number of games played consecutively until it was broken by Cal Ripken. Lou Gehrig was a great ball player in other ways, too. Gehrig set the record for 23 career grand slam home runs (which means bases were loaded at the time when the home run was hit.) He played his entire career of seventeen seasons with the New York Yankees. He has a career 1,995 runs batted in and hit a lifetime batting average of .340 and was a Triple Crown winner in 1934 (which means leading the league in batting average, home runs, and RBIs.) Upon announcing his retirement from baseball (forced by his ALS) he uttered one of the most famous quotes in baseball, “I consider myself the luckiest man in the world.”


13. Cal Ripken Cal Ripken was a short stop and third baseman who played his entire career for the Baltimore Orioles from 1981 to 2001. Long ago, when I was just starting to watch baseball, I saw Cal Ripken show up to bat in his 2,131 game breaking the 56-year-old record set by the "Iron Horse" Lou Gehrig, the legendary New York Yankees first baseman. Okay, I was in tears, looking at the screen and the stadium of fans who truly loved this man as a member of the Baltimore Orioles. He went on to play in a record 2,632 straight games spanning sixteen seasons 1982 to 1998 and played in the MLB All Star game 19 times. With players traded more frequently and free agency, the record for continuous games, especially with the same team will probably stand forever. But that is what they said about Gehrig, too.

14. Mickey Mantle The Boyfriend loves Mickey Mantle (even though he was a Yankee) because Mickey Mantle was a bad boy who was a great ball player and who’s bad habits didn’t seem to slow Mantle down on the field. He played 18 seasons with the New York Yankees and played in 16 All Star teams. He played on 12 pennant winners and 7 World Series championships. He still holds the records for most World Series home runs (18), RBIs (40), runs (42), walks (43), extra-base hits (26), and total bases (123). He made late in life news by needing a liver transplant for all the hard living and hard drinking he had indulged in during life. Oooops.