philliesfiend55
09-09-2008, 08:27 AM
I saw an article on MLB.com today that indicated that Trevor Hoffman is looking for at least a two year contract to pitch at least through the 2010 season. Hoffman, now with 552 saves, would practically insure that he'd finish his career with more than 600 saves were he to sign for that length of time.
By comparison, his nearest competition would be Mariano Rivera who is three saves away from passing Lee Smith (478 saves) for a distant second place in career saves.
I went to a game in Philadelphia at the very start of Hoffman's career, a losing effort that probably paved the way to the Padres' acquisition of Hoffman. It also had a permanent reprocussion on the career of veteran knuckleballer Charlie Hough.
Hoffman wasn't always a dominating closer, who would nail down 95 per cent of his save opportunities. What follows is a story about one of his first efforts that I call "From Humble Beginnings".
A friend and I made the journey from Northern New Jersey (both of us with Philly roots) to a Phillies-Marlins game at Veterans Stadium, Philadelphia on Sunday June 20, 1993, Father's Day.
Charlie Hough vs. Tommy Greene of the Phils was the pitching matchup.
Hough had his knuckler darting and through six and a half innings had a 3-1 lead. Hough retired the first Phillies batter in the seventh and then Milt Thompson hit a grounder that should have been handled easily, but second baseman Bret Barbarie muffed it. Lenny Dykstra followed with a single to shallow center that left runners on first and second with one out.
Dykstra's hit was the first ball that had been hit solidly off Hough for several innings. Nonetheless, manager Rene Lachemann brought in youngster Trevor Hoffman, for what would be just his second major league career appearence to replace Hough. The consensus opinion of that pitching change between my friend and I was that "This guy Lachemann has a hair-trigger as far as replacing pitchers goes. Take away the error and Hough was almost out of the inning, unharmed. He (Hough) had been rolling along fine before the error".
Hoffman got Mariano Duncan on an infield grounder for out numer two,
but then John Kruk really got a hold of one, homering deep over the right field wall. The resulting score of the homer, 4-3 would also be the game's final score. For Hoffman that meant both a blown save and taking the loss.
After taking the Broad Street subway to the station where we parked, the first thing we heard on the car radio was the end of the post-game wrap-up with Harry Kalas remarking "The Marlins really did the Phillies a favor by removing Charlie Hough from the game, who didn't appear to be in serious trouble, and bringing in the youngster, Hoffman". My friend and I both laughed. We couldn't have agreed more and had made remarks to that effect on the subway train..
With this failure by Hoffman freshly imprinted into the Marlins front office personnel's minds, Hoffman was traded to the San Diego Padres four days later and concerning Hoffman's ensuing career with the Padres, "the rest as they say is history".
There's one more facet to this story. When Charlie Hough won his 200th game a year or so prior to this game he was about 15 games over .500 lifetime. Hough played 25 years in the majors (1970-1994). He hung on just a little too long. His final career mark was an even .500 at 216-216. Pitching for a new expansion team in Florida certainly contributed to his record's decline.
However, if Hough was allowed to pitch his way out of trouble that Fathers Day, 1993, or if Hoffman had gotten the job done and gotten Kruk out instead of surrendering a home run to him, Hoffman would have had his first major league save, but more importantly Charlie Hough would have gotten the win, and as it turns out, that meant the diference between Hough finishing his quarter-century career in major league baseball over .500 at 217-216, or right at the.500 mark, at 216 games up, and 216 games down.
-philliesfiend55-
(Dennis Orlandini)
By comparison, his nearest competition would be Mariano Rivera who is three saves away from passing Lee Smith (478 saves) for a distant second place in career saves.
I went to a game in Philadelphia at the very start of Hoffman's career, a losing effort that probably paved the way to the Padres' acquisition of Hoffman. It also had a permanent reprocussion on the career of veteran knuckleballer Charlie Hough.
Hoffman wasn't always a dominating closer, who would nail down 95 per cent of his save opportunities. What follows is a story about one of his first efforts that I call "From Humble Beginnings".
A friend and I made the journey from Northern New Jersey (both of us with Philly roots) to a Phillies-Marlins game at Veterans Stadium, Philadelphia on Sunday June 20, 1993, Father's Day.
Charlie Hough vs. Tommy Greene of the Phils was the pitching matchup.
Hough had his knuckler darting and through six and a half innings had a 3-1 lead. Hough retired the first Phillies batter in the seventh and then Milt Thompson hit a grounder that should have been handled easily, but second baseman Bret Barbarie muffed it. Lenny Dykstra followed with a single to shallow center that left runners on first and second with one out.
Dykstra's hit was the first ball that had been hit solidly off Hough for several innings. Nonetheless, manager Rene Lachemann brought in youngster Trevor Hoffman, for what would be just his second major league career appearence to replace Hough. The consensus opinion of that pitching change between my friend and I was that "This guy Lachemann has a hair-trigger as far as replacing pitchers goes. Take away the error and Hough was almost out of the inning, unharmed. He (Hough) had been rolling along fine before the error".
Hoffman got Mariano Duncan on an infield grounder for out numer two,
but then John Kruk really got a hold of one, homering deep over the right field wall. The resulting score of the homer, 4-3 would also be the game's final score. For Hoffman that meant both a blown save and taking the loss.
After taking the Broad Street subway to the station where we parked, the first thing we heard on the car radio was the end of the post-game wrap-up with Harry Kalas remarking "The Marlins really did the Phillies a favor by removing Charlie Hough from the game, who didn't appear to be in serious trouble, and bringing in the youngster, Hoffman". My friend and I both laughed. We couldn't have agreed more and had made remarks to that effect on the subway train..
With this failure by Hoffman freshly imprinted into the Marlins front office personnel's minds, Hoffman was traded to the San Diego Padres four days later and concerning Hoffman's ensuing career with the Padres, "the rest as they say is history".
There's one more facet to this story. When Charlie Hough won his 200th game a year or so prior to this game he was about 15 games over .500 lifetime. Hough played 25 years in the majors (1970-1994). He hung on just a little too long. His final career mark was an even .500 at 216-216. Pitching for a new expansion team in Florida certainly contributed to his record's decline.
However, if Hough was allowed to pitch his way out of trouble that Fathers Day, 1993, or if Hoffman had gotten the job done and gotten Kruk out instead of surrendering a home run to him, Hoffman would have had his first major league save, but more importantly Charlie Hough would have gotten the win, and as it turns out, that meant the diference between Hough finishing his quarter-century career in major league baseball over .500 at 217-216, or right at the.500 mark, at 216 games up, and 216 games down.
-philliesfiend55-
(Dennis Orlandini)