Quote:
Originally Posted by Kutcher55
Wasn’t a big fan for most of his career, although he did seem to mature later on in some ways. Back in 82 the year he stole 130 my dad and I were on a west coast trip and went to a midsummer Oakland game. The A’s fell behind 6-0 early and Henderson drew a walk and immediately tried to steal 2nd. They pitched out and threw him out by a mile. My dad commented (correctly imo) that it was a selfish play and bad baseball given the game situation.
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That was all Billy Martin. Billy had burned out the A's starting staff the previous couple of seasons and the offense had the lowest Batting Average in all of baseball that season. Billy was just playing chaos ball to try and stay in games.
They had Rickey and a bit of pop, so they were still about league average in Runs Scored, but their pitching was so horrendous it didn't matter.
Billy gave Rickey the green light to go whenever, wherever, and in all situations. Just try and cause chaos and maybe we'll eke one out here and there.
Also rumors were Billy was trying to get fired to go back and work for Steinbrenner......so....there's that.
Not a coincidence Billy did come back as manager, the same year Henderson came to the Yanks.