A Few More Notes From Yesterday's Debacle

* The Cubs have finally joined most other sports teams and concert venues and are no longer "ripping" tickets, i.e. tearing off the stub. Instead, you slide your ticket into a scanner, it reads the barcode, and they wave you on in. It actually makes the line move a bit faster.

It also makes me wonder why they bother making the ticket blanks with perforations any more, but that's another story.

* Mike sent me some interesting stats on the Pirates' offensive explosion yesterday. As I mentioned, Jack Wilson had seven at-bats and the Pirates' leadoff man, Tike Redman, also batted seven times (though had only three official at-bats due to a walk, a sacrifice and two sac flies). The Pirates sent 58 men to the plate, and Mike sent me a list of all games where the lineup has been turned over at least six times, that have been played at Wrigley Field since 1975 (the number is the number of BFP, or batters facing pitcher):

 
56 Pittsburgh vs. Cubs, 7/6/75, 18 runs, 20 hits. 
56 New York vs. Cubs, 8/16/87. 23 runs, 21 hits. 
56 Pittsburgh vs. Cubs, 4/12/04. 13 runs, 17 hits, 11 walks. 
57 Cubs vs. San Diego, 5/17/77. 23 runs, 24 hits. 
59 Cincinnati vs. Cubs, 6/13/75. 18 runs, 24 hits. 
59 Atlanta vs. Cubs, 8/18/90. 17 runs, 24 hits. 
61 Pittsburgh vs. Cubs, 9/16/75. 22 runs, 24 hits. 

The last is the game in which the Pirates established the record for the biggest shutout in baseball history, 22-0, which still stands, and Rennie Stennett set another still-standing record, getting seven hits in a nine-inning game.

I note further, that I attended the first three on that list (the 56 BFP ones), as well as the Atlanta game in 1990.

Boy, have I seen a lot of bad baseball.