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#218 – Phil Bradley

philbradley

Name: Phil Bradley

Rank: 218

Position: OF

Year With White Sox: 1990

With a surprising White Sox squad only 3 games behind the reigning champion A’s for the AL West crown in 1990, they swung a deadline deal that sent Ron Kittle to the Orioles in exchange for Phil Bradley.  “I have always liked the way Phil Bradley plays,” general manager Larry Himes said.  “He has good fundamentals, is very aggressive and a fine addition to our club.”

While Bradley was hitting .270 for the Orioles at the time of the trade, his average plummeted to .226 while with the White Sox as the A’s ran away with the division title.  He went 0-3 in his final appearance of the season, the last night game at Comiskey Park.

Following the season, Bradley left the White Sox to play in Japan and never again played in the major leagues.

Bradley’s numbers in a White Sox uniform, both for games I attended and overall, were:

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You Ought To Be In (19) Pictures

Movie_Reel_22Many years ago, using the weekly TV guide that came with the Sunday Chicago Tribune, I started keeping track of all of the movies I had seen over the course of my lifetime.  The guide would list the two main stars for each movie, and that is a tradition that I’ve carried on in my database ever since.  So, given those guidelines, it is time to look at all of the actors that have starred in at least 10 films that I have seen, as of May 30th.

Today, we dive into the 3 actors that have starred in 19 movies that I have seen.

Ben Affleck

The first Ben Affleck starring role that I saw was in 1997, when I saw both Going All The Way and Chasing Amy.  In 1999, he kicked off a 6 year run where I saw 11 of his films, including 3 films in both 2000 and 2003.  There were 5 years total where I had seen multiple Affleck outings.  In recent years, he has been focusing more on directing, including the last film in which I saw him, 2012’s Argo which I saw last year.  He’s likely to move up this list in the future thanks to his casting as Batman in the upcoming Man of Steel sequel.

George Clooney

George Clooney was bouncing around Hollywood for a while before becoming a superstar on a little show called ER, whose pilot movie was his first entry on this list.  That launched him to great film success.  2 films is my high water mark for Clooney, one which I have reached 5 different times, most recently in 2012.  Like Affleck in the future, Clooney also had the opportunity to wear the cowl and cape in 1997’s Batman & Robin, which killed off that franchise and set the stage for Christopher Nolan’s Bat franchise.  My most recent Clooney experience, which will actually bump him up to the next tier, was Gravity, which I saw earlier this year after the cutoff for this list.

Eddie Murphy

It’s hard to believe now, but at one time, Eddie Murphy was the biggest star in the land.  My first experience with him was likely Beverly Hills Cop.  7 of his films were seen before I started keeping track, so I’m not sure of when I first saw them.  Of the 7 years since that I have seen an Eddie Murphy film, 5 of them have been multiples.  It’s been over a decade since I’ve seen one of his starring perfromances, as I suffered through both Showtime and Adventures Of Pluto Nash in 2004.

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Ballpark Tour – Target Field

targetfieldStadium Name: Target Field

Location: Minneapolis

Home Team: Twins

Years in Service: 2010 – Present

Visits: 2

After 28 seasons of indoor baseball at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, the Twins moved back outside starting with the 2010 season when they opened Target Field in downtown Minneapolis.  The first regular season game took place on April 12, 2010, with the Twins defeating the Red Sox.  This summer, Target Field hosted the All Star Game, the first in Minnesota since 1985.

I took the long trip up to Minneapolis last weekend, along with Danny and Michael, to see the White Sox take on the Twins.  We picked two good games to see, as the White Sox offense came to life and they won both games against the Twinkies.  We sat down on the first level, between home plate and third base behind the White Sox dugout for both games, so I didn’t get to sample the different areas of the ballpark, but I certainly liked what I saw.  The one thing I didn’t like about the park was the configuration of most of the outfield.  Between the large hitting background in center field and the high walls in left and right, there is a lot of dead space in the outfield that seems to put the fans far away from the action.  Besides that, though, a good time was had by all and I certainly wouldn’t mind returning one day.

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#219 – Dave Cochrane

dcochrane

Name: Dave Cochrane

Rank: 219

Position: 3B

Year With White Sox: 1986

Dave Cochrane joined the White Sox organization on July 16, 1985, when he was acquired from the Mets in exchange for Tom Paciorek.  The following year, he was a September callup for the White Sox, making his major league debut on September 2, 1986 against the Royals.  Cochrane appeared in 19 games for the White Sox down the stretch in a season that saw the team lose 90 games.

Despite hitting .271 with 15 home runs for Triple A Hawaii in 1987, Cochrane did not get a chance to return to the major leagues.  On February 3, 1988, he was packaged along with Floyd Bannister in a trade with the Royals that brought back John Davis, Greg Hibbard, and Melido Perez.

Cochrane’s numbers in a White Sox uniform were:

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GF4 – Week 3

Y4Week3A good week that saw the entire week, sans Sunday, above 5800 steps, with 2 days well above 11,000 steps thanks to a trip up to Minnesota.  After a 4 day work week, I took the supposed 7 hour drive up to Minneapolis on Friday, stopping in Madison for some mini golf.  After arriving in Minneapolis, there was a 1.2 mile walk from the hotel over to Target Field.  Saturday included a trip out to the Mall of America for some more mini golf, a mirror maze, and general traipsing.  Once we got back to the hotel, there was some more walking to find a place for lunch, before another trip to Target Field that night.  Sunday’s low total could be chalked up to driving 8 hours to get home.

Total steps: 52,516

Daily average: 7502.3

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Book 12 (of 52) – The Barkeep

William Lashner - The Barkeep

William Lashner – The Barkeep

One of the perks of Amazon Prime is getting a free Kindle book every month.  Earlier this year, I ended up selecting The Barkeep, by William Lashner, mostly because it looked like the most interesting of the options.  I had never heard of Lashner before, but an interesting cover drew me in.  I started reading this back in April when I was in Los Angeles.

Nearly 4 months later, I have finally finished it.  Which makes it sound like I didn’t enjoy it, which isn’t necessarily true.  It was a slow burn and it did take a while to pull me in, but eventually it did.  As the title suggests, this is the tale of a bartender who, years before, found his mother’s dead body and helped put his father in prison.  Now, when an old man shows up at his bar suggesting that his father is innocent and that he, in fact, was hired to kill the bartender’s mother, he starts to question everything in his life.

Like I said, it took a long while for this book to draw me in.  Eventually, all of the threads started to come together and drew me in to the story.  Still, it was a bit of a chore and I don’t know if I would be up to taking in another of Lashner’s works any time soon.

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Hall Of Fame Pitching Leaders

greg-madduxSunday, former Cubs pitcher Greg Maddux took his place in Cooperstown alongside Braves teammate Tom Glavine, Frank Thomas, and former managers Joe Torre, Bobby Cox, and Tony LaRussa. I thought it would be interesting to look at the overall leaders amongst Hall of Famers on both sides of the ball from all of the games I’ve attended between 1984 and 2013, finishing up with the defense.  Which seemed like a much better idea before I saw there are only 4 Hall of Fame pitchers I’ve seen live.  Oh well.

Wins

Name Total
Greg Maddux 9
Tom Glavine 1
Rich Gossage 1

Losses

Name Total
Greg Maddux 12
Tom Glavine 2
Tom Seaver 2
Rich Gossage 1

ERA

Name Total
Rich Gossage 3.86
Greg Maddux 4.17
Tom Seaver 4.21
Tom Glavine 7.62

Strikeouts

Name Total
Greg Maddux 92
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You Ought To Be In (18) Pictures

Movie_Reel_22Many years ago, using the weekly TV guide that came with the Sunday Chicago Tribune, I started keeping track of all of the movies I had seen over the course of my lifetime.  The guide would list the two main stars for each movie, and that is a tradition that I’ve carried on in my database ever since.  So, given those guidelines, it is time to look at all of the actors that have starred in at least 10 films that I have seen, as of May 30th.

Today, we continue with the 5 actors that have starred in 18 movies that I have seen.

Jennifer Aniston

18 is the high level mark for actresses, and Aniston is one of 4 that are tied for this lead.  My first movie experience with the former Friends star came in 1997, with a double feature of She’s The One and Leprechaun.  In the 14 years since, she has been a pretty steady contributor.  Even when she would miss a year, there would be a multi-entry year to make up for it.  The high water mark was 1998, when I saw her in 3 starring roles.  Her most recent entries, Wanderlust and Just Go With It, are from last year.

Sandra Bullock

Sandra Bullock burst on the scene in 1994’s Speed, but Dennis Hopper took home the second starring slot in that one, so her starring role the following year in The Net was likely her first entry on this list.  That kicked off a 9 year run where I saw a movie where she had a starring role.  The only “franchise” in her list, other than the Speed sequel, are the Miss Congeniality films, which only make up 2 of her total.  2010 was the last time I watched one of her films, but, as of this writing, I have Gravity home from Netflix, so she should be moving in to the lead for actresses relatively soon.

John Cusack

The one male to be at 18 first entered my movie-watching consciousness in 1988 when he portrayed disgraced White Sox thirdbaseman Buck Weaver in Eight Men Out.  After a 9 year dry spell, Cusack came back with a vengeance with 3 films in 1997 which started a run of 8 films in 4 years.  His most recent film that I’ve seen was 2003’s Runaway Jury, which I watched in 2012.

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