Obscure sports trivia

Just looked him up. He was only on base 12 times in his career (though he did score two runs), so he might never have had a chance to run.

 

OK, been plowing through baseball reference and just found the answer

OK, been plowing through baseball reference and just found the answer to this one. Cycling, let me know if/when it's OK to spill it.

BTW, I almost missed this because there's a bit of a tricky circumstance involved.

 

Jim Thorpe?

 

I say fire away

 

Not Thorpe, who according to several stories I’ve read over the years promoted John McGraw to post a sign in the clubhouse, “no wrestling the Indian.”

 

Ace Parker, quarterback for the NFL's Brooklyn Dodgers/Boston Yanks/New York Yankees (and the NFL's 1940 MVP), homered in his first career at bat for the Philadelphia A's in 1937.

The tricky part is it wasn't in his first career appearance. On April 24, he entered the game as a pinch-runner in the ninth and scored in a 6-4 victory at Washington. Six days later, he pinch-hit in the ninth and hit a two-run homer in a 15-5 loss at Boston.

 

that is him. I am honestly not sure why he is in the Football Hall. Not trying to be mean, but his career was short and not really that memorable.

 

I looked at his game log on Baseball Reference, looked at the HR column in his first game, saw a zero and was about to move on when I saw a zero in the at-bat column as well. Then I checked his next game -- one at-bat, one home run.

 

Well, one reason his career was short was that he lost three seasons to World War II. And he's in because he was one of those triple/quadruple-threat guys who ran, passed, caught passes and kicked, and he was named all-NFL in three of his seven seasons. And, hey, in 1940 he actually threw more touchdown passes (10) than interceptions (7), which was rare back then. He also did that in his last season, with 8 TDs and 3 ints. in 1946.

Still, he was no Spec Sanders.

 

Who was the only pitcher in the 1980s to win 25 games in a season?

In that same decade, what team won the World Series despite having one of their top starting pitchers go 7-16, 5.35?

 

Has to be Steve Stone in 1980 for the first.

 

for the second part, Wild guess would be Larry Lerch for the Phils in 1980. He was really bad that year, but don’t think he got 16 losses. Also, could be the 1983 orioles and Dennis Martinez