Greg Goossen, Passes at 65
Posted by Steve Lombardi on March 5, 2011
Click here to read the New York Times coverage of his life.
Baseball history is full of players like Goossen. Not much in the statistics to catch your eye - but, he's part of some great baseball lore.
Note, also this week, Greg Golson got beaned in the head with a BP pitch from A.J. Burnett. Clearly, it's not a good week for guys named Greg whose last name starts with "G," ends in "son" or "sen" and has an "o" or two in between.
March 5th, 2011 at 11:38 am
Wally Yomamine passed recently, too, and should be recognized.
March 5th, 2011 at 4:25 pm
Wally Yonamine (I've just learned) played for the SF 49ers in the All-America Football Conference (before it merged into the NFL), played 1 year in the U.S. minor leagues, and had a long and glorious career in Nippon Professional Baseball, culminating in his induction into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wally_Yonamine
http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=yonami001wal
March 5th, 2011 at 4:56 pm
Greg Goossen was the only Seattle Pilot with two multi-HR games. In one of those games, he also grounded into 2 double plays. That 2-HR, 2-GIDP feat was not replicated for 18 years.
Goossen still holds these Seattle/Milwaukee franchise records (min. 100 PAs):
-- Season OPS+, 175. Next-best is 166, by Robin Yount (1982) and Prince Fielder (2009).
-- Career OPS+, 161. Next-best is 142, by Larry Hisle.
-- Career OPS, .934. Next-best is .919, by Prince Fielder. Ryan Braun is at .918.
Goossen also held these franchise records for at least 10 years:
-- Season OPS, .982 (1979, Sixto Lezcano, .987)
-- Season SLG, .597 (2007, Ryan Braun .634, Prince Fielder .618)
-- Season HR %, 6.37% (1979, Gorman Thomas, 6.74%)
March 5th, 2011 at 6:54 pm
I actually was the proud owner of a Greg Goosen signature baseball bat
It was the Mets bat day promotion in 1968. I remember the Mets losing a doubleheader to the Phillies and after checking the schedule to verify it, I googled the date and found a commenter also had received one that day.
At that point Goosens career numbers were 205/.268/274/541 which were probably higher than my were with that bat. By the end of that week he was back n the Minors never to play at Shea Stadium again.
And in case any of the younger readers are wondering, yes MLB teams actually used to provide bats to incoming pre-teens on their way INTO the stadia. This was back before the glut of attorneys hit the USA.
March 6th, 2011 at 7:15 am
Bruce Markusen wrote a nice tribute article about Goosen too:
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/cooperstown-confidential-who-was-greg-goossen/
March 6th, 2011 at 9:38 pm
Reading about Goosen led me back to another old favorite, Ray Oyler. They were teammates on the Pilots and are now both deceased. Oyler wasn't a colorful as his teammate but his batting records are truly amazing. That he could put up those kinds of numbers and be a starter on two Detroit teams that were either in the thick of one of the mostly hotly contested pennant races in history or, the following year, World Series Champions AND hold the all-time Seattle Pilot record for games played at shortstop is nothing short of astonishing. There aren't many post WWII players who's closest comp is a guy who's career ended in 1890 either.