Sparky Anderson Teaches Management

Sparky Anderson once said this about managing: "I don't believe a manager ever won a pennant. Casey Stengel won all those pennants with the Yankees. How many did he win with the Boston Braves and Mets?"

And:  "My idea of managing is giving the ball to Tom Seaver and sitting down and watching him work."

And: "We averaged 96 wins my nine years in Cincinnati. We had Bench, Rose, Morgan, Perez, Foster, Griffey, Concepcion and Geronimo. Imagine what I could have done if they (the Reds front office) had given me some players!"

There were other quotes. Many, many others.

Lee May ... Happy Birthday

One of my first baseball heroes, if I may use that word, was Lee May. Today is his birthday. Happy birthday, Lee.

Lee was a big-boppin' first baseman for the Cincinnati Reds in the late 1960s. I started to really follow him in 1969, when he hit .278 with 38 homers and 110 RBI. In 1970, he batted .253-34-98, and in '71, he hit .278-39-98. Then the Reds up and traded him to the Astros. On November 29, 1971, he was traded by the Cincinnati Reds with Tommy Helms and Jimmy Stewart to the Houston Astros for Ed Armbrister, Jack Billingham, Cesar Geronimo, and Denis Menke.

Oh, and Joe Morgan.

I didn't understand this. Why would they trade a young, great slugger and the steady Tommy Helms for a bunch of players that I was not too familiar with? Of course, it turned out that it was one of the greatest trades in Reds history, if not THE greatest, and I spent the rest of my days as a huge Tony Perez fan, as well as a Joe Morgan fan.

But I'll always remember big Lee.