Guess The Flapper, The Town and The Year
Ok, so for starters this is an absolutely abominable picture if we’re just talking about guessing the Flapper. I don’t know how anyone gets this. Besides that this picture is great, let’s dive into an analysis…..
Now, the uniform might not have had the Patrician elegancy of a Sunset Magazine sponsored team. Few did. But look closer! Left index finger gamely pulled out of glove. Workman-like sweatshirt rolled up to the elbow. Grizzled color line meandering down the pant leg morphing perfectly into stirrups the way they should always have been worn. Plebeian roots, maybe, but a young lad born with moxie and verve. Whoever was unfortunate enough to be standing in the batters box just struck out…..
A Place To Talk About Giants Baseball 
He’s a little upright on the release. I’d like to see a little more drive off the rubber. But the glove/shoe/3/4 sleeve game on this guy is strong as hell.
no guess? I feel like you’re the front runner to get this one.
the consensus #1 pick in draft, 1b Spencer Torkelson, is at Arizona St. and played high school ball at Casa Grande of Petaluma…also alma mater of Amy G. from “P-town.” Nice story on him in Chron today.
Is that a glint of glasses under the cap? Zumie, Fremont, 1974.
Great photo, but it’s not me. I never played organized baseball past little league. That photo seems like someone older than little league. That IS about what I looked like at that age.
Yeah, that’s my hair . . .
Good God, man. Too funny.
Not the quality of great old timey pix he posts here, but is that Dirt?
No but that’s a great guess.
first line of MLBTR story that I think also applies to Giants; another reason I really hope there is a season:
“The Mariners never expected to contend in 2020, but a lost or truncated season stands to impact the club’s developmental timeline.”
Look, it would be great to see new OF of Yaz Dick Davis (maybe even Ramos), plus Dubon and for that matter Bart as Posey’s back up get ML reps for a few months. Add Webb as SP not on innings limit and all the young pen guys like Gott Rogers yada yada maybe even Moronta. Beyond that, without minors ball all the prospect guys like Luciano Toribio Hjelle, the guys they got last year like Bishop and Wilson, none of these guys will have any competition at all.
Hopefully an extended AZ Fall league this year will allow some of the 7 (!) picks Giants have coming tmw to get some action too. No ball at all with definitely have negative impact on giants “developmental timeline” for players and I’d also say for Kapler as well.
Been outta the loop too long to get Dick Davis, Ramos,Toribio. Can you fill me in on those guys, Willedav?
Interesting right knee hitting the ground ala Tom Seaver!
Ok I’ll give it a go Blade??
negative! But I hope Blade submits a pic!
Stix: Dickerson played briefly in LF for Giants last year and showed a lot of power despite some debilitating injuries that cut his season way short.
Jaylin Davis is guy they acquired in a trade, great AAA stats.
Heliot Ramos lit up high A ball last year in San Jose and played little AA too for Richmond, top rated OF.
Toribio another of Giants top prospects.
I think you can find some more stats/background info on widget “SF minor stats.”
Thanx. Will check it out.
DJ Loo, 1970, Brooklyn NY.
Negative but another outstanding guess!
Is it Xoot?
Great stories by PNA and Chuck last night. Reminds me of the time I met Jay Bennett, multi-instrumentalist from Wilco (my namesake). Jay had just been fired from the band and was playing a solo show at a small club in Austin. There may have been maybe 50 people at the show, mostly ardent Wilco fans like myself. When the show ended and Jay was packing up his gear (no more roadies since his dismissal from the band), I walked up to him and introduced myself. I told him I was a huge fan of his and that I had recently seen Wilco play and that his musical brilliance was noticeably absent from the band.
He must of loved hearing the adulation, because he invited me back to the “green room” which was more of a storage closet and not a backstage room filled with bottles of booze and girls like they might expect at the Fillmore. He opened up a cooler, lightly filled by the club with one remaining bottle of Sierra Nevada. He handed it to me, saw my Giants hat and said “if your from SF, this is more up your alley. It’s too hoppy for me.” He then proceeded to head to the bar where he ordered a Lone Star (when in Rome, I guess) and to my dismay the bartender rung him up for $4. I pulled out a $5 and returned the favor.
We talked for the next 20 minutes or so about his exit from the band, which was not his choice. It was like coming home from work to find that your wife had your belongings in the driveway and without warning, announces that she doesn’t love you anymore. This was a man wounded by his true love; music.
About 7 years later, Jay died from an overdose of Fentanyl. I kept that bottle of Sierra Nevada as a reminder of my star struck encounter with one of my musical heroes. To this day, I can’t listen to such brilliant Wilco albums like Being There and Summerteeth and not hear his influence all over those songs. In fact, the band hasn’t been the same since his departure. Some of their most recent work has been so bad, that I have considered changing my handle.
That is gold right there. Great story.
wow fantastic sad story; very cool you covered his beer. Fentanyl is a scourge.
Yeah rock solid gold story W/J , always cool when you can meet someone you looked up too!
Having a cold one together must have been special!!
My guess…UncaC…
I’ve hung around a bit with a certain Flapper from the Suisun Valley, who I know used to pitch. Like Jermaine Dye, he’s a Vacaville guy, and I’m gonna connect all of those dots and say that is James, circa 1979 and the F stands for “Fairfield.”
oh man used to have to drive delivery van from San Jose to Vacaville Nut Tree Outlet as part of route that came south (Concord Dublin). After some rough times at CHP truck scales there on 80, we figured out a way around them and you reconnect with 80 right by where the big Budweiser plant is. As I used to tell Raider Fan driver, a big Bud fan, “Uh, stay out of the Fairfield area.”
I’m guessing it is sandog himself.
Nope. No pics of me playing baseball. There might be one of me that I’ll never find, in my St. Matt’s basketball gear. Funny thing is, those shorts looked like they were from the 40’s. And, no, I’m not THAT old!
Wilco, that’s too bad. Great story, but sad. Their early stuff is fantastic. Kinda like Fleetwood Mac. I wasn’t aware of their early stuff until I heard Green Manalishi by Judas Priest. That led me to Oh Well, and then the early peter Green FM albums.
Have to say I have a soft spot in my heart for the JP Version. Even though this song suffers from the never-ending ending of songs so prevalent in the 70s. Fast forward the first 1:30 of this as it is 70s rock god posturing at its worst (best?).
The three earliest 60s era FMac albums are great — the best British blues, imo (and I like Mayall). Albatross and Black Magic Woman really stood out. Peter Green is still recording, I believe, now that they’ve found some meds that address his wild-ass visions.
Playboy After Dark had FMac on once, just before Green left the band. Good live versions of two songs from Oh Well. And, of course, Hugh and his friends dancing. It’s on youtube.
My take on the Wilco situation is different. I loved Jay’s work with the band, and he was a joy to watch in concert. I was heartbroken when I read that he had died.
His firing from the band was not handled right.
But, it’s clear from the Wilco documentary “I am trying to break your heart,” bandleader Jeff Tweedy wanted to take the band in a new musical direction, and Jay was resistant to that. Tweedy felt they had taken the sound of their early albums to its limit. He wanted to peel back the sound of the band, and have more open space in the sound. It was the old cliche “musical differences.” Jeff had more power within the band as lead singer and main songwriter.
Wilco became less of a rootsy rock band and more of an art-rock band. I like both versions of Wilco a lot. And Wilco kept growing in popularity, and plays big amphitheaters now, They grew the size of their audience.
I still tell people that Jeff Tweedy has been the best songwriter of this past generation.
I still enjoy Wilco’s music, but I do feel bad about what happened to Jay. I bought some of his solo albums. I was pulling for him. He was a brilliant musician. I’ll always remember his big grin during their shows. They were great and he knew it. They were the best band in the world. I fully believe that. They might still be the best band in the world, depending on who you ask.
It’s a great film if you ever get a chance to see it.
Parts of it are not an easy watch, but the film does give Jay his say.
Tweedy did allow a depiction of himself, warts and all, in the film.
I think Jeff has become a better person since then, from what I’ve seen in interviews. He’s less obsessed with music, and a better rounded person. And a more round person in the physical sense, as he gained some weight after giving up cigarettes. He used to chain smoke.
That documentary came out less than a year after I met Jay. I saw it the day it opened at a little art theater in Austin. Watching the moments with Jay brought back memories of our conversation. I felt like I had special sneak preview that night conversing with him.
Diggity wins! That is, indeed, the esteemed James!
I’ll let James fill in the year, I don’t know the year.
straight up gamer
Heard the Giants might be interested in Tyler Soderstrom Left handed hitting catcher from TurlockGiants drafted his father Steve #6 a pitcher in 93.
With Posey& just drafting Bart not sure of the reasoning, other than Z likes flexibility in his players,and reports that Tyler could also move to 3rd are corner outfield positions.Even Bart is trying on a 1st base glove.Thats the Zman he’s all about VERSATILITY in all of his players!!
1975, sophomore year, Fairfield Falcons. You steered clear of Fairfield back then for reasons other than WillieD’s. SD, yes, despite getting a lot of the motion to look right, it was mostly arm and I’m paying for that to this day. I coulda used some help from a Mr. Lincecum-like muse. It still just takes one game of catch for my right arm to be taken back to its unhappy teen years. At least the scrapes on the right knee healed.
thanks for submitting your pic! I encourage anyone who has a cool photo from back in the day to send it to me. bigflavor77@gmail.com
playing baseball or not, doesn’t matter.
And thanks for the intro. I think the photo was taken during a throwing session — the SS didn’t do a lot of shifting back then. 🙂 I was probably going for the K, anyway ….
Solid pic there, James.
What was your WHIP & BABIP over that ’75 season? ERA-?? spine rate???
If I had them, they’d be damn ugly. The HBPs probably did a lot of damage to the WHIP.
Nice action pic, James. Were you on a pitch count?
No need, I usually reached Dirty Sanchez totals by the 3rd or 4th.
Great pic James. 25 yrs ago we used to take the detour route off going north 680 to Green Valley Rd. and then on into Cordelia, one lane each side. A few shops, one stop sign and then residential. Same road out of town with occasional CHPs to bust illegal big rigs; nearby was I think a bird or animal rescue place and a lot of housing being constructed before the road that got you back onto 80. I remember a Guittard chocolate factory building too.
bet this area looks lot different now…One of the former mgrs. where I used to deliver had a daughter who played b-ball for either Wood or Vac high, and then over at Solano JC.
I knew there was something else about Fairfield…Jelly Belly factory!
That and the omnipresent Budweiser factory.
James, did the Fairfield Falcons saran wrap the dugout when you pitched?
lulz
Ha, the only one of us who ever gratified: https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=powers001lar
We lived in Green Valley from 1989-1997 when I moved to Austin. WillieD, I remember all the CHip’s pulling 18 wheelers over on Green Valley and Rockville Rd for bypassing the scales. I ended up going to Justin-Siena (Catholic HS in Napa) as I was too much of a fancy boy to go to Fairfield or Armijo. 😉
Ha. Damn scales were pain in the ass if you got flagged for inspection; we ran into them at top of summit Sheridan Rd. 680 south of 580 split and on 880 Fremont by old Toyota (now Tesla I guess) plant. Chips owned you and they knew it.
Anything that required mechanic to fix meant $$$, an hour’s delay and another full inspection before you were allowed back on the road. Our trucks were only 13 ft box vans so light enough not to get in any trouble on side roads. that was a pretty cool detour road to take too. suspect it’s gotten developed quite a bit by now.
That was the old Ford plant in the 60s. My dad’s 1969 Mach I came from there. Man, that was a bad ass car.
The ford plant was in Milpitas. I knew a guy who worked there for a while. He said his job was to install four screws on the driver’s side floorboard. He could handle two, once in a while, three, before the line moved on. Modern Times redux. The Warm Springs Fremont plant was GM (later GM/Toyota JV) — I remember GM pickup trucks in the old days. On the SP, we used to run a locomotive into the plant, extract a very long cut of empty boxcars from the loading dock and then shove a very long cut of loaded boxcars back in. The finished vehicles rolled out of the plant onto two-tiered auto carrying cars, too. I wonder if Tesla even uses the RR yard and mainline? They’re big on 24/7 instant-inventory semis, I think.
I’ll bet there haven’t been too many cars from GV in the FHS lot for a good while now. One of my closest buddies back then had an MG he’d regularly escort himself into school with from the Valley.
Cool picture, James. Thanks for sharing and providing a bit of entertainment, today.
Lakers at Celts game 4 1987, classic on nba tv. These 2 dominated 80s, great match ups in half court at both ends.
On this day June 9th Mike Trout was the 25th draft pick by the Los Angeles Angels ..And the rest is History!
Also the only player to show up for the draft pick show. Shows how much class and respect he has for the game!
Year was 2009
Maybe I’ve missed some recent posts, but feel like I haven’t seen Loo around for awhile. Loo, you out there?….
I’m guessing Loo got tired of the BS about politics Trump/Biden daily crap 💩.
His last post I remember was that he said I thought this was a baseball blog?
Yes, maybe. I disappeared from the Flap for a month or so at the beginning Covid and I noticed Loo had noticed that, so I’m returning the favor. Hope he’s ok.
Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival announced it is officially cancelled for this year. No surprise, obviously.
A lot of musical acts depend on festivals for a good percentage of their yearly income. Some of the acts are doing some online performances and getting some income from fans that way.
The city of SF hotels take a hit from the festival being cancelled. We always stayed at the Stanyon Hotel across the street from Golden Gate Park. We would reserve our room a year in advance because hotels would sell out all over the city for that weekend.
The hotel is pretty close to the start of Haight St. near the Park. There’s a huge Amoeba’s music store on Haight near there. I don’t buy many albums anymore. We have so many CDs from over the years.
The younger generations don’t want to buy music. They expect it free from internet sources. This means music acts, even giant acts like Springsteen, have a hard time selling music. The live show is just about all the income for a lot of performers these days. And now the virus has complicated that.
Great pic, James. Though I notice you’re falling off toward 1st base side, no doubt to cover for a possible bunt, because we all know how much love bunting…. 🙂 Wish I had some old baseball pics, had some good ones. Now stored in someone’s basement somewhere..
how much *you* love bunting
Draft is tomorrow? Maybe there will be some baseball to talk about….