Post by rog on Sept 20, 2018 11:00:15 GMT -5
Moon Man Minton -- The story behind his nickname, as he told James K. Skipper in the invaluable "Baseball Nicknames." While he was a Giants Minor Leaguer, Minton went tubing down the river one day. In his own words:
"Well, it so happened that I forgot one thing -- my clothes. And certain parts of my body got very badly sunburned. The burn was so bad, in fact, that I got ugly water blisters .... Big blisters, craters. So that night, when I walked into the clubhouse and started putting on my uniform, manager Rocky Bridges took one look at me and said my body had more craters than the moon. I became 'Moonman' or 'Moonie.'"
According to Wikipedia, Minton's nickname, "Moon Man," (also) stemmed from various escapades such as the hijacking of the team bus and the flooding of a minor league ballpark so he could leave Amarillo one day early at the end of the season.
I nicknamed Greg "Piano Man." While moving into his house in San Ramon, his piano got loose on his sloping driveway. Being a closer who was used to coming to the rescue, Minton rushed in front of the sliding piano and tried to "catch" it. He showed he was more pitcher than catcher when the piano ran him over, causing him to miss time.
ESPN cites another freak Moon Man injury:
"In 1985, Giants pitcher Greg Minton showed up at spring training hurt, after he drove a nail through the middle of his pitching hand while trying to shoe a horse."
All in all, I think the Moon Man richly deserved his nickname.
Speaking of the moon and the Giants, manager Al Dark once cracked that a man would walk on the moon before pitcher Gaylord Perry hit a home run. Sure enough, within minutes of the moon walk, Perry jacked his first ball out of the park.
Perry went on to homer in each of the next three seasons as well, and wound up his career with half a dozen homers. In contrast, despite being a Hall of Fame pitcher, Gaylord gave up just one homer less than 400.
I guess when it came to homers, Gaylord could have been said to have posted a (minus) -393. The worst was Jamie Moyer, who yielded a major league high 522 homers without hitting a single one himself.
"Well, it so happened that I forgot one thing -- my clothes. And certain parts of my body got very badly sunburned. The burn was so bad, in fact, that I got ugly water blisters .... Big blisters, craters. So that night, when I walked into the clubhouse and started putting on my uniform, manager Rocky Bridges took one look at me and said my body had more craters than the moon. I became 'Moonman' or 'Moonie.'"
According to Wikipedia, Minton's nickname, "Moon Man," (also) stemmed from various escapades such as the hijacking of the team bus and the flooding of a minor league ballpark so he could leave Amarillo one day early at the end of the season.
I nicknamed Greg "Piano Man." While moving into his house in San Ramon, his piano got loose on his sloping driveway. Being a closer who was used to coming to the rescue, Minton rushed in front of the sliding piano and tried to "catch" it. He showed he was more pitcher than catcher when the piano ran him over, causing him to miss time.
ESPN cites another freak Moon Man injury:
"In 1985, Giants pitcher Greg Minton showed up at spring training hurt, after he drove a nail through the middle of his pitching hand while trying to shoe a horse."
All in all, I think the Moon Man richly deserved his nickname.
Speaking of the moon and the Giants, manager Al Dark once cracked that a man would walk on the moon before pitcher Gaylord Perry hit a home run. Sure enough, within minutes of the moon walk, Perry jacked his first ball out of the park.
Perry went on to homer in each of the next three seasons as well, and wound up his career with half a dozen homers. In contrast, despite being a Hall of Fame pitcher, Gaylord gave up just one homer less than 400.
I guess when it came to homers, Gaylord could have been said to have posted a (minus) -393. The worst was Jamie Moyer, who yielded a major league high 522 homers without hitting a single one himself.