Backwards K Pod

Our profile this week will be on Roger Clemens. The seven-time Cy Young Award winner, and eleven-time All Star, who would rewrite the modern age record books, by establishing himself as the preeminant power arm of his generation. Only to find himself exiled from the very game he dominated, as whispers and suspicions of steroid-use cloud his impressive resume and all of his accomplishments. #RogerC...

This week. Notorius November rolls on, as I take this month to focus on some of baseball's more controversial players, when I detail the life and career of baseball's home run king Barry Bonds. He had a stellar career, made a mountain of money, and holds many records in baseball, but his own actions and words have made him a pariah in the game, perhaps never to attain the Hall of Fame status that...

The curtain has been drawn on the 2024 MLB season, with the Texas Rangers abdicating their throne in favor of the Los Angeles Dodgers, who beat the New York Yankees in five games, to claim the crown of baseball champion in this year's Fall Classic. Jake opens the show with an analytical breakdown of what happened during the history making championship victory, and what to look forward to in the up...

This week we do a deep tissue autopsy on the life and career of the "Big Unit" Randy Johson. As a youngster in the game, his tall stature created problems and setbacks to his immense potential and development. After some sage advice from Strikeout king Nolan Ryan, and after the tragic death of his father, Randy changes his approach to the game, and becomes one of the most dominant left-handed pitc...

For over 100 years, the cries of baseball fever have echoed across the San Diego County region in Southern California. From Oceanside to Otay, from the neighborhood sandlots to the engineering marvel, that is PETCO Park. Baseball has been an integral part of the San Diego sports conscious, that stretches all the way back to May of 1871, when the game is introduced to the city, with it's first reco...

In the long and storied history of baseball, there have been a collection of street corners that have become synonymous with the throwback cribs that have claimed domain there. At the corner of Michigan and Trumbull once stood the iconic Tigers Stadium. 21st and Lehigh was the home of Shibe Park, You had the corner of Findlay and Western, where the Reds played at Crosley Field, and on the south si...

This week. BKP chronicles the baseball life and career of the sport's first great manager. Cornelius MacGillicuddy, better known in the MLB universe as Connie Mack, spent 71 years in organized baseball, from 1884 to 1955 as a bare-handed catcher, a manager, a front office executive and an owner. He carried himself with a quier dignity, and he commanded respect from friends and rivals alike. Along...

This week we do a deep character profile bio on the Wizard, Osborne Earl Smith. Ozzie Smith was one of the few players who could beat you with just his glove, and phenomenal defensive feats. The 15 time All Star, winner of 13 consecutive Gold Gloves, is widely regarded as the greatest defensive shortstop ever, if not the greatest defender at any position, in the history of the game. From being ove...

Ever since 1915, with the exception of the World War Two years, the Koshien Japanese High School Baseball Tournament has beome a national institution, with it's championship game broadcast throughout the country. pulling in millions of viewers who tune in to watch the drama unfold. The annual spring and summer tournament is the culmination of thousands of high school teams competing in regional to...

In 1858, Cincinnati, Ohio is the second most populated city, per capita outside of Manhattan, New York. It is also one of the final destination spots for the Underground Railroad, freeing runaway slaves from the oppressive south, and the young and evolving sport of baseball, takes it's roots in the city. In 1869, the Cincinnati Red Stockings become the first professional baseball team in America....

During the 1976 Major League Baseball season, a shooting star blazes across the baseball universe, as the kid from nowhere is seemingly everywhere, becoming a 1970's pop-culture icon. Mark " The Bird" Fidrych captures the imagination and hearts of seamheads everywhere with his dominanat pitching prowess, and his on-mound antics, becoming a character of the game, who won't be soon forgotten. #MarkF...

With players contractually bound to their respective MLB teams, via the oppressive Reserve Clause. 22 Major League players defect to the Mexican Baseball League in 1946. New commissioner Happy Chandler drops the hammer. and levies five year bans to all the players who jump the league, This week we take a look at the 22 players involved, and the consequences they faced, because of their actions. Ne...

In this week's biographical chapter of ballplayers and their stories, the focus is on the baseball journey and life of the great Eddie Matthews. In tandem with Hank Aaron, the duo would become baseball's most lethal power-hitting combo to ever play the game, As the two players developed into the game's prolific power-hitters of the day, the same Braves team that had just fled the city of Boston, f...

The 1981 MLB season is best remembered for two things; a strike shortened season breaks the season into a story of two halves, and the birth and rise of Fernandomania in Los Angeles. Fernando Valenzuela, was the youngest of 12 siblings, from the backwater town of Etchohuaquila, Mexico. He would rise from abject poverty, to become the bightest star, in the baseball universe in the early 1980's. His...

This week I do a deep dive into the history of baseball in the Steel City. I will give you the genesis backstory on a major league team that has been around since 1882. When a rag-tag group of guys from the Burgh, who called themselves the Alleghenies, would play the then young sport of baseball, after working all day in the mills. I will discuss the rich Negro League heritage of the city, where t...

With his famous corkscrew stance, off balanced follow through, and inside-out swing; line drives came off of Stan Musial's bat like bullets. He spent 22 years in the majors, all with the St. Louis Cardinals. He played in three World Series. and 24 All Star Teams, while winning 7 batting titles, and three league MVP Awards. This week we do a deep character profile dig on " The Man", who is best rem...

I've had to re-learn the Ty Cobb story, that I've heard all of my life, because a fraudulent, hack sportswriter had always set the false narrative. This week i will do a deep character profile study of the great Tyrus Raymond Cobb. Discern between the researched facts and the myths, that made up this most complex man. And hopefully i can be but a piece of justice, for the Ty Cobb legacy, that has...

At every level of baseball, Jim Abbott had doubters and skeptics. They doubted him in grade school little-league, high school, college, and the major leagues. He had model size, and a 95 MPH fastball. By any standard, he would be considered great. What made Abbott stand out during his amateur and pro career, were the challenges he overcame to compete at the highest level. Jim was born with a defor...

This week we dive into the history of the Baker Bowl, the home of the Philadelphia Phillies from 1887-1938. There were two versions of the ballpark. While both were considered state of the art engineering marvels of their day, both would be beset by tragedy, and both would devolve from sugar to shit. #BakerBowl #NationalLeaguePark #PhiladelphiaPhillies #AlfredReach #ColonelRogers #WilliamBaker #Re...

This week we do a deep dive into the legend of the Iron Horse, Lou Gehrig. While the roaring 20's was the perfect age, for the larger than life, overindulgent, and bombastic Babe Ruth. The 1930's saw the country headed for dark times, and economic collapse. Baseball now needed a hero who was solid, dependable and dignified. The baseball universe would find that hero in Lou Gehrig. #LouGehrig #NewY...

Milwaukee has a rich baseball tradition, and a legacy that goes back to the 1870's. Granted, it's never been the center of the mid-west baseball universe, and never will, considering Chicago's close proximity. But the last quarter of the 19th century, and the first half of the 20th century, often found the city of Milwaukee, in the thick of major league baseball, but never quite able to sustain a...

Denton True "Cyclone" Young left a baseball legacy behind that is ulikely to ever be matched. He won 511 games, which is almost 100 more than Walter Johnson. His resume of records also include, most starts, complete games, innings pitched, hits surrendered, earned runs allowed, losses and batters faced, as statistically speaking, he stands head and shoulders, above any pitcher who has ever played...

In 1966, a fresh-faced. twenty year old kid arrives on the baseball scene, and puts the immortal Sandy Koufax on the shelf, when he beats the icon, in his last baseball appearance; Game three of the World Series, 17 years later, he's beating Hall Of Famer, Steve Carlton in game three of the 1983 World Series. In between those amazing book ends, Jim Palmer became the most consistent, and dominant p...

According to legendary Negro Leagues pitcher Satchel Paige, Cool Papa Belll was so fast, he once hit a line drive up the middle, that hit him in the ass, when he was sliding into second base. This week we do a case study on the great speedster. Just the mere mention of his name, would conjur up, many fantastical stories, by teammates and opponents alike, about his blazing speed. Some true, some no...

Even though the San Francisco Giants have won three chips in the past 14 years, the fan base has seen it's share of cold days and hard times. There were the windy, foggy days, out at Candlestick Park. The happless teams of the1980's and 90's. Being seductively wooed by Toronto in the 1970's, and by the city of Tampa in the 1990's. As well as the two years of watching Armando Benitez as their close...