Life of Pie.

      Things have gotten a little, um, weird, this week for most of us.  But really, is there anything going on that can't be solved with a hot cup of coffee and a beautiful slice of pie?  Alas, my love of Twin Peaks will have to wait for another time (my best friend got me this for Christmas and all that will show up here eventually).  I also was going to post my American Pie sets but I checked and saw that I did already.  That left me with the very obvious choice of Hall of Famer Pie Traynor.

Long ago I made a threat to put together a page of ol' Pie here and in the subsequent five years, look, I actually did.  Pie Traynor, despite his wonderful nickname, is one of those hall of famers that I don't know much about.  I know he was considered the best third baseman in history until Eddie Mathews and then Mike Schmidt and George Brett came along...and that's about it.  I couldn't even tell you his real name (Harold Joseph Traynor).  So a little bit of card back reading and SABR and wiki research has made a ten minute expert in the life and times of Pie. He was considered a wizard with the glove.  He only hit double digits in homers once and hit just 58 in his career.  He did, however, hit 164 triples and while that is a ton, it doesn't crack the top three in Pirates history - Honus Wagner, Paul Waner, and Roberto Clemente all have more.  In fact, those 164 would lead all but five teams in MLB history, including some very old ones (The Yankees and the Giants to name two - I also learned that Lou Gehrig leads the Yanks with 163, a number I wouldn't have come close to guess for him). He is the only player to steal home in an All-Star Game.  He was a player manager for a time and resigned as manager after the Homer in the Gloamin' (one of my favorite event nicknames in all of sport) ruined his confidence in himself and the team.  I also learned that he grew up in Somerville MA (a town I know well) and his nickname came from a grocer who called him Pie Face due to his...love of pie.  I am not sure what I was expecting from a nickname like that, but hey, that'll do. 

Happy Pi Day everyone!