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Monday, December 7, 2015

Memorable Days for Both Nolan Ryan and Lou Gehrig

On this day in 1939, less than six months after playing his last game, Lou Gehrig is elected to the baseball Hall of Fame.  The five-year waiting period was waived since he had ALS.




In 1988 on this day Nolan Ryan signed as a free agent with the Rangers.  Ryan would then become the first player to play for all four of the original expansion teams - Mets, Astros, Senators/Rangers and Angels.  I never knew that.  



Did anyone else play for all four other those franchises?  Let's see how long it takes me to find out.  Nine minutes later - I've gotten just Darren Oliver.  

Ryan played from 1966 to 1993.  Oliver played from 1993 to 2013.  Together  they played for almost my entire life.  

Amazingly, Ryan and Oliver were teammates for September of 1993.  Oliver only appeared twice and in neither game did Ryan pitch.  In his first game Oliver came in to give an intentional walk to Mike Greenwell.  That was it.

In Oliver's only other appearance on 10-02-1993, he pitched over three innings and gave up a home run to Gary Gaetti who hit 360 career homers.  Wow, I didn't realize he hit that many.  Gaetti hit two homers in 13 career at-bats versus Oliver.

Gaetti hit only one homer off Nolan Ryan in 16 career at-bats.  The two were in opposite leagues for most of their career overlap and there was no inter-league play back then.




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