With a 6-5 win over the Cleveland Indians on Sunday, Mike Scioscia became just the fifth active manager to win 1000 games trailing just Tony LaRussa, Jim Leyland, Dusty Baker and Bruce Bochy.
"It's not a personal accomplishment," the Los Angeles Angels skipper said following the game. "As a manager, you're one small part of this whole thing."
Scioscia is now 1000-817, good for a ..550 winning percentage. This is 12th season as Angels' manager which makes him the longest tenured manager in the American League and second longest in the Majors behind LaRussa.
In 2007, with his 626th victory, Scioscia became the winningest manager in Angels' history, surpassing Bill Rigney.
Last week, I previewed (kinda) the return of Los Angeles Angels skipper Mike Scioscia to America's longest-running sitcom..."The Simpsons". And by now, most of you have seen it, read about it, downloaded it or whatever.
My take is that, outside of the creepy opening, "MoneyBART" was, at best...pretty awful.
Now, I'll leave the tater trot tracking of Bart's home run to my friend Larry Granillo over at Wezen-Ball and the roundup of notable quotables to the boys from Big League Stew...I'm here to focus on the only two things I took from the episode.
First, while Bart, Homer and the gang haven't aged a bit in the 18 years since Mr. Burns put together an All-Star cast for his company's softball team...Mike Scoscia has. His hair is a grayer, his waistline is a little thicker and, best of all, he's healthy.
If you recall, in "Homer at the Bat", the then-catcher for the Los Angeles Dodgers took a job at the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant where, unfortunately, he was stricken with radiation poisoning. Now, he's been stricken with "super managing power" and the ability to de-magnetize credit cards.
Second, Scioscia can offer up some sage wisdom.
The plot of the episode, in a nutshell, was that Bart was upset that his sister, Lisa, took over as manager of his team...the Springfield Isotots. Thankfully, Scioscia popped up to offer up some sage wisdom:
I don't care if your manager is your sister, Dick Drago's mustache or Oscar Gamble's afro...a player should always listen to his skipper. (You can hear the clip HERE)
Dick Drago's what now?!?
Pretty sound advice if you ask me, but what did Drago think?
"I don't watch The Simpsons," the former pitcher said, "but (it is) kinda cool that my name and mustache were mentioned on the show."
Kinda cool?!? Absolutely.
If only it was a better episode. Oh, since I mentioned it...I've included the Banksy intro for the four of you that haven't seen it.
Athletes appearing on "The Simpsons" isn't a new thing.
From Roger Clemens to Yao Ming. Tom Brady to Tony Hawk...the guests stars have run the gamut. But no athlete (outside of the fictional Drederick Tatum) has appeared more than once.
Until now.
Read this from FOX:
In an effort to bolster her resume, Lisa jumps at the opportunity to coach Bart’s little league team, and despite having little understanding of baseball, leads them to a record-winning streak. But when Bart confronts Lisa for taking the fun out of baseball, she benches him from the championship game. Hoping to lift his spirits, Marge spends the day with Bart at an amusement park where MLB manager and former catcher Mike Scioscia (guest-voicing as himself) reminds Bart of his genuine love of the sport. Meanwhile, with one last chance to win the game, Lisa makes an unexpected call and learns that there is more to sports than winning in the all-new “MoneyBART” episode of "The Simpsons".
So that begs the questions...will this Sunday's episode make reference to the series' famous "Homer at the Bat" episode where the then-Dodgers catcher (turned Angels all-time winningest manager) Scioscia was hospitalized due to radiation poisoning?
Will this open the door to us finding out whatever happened to Ozzie Smith after he disappeared while visiting the Springfield Mystery Spot?
More importantly...is anyone still watching The Simpsons?
