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Showing posts from January, 2011

One of the Six MLB Players Born in Italy: Henry Biasatti

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Henry Arcado Biasatti was one of six MLB players to be born in Italy. He was born on January 14th 1922 in Beano, Udine Italy, located in the far North Eastern section of Italy, bordering the Alps & the Adriatic Sea near the towns of Trieste & the country of Slovenian. As a child his family immigrated to the Windsor, Canada where he became a star baseball & basketball player growing up. He was a neighbor to future MLB Italian born player Reno Bertoia in Canada. He went off to World War II serving for his new country of Canada. He was a farmhand of the Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team, playing for London Army during the war. The team won the Canadian Congress baseball championship and played in the Ontario Baseball Association championship series in 1943 & 1945.   While playing minor league ball he was invited to the inaugural training camp for the Toronto Huskies in preparation for the first season of the Basketball Association of America which became the...

Album Review: Theatres des Vampires- Moonlight Waltz ****

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I never thought I’d be into Vampire anything, let alone music. But lately as my musical tastes have become engulfed by female fronted metal bands & my horizons have been broadened. The Metal genre has taken on many new forms; most female fronted bands can be classified as gothic or symphonic metal. Most of the music is the usual rock with orchestration, keyboards as well as choirs& comes out of Europe as well as other countries outside the U.S. Theatres Des Vampires is a female fronted Gothic Metal band from Rome, Italy. The band started in 1994 and based their music on the theme of vampires. Through the years the lineup has changed & since 2004 the beautiful Countess Sonya Scarlet (born in Rome) has fronted the band. She puts on very theatrical shows, dressing gothic & sexy, doing seductive dances as she mesmerizes her audience with wonderful rock theater. She wears heavy make up & at times is even a mask as do the rest of the band to add to their mystery. It’s...

Former Italian / American Player of the Day: Ben Guintini (1946 / 1950)

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Benjamin John Guintini was born on January 13, 1920 in Los Banos, California. He was the son of Italian immigrants & didn’t learn how to speak English until he was in school. He played two years of minor league ball before going off to World War II for two years returning to be a star play & fan favorite in the Pacific Coast league with the San Francisco Seals, San Diego Padres & Hollywood Stars baseball teams. He was very acrobatic & once delighted his home town fans in Los Banos California doing a walking hand stand out to his center field position. As a result his manager Lefty O’Doul benched him, the dismay of the fans. Comedian Joe E. Brown was huge fan of his & tried to convince him to make movies. He once came across a pitcher who took a lot of pills to help out his health. When the pitcher told him he was struggling at 414 he told him “If I were you, I’d do something else with those pills”. He made his MLB debut in 1946 with the Pittsburgh Pirat...

Former Mets Prospect: Nikco Riesgo (1990)

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Damon Nikco Riesgo was Born on January 11, 1967 in Long Beach, California. The six foot two inch outfielder was a star player at the University of San Diego getting picked in the 8th round off the 1988 draft, by the home town Padres. In 1990 he was traded to the New York Mets organization where he became a sat with the St. Lucie Mets. He was the 1990 Florida State League MVP, leading the league with 94 RBIs, 219 total bases & 35 doubles. He stole 46 stolen bases and was second in the league with 14 HRs. That August he was traded to the Phillies in the deal that got Tommy Herr to the New York Mets. This was another Mets debacle as Herr, an All Star Met killer back in 1985, only played in 27 games batting .250 with 1 HR & 10 RBIs in 1990. In 1991 he was terrible, only hitting .194 in 70 games before getting released & having Greg Jeffries take over second base. The Phillies didn’t put Riesgo on their roster in 1990 & he was taken Rule V by the Montreal Expos. In 1...