Short Time Mid Nineties Mets Reserve Catcher: Brent Mayne (1996)

-
Brent Danem Mayne was born on April 19, 1968 in Loma Linda, California. The tall six foot catcher was the Kansas City Royals first round draft pick (13th pick overall) out of California State University. The next season he was brought up to the Royals big league squad for nine games. Mayne spent six seasons in Kansas City sharing time behind the plate with Mike Macfarlane.

He came in 8th in the 1991 Rookie of the Year voting & threw out 40% of would be base stealers the next season. In 1995 he was the main catcher seeing action in 110 games (103 behind the plate) batting .251. In the winter of 1996 he was traded to the New York Nets for minor leaguer Al Shirley.

In 1996 he was Todd Hundley’s back up catcher, although he only saw action in 21 games behind the plate due to Hundley’s durability that season. Mayne would only throw out one of the 23 base runners attempting to steal while he was behind the plate.

By the end of May he was hitting at .290 & then in August he brought his average back up again near the .300 mark. In 70 games on the season he batted .263, hitting a HR on April 25th in St. Louis. After the season he was granted free agency & signed on with Oakland.

He would spend time there as well as San Francisco, Colorado, back to Kansas City , Arizona & Los Angeles as a backup catcher through the 2004 season. In 2000 he was brought in to pitch an inning by his Rockies manager Buddy Bell. He pitched a scoreless inning & became the first position player since Rocky Colavito in 1968 to earn a victory when the Rockies won it the next inning.

He is the only catcher in the entire 20th century to get credited with a win. In his two seasons back with the Royals, he was their main catcher, enjoying a good 2003 season where the team finished third after being in the wild card run all season.

Mayne finished his 15 year career with 951 hits 38 HRs 178 doubles & 403 RBIs playing in 1279 games.

In his career he posted a .993 fielding %, ranked at #18 all time. His 1143 games behind the plate are 80th all time, & his 6186 put outs are 58th all time. There have been 651 successful stolen bases on Mayne, 95th most on the all time list.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Remembering Bobby Ojeda's Tragic Boating Accident (1993)

-
Image
Steve Olin, Tim Crews & Bob Ojeda March 22 nd 1993: was an off day from Spring Training, for three Cleveland Indians pitchers; Former Mets 1986 World Champion pitcher; Bobby Ojeda, Tim Crews & Steve Olin. The three friends, took out an 18-foot open-air bass boat & went out fishing & gator hunting in the darkness of the evening on Lake Nellie in Clermont, Florida. Tragedy struck, when the boat rammed into a private dock that jutted out some 250 feet into the still waters. Two other Cleveland Indians personnel had arrived to meet the fishing party just as the horror took place. They heard Bob Ojeda saying they needed help. The two men jumped into the water and called out for someone to call 911. 27 year old pitcher; Steve Olin was killed instantly. 31 year old pitcher; Tim Crews was alive but was struggling to breathe suffering from massive head wounds. Bobby Ojeda was in & out of shock, he was suffering from head lacerations but was coherent. The
Read more

Remembering Sal Bando: Former Italian / American All Star (1966 - 1981)

-
Image
Salvatore Leonard Bando was born February 13, 1944, in the Little Italy section of Warrensville Heights, 16 miles southeast of Cleveland, Ohio.  His father Ben was a self-employed carpenter & accomplished softball infielder. His mother Angela was a home maker who also enjoyed sports playing both softball & basketball. Ben & Angela had a daughter Victoria & sons Salvatore & Christopher. The six-foot third baseman played baseball at Arizona State University with his future Oakland teammate Rick Monday & seven others who made the major leagues.  There his manager was the legendary coach Bobby Winkles who would later go on to coach Bando in Oakland in 1974. Winkles would also manage the California Angels. In 1965 Bando batted .317 was All Conference & batted .480 (12-25) with 9 RBIs in the College World Series. Bando was selected in the sixth round of the 1965 draft after Rick Monday who was the first-round pick of the Kansas City Athletics. MLB Debut: He got
Read more

Remembering Vixen Founder / Guitarist; Jan Kuehnemund (1961-2013)

-
Image
centerfieldmaz was shocked to learn of the sudden passing of Jan Kuehnemund, the founding member of the all female metal band Vixen. Jan was a fantastic guitarist, song writer & women pioneer in Heavy Metal. I am a huge fan of hard rock all girl bands & Vixen were one my long time favorites. Janice Lynn Kuehnemund was born November 18th, 1961 in St. Paul Minnesota. The female guitarist formed one of the first all female Metal bands in Minnesota with singer Janet Gardner while in high school in 1980. By 1985 they moved the band to Los Angles California, to be part of the Heavy Metal scene. In 1987 the classic Vixen line up of Jan Kuehnemund (lead guitar) Janet Gardner (vocals/ guitar) Share Pederson (bass) & Roxy Petrucci (drums) formed & released their debut album the following year. Vixen 1988 In a world of all male Heavy Metal bands during its heyday, Vixen were groundbreaking in being an all female metal band. The Runaways, with Joan Jett & Lita Ford
Read more

The 1970's Oakland A's Ball Girls- (MLB's First)

-
Image
In the days of the early seventies the Oakland A's won three straight Championships & changed the face of baseball forever.  The team's controversial owner was known to be cheap in paying his star players & known to meddle in the teams on field affairs. He drove managers crazy & even had Dick Williams resign after winning his second straight World Series. But Finley also revolutionized baseball in many other ways. He was instrumental in getting the designated hitter in the American League & have the World Series played at night, so fans could attend after work. He gave his players fancy names like Catfish, Blue Moon & True Blue.  When his star Reggie Jackson refused to shave his beard, he encouraged the whole team to grow facial hair by paying them $200 each.  The A's team even grew their hair long, a sign of the times. But before that baseball players had not had facial or long hair since the 1800's.  He introduced bright colored yello
Read more

The Odd Couple TV Show's Beloved Supporting Cast

-
Image
On this the 45th Anniversary Season of when my favorite television show of all time The Odd Couple first debuted it's time to pay tribute to the great supporting  cast. Murray Greshler was a  big hit with fans as the simple minded bumbling NYPD Officer: Murray the Cop . Murray was a long time friend of Oscar Madison & usually becomes the subject of Oscar's jokes. Some great lines referenceing Murrays nose are "N ose' Feliciano" / "Tokyo Nose" & "Come inside Murray, your sucking up all the air in the hallway".  Even Felix chimed in asking him if the other army reserve soldiers made fun of him saying "when you look up it looks like a two car garage". Murray would become one of both Felix & Oscars best friends appearing 73 of the 114 Odd Couple episodes . Murray wouldn't think twice about double parking his patrol car double parked outside the Park Avenue or Central Park West building where Felix & Oscar
Read more