Card #150: Ted Simmons

Who Can It Be Now?
Ted Lyle Simmons was born on August 9, 1949, in Highland Park, Michigan. Simmons spent his youth in Southfield, Michigan, where he was a star in both football and baseball at Southfield High School. He was well known to major league scouts as a high school player, and his draft status in 1967 supported that. He was selected tenth overall in the 1967 draft by the St. Louis Cardinals. 

He held out for a short while to ensure that he could get sufficient money out of the Cardinals as a signing bonus. He used the threat of attending college over the Cardinals, saying in The Sporting News shortly after the draft that, "The contract will have to be big enough to make it worthwhile for me to pass up college. I'd have to say that I'd want about $50,000 -- although some people have told me it should be $75,000 and some say $100,000." 

He got his $50,000 that he asked for (which he told Daniel Okrent in Nine Innings was "more money than my family had ever seen"). As a result, despite having signed on the dotted line to do so, he did not go to college to play football for the University of Michigan. 

Instead, he used his baseball signing bonus to attend Michigan and, later, Wayne State, in the offseason. As Okrent mentions, being at the University of Michigan from September through April every year from 1968 through 1970 had a distinct effect on Simmons, creating in him a determination not to be seen "as merely a jock." UM in that turbulent time was greatly affected by the anti-Vietnam War activities, as these photos show, and it had an impact.

Still, he signed soon enough in 1967 to play 53 games in rookie level and low-level Single-A baseball. It was enough to earn a promotion in 1968 to Modesto in the Advanced-A California League. Despite being 3.5 years younger than the average player in the league, Simmons dominated offensively -- hitting 28 HR, driving in 117, and slashing .331/.415/.570 and winning the California League MVP. That earned him his first call-up to the big leagues at the age of 19 in 1968, where he got a 4 plate-appearance cup-of coffee.

So, at the age of 19 in 1969, he found himself amongst the grown men at Triple-A Tusla in the American Association. Different league but similar results -- 16 HR, 88 RBI, .317/.365/.495. He got another look in the big leagues as a result -- a 16 plate appearance stint. 

He'd made a mark on ownership with his play in the minor leagues and his short stints in the big leagues that circumstances in 1970 led to his being called up for good. Cardinals third-baseman Mike Shannon was forced to retire at age 30 due to glomerulonephritis (a condition that prevents the kidneys from filtering waste properly). Lacking a good internal replacement at third base, the Cards instead moved their multiple-time All-Star Joe Torre to third base (even though Torre had not played there in the majors before) and called up the 20-year-old Simmons. 

Simmons and St. Louis in the 1970s were synonymous. Simmons became well known for his unique interests in the arts and antiques -- even being featured in a 1978 Sports Illustrated article about him. That article mentioned that he was named a trustee for the St. Louis Art Museum in 1978 thanks in part to his knowledge on 18th century antiques and his position with the Cardinals. 

Something else that article mentioned is Simmons's defensive reputation. Despite it being a human interest puff piece in most regards, it states that Simmons was aware of the misconception that he was "no more than a mediocre catcher," citing to his huge passed ball totals in 1974 and 1975 (he had 28 passed balls, falling one short of tying the league's record in passed balls since 1900). Tim McCarver said Simmons was concentrating on his hitting while catching, which sounds like something Tim McCarver would say. 

That defensive reputation/ability is what led to his trade to Milwaukee. Whitey Herzog came to St. Louis before the 1980 season and came to the conclusion that the thirty-year-old Simmons -- who, by then, had caught in excess of 11,000 innings in his career -- was simply not going to be the catcher for his team in 1981. Herzog, who was also the Cardinals GM, signed his former Kansas City catcher (and former Brewer) Darrell Porter to catch and told Simmons that Simmons would shift to first base (with Keith Hernandez moving to the outfield). 

Simmons did not like that idea all that much, so he asked for a trade. That led to the blockbuster deal of the 1980 offseason. Herzog traded Simmons with the recently acquired Rollie Fingers (who was surplus to requirements in St. Louis thanks to Bruce Sutter's signing) along with Pete Vuckovich to the Milwaukee Brewers in exchange for Sixto Lezcano, Lary Sorensen, Dave LaPoint, and David Green. While the Brewers gave away Lezcano (whom many thought was a rising star) and Green (whom many thought was the best prospect in the minor leagues), they received in return two Cy Youngs (Fingers in 1981 and Vuckovich in 1982) and a soon-to-be two-time Brewers All-Star (Simmons in 1981 and 1983).

Simmons's stay in Milwaukee was a fruitful yet frustrating one. Yes, he got to the postseason twice in his five seasons as a Brewer, but both trips ended in losses and the 1982 trip ended in a loss in his adopted hometown of St. Louis. In many respects, a lot of the issues in 1982 could be placed at Simmons's feet, as he batted a poor .174/.321/.435 in the World Series (4-23 with 5 walks and two homers). Still, watching his former team win both in 1982 and in 1985 had to be somewhat hurtful.

The Brewers decided to move on from Simmons after the 1985 season, and Simba moved to Atlanta as a pinch-hitter who could catch or play first or third in a pinch. Moving back to the NL gave him the opportunity to see the Cards more frequently, and it led to his post-retirement career as well. In August of 1988, Simmons knew he would retire after the season. Before a game with the Cardinals in St. Louis, Simmons spoke with his old pal Whitey Herzog about what was next. Whitey immediately asked Simmons if he would be interested in becoming the Cardinals farm director. That is what Simmons did after the 1988 season and his retirement.

Freeze-Frame
It's not an exact fit for this category, but the story needs to be put somewhere in Simmons's biography. During the 1970s, Simmons's son John had a baseball-crazy best friend named Jon Hamm. Yes, the Jon Hamm of "Mad Men" fame. Thanks to that tie, Jon Hamm's first catcher's mitt was given to him by Simmons -- a Rawlings mitt shipped direct from the factory. Hamm recognized the irony of the 1982 Series as well, saying, "My favorite baseball memory is my best friend's baseball disaster."

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
Simmons's entire life has been spent in baseball. Simmons moved from the Cardinals front office to become the GM, but he stepped aside in 1993 after suffering a heart attack at the age of 44. That led him to stop smoking, start exercising, and eat better so, as he put it, he would not be "dead by the time you are 50." He then worked in scouting and/or in the front office for Cleveland, San Diego, Seattle and Atlanta. In addition, he was the bench coach for the Milwaukee Brewers for the 2008 season -- their first trip back to the postseason since 1982.

Of course Simmons was one of the guys who played a major role for my 1982 Milwaukee Brewers team. As a catcher as a kid, Simmons was a personal favorite of mine -- he and Gary Carter. But, overall, Simmons probably does not rank much higher than 7th or 8th in terms of the favorite players on that team behind at least Cecil Cooper, Robin Yount, Paul Molitor, Ben Oglivie, Jim Gantner, and Gorman Thomas (and maybe Rollie Fingers too). 

The major question that gets asked these days is if Ted Simmons belongs in the Hall of Fame. My answer is a resounding yes. Looking to the "JAWS" scores from Baseball Reference, Simmons is the highest ranked catcher who is eligible for induction but has not yet been inducted. He's listed as the 10th best catcher overall, and only the recently-retired Joe Mauer ranks higher without being inducted. 

Simmons's main problem is similar to what Tim Raines went through. Simmons played at the same time as the 1st, 2nd, and 4th best catchers in baseball history -- Johnny Bench, Gary Carter, and Carlton Fisk. Bench debuted in 1967, Simmons in 1968, Fisk in 1969, and Carter in 1974. Even if Simmons was the poorest defensively amongst those four, there is a good argument that he is the best or at worst second best offensive catcher of the four. The fact that Simmons played at a time when the game's best ever catchers played, however, should not be a reason to keep him out. 

Simmons is a Hall of Famer, and the voters made a mistake (and continue to make a mistake) in keeping him out.

Card #143: Mookie Wilson

Programming Note: Yes, I'm back. Finally. Here's the thing, though -- life has gotten incredibly busy for me. So much so that I do not have the time to write up the big career stories that I was writing. Instead, going forward, the posts will look more like this one -- a much shorter "Who Can It Be Now?" along with whatever category posts I have and maybe a paragraph wrap-up with my thoughts.

Who Can It Be Now?
William Hayward Wilson -- Mookie -- was born on February 9, 1956, in Bamberg, South Carolina. He became a South Carolina Gamecock eventually, spending his junior year in Columbia. His junior year was good enough to make him the Mets second round pick (42nd overall) in 1977.

If you know one thing about Mookie Wilson's career, you know that he was the guy who tapped the dribbler in the tenth inning of Game 6 of the 1986 World Series -- the dribbler that went through Bill Buckner's legs and scored the winning run. Wilson was one of only a few holdovers on that '86 team from the early 1980s Mets -- most of which were not very good teams.  

Mookie spent parts of ten seasons in Flushing, and, indeed, stands 15th at present in career wins above replacement among all New York Mets players -- just behind Howard Johnson and just ahead of David Cone's Mets years. After he left the Mets, he finished his career off with three seasons in Toronto. His career came to a close after the 1991 American League Championship Series in which the Jays lost to the eventual World Series Champions, the Minnesota Twins.

Mustache Check: Mookie is definitely whiskered.

Family Ties
In a convoluted and potentially uncomfortable family tie, Mookie's stepson is former major leaguer Preston Wilson. Mookie is also Preston's uncle, because Preston's natural father was Mookie's brother Robert.  

Mookie also had two other brothers who played minor league baseball.  Younger brother John Wilson was the Mets 17th round pick in the 1982 January Draft -- which pretty much guarantees that John was not regarded highly despite impressive speed in the minor leagues. 

The youngest of the three Wilson brothers to play professionally was Phil Wilson, who was a fifth round pick of the Minnesota Twins in 1984. Phil had trouble making enough contact to get past Triple-A.

Freeze-Frame
Mookie Wilson parlayed his fame in the 1986 World Series into a TV appearance. He joined Keith Hernandez, Mark Ingram (the Dolphins and Giants WR who fathered the running back who attended Alabama), Sean Landeta, Pee-wee Herman, Jeremy Irons, Madeline Kahn, Itzhak Perlman, Paul Simon, and Rhea Perlman, among others, in singing "Put Down the Duckie" in a 1988 "All-Star Musical Special" of the same name for Sesame Street.

The World According to Garp
In April of last year, Mookie released a book called "Mookie: Life, Baseball, and the '86 Mets." If you are a Mets fan, or if you like good baseball books, this may be one to pick up. The book has been reviewed 21 times on Amazon, and it has received 17 5-star reviews and 4 4-star reviews.  

A Few Minutes With Tony L.
Mookie's distinctive nickname made him well-known to all fans of baseball in the 1980s. A number of the reviews of his book mention how much Mookie loved baseball -- playing the game and being around it.  

It should come as no surprise, then, that he has spent a great deal of his post-playing career as a coach for his New York Mets. He was unhappy to be named as a club ambassador last spring, however, because it was a role he received after being pushed out of his on-field role. Indeed, this link has excerpts from his book in which he said that he had "basically become a hood ornament for the Mets" after his demotion from being an on-field staff member in 2011. 

Card #141: Cleveland Indians Future Stars

Who Can It Be Now?
We have three players on this card who had varying degrees of success as major leaguers and in their post-playing careers. 

1. Christopher Michael Bando was born on February 4, 1956, in Cleveland, Ohio. Bando was not drafted directly out of high school in Cleveland, and chose instead to attend Arizona State University to play baseball. While at Arizona State, he made news for hitting a home run in the championship game that won the Sun Devils the 1977 College World Series. 

That led the Milwaukee Brewers to select Bando with the 541st pick of the 1977 draft (22nd round, 3rd pick of the round). Okay, I say that his CWS heroics led to the pick, but the reality was probably closer to nepotism: the Brewers signed Chris's older brother Sal as a free agent prior to the 1977 season. Apparently, though, the money on offer from Milwaukee was not sufficient to sway Chris to sign, so he went back to ASU for another season.

During his senior year of 1978, he hit .415/.508/.744 with 17 HR and 102 RBI in 258 at bats (along with 49 walks). That season propelled him into the second round of the 1978 draft, where the Cleveland Indians selected him with the 36th pick overall (10th pick of the round). He signed was assigned to Double-A Chattanooga (Southern League) where he stayed through 1980. After a good year in Triple-A Charleston in 1981, the Indians gave him a shot at the big leagues at the age of 25 once the strike ended.

Bando did not hit all that well right away, and he had both Ron Hassey and Bo Diaz in front of him. The Indians traded Diaz to the Phillies to open up a spot for Bando to be the righty hitter in a platoon with Hassey in 1982. He scuffled at the plate in his limited playing time until 1984, when he slashed at .291/.377/.505 and hit 12 HR in 260 plate appearances at the age of 28.

The problem, though, was 1985. All of his good work was undone and then some. In 199 plate appearances, Bando "hit" .139/.234/.173, good enough for an OPS of .407. In other words, terrible. He was sent back down to Triple-A to right the ship. He came back in 1986 and enjoyed the most playing time he would see in his major league career -- 92 games, 290 plate appearances (.268/.325/.327) -- but, the power he showed in 1984 was nowhere to be found. 

He filled a similar role with similar plate appearances in 1987 with even worse results -- .218/.260/.332. Thus, when he struggled mightily in 1988, the Indians decided to release him in August. He appeared in one game in 1988 without a plate appearance for the Detroit Tigers, who cut him after the season. He signed on for 1989 with the Oakland A's, and, after 1 game, 2 at bats, 1 hit, and 1 RBI for the A's, his playing career ended.

Mustache Check: Chris was a good, clean-shaven, All-American Bando.

2.  Thomas Martin Brennan was born on October 30, 1952, in Chicago. He attended Leo High School in Chicago (part of the Chicago Catholic League which counts a number of major league alumni in its ranks). Undrafted out of high school, Brennan stayed close to home and matriculated at Lewis University in Romeoville, Illinois. Brennan then led Lewis to the Division II College World Series in 1974. The Indians took notice and drafted him 4th overall in the first round of the 1974 draft -- one spot ahead of where the Atlanta Braves selected Dale Murphy.

Cleveland being Cleveland and Brennan being a college star, the Indians pushed Brennan to Triple-A Oklahoma City immediately after he signed. Bad idea. In 50 innings, Brennan allowed 46 hits and 56 walks (38 earned runs, 42 runs) in 13 starts, good enough for a 6.84 ERA. In 1975, the Indians tried the same thing, and Brennan was even worse -- 122 innings, 149 hits, 98 walks (52 strikeouts), leading to 103 runs (96 earned) and 21 HR allowed to boot...leading to a 7.08 ERA.

It took Brennan until 1981 -- at the age of 28 -- to finally reach the majors.  By that point, he had spent all or parts of 7 seasons at Triple-A in Oklahoma City, Toledo, Portland, Tacoma, and Charleston. He got his chance in the major leagues in September of 1981, and he pitched fairly well -- 48-1/3 innings with an ERA of 3.17 in 7 appearances.

That led to his only complete season in the major leagues in 1982, in which he appeared in 30 games (14 starts) with 92-2/3 innings pitched. He gave up a lot of hits -- 112 -- but he controlled his walks extremely well (just 10). Along the way, he earned the nickname The Gray Flamingo for how his windup featured a pause in his delivery when he was perched on one leg.

Yet, he would find himself splitting 1983 between Triple-A and Cleveland and, after the season, traded to the Chicago White Sox for a player to be named later that would not be named until 18 months later. He made four appearances with his hometown club in 1984, and they let him go. He signed with the Dodgers for 1985. But after a 7.39 ERA (despite a 3.47 FIP), he was out of the majors after 1985. He spent one final Triple-A season where he started out -- Oklahoma City -- in the Rangers organization before his career came to an end.

Mustache Check: Brennan saved the Indians from the ignominy of not having a mustachioed prospect fit for sharing in 1982.

3. Von Francis Hayes was born on August 31, 1958, in Stockton, California.  He attended St. Mary's High School in Stockton. but he was not selected by any major league team out of high school. He then enrolled at St. Mary's College of California in Moraga, California. His play there led the Indians to select him in the 7th round of the 1979 June Draft. 

Hayes did not play in the Indians system until 1980, however, when he hit .329/.405/.500 in Single-A Waterloo with 15 HR, 90 RBI, and 51 steals in 59 attempts. That showing was enough to get him promoted directly to Triple-A Charleston in 1981 where he once again hit well: .314/.401/.474  with 10 HR and 34 steals in 41 attempts. Hayes only played in minor league rehab assignments after 1981.

He actually made the major league roster directly out of spring training in 1981 and appeared in the 9th inning of a 7-1 win against Texas as a defensive replacement for Jorge Orta. Hayes came back to the majors when the strike ended and notched his first major league hit in his second major at bat -- a single off Brewers starter Jim Slaton on August 11, 1981, in a game Milwaukee won 6-1. 

In 1982, Hayes started regularly for the Indians -- mostly in right field but also making appearances in left, in center, at first, and at third, though he came up through the minors as a third baseman. At the age of 23, he hit .250/.310/.389 with 14 HR and 32 SB in 45 attempts. But, the Indians decided to cash in on Hayes's talent by using Hayes as a trading chit to rebuild their own farm system. So, on December 9, 1982, the Indians sent Hayes to the Phillies in return for pitcher Jay Baller, catcher Jerry Willard, outfielder George Vukovich, and infielders Manny Trillo and Julio Franco.

Through the trade, Von Hayes got the nickname "Five-for-One." Phillies fans never warmed to Hayes. As the Philadelphia Inquirer sportswriter Paul Hagen put it in 1991:

Hayes had an oil-and-water relationship with the crusty Veterans Stadium boobirds almost from the moment he came to Philadelphia as the one in a controversial five-for-one trade at the winter meetings in Honolulu nine years ago today. He was smooth and elegant and that didn't play in South Philly, where the fans like players with a little dirt under their fingernails.

Or, as NBC Philadelphia stated, "[t]he Phillies thought they were getting a five-tool player who could complement superstar third baseman Mike Schmidt. Instead they got an average outfielder who would make only one All-Star game in nine seasons in Phillies baby blue."

Hayes was traded from Philadelphia to California at the end of the 1991 season in exchange for pitcher Kyle Abbott and outfielder (and future Phillies GM) Ruben Amaro, Jr. He spent one season with the Angels, and that was the end of his career.

Mustache Check: Von Hayes was silky smooth in the field and in terms of his facial hair.

Family Ties
Chris Bando's brother Sal Bando is the far better known of the Bando brothers, having played for the Kansas City/Oakland A's and the Milwaukee Brewers from 1966 through 1981. Since Sal does not appear in the 1982 Topps set (only in Donruss and Fleer), let me use this opportunity to say that I'm still bitter about Sal and Bud Selig not resigning Paul Molitor in 1992.

Chris's son Ben Bando played with Arizona State (5 games) in 2006. Another son, Phil Bando, played 8 games in the Anaheim Angels system in 2009 after being drafted in the 45th round of the 2009 draft.

Goody Two Shoes
Another Chris Bando fact is that he is a baseball coach for San Diego Christian College in California. His coach's page mentions that his "lifelong accomplishments in competitive baseball along with his focus on building whole person growth for the glory of God is an asset to SDCC Hawks." Or, as his LinkedIn page puts it, the goal of his career is to "glorify God through the arena of baseball, by teaching sound baseball fundamentals, sound doctrine and a faithful commitment to the local church."

Freeze-Frame
Tom Brennan appeared in the movie "Rookie of the Year" as the home plate umpire in the final scene of the movie, according to a story reprinted in full on this website from a newspaper called The Southtown Star. IMDB improperly credits a different Tom Brannan with the role.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
Obviously, Von Hayes had the most successful career of these three guys. I would question including Brennan as a "future star" since he was already 28 years old when he appeared on this card. Topps tended to show players that had appeared in the majors already on these cards, though, so making a call as to who should have appeared on this card in his place is tricky. Maybe Mike Fischlin or Jerry Dybzinski? In other words, when the Indians traded Von Hayes, they did it out of necessity -- they needed more younger talent.

I mentioned above that Chris Bando is coach at SDCC. He's been in baseball in one capacity or another since he retired from playing. His first year out of playing he was the manager of one of the best minor league teams in Brewers history according to Reviewing The Brew: the 1990 Stockton Ports. He remained in the Brewers system as a manager through 1995 when he joined the big-league team as third-base coach. He did that two years under Phil Garner, then served as bench coach in 1998. He was reassigned to be a scout in 1999, and then was shown the door after the 1999 season when brother Sal was also kicked to the curb. Chris then joined up with the Indians organization until 2005, when the Arizona Diamondbacks hired him as a scout. Since then, he's managed twice in independent leagues and, as I said, in college.

Tom Brennan moved back to Illinois after his playing days ended and, according to his minimal LinkedIn biography, he works as a facility manager at "a local community bank." Since it appears he has been with the same bank for nearly 15 years, this Chicago Sun-Times article puts him at Standard Bank and Trust in Hickory Hills, Illinois. He also volunteers as a youth pitching coach around Chicago's South Side.

Von Hayes has also done some managing in his post-playing career in the Diamondbacks organization and in independent baseball. He also coached at his alma mater, St. Mary's College in between selling boats and moving from Florida to Illinois and back again. Based on his LinkedIn profile -- and we went three-for-three for this card -- he is a Partner in First Source HR/Employco, a company which he describes as "a professional employer organization that offers payroll services, competitive workers' compensation rates, human resource services, employee benefits and much more."

Just don't call him Five-for-One.

Card #132: Lee May

 

Who Can It Be Now?
Lee Andrew May was born on March 23, 1943, in Birmingham, Alabama. He was born into a working-class family. His father Tommy made mattresses and springs, and his mother Mildred plucked and washed chickens in a poultry house. Shortly after Lee's brother Carlos was born, however, Lee's parents divorced and he, his mother, and his brother moved in with their grandmother. 

Lee was a three-sport star (baseball, football, and basketball) at A. H. Parker High School in Birmingham. Parker is a nearly all-black school -- so much so that when a white girl called Crystal Wadsworth graduated in 2007, she became the first-ever white student to graduate from the school and only the second non-black student to do so (a Latino student graduated in 2006). 

May was offered a football scholarship to play fullback at the University of Nebraska. It would have been a tough move in many respects for May. After all, staying close to home was not an option for football.  After all, it took the SEC until 1966 to integrate (when Kentucky was the first SEC school to sign an African-American athlete to a scholarship), even if Alabama played against an integrated Penn State squad in 1959 in the Liberty Bowl in Philadelphia.

Instead, he chose baseball. As he put it in an interview, "the Reds offered me money and I felt I had a better chance in baseball.  Plus, I felt I'd have a longer career in baseball . . .  and it was safer."  Coming out of high school in 1961, May graduated before the onset of the draft and as a result was signed as an amateur free agent by the Reds.

He was assigned to Class D Tampa by the Reds in 1961. His manager there, former pitcher Johnny Vander Meer, converted him to first base from the outfield. He played only 26 games that season and came back for a second year in 1962. That winter, he set off for Venezuela and Puerto Rico to play winter ball. Again, as Lee put it in his SABR Biography: "They paid you better in Puerto Rico and Venezuela than your own club paid you. ... I made $350 a month in my first year in the minors and $1,500 a month in Venezuela that same winter."

After those two years in Tampa, May moved up to Rocky Mount in the Single-A Carolina League in 1963. He started hitting for more power as he filled out and grew into manhood. That power carried over into Double-A at Macon -- 25 homers at the age of 21 -- and in Triple-A in San Diego in 1965. Indeed, in San Diego, his hitting was outstanding: 34 HR, 103 RBI, .321/.355/.586 with 32 doubles thrown in for good measure. That year earned him a cup of coffee in 1965 and his first ever major league appearance in a game against the Milwaukee Braves.

In 1966, he made the team out of spring training. But, buried behind fellow youngster Tony Perez and veteran Gordy Coleman on a mediocre Reds team, he was relegated to pinch hitting a few times without a hit between April 16 and May 7 and found himself back in Triple-A -- this time in Buffalo -- as a result.  But, after 1966, he would never play in the minor leagues again.

On making the team in 1967, May still had the problem of being difficult to slot into a defensive position. He played 80 games at first that year along with 33 games in LF and 16 games in RF. Meanwhile, to make room for May and fellow first baseman Deron Johnson, the Reds moved Tony Perez to third base. May hit okay -- not great -- in 1967. He was slightly under the league average at OPS+ and walked just 19 times in 472 plate appearances. That lack of walking is probably the biggest knock that can be leveled at May over his career. Even so, The Sporting News named May as its Rookie of the Year.

Still, the Reds of the late 1960s were a team that hung around the upper levels of the National League and, in 1969, the National League West without ever getting over the hump. May was an All-Star for the first of three times in his career in 1969, and he hit a ton that year -- 38 HR, 110 RBI (his career high), and slashing at .290/.337/.469.

After the 1969 season and despite coming off an 89-73 season, the Reds let manager Dave Bristol join the Milwaukee Brewers organization to be that team's first manager in Milwaukee. In his place, the Reds hired an unknown for his first major league managing job at the age of 36: Sparky Anderson. All Anderson did was manage the team to 102 wins and a World Series loss to the Baltimore Orioles. May put up good power numbers again -- 34 HR, 94 RBI, 34 2Bs -- but his OBP fell below .300, which made him a barely above-average player despite all the taters.

Coming off that year, the Reds made few changes. May started at first, Perez at third -- just as they had the previous year. Yet, the results did not follow. The Reds went from 102 wins to 79 wins, so GM Bob Howsam decided to make some major changes -- one of which was to trade Lee May in a blockbuster deal to the Houston Astros. It was a risky move -- May was an All-Star again and finished the season 9th in the NL in 1971 in Offensive WAR (5.1), 4th in SLG (.532), 9th in OBP (.864), and 3rd in HR (39).

But the Reds got the better end of the deal. The Astros obtained May along with 2B Tommy Helms and utilityman Jimmy Stewart in exchange for OF Ed Armbrister, P Jack Billingham, OF Cesar Geronimo, 3B Denis Menke, and future HOF 2B (and completely obnoxious announcer) Joe Morgan. 

May stayed in Houston for just three years. He was an All-Star in 1972 at the age of 29 while leading the NL in strikeouts at 145; he also had his career high in walks in this season with 52 in 647 plate appearances (12 of those were intentional, however). Perhaps the cavernous Astrodome took away a few HRs, as he went from hitting over 30 HR a year to topping out at 29 that same year. May watched as his former teammates -- bolstered by the trade -- became the Big Red Machine while May's Astros finished 3rd, 4th, and 4th behind the Reds.

At the end of the 1974 season, May found himself on the move again. The Orioles needed to add power to their team, so they traded for the man nicknamed "The Big Bopper of Birmingham". In exchange, the Astros got IF Rob Andrews and OF-3B-1B Enos Cabell. May put up one final big season in 1976, leading the AL in RBI with 109. Still, his OBP was only .312, again reflecting his hacktastic approach at the plate. 

May's move to the Orioles provided his second missed opportunity for a World Series ring in 1979, since his Orioles could not close out Willie Stargell's "Family." May only hit one time in that series as Earl Weaver went with switch-hitting future HOF Eddie Murray at first base.

May turned 37 just before Opening Day in 1980. His reflexes slowing were accompanied by Weaver giving May next to zero playing time in the field that season. May played the field in just 7 games that season overall, and 61 of his 78 appearances were as the DH.  

On the clear downslope of a long career, May signed a two-year contract with the Kansas City Royals in December of 1980. He made just 68 appearances and tallied only 165 plate appearances over the two years of that contract. At the end of the 1982 season, May's career came to an end. He finished his career with 354 HR (which is currently 87th all time), 1244 RBI (134th all time), and a slash line of .267/.313/.459 in 8219 plate appearances. 

It is safe to say that he would not have been an NFL player for that length of time as a fullback.

Mustache Check: Yes, the Big Bopper of Birmingham has a big hairy lip here.

Family Ties
Lee's brother Carlos May played OF and 1B for the Chicago White Sox, New York Yankees, and California Angels between 1968 and 1977.  

Lee's son Lee May, Jr. was the first round selection of the New York Mets in the 1986 June Draft with the 21st pick overall. Unfortunately for Lee Jr., he was one of just 9 players out of the 28 selected who did not make it to the major leagues from that first round. 

Lee's grandson Jacob May was drafted twice for baseball. He was selected the first time in the 39th round of the 2010 June Draft out of high school. Jacob then attended Coastal Carolina University and blossomed. He became the Chicago White Sox 3rd round selection in the 2013  June Draft with the 91st pick overall. Jacob hit .258/.326/.395 at High-A Winston-Salem in the Carolina League at the age of 22 (he was about a year younger than the league average). He's a speedster, stealing 37 bases in 45 attempts last year.

Trivial Pursuit/Freeze-Frame
Though he never appeared on the show Cheers according to IMDB, May supposedly crushed a ball off Sam Malone -- the former fictional Boston pitcher portrayed by Ted Danson -- entirely out of Baltimore's Memorial Stadium.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
As a kid, Lee May was an Oriole to me. It was always strange seeing cards for guys like him on other teams to me as a 7-year-old, because my brain was trying to work out how those guys used to play on other teams than the one they were on currently.

May served a few teams as a coach after his career ended. He was the Kansas City Royals hitting coach from 1984 to 1986, a job which allowed him finally to be on the winning side of a World Series in 1985. 

After a year away from the majors in 1986, he was the Cincinnati Reds first base coach in 1988 and 1989 under Pete Rose and, later, his old pal and former Reds and Astros teammate Tommy Helms. Indeed, for his time as a player and as a coach, May was inducted into the Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame in 2006. 

He was let go as a coach by the Reds after the 1989 season under the Marge Schott regime. If you're not familiar with Schott, she was a piece of work. She was a chain-smoking widow who made her money taking over her late husband's car dealership. She had a Saint Bernard called Schottzie which ran around on the field at Riverfront Stadium before Reds games. She once got upset when a sold-out opening day Reds game was cancelled because one of the umpires had a heart attack and died on the field.

Seriously.

Then add in this; Schott was a female, 1980s version of Donald Sterling -- perhaps with more venom that only going back 25 years in this country can add. From all indications, Schott was a racist, apparently making anti-Semitic comments and calling black players her "million-dollar (moron's word from the 1940s for black person)".  As one writer from the Cincinnati Enquirer put it recently in the context of the Sterling episode, "Marge didn't limit her ugliness to blacks. She spread it like buckshot. Schott offended everyone from scouts to Jews, gays to blacks. The litany of her indiscretions was comprehensive and impressive."

Anyway, May was under the misguided impression that he and Schott had an agreement that May would be kept on after the 1989 season. When he found out that that was not the case, he said, "If baseball is coming to the way this lady is doing things, I don't want any part of it."

He ended up back in Kansas City under his former Royals teammate Hal McRae as the hitting coach from 1992 to 1994. Then, when McRae was the manager with the Tampa Bay Rays in a terrible 2002 season, May served as the first base coach. As far as I can tell, that was the end of his baseball coaching career. Of course, he was 60 years old at that point, so you can't really blame him for hanging up his spikes.

He also, apparently, had an "Afro hair replacement" done by a guy called Jim Kreuz in Toledo in the 1970s. The fun things you can find in local newspapers.

In any event, May is 71 now. As of 2011, he was working with the Reds doing PR and, otherwise, was enjoying his retirement and his 8 grandchildren.

Card #113: Steve McCatty

Who Can It Be Now?
Steven Earl McCatty was born on March 20, 1954, in Detroit, Michigan. McCatty attended high school in Troy, Michigan, where he was an All-League, All-Detroit North, and All-Oakland County baseball player and also played basketball. 

Despite all the recognition locally, major league scouts did not warm to McCatty's talents. As a result, he was not drafted. Instead, the Oakland A's picked him up as an amateur free agent before the 1973 minor league season. McCatty was assigned to Lewiston in the Northwest League and pitched mostly in relief that year. Then, in 1974, he spent a second season at Lewiston and started 15 games. 

The A's liked what they saw, so they pushed McCatty to the Single-A California League at Modesto. Oakland did not have a lot of talent at Modesto that year, and, to be fair, McCatty didn't exactly look like a great find there -- 4-8 record, 4.57 ERA (league ERA of 4.12). 

Even so, the A's pushed McCatty to Double-A Chattanooga for the 1976 season. Whether it was a matter of fortuitous scoring or just plain luck, McCatty looked decent in a relief role there -- 2 starts in 36 appearances with a 5-4 record and a 3.16 ERA (deflated by 17 unearned runs out of 44 total runs allowed). That performance earned him a short look at Triple-A Tucson in 1976 as well. Not too bad for an undrafted free agent.

The Oakland A's entering 1977 were in full fire sale mode. Charlie Finley had thrown a fit about free agency generally. He and Bowie Kuhn were at odds over Finley's ability to sell player contracts and, more to the point, the amount for which such contracts could be sold. When Finley couldn't sell all the contracts, he started "trading" for minor leaguers and cash. In any event, after the 1976 season, the A's lost Sal Bando, Don Baylor, Bert Campaneris, Nate Colbert, Rollie Fingers, Willie McCovey, Joe Rudi, Gene Tenace, Larry Haney, Billy Williams, Gary Woods, Glenn Abbott, Ron Fairly, Ken McMullen, Jim Todd, and a host of others to "trades" and free agency. This opened up the door for all the young players in the Oakland system. 

This helped guys like McCatty who, under normal circumstances, might not have been promoted otherwise.  McCatty spent 14 games in Double-A in 1977 before a 1.93 ERA convinced the A's to promote him to San Jose in Triple-A.  In San Jose, McCatty got battered around, but, no matter -- he received a September call-up in 1977 and made the first appearance of his major-league career in a losing effort against the Milwaukee Brewers.

McCatty's 1978 season was not much different. He spent most of the year in Triple-A -- this time in Vancouver. This time, though, McCatty was called up for a mid-season look through June and July. He didn't pitch terribly or terribly well either, and the A's didn't exactly trust him too much -- McCatty appeared in only one game in which the teams in the game were 2 runs apart.

In 1979, McCatty once again did not make the club out of spring training. But, when the A's needed a pitcher at the beginning of May, the call went to Triple-A Ogden and McCatty joined the A's bullpen. He made his first major league start on May 27 against the Milwaukee Brewers and held them to just 1 run on 6 hits and 3 walks in 8-2/3 innings. Even so, the 1979 A's were a terrible team under manager Jim Marshall, who was fired after that season. McCatty finished the year with pedestrian numbers -- 4.22 ERA (19 unearned Runs) in 185-2/3 innings, giving up 207 hits, walking 80 and striking out 87.  

Then, 1980 happened. Billy Martin took over as the manager, and Art Fowler was his pitching coach. Some people claim that Fowler taught his pitchers a spitball. Others claim only that Billy and his competitive fire would make any team a better team. Perhaps a pitching philosophy was at play, as one of Martin's defenders (his biographer, David Falkner) claimed. He argues that these guys all were incredibly efficient breaking-ball pitchers who pitched to contact. For what it's worth, neither I nor Rob Neyer believe that.

For his part, McCatty did not necessarily receive the brunt of Billy's "pitch them till their arms fall off" philosophy. McCatty also didn't pitch all that well in 1980. At the age of 26, he went 14-14 with a 3.86 ERA, completing 11 of his 31 starts. His control was his biggest bugaboo -- he walked 99 hitters in 221-2/3 innings against 114 strikeouts (the only year he topped the 100 K mark). He was, in essence, a very average pitcher.

Then 1981 came along. Even though McCatty really wasn't the ERA title winner, he was (longer explanation here). McCatty tied with Jack Morris, Dennis Martinez, and Pete Vuckovich for the league lead in wins with 14. McCatty threw 16 complete games (second in the league) and 4 shutouts (league leader) while allowing just 140 hits over 185-2/3 innings. He was even 9th in the league in strikeouts with 91.  These overall numbers led to his coming in second behind Rollie Fingers for the AL Cy Young Award and, to be fair, WAR says he should have won it.

Entering 1982, then, McCatty was turning 28 years old -- the beginning of the prime of a pitcher's career. To avoid arbitration and free agency, the A's decided to sign McCatty to a four-year contract with two option years. It turned out poorly. McCatty started having arm troubles and went on the DL in 1982 for those troubles. Newspapers even then -- Murray Chass in particular -- questioned whether Billy Martin burned out the A's staff in 1980. By July 4, McCatty visited Dr. Frank Jobe and learned that he had slight adhesions in his shoulder. He received a cortisone shot and came back later that year.

Still, after 1981, McCatty's career went spiraling downward into an abyss of bad pitching, behavior issues, and shoulder problems.  In the end and for their investment, the A's got 561 innings out of McCatty over 4 seasons with a 24-30 record, a 4.48 ERA (4.91 FIP), 264 walks against 230 strikeouts, and just 10 complete games. After the 1985 season, McCatty was let go. 

The next spring, he tried to make the Chicago White Sox. He was still bitter about being released by the A's and made this comment:

Sandy Alderson (A's general manager) calls me up and asks how my golf swing is. Then he says, "We're not going to pick up your option." I thought of all the times I was told not to throw, then two days later I'd be out there. They couldn't even face me. Thirteen years with the team. I think they owed me more than "how's your golf swing, see you later." It was just a bad situation.

McCatty did not make the White Sox that season, and ended up on waivers after putting up a 9.64 ERA at Triple-A Buffalo. He pitched the rest of that year and in 1987 for the independent San Jose Bees in the California League before calling it a career.

Mustache Check: The picture isn't the best, but he does not have one on any of his other cards in this set so I'm saying no mustache.

Family Ties
McCatty's son Shane McCatty was drafted in the 34th Round of the 2009 June draft out of Oakland University in Rochester, Michigan, by the Washington Nationals. It appears that Shane is no longer pitching in the Nats' system, though, since his last stats came in 2012 and were pretty bad -- 7.17 ERA in 21-1/3 innings in High-A and Rookie Level ball at the age of 25.

McCatty's younger son Luke McCatty is a redshirt junior at Oakland University. Last season, Luke pitched 7 innings in 8 appearances after making 11 appearances the year before. 

The Verdict 
Okay, it's not much, but it did make me laugh. In 1984, McCatty -- along with pitcher Bill Caudill and coach Clete Boyer -- were arrested in Cleveland for disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. The reason: the threesome did not want to leave their hotel bar at the hotel at which they were staying when the bar was closing.

Freeze-Frame
While IMDB doesn't have any reference to it, McCatty's biography on the Washington Nationals website claims that he "served as technical consultant for Disney movie 'Angels in the Outfield'." I'm wondering why IMDB does not list that, since they even list the "Transportation Department" for the movie, including the driver.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
Because he was a contender for the Cy Young in 1981, I was definitely aware of McCatty at that point in time. He always did really well against the Brewers too, it seemed. His career numbers support that as well. In 17 games (13 starts), McCatty had a 2.39 ERA, a 7-5 record, 1 shutout, and gave up just 93 hits in 101 2/3-innings. Considering he finished his career at 63-63 with a 3.99 ERA, that's a pretty significant difference.

After his retirement, McCatty started worked in broadcasting for three years as a broadcaster for the Oakland A's and, then, as an analyst on ESPN for a season. So, I could have done a "This Is Radio Clash" item for him too. But I liked the idea of him getting arrested for not wanting to leave the bar.

In 1996, McCatty got his first job as the pitching coach for the Visalia Oaks in the Detroit Tigers' system. He made it to the Majors as the pitching coach in 2002 with the Tigers in its car-crash of a 55-106 season. After that, the Tigers cleaned house, and McCatty hooked on with the Ottawa Lynx in the Baltimore organization.  

Then, in 2006, he joined the Washington Nationals organization, where he has been ever since. As you may know, McCatty has been the pitching coach for the Washington Nationals since the end of 2009. He has been a constant for the Nationals since that time despite the fact that the Nationals have gone from Manny Acta to Jim Riggleman to Davey Johnson to Matt Williams as their managers.  

In that time and through the power of the Internet, McCatty's pitching staff discovered that McCatty modeled in swim trunks for Playgirl. As a result, they made t-shirts. I guess it's the baseball equivalent of a sorority party t-shirt. This happened last year, so perhaps that's why the Nationals didn't make the playoffs last year -- they were distracted by McCatty's manliness all season.

Let's hope for their sake that the distraction won't resurface in this postseason.

Card #112: Billy Sample

Who Can It Be Now?
William Amos Sample was born on April 2, 1955, in Roanoke, Virginia. According to Billy's own webpage biography, Billy spent all but two years of his childhood in Salem, Virginia (a town just outside Roanoke) where he attended high school. His classmates there voted him "Most Versatile" after he lettered in three sports, was on the debate team his freshman year, and acted in two plays during his junior year. 

The Texas Rangers drafted Sample twice. The first time he was drafted was in the 28th round of the 1973 June draft -- straight out of high school. He chose instead to make the 108-mile trip north on I-81 to Harrisonburg to attend James Madison University, where he majored in psychology. After his junior year at JMU, the Rangers drafted Sample again in June of 1976 -- this time in the 10th Round. 

Sample signed after this second time being drafted and was assigned to the Rangers Rookie League team in the Gulf Coast League. Being a man among boys -- 1.2 years older than the average player in the league -- Sample destroyed the league. He hit .382/.505/.566 -- yes, .505 OBP -- in a league which averaged .237/.340/.306 overall. Unsurprisingly, he led the league in batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging, finished second in steals with 27 (behind his teammate Greg Jemison's 32), led the league in triples with 9, tied for 9th in doubles with 7, and tied for twelfth in homeruns with just 1.  

Those video-game-style numbers led the Rangers to push Sample to a more age-appropriate league in 1977 -- the Double-A Texas League. He still looked to be a hitting star in Tulsa, slashing at .348/.426/.527, which was good enough for third in the league in hitting (first in the league in the non-El Paso standings), fifth in OBP, and seventh in SLG.  

Thus, in 1978, Sample moved up to Triple-A Tucson. Once again placed in a great hitting environment, Sample took advantage and increased his HR from 7 in Tulsa to 18 in Tucson with a .352/.471/.573 line in a league that hit .291/.369/.422 overall. Once again, placed in context, these numbers still were excellent -- 5th in hitting, 1st in OBP, 4th in SLG (and first among players who appeared in more than 100 games.

That impressive season in Triple-A earned Sample a call-up in September of 1978 to the big club. Then, in 1979, Sample made the Rangers out of spring training and never played in the minors again aside from a three-game stint on an injury rehab in 1981. 

Sample hit reasonably well in 1979 -- .292/.365/.415 -- but the Rangers had a stocked outfield that season. Sample played the most out of 6 players -- who included Al Oliver, Johnny Grubb, Richie Zisk, Mike Jorgensen, and Dave Roberts -- to record an appearance in left field that year. Never shy to express his opinion, Sample noted exactly that issue in a UPI wire story in 1979:

I can't make any excuses. I'll wind up with about 325 to 330 at-bats so I can't complain about the way I've been played. I wanted to hit better than .270 but I'd like to have a few more home runs and RBI. I'm not content, but this is good for starters. I didn't expect to come in here and tear up the league.  

Sure, everyone wants to play every day, but we've got a Mickey Rivers and an Al Oliver and a Richie Zisk in the outfield and those are tough people to move out. But push will come to shove someday.

Instead of pushing others out, however, the Rangers did exactly the opposite -- bringing in Mickey Rivers from the Yankees while trading away DH Oscar Gamble. Yes, that cleared a spot for Zisk to move to DH, but it put yet another player in Rivers ahead of Sample in the Rangers outfield. Add in the fact that the Rangers simply did not appear to be sold on Sample as a right fielder or left fielder -- putting Oliver in left most of the year and rotating 7 different players through right field including Grubb, Jim Norris, Zisk, Oliver, Rusty Staub, Roberts, and Sample. 

Then, throw in the other fact -- Sample was pretty bad at the plate for most of 1980, when he hit .323 in September to pull his average up from . 230 to .260. Of course, that coincided with his most regular playing time of the year. 1981 was not much better for Sample in terms of playing time either but that had to do with injuries as much as it did with players in the way.  Of course, as I mentioned back when I discussed their team checklist, the Rangers were not exactly a well-run organization. Still, why would the Rangers screw around like this with a guy who appeared to be a pretty good prospect with a good batting eye in the minor leagues? (Maybe it was because Sample was the players' rep for 5 years with the club?)

1982 wasn't much better. That year, Sample watched as the team promoted switch hitter George Wright directly from Double-A to be the regular centerfielder. The Rangers brought in third baseman Larry Parrish from Montreal and promptly made him a right fielder. Pushed back to left field, Sample played 85 games there while Johnny Grubb (still around after all these years), Leon Roberts, Lee Mazzilli, and even Pete O'Brien got playing time in left. 

To be fair, it wasn't like Sample's production at the plate was screaming "play me now!" Being as bad at the plate as the 1982 Rangers were (AL ranks: 12th in HR, 13th in AVG, 14th in OBP and SLG) was a team effort, but Sample's OPS+ put him squarely at league average.

Finally, though, in 1983 and 1984, Sample got the opportunity to play on a daily basis in Texas. He put up his best season in the majors in 1983 -- .274/.331/.401, 44 SB (only 8 CS), 12 HR, and 57 RBI. He did this despite hitting in every single spot in the order. His 1984 was less encouraging though, as his batting eye and his OBP deserted him. 

Thus, when the opportunity to get rid of Sample arose, the Rangers did just that. On February 27, 1985, the Rangers sent Sample and a minor leaguer to the Yankees in exchange for former Ranger Toby Harrah. Sample spent one entirely underwhelming season with the Yankees -- coming to the plate just 154 times. 

Despite this less-than-impressive year, he did provide one of the best lines I've come across so far. When asked what kind of guy he is, he said, "I'm like Daffy Duck in the cartoons. I'm black. I've got big feet, and I'm always bitching."

After the 1985 season, he was traded for a second time in his career -- this time to the Atlanta Braves. The Braves played him a little bit as a fourth/fifth outfielder type, but after the season, they let him go. He signed as a free agent with the Twins in February of 1987, but he did not make the team. Thus ended his major league playing career.

Mustache Check: Look closely...do you see it? Billy's got just a hint of a mustache, but he has one.

This Is Radio Clash
From 1988 to 1989, Sample served as a broadcaster for the Atlanta Braves. Then, in 1992, he was a broadcaster with the Seattle Mariners. After that year, he joined the broadcast team for the California Angels for two seasons.  When that ended, he signed on to work for the MLB.TV and MLB.com for 8 years as a writer and commentator.  He was also writing for USA Today and Sports Illustrated in that time as well.

Freeze-Frame
Sample's unique talents in his post-baseball career are best shown by his IMDB page. In 2012, he appeared in a slasher pic called The Meat Puppet. In 2013, he joined the same writers from The Meat Puppet (Billy and Joseph Pepitone, who are the nephews of former Yankee Joe Pepitone) as well as former major leaguers Brian McRae and Jim Leyritz in another horror film called Gravedigger. 

Once that acting bug bit, Sample had to carry out his own dream. He wrote, directed, produced, and starred in a film called Reunion 108.  The film has been rated pretty highly by IMDB users -- 8.2 out of 10 -- though it's not available on Amazon Prime quite yet.  The screenplay for his film won an award at the Hoboken International Film Festival in 2011, and that's what spurred him on to make the film.

With his own film in the can, he's now in two more indie films scheduled for release in 2015. There's Sugar, for which the IMDB synopsis is "A housewife of a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate secretly forms an all-women [sic] rock band turning her entire world up side down [sic]." And, then, Sample is scheduled to appear in another horror film called Amygdala. You can click through to read the plot summary yourself on that one.

Family Ties
Billy's son Ian was a wide receiver for the University of Hawaii about 10 years ago now -- the year before Hawaii got into the Sugar Bowl with Colt Brennan so that they could get exposed by Georgia.  Ian even wrote a book about being a football player.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
Sample absolutely owned the Brewers. In 198 plate appearances, he slashed at .353/.388/.500 with 4 HR, 6 SB (5 CS, though) and 13 doubles. That line compares to his career line -- .272/.329/.384 with 46 HR. Geez.

During his career, Sample was the target for some crazy racist jerks who threatened his life and his wife with phone calls (in the days before caller identification). They did this because Billy Sample married a white woman. Among the stunts they pulled, they called the ballpark and told the Rangers' traveling secretary Dan Schimek that Billy's wife had been shot. That was untrue. They also left a note cut out of magazine headlines that formed a death threat. To Sample's credit, he recognized that it was not endemic to Dallas: "But no matter how much hatred is involved, I'm going to refrain from bad-mouthing the whole (Arlington) area."

These days, Sample is busy with his film work. He is also represented by the same agency who represents Rick Cerone -- which means that yes, you can hire Billy Sample to join you at your birthday party for $750 or to play a pick-up game for $500.  Oddly, on his bio on that page, the tags listed for him are fitness, women's issues, health and wellness, arthritis, knee injuries, multiple sclerosis, and foodie.

When he's not busy acting or addressing women's issues through pick-up games or attending your live fantasy draft (only $500 guys!), he appears to spend a decent amount of time on Facebook. Other than commenting about the call on the game-deciding fourth-down measurement in the South Carolina v. Georgia football game a couple of weeks ago, Sample appears to spend a lot of time finding news stories about "neocons playbook of bullsh*t" in Iraq and, mostly, about how Israel is the cause of all the problems in the Middle East.

I'm not going to argue with him on those news stories. I don't know enough to do it. But to share a video that accuses Israel of "ethnic cleansing, colonialism, and apartheid" is pretty strong stuff. 

Click through if you wish to read them.