If SABR 44 were a baseball game, you could say that members of the Rogers Hornsby Chapter were deeply involved in all facets of the game as they had a hand in nearly all aspects of the convention.
A team made up of mostly Hornsby members were runners-up in the trivia contest; two members snagged foul balls at the Astros game; one member gave a very interesting talk about the Houston Eagles; and several members had the winning bids in the silent auction, including such items as Diamond Club seats behind home plate at the Astros game, a Jose Altuvé game-used, cracked bat and a piece of the original Astrodome turf.
Though no official count was taken, it appeared that the Hornsby Chapter had the largest representation at the convention, and we made our presence felt. The Larry Dierker Chapter, led by Bob Dorrill and Marsha Franty, hosted and coordinated the convention and were greatly assisted by the Hornsby Chapter.
The conference was filled with research presentations and panels on the history of the Houston Colt .45’s and Houston Astros.
Both the Houston Astros and Sugar Land Skeeters played a big part in the convention. Tal Smith, former Astros president and current special adviser to the Skeeters, spoke at the convention and hosted members at Constellation Park. The Astros president Reid Ryan and general manager Jeff Luhnow spoke on panels and fielded questions from the audience. More than a dozen former Astros and Colt .45 players were featured on panels, including Larry Dierker, Art Howe, Alan Ashby, Roger Clemens, Enos Cabell, Jose Cruz, Bob Watson, Bob Aspromonte, Hal Smith and Jimmy Wynn, among others. There was also a media panel consisting of longtime Astros broadcaster Bill Brown; Alyson Footer, national correspondent with MLB and former social media director with the Astros; Evan Drellich, Astros beat reporter for the Houston Chronicle; Buck Martinez, former player and current broadcaster with the Toronto Blue Jays; and Brett Dolan, radio broadcaster formerly on the Astros broadcast team.
In addition to a walking tour of old baseball sites around Houston, there were outings to Constellation Field to watch a Sugar Land Skeeters in the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball, and to Minute Maid Park for a Blue Jays-Astros game.
In fact, both games had SABR members buzzing about what they experienced and saw – and what they nearly saw. The Skeeters’ starting pitcher Clint Everts came within two outs of no-hitting the Brideport Bluefish, giving up two hits and one walk through 8.1 innings.
On Saturday, Aug. 2, the Astros game featured several interesting tidbits: Jon Singleton had a thrilling inside-the-park home run that resulted after replay review overturned an out call at home; Jose Altuvé had two more hits, adding to his Major League hits total, and scored from first base after two errant throws; highly touted Astros prospect Mike Foltynewicz had his Major League debut; and the roof was open for an uncharacteristically cool August night. In fact, Minute Maid Park had its roof open at game time in August for the first time since 2004. In addition, Hornsby Chapter director Jan Larson and C. Paul Rogers III of the Banks-Bragan Chapter both won the auction for Diamond Club tickets. In the second inning, Raeanne and Gilbert Martinez joined them in the Diamond Club after receiving a surprising upgrade from their regular season ticket seats (check out a screen-grab from the television broadcast of Jon Singleton’s mighty swing; Gilbert and Raeanne can be see behind the umpire). In addition, chapter members Michael Hammon and Ryan Pollack caught foul balls while sitting with 500 of their closest SABR friends along the first base line.
One of the most popular attractions at any SABR convention is the trivia contest, and this year was no exception. The Hornsby +1 team consisted of Bill Gilbert, Jan Larson and Tom Thayer plus David Kaiser of the Lajoie-Start Chapter. In addition to the usual trivia questions one might expect, the contest also featured physical demonstrations of gestures by baseball players, including batting stances of Stan Musial and Hunter Pence. The Hornsby +1 team lost to a team from New England that called themselves the Misspelled Tulowitskis. For more about the trivia contest, click here.
In the research presentations, Hornsby’s own Eric Robinson gave his presentation on the brief life of the Houston Eagles, the only Negro League team to be based in Texas. His presentation, like many at SABR 44, was well received.
For more details about the convention schedule and summaries, please click here.
Many thanks to all the Hornsby and Dierker chapter members for volunteering and giving up some time to staff the chapter and silent auction tables and monitor the presentation rooms. Also, a special thanks to all SABR staff and interns for helping make SABR 44 one of the best conventions ever.
SABR 45 will be in Chicago next year from June 24 to 28. Upon the conclusion of SABR 44 in Houston, a number of SABR members took to social media to start counting down the days to Chicago.