Notes
A lot of research was necessary to complete these stories. Here is a smattering of it.
Billy Goat
A goat is an odd choice for a familiar, but the animal is critical to Cub history. For many years, the owner of the Billy Goat Tavern always brought his pet billy goat to regular season games. During the 1945 World Series, park officials would not allow the owner to bring his goat into the stadium. Outside the park, he cursed the Cubs saying they will never play in another World Series. That is the last World Series the Cubs played in.
Put A Cork In It!
Pretty Sammy Sosa brought a cork out to defeat evil. Though everything is fair play in a battle of good in evil, the rules are different in a baseball game. In the 2003 season, Sammy Sosa was injured and came off the disabled list. When he came back, he entered a huge slump. During his first at bat one game, his bat shattered across the infield. The umpire inspected the lumber and determined that the bat had its inside drilled out and cork filled the inside of the bat. In theory, this makes the ball travel farther after it hits the bat. Sammy Sosa was suspended 8 games for this.
"Who You Crappin'?!"
Unfortunately, I am not a great writer, fortunately, Mike Ditka has a way with words. This line was actually uttered by Da Coach, and is probably the most famous one attributed to him.
Yomiuri Giants
This team is the most storied team in Japan, the "Yankees" of their league. They are located in Tokyo, but are named Yomiuri for the corporation that owns them. It would be like calling U.S. teams the Stienbrenner Yankees, the Disney Angels, and the Tribune Cubs.
Tomohiro Nioka
I wanted an actual player named on the team along with all the ah, "cannon fodder." I researched the most recent stats on players in Japan (up to date stats in English are difficult to find). There were a couple other players on the team that had a higher batting average or more home runs. In pure stats analysis, Nioka was the best all around player on the Giants, and the honored person in my comic.
What is that thing?
Along with Nioka, I made the manager and the team mascot distinguished characters. Yuppie is his name and looks like a deranged dog with cancerous growths. Amazing as it is, there is some design to him! If you look closely at the letter nesting on the Giants hat, the shape of Yuppie's head is a duplication of those letter shapes.
Satchel Paige
A pretty bizarre name for a throw away character in a story? Wrong! Satchel Paige is the name of perhaps the best player ever to play in the now defunct Negro Leagues. This left handed pitcher was known for his excellent play and charisma. He played for the Kansas City Monarchs.
Dorthy Kanenshak
Dorthy is the name of a very productive and famous player from the short-lived Women's Baseball League. I had a harder time selecting this one from my limited information. I didn't want to lift any of the players that appeared in the Hollywood movie "A League of Their Own." Though I had no qualms with lifting the title for my story name. ^_^ Dorthy held her own in the league and played for the Rockford Peaches.
BALCO
Upon talking with my friends, I realized not many people knew what this stood for, making the candy named BALCO Bar is little puzzling. BALCO stands for Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative. In December 2002 their offices and lab were raided by the U.S. Government to uncover steroids and other illegal drugs used by athletes to not test positive in their sport's drug tests. World class athletes from track athletes, football players, and baseball players from Jason Giambi to Barry Bonds have connections with this laboratory.
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