Bob Short Finished What Others Started

Bob Short.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Just the mention of his name darkens the skies and depresses the soul.

Have you ever seen the movie "Major League" where the new owner of the Indians gets rid of her best players so the team would lose badly, both on the field and in the stands, and then move the team to Florida?

If I didn't know better, I'd swear that was based on Bob Short.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

In 1970, Short traded three of his best players to the Tigers for the enigmatic and over-the-hill Denny McLain, drastically reducing both wins in the standings and fans at the stands.

Crying "poverty," the team was playing in refurbished Turnpike Stadium in Arlington Texas just a few months later.

D.C. baseball fans remember what Calvin Griffith did to the city of Washington in 1960. D.C. baseball fans remember what Bob Short did a decade later. Few remember, however, that there was another owner who tried to move the team in that period between pariah one and pariah two.

The Braves were not the first baseball team courted by the city of Atlanta. A new, modern stadium, "like that one in Washington," according to the mayor, was on the drawing board since the early 1960's. The city was ready to begin construction the moment a team was found.

Days after Kansas City officials turned down owner Charlie Finley's request for a new park for the Athletics, he was invited to Atlanta to look at potential sites for the new stadium there. By July of 1962, however, it was obvious that Finley didn't have the support of his fellow owners for a move to Atlanta. The deal was dead.

1963, however, was more fruitful.

The Braves, no longer the wonder-child in Milwaukee, were suffering from a combination of low attendance and political indifference. Agreements were eventually signed, a stadium built, and although slowed by a judge's ruling, their move to Atlanta was completed in time for the 1966 season. Atlanta had their baseball team. The Athletics were Atlanta's second choice, the Braves their third.

The Senators had been their first.

Calvin Griffith's attempt to move the Senators to Bloomington, Minnesota was met with all the bluster that Washington politicians could muster. It was only when Major League Baseball promised an expansion franchise to the city did the lawyers finally back off. Griffith's moving vans weren't past Fairfax Circle before Elvin Quesada, the FAA administrator, was named the owner of the Senators II.

The honeymoon lasted less than a year.

Quesada was not a wealthy man, and his operating capital was depleted before the end of the first season.

Attendance dropped by 55,000 from 1960. Although playing in the new RFK Stadium would greatly increase revenue, Quesada wasn't sure he could keep the team afloat until then.

Enter Colonel Beauregard Peyton of Atlanta.

Beauregard was a life long resident of Atlanta. He was a businessman who envisioned an Atlanta based baseball team as a conduit to a regional television and radio network. A team in Atlanta, he correctly assumed, would likely be embraced by fans in all the southern states. Unlike Short, Peyton didn't hide his plans.

Many believed that it was just a matter of time before the team moved south. Washington legend Shirley Povich wrote, "It is not believed that the American League would allow him to move for the 1962 season, so he will have a full year to work on American League president Joe Cronin, a former Senator player."

Peyton promoted manager Mickey Vernon to general manager, and hired another former Senator, Cecil Travis, to manage the club. Povich was wary of this move, "wondering" in his column if Peyton made Vernon the GM so that he could succeed, or more likely, so he could fail.

Of course, Peyton never got his wish. American League owners didn't want to hear about losing their "anti-trust exemption" from piqued congressman still angry about the Calvin Griffith move, and refused to entertain Peyton's request to move the team. The Senators were sold again before landing in the lap of Robert Short, who completed Peyton's dirty deed in 1971.

In the end, all is forgiven. Washington now has a National League team, a new stadium, and a fan base large enough to support a top-notch organization. Although the thirty-four year wait was painful, it helped all of us remember what its like not to have a team. This time, D.C. baseball will be forever embraced and never taken for granted.

Oh, and Bob Short? Rot in hell.

NATS NOTES for December 29th:Since the Winter Meetings in early December, members of the Nats' Nation have been chanting "har-me-no-in-geck-e-o" and burning incense in hopes of stopping Jim Bowden's attempts to trade for Rockies' outfielder Willie Taveras. Though he had 68 steals last year, he also had a .604 OPS (.296 slugging, .308 OBP), a full one-hundred-seventy-four points below the league average.

Yuck.

But the chanting must have worked, because Taveras, who was non-tendered by the Rockies, signed with the Reds over the weekend.

Saved.

Well, not really.

Bowden signed Corey Patterson instead. Patterson didn't have an OPS of .604 like Taveras.

He had an OPS of .582—.344 slugging and...are you ready for this? .238 on-base percent.

I would think an OBP of .238 would be physically impossible.

Sigh...

To be fair, at least Patterson has power, though you wouldn't know it by his 2008 statistics. He hit 24 homers a few years ago and though not as fast as Taveras, has stolen as many as 45 bases in a season.

Here's the problem: Elijah Dukes and Lastings Milledge each need 500+ at-bats in 2009 for the team to be successful. Josh Willingham will be in left and will play every day. Patterson, if he plays at all, will play in center, moving Milledge either to the bench or to right, replacing Dukes.

Willingham can hit 25 homers. Dukes can hit 30. Milledge can hit 25 and steal 30 bases.

And Patterson?

Well, he can get on base 23.8 percent of the time.

Repeat after me.

Har-me-no-in-geck-e-o. Har-me-no-in-geck-e-o. Har-me-no-in-geck-e-o.