Fungos & Fastballs: Baseball History & Trivia

E26: King Kelly, Baseball’s First Rock Star & The 1984 Bean Brawl

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2569696/fan_mail/new] Seventeen ejections in one night should be impossible, yet baseball found a way. We start with the 1984 Braves Padres beanball brawl, where one hit-by-pitch spirals into pitcher retaliation, managers getting ejected, and a benches-clearing pileup that somehow doesn’t even end the game. We walk through how “beaning” worked as baseball’s old language of payback, why umpires kept tossing players and coaches, and how the chaos spreads from the field to the stands with fans throwing objects, pouring drinks, and pushing the night toward real danger. Then we flip the calendar back a century to meet Michael Joseph “King” Kelly, the late-1800s phenomenon who helps invent what a baseball celebrity looks like. We talk through the record-breaking $10,000 contract sale, the crowds that follow him across cities, and the mix of skill and swagger that makes him must-see entertainment. Along the way we dig into 19th century baseball strategy and tactics that still matter today: the hook slide, daring steals, the hit-and-run, and early ideas that resemble modern defensive shifts. We also get into the trickster side of early pro ball, when fewer umpires and looser enforcement made rule bending tempting, and legends like Kelly helped force the sport to tighten its rules. We cap it all off with a Hall of Fame trivia answer about how many women are in Cooperstown. If you like baseball history, MLB fights, forgotten legends, and sharp trivia, hit play, then subscribe, share the show with a friend, and leave us a review. Email us at fungosandfastballs@gmail.com

E25: Vintage Base Ball Brings The 19th Century Back To Life

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2569696/fan_mail/new] Link to the National Assoc of Historic Base Ball Clubs  [https://nahbbc.com/] Baseball changes completely when you strip away gloves, modern habits, and the assumptions we’ve all carried since Little League and it becomes Base Ball (two words!). We sit down with Tom “Big Bat” Fesolowich, a 30-year veteran of vintage 19th century baseball, coordinator at Old Bethpage Village Restoration in New York, and the longtime force behind the New York Mutuals. He walks us through how “vintage baseball” isn’t theater, it’s competitive ball played under carefully researched rules from a specific year, often 1864, with teams working hard to keep the language, uniforms, and on-field behavior historically accurate. We get into the fan experience first: old benches, blankets, picnics, and a rare setting where you can look around and see almost nothing modern. Then we hit the big shockers, like playing without gloves (Tom has the broken fingers to prove it), using a softer “lemon peel” baseball, and even playing with rules that feel upside down today. One bounce can be an out. You can’t overrun first base. Fair or foul depends on where the ball first hits the ground. Even the umpire’s approach to balls and strikes can start with a warning before anything is called. Along the way we trade nickname stories, talk about keeping anachronisms off the field, and hear an all-time tale featuring Bill “Spaceman” Lee that captures how funny and fiercely competitive this game still is. If you’ve ever wanted a hands-on way to connect with baseball history, this is your roadmap. Subscribe, share with a baseball fan who loves the old game, and leave a review with the strangest vintage rule you’d want to bring back. Email us at fungosandfastballs@gmail.com

Ep 24: Kitchen Sink Episode: LOOGY Explained, The Kissing Bandit, Eephus (film), & '70 East West Classic,

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2569696/fan_mail/new] A single baseball episode can feel like four different road trips, and that’s exactly the point here. We’re clearing out a backlog of “first pitches” with a grab bag of baseball history, MLB trivia, and the kind of oddball stories you only hear when fans start swapping favorites. Before we dive into the time capsule, our friend Edwin Nolan calls in with a sharp MLB rundown, including what’s happening across the AL and NL, plus a quick moment to remember two huge losses in the baseball world: legendary Yankees broadcaster John Sterling and Hall of Fame manager Bobby Cox. From there, we hit the baseball dictionary with “Loogie” (the left-handed one-out guy) and explain why the tactic thrived, why it slowed games to a crawl, and how the three-batter minimum rule basically pushed it into extinction. Then we step straight into baseball folklore with Morgana Roberts, the Kissing Bandit, whose cheek-kiss field invasions turned into a strange, very real piece of 1970s and 1980s sports culture and earned her a place in conversations about the Shrine of Eternals and baseball’s broader lore. We also go high culture in our own way with a review of the film Ephus, a quiet, quirky baseball movie that ditches the usual underdog formula and instead nails what it feels like to hang onto a field, a team, and a night you don’t want to end. Finally, we tell the story of the 1970 East-West Major League Baseball Classic, a powerful charity game organized in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. that featured an unbelievable lineup of legends, meaningful symbolism, and no known video record. We wrap by answering the Hall of Fame trivia question: the only player inducted without the five-year wait.  Subscribe, share with a baseball-loving friend, and leave a quick review if you want more deep cuts like this. Email us at fungosandfastballs@gmail.com

E23: Talkin’ Ryno: Ryne Sandberg - Heart of the Chicago Cubs

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2569696/fan_mail/new] A Cubs legend doesn’t have to be loud to be unforgettable, and Ryne Sandberg is the proof. We sit down with longtime friend and die-hard Cubs fan James Maumus to trace how a kid in New Orleans became devoted to Chicago baseball thanks to cable TV, WGN superstation broadcasts, and the simple magic of day games at Wrigley Field. The result is part baseball history, part fan memory, and a clear case for why Sandberg’s steady, team-first style still resonates. We dig into Sandberg’s path from the Philadelphia Phillies to the Cubs, the infield that helped define early 1980s Chicago, and what it means to win nine straight Gold Gloves as a second baseman. From there we relive the electric 1984 season and the moment that put Sandberg on the national map: June 23, 1984, the “Sandberg Game,” when he took Hall of Fame closer Bruce Sutter deep twice in the biggest spots, with Harry Caray’s call turning it into Cubs folklore. The conversation also follows the full arc: playoff heartbreak, Sandberg’s 1990 power peak, the emotional toll of the 1994 MLB strike, and how fans reconnect to the sport. We close with Cubs retired numbers trivia, Sandberg’s Cooperstown values, the statue outside Wrigley, and the weight of his later battle with metastatic prostate cancer, plus one of the most human fan stories you’ll hear all week. If you care about the Chicago Cubs, baseball history, or what real leadership looks like between the lines, hit play, then subscribe, share the episode with a Cubs fan, and leave us a review. Email us at fungosandfastballs@gmail.com

E22: The Baseball Reliquary: A Fan’s Hall of Fame

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2569696/fan_mail/new] Cooperstown tells one kind of baseball story. The Baseball Reliquary tells the one that lives in fan memory, strange artifacts, and the people who shaped the game’s lore even if they never fit a Hall of Fame template. We sit down with Joe Price, Professor Emeritus and co-director of the Institute for Baseball Studies at Whittier College, to explore how an “alternate hall of fame” can honor impact, meaning, and cultural weight alongside on-field greatness.  Joe explains what a reliquary is and why the word belongs in baseball, then takes us inside the collection now housed at Whittier: a grassroots museum and archive built from donations, obsession, and love. We get into unforgettable pieces of baseball memorabilia, from perfect game baseballs signed across eras to a one-of-a-kind Tommy John surgery textbook signed by Tommy John on the very page that diagrams the procedure. Along the way, we talk about Joe’s National Anthem Tour and what it reveals about baseball as tradition, ritual, and community.  Then we break down the Shrine of the Eternals, the Reliquary’s fan voted hall that celebrates cultural significance, barrier breakers, and enduring stories, not just career totals. If you’ve ever argued about who really matters to baseball history, this will sharpen your list and probably scramble it too. Subscribe, share this with a baseball friend, and leave us a review with your pick for who belongs in the Shrine next. Email us at fungosandfastballs@gmail.com