Jacob Pomrenke
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buckweaver.bsky.social
Jacob Pomrenke
@buckweaver.bsky.social
2.6K followers 980 following 3.9K posts
Curling, cats, and crimes. And occasional baseball. (Also, baseball crimes.) Living in Chicago with @pulhitzherprize.bsky.social. Never quite sure which century I’m in. https://jacobpomrenke.com
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buckweaver.bsky.social
Some old-time baseball reading for your holiday weekend: We’ve posted every article online from SABR convention journals, 1984 (Providence) to 1999 (Phoenix) inclusive. More to come, but lots of great stories in this new collection: sabr.org/convention-j...
Cover images for SABR convention journals in 1986 (Chicago), 1991 (New York City), and 1998 (Bay Area)
November 25, 2025 at 8:02 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
I will always have a soft spot for Felix the Cat, and how his mask changed colors whenever he switched teams.
A 1990s color photo of Felix Potvin of the Toronto Maple Leafs with a custom blue goalie mask featuring cat fangs, befitting his nickname.
November 22, 2025 at 1:11 AM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Excited to be part of SABR's newest research committee — the Town Ball Committee — focusing on amateur/semipro baseball in local communities. My former intern Jude Butler has taken charge to launch this project. sabr.org/latest/sabr-...
1925 Waycross, Georgia, baseball team, including Shoeless Joe Jackson (third from right). 12 players are standing in a line with their hands on their hips on a patchy dirt baseball field with weeds sticking up in places. A covered wooden grandstand, empty of fans, is behind them.
November 21, 2025 at 5:40 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
How about cats who sat in a bowl of wet food while attempting to stretch out Hungry Hungry Hippo-style for a nearby bowl of dry food?
An elderly gray tortie laying in a plush white heated bed with all four paws pointed east. She lifts her head toward the camera with a quizzical look on her face. Her tail and undercarriage were just wiped off after she sat in a bowl of wet cat food.
November 19, 2025 at 10:58 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
And look who’s right behind Judge on that 7-year peak list for RF … those are some inner-inner-inner circle names.
List of JAWS 7-year peak leaders for all right fielders in baseball history. 1. Babe Ruth 84.7 WAR 2. Stan Musial 64.6 3. Henry Aaron 60.3 4. Aaron Judge 56.9 5. Mookie Betts 55.6 Average among 30 Hall of Famers at RF is 42.2.
November 19, 2025 at 10:03 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Old Yankee Stadium was likely also blessed (or cursed) by multiple popes.
Two bronze plaques with gold borders and an engraved round medallion of each Pope hang on a gray wall at Yankee Stadium’s Monument Park. The top one reads: IN COMMEMORATION OF THE SOLEMN MASS FOR PEACE OFFERED BY HIS HOLINESS POPE PAUL VI OCTOBER 4, 1965 HERE IN YANKEE STADIUM GIFT OF KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS The bottom one reads: IN COMMEMORATION OF THE MASS FOR WORLD JUSTICE AND PEACE OFFERED BY HIS HOLINESS POPE JOHN PAUL II OCTOBER 2, 1979 HERE IN YANKEE STADIUM GIFT OF KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS
November 19, 2025 at 9:48 PM
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RIP Randy Jones, 75, one of the most beloved players in San Diego Padres history and the 1976 NL Cy Young Award winner. Here's his SABR bio: sabr.org/bioproj/pers...
Randy Jones of the San Diego Padres posing with his left hand inside his baseball glove in the 1970s.
November 19, 2025 at 9:10 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Call for papers: SABR’s 2026 convention journal, The National Pastime, is accepting articles for stories about baseball in Cleveland and other locales around Lake Erie. Deadline for abstracts is Dec. 15. sabr.org/latest/call-...
SABR 54 convention logo in Cleveland 2026
November 18, 2025 at 4:31 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Braaaaaains.
Headline from the November 8, 1925 edition of the Chicago Tribune, after Northwestern upset Michigan, 3-2, at Soldier Field: PURPLE BRAINS AND LEWIS' TOE SINK WOLVERINES IN MORASS Flash of Genius in Giving Foes Safety Saves the Day
November 16, 2025 at 1:51 AM
buckweaver.bsky.social
They don’t call it Lake Northwestern.
A band of red and yellow from the setting sun hovers over Lake Michigan on the north side of Chicago. Go Blue.
November 15, 2025 at 10:51 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Scenes from the Friendly Confines. About 85/15 Michigan fans, at least on the outside. Someone needs to teach the bucket boys to play “The Victors” and they’ll all make a million bucks today.
A temporary banner for Fox Sports “Big Noon Kickoff” with plastic footballs on a green grass background stands in an empty parking lot full of tall light fixtures after the show. Across the street, fans wait to get into the bleacher entrance at Wrigley Field. The flagpole displays two purple Northwestern flags below an American flag. A yellow brick building on the other side of the street has a green sign near the roof that says “Wrigley Field welcomes Big Noon Kickoff.” Murphy’s Bleachers bar with a large crowd spilling outside on the patio. Most of them are wearing blue or maize Michigan shirts. A sign on the railing says “Champions are made in Michigan / Welcome Michigan football fans”. An empty ice skating rink has been installed outside Wrigley Field. Beyond the rink, many fans wait to get inside the ballpark as the Michigan-Northwestern football game has already begun. The Ryne Sandberg statue watches over them all from the foreground. A well decorated Christmas tree and winter wonderland shacks can be seen beyond the ice rink. The sky is gray, football weather. A group of about 6-8 young men in Michigan jerseys stand outside a green padded outfield entrance to the field and hold up their phones to take a picture. The grandstand at Wrigley Field is filling up during pregame warmups. The ribbon board on the third-base grandstand shows “Michigan 0, Northwestern 0”.
November 15, 2025 at 5:56 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Not sure all these people are going to make it inside Wrigley Field by kickoff. (I’m not going inside either, just want to soak in the spectacle.) #GoBlue
A large crowd of people, mostly wearing maize and blue, stand outside the main entrance to Wrigley Field at the corner of Clark and Addison (both streets are completely closed to vehicles). The ref marquee says “Michigan vs Northwestern, kickoff at 11:00 am”. A purple Northwestern flag and a blue Michigan flag flank the marquee. Two white Big Ten Conference flags flank the school flags. Above them both are state flags for Illinois and Michigan.
November 15, 2025 at 4:55 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Speaking of baseball’s Rule 21, has anyone gone on a clubhouse/ballpark tour and taken a picture of the large poster warning players against gambling, game-fixing, and other misconduct? Please send it my way! I’m curious how the rule has been communicated over the years.
A framed copy of baseball’s Rule 21 which used to hang in a clubhouse at Wrigley Field circa 1955. This is on the wall at Lou Malnati’s original restaurant in Lincolnwood, Illinois. It was a gift to Malnati himself from Cubs manager Charlie Grimm, who also supplied other items and photos that are still hanging on the restaurant’s walls today.
November 14, 2025 at 9:56 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Last year, when I wrote about Tucupita Marcano's lifetime ban from baseball, I emphasized the difference between gambling and game-fixing under Rule 21. If Clase and Ortiz are punished under 21(a) for fixing, it would be a historic (and infamous) first.

jacobpomrenke.com/black-sox/no...
Screenshot of the author's 2024 article on Major League Baseball banning Tucupita Marcano and four minor-league players for betting on baseball. The screenshot reads: Rule 21(a) — in a section titled “Misconduct in Playing Baseball” — warns players “who shall promise or agree to lose, or to attempt to lose, or to fail to give his best efforts towards the winning of any baseball game with which he is or may be in any way concerned.” This section of the rule covers the fixing or attempted fixing of games, which would have ensnared the Black Sox following their loss in the 1919 World Series. The punishment for fixing games is a lifetime ban, then and now. Rule 21(d) — in a section titled “Gambling” — targets any “player, umpire, or Club or League official or employee, who shall bet any sum whatsoever upon any baseball game.” Any bets placed on a game “with which the bettor has no duty to perform” shall cause that person to be declared ineligible for one year. Any bets placed on a game “with which the bettor has a duty to perform … shall be declared permanently ineligible.”8 That’s the rule which applied to Tucupita Marcano and the four minor-leaguers who were suspended.
November 14, 2025 at 8:56 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Guess we’re destined to speed run through all the 1910s mini-scandals involving baseball and gambling until we get to the big one again! New century, same problems.
Headline of Irving Sanborn’s article in the October 12, 1919 edition of the Chicago Tribune (three days after the fixed World Series ended): BASEBALL MEN FEAR EFFECT OF BETTING CLIQUES Wagers and 'Pools' Help Kill Fans' Interest in Game for Itself. Thoughtful baseball promoters who have the best interests of their business in view are beginning to worry about the way professional gamblers lave been flocking to the national pastime during the last year. There always has been betting on ball games, and always will be, but most of it has been of the promiscuous, haphazard kind in which sentiment was the determining factor. With the quick resumption of interest in baseball this year there has reappeared the menace which so nearly wrecked the game back in the dark days of the late '70s, when it was necessary for the National league to bar from its ball parks forever a quari it of players who were found guilty of having dealings with a gambling clique which was then trying to earn a dishonest living out of baseball.
November 14, 2025 at 6:43 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
This is Bones Ely, who was the best cat ambassador you could ever hope to meet. So polite and generous to all visitors, human and otherwise, but with a sly goofball side reserved for those she loved most. @pulhitzherprize.bsky.social
A white and blonde cat with big green eyes and a bright pink nose stands at attention and politely looks up at the camera. Her soft, floofy white chest fur is flowing in multiple directions. She is standing on a black and white zebra-print blanket.
November 13, 2025 at 8:32 PM
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Continuing my quest to go inside every cool old building in Chicago and hear awesome people talk about things they love. Tonight: Samin Nosrat at the Athenaeum Center (built in 1911.)
At the Athenaeum Center in Chicago, chef and author Samin Nosrat sits in a big poofy chair on a stage and talks to food blogger Tim Mazurek. The screen above them shows Samin’s photo, her name in colorful letters, and the cover of her new book, “Good Things.” The stage is framed by a decorative grand arch, with a centerpiece depicting musical instruments and theater masks.
November 13, 2025 at 6:58 AM
buckweaver.bsky.social
That Ortiz and Clase reportedly received the EXACT same dollar amount from fixers — in 2025! — as Shoeless Joe Jackson and Lefty Williams did in 1919 is … completely absurd. And another reason why player salaries have very little to do with why these gambling scandals happen.
Tweet from ESPN’s Jeff Passan at 12:37 pm on November 9, 2025: Prosecutors allege that Luis Ortiz was paid $5,000 for throwing an intentional ball June 15 and Emmanuel Clase given $5,000 for facilitating it. They did it again, according to the indictment, June 27. The payment for each on that pitch was $7,000 apiece.
November 9, 2025 at 7:04 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Fernando Tatis Jr. of the Padres and Bobby Witt Jr. of the Royals were announced tonight as the 2025 Rawlings Platinum Glove Award winners, presented by SABR: sabr.org/latest/tatis...
2025 Rawlings Platinum Glove Award winners: Fernando Tatis Jr. of the San Diego Padres and Bobby Witt Jr. of the Kansas City Royals
November 8, 2025 at 4:13 AM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Bula is looking good! We also have a daily “wipedown” routine with Nixey, who turns 19 in a few weeks. She likes to make a mess but we help clean her up — because grooming each other is a sign of love.
An elderly gray tortie lays on a wooden floor with her front paws resting on a red rug. Behind her is a brown plush bed that she just climbed out of and a black trunk with a green pillow on top of it.
November 7, 2025 at 12:00 AM
buckweaver.bsky.social
One more from the highly entertaining Howl Owl Howl show in Chicago: “Don’t Go Back to Rockville.” Always go to the show, y’all.
November 6, 2025 at 8:35 PM
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Want to present your baseball research at the SABR Analytics Conference in Phoenix? There's just 2 weeks left to submit a presentation abstract for the 2026 conference; the deadline is November 21. Here's all the details: sabr.org/analytics/pr...
SABR Analytics Conference logo
November 6, 2025 at 6:41 PM
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SNL’s The Californians with quizzical looks on their faces.
November 6, 2025 at 6:20 PM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Sorry for the convenience.
An escalator is barred with a sign that says “Sorry! Escalator out of service” at a CTA station on the north side of Chicago. As comedian Mitch Hedberg once famously noted, “An escalator can never break; it can only become stairs.”
November 6, 2025 at 6:26 AM
buckweaver.bsky.social
Looking for new baseball books this fall? Check out the new edition of the SABR Bookshelf, with dozens of recently released books on all aspects of the game: sabr.org/sabr-bookshe...
Collage of cover images for new baseball books released in 2025.
November 5, 2025 at 5:33 PM