To expand on the chart a little bit, 46 of the 106 World Series have been won by the Yankees, Cardinals and A’s, or 43 percent.

32 of the 45 Super Bowls have been won by the Steelers, Cowboys, 49ers, Packers, Redskins, Raiders, Giants or Patriots, or 71 percent (it will be 33 of 46 in a couple weeks, or 72 percent).

33 of the 65 NBA titles have been won by the Celtics and Lakers, or 51 percent.

The Canadiens, Red Wings, Maple Leafs and Bruins have won 54 of the 95 Stanley Cup titles, or 57 percent.

It seems logical that the sport that has the least number of athletes playing in a game would be the one that is the most dominated by one or a few great franchises. After all, in the NBA two superstars playing about 75 minutes a game combined can carry a team to a handful of titles. Those two stars (Pippen and Jordan, O’Neal and Bryant, etc., etc.) will account for about a third of the 240 minutes of playing time available for a team (five players on the court at any one time in a 48-minute game). In MLB and the NFL, on the other hand, with nine players (10 in the A.L) and 22 players starting each game, a single player should have less influence on the outcome of the game. The NHL, with a series of rapid shifts for the five skaters, while one goalie typically plays all 60 minutes of a game that usually only has a few goals scored by each team, is unique. I don’t know enough about hockey to guess exactly how important the goalie or the first shift is to a team with at most 23 players.

I have no formidable conclusions to present here, but the NBA is indeed (barely) the league with the highest percentage of titles won by a single team, and the NFL has the lowest percentage by far. More to the point, the Celtics and Lakers account for half of all the NBA titles won, and the Lakers have been in the Finals a stunning 31 times.

By the way, a week later the Times reported that “USC first baseman Mark McGwire hit his 17th home run of the year last Sunday to equal the school record, set by Dave Hostetler in 1978. It took Hostetler 58 games to hit 17 homers. McGwire, a sophomore, did it in his 38th game.” A note added that McGwire had a .970 slugging percentage in Pac-10 games. Barry Bonds was playing left field for Arizona State and slumping.

Then, in February of 1984, USC coach Rod Dedeaux said, “We’ve got a team that’s going to be tough to beat.” Johnson, now a sophomore, and still 6-10 and 210 pounds, threw a three-hitter over six innings, striking out seven UC-Irvine hitters to get his second win of 1984. Dedeaux said: “When I go out and talk to him, I make him get off the mound so I don’t look like a Pygmy.”

A year later, in February 1985, the Times did a preview of USC’s baseball team. Dedeaux said of Johnson, who’d gone 5-3 with 73 strikeouts in 78 innings in 1984, “I look for him to come into his own this year.” McGwire had left USC after his junior year to sign with the A’s. By the way, USC fans will recognize the name of Rodney Peete, who Dedeaux touted as a freshman shortstop who was “going to be a good player. It’s just a question of when.”

Ken Hubbs remains Bob Kennedy’s “all-time” second baseman.

Thirty years after Hubbs’ Cessna 172 airplane plummeted into Utah Lake, killing two people including the 1962 National League rookie of the year, the former Brigham Young University student is remembered as a “can’t-miss superstar.”

Kennedy, the ex-Salt Lake Bees manager who went on to manage the Cubs from 1963-65, says he doesn’t know current Cub All-Star second baseman Ryne Sandberg that well. But “if I had a choice,” he said, “my all-time second baseman would be Ken Hubbs.”

Playing in a lineup that included future Hall of Famers Ernie Banks and Billy Williams in 1962 and 1963, the 22-year-old Hubbs was viewed by Kennedy as part of a team that would return the Cubs to baseball prominence.

Buttressing Kennedy’s prophecy was a recent issue of Sports Illustrated that fantasized just how big a cog Hubbs could have been. SI suggested the Cubs with Hubbs would not have collapsed in 1969, and it would have been Chicago, not the New York Mets, who won the N.L. East, the N.L. playoffs over Atlanta and ultimately the World Series over Baltimore.

Kennedy wasn’t so sure about a Cubs pennant and a World Series in 1969, even though it was Leo Durocher and not he that was managing by then. “Kenny was a great young fielder and a pretty good hitter, but then, like now, what the Cubs lacked was good pitching depth.”

Chicago was just 59-103 in Hubbs’ rookie season of 1962, when he hit .260 with 49 RBI and a .983 fielding average. In Kennedy’s first season at the helm in 1963, the Cubs improved to 82-80 although Hubbs’ average dipped to .235. His fielding held steady at .974.

Kennedy, speaking from his home in Mesa, Ariz., remembers Hubbs as the “highest type of young man . . . a great talent. He was like a steel post at second. When you thought there was no way a double play could be turned, Ken Hubbs turned it.”

Hubbs was better known for his glove than his bat. He broke two major league records in 1962, playing 78 games and handling 418 chances without an error. In addition to 1962 N.L. rookie honors, he was honored by his peers with a Gold Glove. He was the first rookie to win the award.

His brief career ended on Feb. 13, 1964. He and Dennis Doyle were killed instantly when the new Cessna that Hubbs was piloting crashed into Utah Lake in a snowstorm some 10 miles from the Provo Airport.

Hubbs, like Doyle a native of Colton, Calif., had logged just 71 hours of flight training prior to the accident. The Civil Aeronautics Board attributed the crash to faulty judgment. The CAB said Hubbs was not qualified to fly by instruments and “continued visual flight into an area of adverse weather resulting in a loss of control.”

Kennedy says Hubbs’ death was “a terrible blow to his family, to the Cubs’ family and to baseball. His future was boundless. Leadership in baseball comes in the middle of the diamond from catcher on out through second and short and to center field. Kenny was to be the center of the Cubs for years and years.”

About a decade later, in 2003, the Chicago Sun Times looked at Hubbs and why his memory was so vibrant for Cubs fans:

For a baseball team whose modern history revolves around the concept of woulda, coulda, shoulda, there can be no better icon than Kenny Hubbs.

He would have taken the Cubs to the World Series, some say. He could have made it to the Hall of Fame, they’ll tell you.

On Wednesday, he’ll come as close as he’ll ever get.

As part of the buildup for next week’s All-Star Game here, Hubbs’ family is donating to the Hall of Fame the glove he used as a rookie in 1962 to set two major league fielding records, along with the game ball from the day he set one of them–consecutive errorless games by a second baseman.

Ted Spencer, chief curator for the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, said he will immediately display Hubbs’ items along with artifacts from more famous baseball notables at the All-Star FanFest, which opens Friday at McCormick Place. Then he’ll take Hubbs’ memorabilia back to Cooperstown to join the museum’s collection, more “footprints in time,” as Spencer refers to the keepsakes from record-setting performances.

Keith Hubbs, Ken’s older brother, met me at McCormick Place on Tuesday to show me the ball and glove and talk about his brother. If there’s one thing you don’t have to ask Keith Hubbs twice, it’s to talk about Ken, who would have turned 62 this December.

“It’s nice to have just a little bit of him in the Hall of Fame,” said Keith, 65, a successful businessman and star athlete in his own right who moved to Wrigleyville with his wife six months ago on a Mormon mission.

Keith showed me pictures of when Ken was a high school All-America in both football and basketball (“his best sport,” Keith says) in California, and told me how he’d been class president and a top student. He told me about the personal qualities that always set Ken apart: quiet, modest, focused, driven.

He showed me the Sports Illustrated article from a decade ago titled “What Might Have Been,” in which the writer took a flight of fancy relating how Hubbs led the Cubs to five world championships (with the help of Brock, who was never traded for Ernie Broglio in this altered state of reality). Keith told me Billy Williams assured him they would have at least won in 1969.

Keith showed me a letter he’d received in 1964 from Holly Schindler, 12, of Flossmoor, donating 50 cents to the then-newly created Ken Hubbs Foundation. (It’s still going strong.)

“I am a loyal Cub fan and Ken Hubbs was my hero,” Holly wrote. “I knew all statistics of him, height, weight, etc., even the color of his eyes. I have even converted a Sox fan to a Cub fan. I was grieved to hear of the young athlete’s death, and I feel terribly sorry for the Hubbs family. This is part of my allowance, and I feel better by donating.”

If you’re not old enough to remember Hubbs, Holly’s letter may give you a sense of how his death was received.

It was a knife through the heart of Cubs fans, but the story of the untimely death of the young athlete with the wholesome, clean-cut image went beyond Cubdom.

“Ken Hubbs had the affection and respect of all Chicago,” said the telegram from Mayor Richard J. Daley that was read at the funeral. “There isn’t a man in Chicago who wouldn’t have been proud to have him as a son.”

Keith Hubbs said he only recently found the ball, which was kept in a small pouch with two small black-and-white photos of Santo making the presentation.

His mother then found the glove in a long-neglected equipment bag, just where Hubbs had packed it for the trip to spring training that never came. He died when a small plane he was piloting crashed in a snowstorm near Provo, Utah.

It never occurred to them to sell the stuff.

The Hubbs glove is notable mostly for its simplicity–a small Chuck Cottier autograph model made by Spalding. Hubbs used it while going 78 consecutive games and 418 chances without an error, which helped him become the first rookie to win a Gold Glove award.

Ninety-two years ago, Cleveland-born Ed Delahanty, playing for the Washington Senators of the American League, plunged to his death from the International Bridge connecting Buffalo, N.Y., and Bridgeburg, Ontario. Swept away in the Niagara River, Delahanty’s body was found one week later after going over Niagara Falls.

The only man to win batting titles in both leagues and one of five brothers to play at the game’s top level was dead at 35. With a lifetime batting average of .345, fourth-highest all-time, Delahanty’s skills were slipping somewhat, but he was still considered “King of the Swatters” when he died.

There used to be a baseball diamond on St. Clair Ave., just down the street from the Delahanty house on Phelps St. (later E. 34th St. between Superior and St. Clair). It was next to a firehouse and firemen took care of the field, which provided the venue for the Delahanty boys to learn the game.

After attending Cleveland Central High School, the first public high school west of the Alleghenies, Delahanty went to St. Joseph’s College on Woodland Ave. Despite protests from his mother, the 6-0, 200-pound Delahanty – nicknamed “Big Ed” – quit school to play ball in a newly formed state league.

“I’m goin’ to quit you and play ball in Mansfield,” Delahanty told his mother in 1887.

“Drat baseball,” was her reply. “It’s ruinin’ the family.”

One year later, Delahanty was playing outfield for the Philadelphia Phillies of the National League. In 1890, Delahanty pulled the “dinky dink” when he “jumped” the Phillies to play for the Cleveland Infants in the new Players League for $3,500, twice what he had been making.

If baseball seems a mess now, the 1890 season was filled with all sorts of team- and league-jumping as the American Association, National League and Players League fought for supremacy.

Del, as he was also known, was back with the Phillies in 1891 after the Players League and American Association folded. He spent 11 seasons with the Phillies, winning the batting crown in 1899 with a .408 average.

Slow horses and tight-fisted owners had left Delahanty desperately seeking the best deal in 1902, and he wound up playing for the Washington Senators of the new American League. He won the batting title with a .376 average and .590 slugging percentage in the AL’s second season.

But there were skeletons in Delahanty’s closet that he could no longer hide. A liking for the ponies and a penchant for getting drunk began to take their toll.

“Next to a base hit,” said a sportswriter of the player’s horse-betting ways, “Dell likes a straight tip, with a big killing as a chaser.” Another called him “the ranking chief” of the “horsey boys.”

Down on his racing luck after the 1902 season, Delahanty never seemed himself in 1903. Rumors had Delahanty secretly agreeing to jump leagues again, this time to join friend John McGraw on his National League’s New York Giants.

On June 25, 1903, the Senators lost to the Cleveland Naps, 4-0, in League Park. Delahanty singled in the fourth inning, the 2,597th and last hit of his career.

Delahanty went on a drinking binge after that, missing the rest of the Cleveland series. His teammates got him to Detroit, where Delahanty composed himself enough to sign the “pledge” in the presence of his mother and a Catholic priest.

Still not fit to play, a despondent Delahanty began drinking again. He had $200 and wore $1,500 in diamonds, or “sparklers,” when he boarded a New York-bound train the afternoon of July 2.

Instead of going home to Washington with his teammates, it is presumed Delahanty was intent on joining McGraw’s Giants to change his fortunes.

Fueled by whiskey, Delahanty began bothering passengers. When he tried to pull a woman out of her sleeping berth by the ankles, he was put off the train near the Canadian border at 10:45 p.m.

A night guard encountered an argumentative Delahanty and later reported seeing a man thrashing in the water. When his body was found, with one leg nearly severed, there was no money or jewelry on him.

The [Delahanty] family wanted $20,000 from the Michigan Central Railway Co. [in the lawsuit they filed over his death]. A Canadian jury in 1904 awarded Delahanty’s widow, Norine, $3,000 and his daughter $2,000.

On Saturday morning, July 11, 1903, services were held for Delahanty in a packed Immaculate Conception Church at E. 45th and Superior Ave. McGraw journeyed here to help bury his friend in Calvary Cemetery.

For what it’s worth, I first heard about the story of Delahanty’s death from Bill James, who summarized it as a drunken ballplayer falling from the Niagara River railroad bridge and dying “of damned foolishness.”

This is the kind of legal language that hardly anyone pays attention to, but in fact, there are substantial risks involved with going to an MLB game. Sporadic cases of fans falling out of the stands, sometimes to their deaths, have happened for years. And, Baker Bowl in Philadelphia, the sort of oldtime bandbox stadium that evokes a vague sense of warm nostalgia among some fans, was a literal death trap on two occasions. In 2003, the Philadelphia Inquirer told the story of “the day the Phils’ ballpark crumbled” in 1903, saying:

On the evening of Aug. 8, 1903, a grocery store along 15th Street turned its display window into a lost-and-found, filled with hundreds of hats – straw boaters, derbies, the soft caps worn by young boys.

A few hours earlier, the grocer had scooped them off the bloody street separating his North Philadelphia store from the third-base wall of the National League Park, the Phillies’ ballpark that years later would be renamed Baker Bowl after the man who bought the club in 1913.

The hats had fallen from the heads of the several hundred spectators who dropped 30 feet into a deadly heap when a wooden balcony collapsed during the second game of a doubleheader between the Phillies and the Boston Braves.

“The balcony tore itself away from the wall and the crowd hurled headlong to the pavement,” read the following day’s Inquirer. “In the twinkling of an eye the street was piled four deep with bleeding, injured, shrieking humanity struggling amid the piling debris.”

What followed was chaos. Rescuers worked frantically to remove the dead and injured, commandeering wagons and even some newfangled motorcars to haul them to St. Luke’s, Samaritan and Jewish Hospitals. Neighbors opened their homes. Pickpockets plucked wallets and watches from the helpless victims.

The collapse killed 12 fans, ranging in age from 24 to 63, and injured 232. Even today, exactly 100 years later, it remains one of the greatest tragedies in the history of American sports. . . .

In subsequent weeks, lawsuits were filed against the Phillies and their former owners. Investigations were begun, and inquests held. Ultimately, the disaster led to the end of wood as a major building material in ballparks. . . .

[On August 8, 1903] a large number of fans along the third-base line became interested in something happening off the field.

Below them on 15th Street, several neighborhood children had been teasing two drunks as they staggered from a neighborhood tavern toward Lehigh Avenue. Suddenly, one of the men reacted angrily, turning and grabbing the hair of a 13-year-old girl, later identified in newspaper accounts as Maggie Barry.

Her high-pitched squeals drew the attention of fans. An estimated total of 300 of them rushed to a wooden balcony that jutted out several feet from the grandstands above the corner of 15th and Lehigh.

The weight was too much for the makeshift structure. The wooden supports gave way, and wave after wave of spectators plummeted to the street below.

“There must have been one hundred men and boys, and every one of them was covered with blood,” a police officer told The Inquirer. “Some of them had their clothing almost torn from their bodies, while others were so bespattered with blood and mud as to be almost unrecognizable.”

The game was halted and eventually canceled. The remaining fans, fearful that the rest of the ballpark might tumble down, rushed onto the field.

“Some players armed themselves with bats to keep from being overwhelmed by the wild stampede,” Warrington said.

The Phillies ordered the debris removed immediately. The following day, Phils business manager Bill Shettsline attempted to absolve his club, which had been sold to a group headed by James Potter in 1902. Shettsline blamed the calamity on the “overanxiety” of the fans.

“The accident was in no way due to any lack of proper precautions or neglect on the part of officials of the club,” Shettsline said. “When the present management assumed control of the grounds, the pavilion and stands were in perfect condition, and, for the purposes intended, were safe and reliable, but the simultaneous rush of several hundred persons to one concentrated point weakened the structure and precipitated several hundred unfortunate persons to the street below.” . . .

A panel of six builders ruled after several days of hearings that rotting hemlock timbers were to blame and that the former owners, Reach and Rogers, were responsible. The courts determined that it was the rush of spectators, and not the faulty timber, that caused the collapse.

The Phillies wanted to rope off the affected area of the grandstands and resume their season. The city said no, and the team was forced to share Columbia Park, at 29th Street and Columbia Avenue, with the American League Athletics until repairs were made. . . .

The ballpark was repaired, but in 1927 a section of the first-base stands collapsed. This time, only one person died, but 50 were hurt. Eleven years later, the Phillies finally abandoned their rickety ballpark for good. Once again, they moved in with the A’s, this time at Shibe Park, six blocks farther up Lehigh Avenue.

Back in 1985, the Inquirer had noted the death of “HARRY ICKLER, 86, AVID PHILLIES FAN”: he was “believed to be the last survivor of the collapse at the Baker Bowl” in 1903. A 4-year-old when the disaster happened, Harry was attending his first game. It is a strange note of either irony or coincidence or something else that the Inquirer added: “Ickler became a Phillies fan, played third base in the sandlot leagues and worked with Phillies groundskeepers. He seldom missed a game, except during service in World War I.”

You’re tempted to dismiss the two Baker Bowl accidents as outdated signs of how things used to be at the old, dangerous, rickety stadiums. But, on April 13, 1998, the Orange County Register reported that:

The most storied stadium in baseball began to molder Monday, forcing the game between the Angels and the New York Yankees to be postponed and perhaps finally giving owner George Steinbrenner the leverage he needs to get a new home for his team.

A 500-pound, cubic-foot piece of steel fell from the loge level ceiling in the left-field stands of Yankee Stadium on Monday afternoon, about five hours before the teams were to play. The stadium, which turns 75 years old Saturday, was empty.

About two hours before the scheduled first pitch, an announcement was made that the city, the Yankees’ landlord, had ordered the stadium closed to the public until it was determined there were no further structural defects. The Angels-Yankees game today was also postponed, and Wednesday’s game will likely be played at Shea Stadium in the afternoon, before the New York Mets play the Chicago Cubs there.

The Angels continued to take batting practice as New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani held an impromptu news conference on the grass behind home plate.

“We have no reason to believe there’s anything else in that position,” the mayor said. “Then again, we don’t have any idea if there is. It will be closed for two days, possibly three, so they can make a complete inspection. “

It is not known exactly why the beam, an expansion joint designed to offset structural expansion, fell. It was determined the joint was part of the stadium’s original construction in 1923.

“Its purpose is to move,” stadium superintendent Bob Wilkinson said. “It’s like a shock absorber for a car. It’s similar to what they do in buildings in California for earthquakes. This is one of the earliest forms of that principal.”

The other expansion joint in the stadium was part of the ballpark’s remodeling in 1974 and 1975. It was examined Monday night and determined to be safe.

The only person to witness the incident was Angels muscle therapist Bill LeSuer, a New York native, who was returning from the outfield around 2 p.m.

“I went out to pay my respects, as usual,” said LeSuer, a lifelong Yankees fan. “As I was coming back, I heard this tremendous bang, and there was a real big puff of smoke. I saw something falling down. I looked around to see if anyone else saw what I saw, and I realized I was alone. I thought the stadium was falling down. “

The seat on which the beam fell was crushed, and there was a 6-inch crater in the concrete. The beam looked like a large, rusted car battery.

“If somebody had been there at the time the beam came down that person would now be dead,” Giuliani said.

The Register also noted several other cases of structural damage at baseball stadiums in the ‘90s:

Sept. 13, 1991, Olympic Stadium — A 55-ton concrete beam fell off the side and crashed onto a walkway below, forcing the Montreal Expos to play their last 13 regular-season home games on the road.

Jan. 17, 1994, Anaheim Stadium — Northridge quake caused Sony Jumbotron, advertising panels and a portion of the stadium roof, including the “Little A,” to collapse into empty stands.

July 19, 1994, Kingdome — Four acoustic tiles fell from ceiling into empty seats hours before Seattle’s game against Baltimore. The Mariners had to spend the final 22 days on the road. The Seahawks played their first three home games at the University of Washington.

June 22, 1995, SkyDome — At least seven spectators were injured when two wood tiles fell from the upper deck during Toronto’s game against Milwaukee.

And on July 2, 2003, the sudden acceleration of an escalator at Coors Field caused dozens of injuries to Colorado Rockies fans.

Finally, Bob Gorman and David Weeks wrote an article called “Foul Play: Fan Fatalities in Twentieth-Century Organized Baseball,” for the baseball journal Nine in 2003. They noted three fatalities at Yankee Stadium and the Polo Grounds. The AP said that “at a 1929 game at Yankee Stadium, two people died and 62 were injured when a heavy rainstorm caused the right field bleacher crowd of about 9,000 to stampede the exit.” And, “at a 1950 game at New York’s defunct Polo Grounds, Bernard Doyle was shot in the head by a .45-caliber bullet while sitting in the upper left field stands. A few days later, a teenage boy confessed to randomly firing the pistol from his nearby apartment rooftop.”

Still, Gorman argued: “You’ve got to keep this in context. In terms of American sports, it’s much safer than sports played in other countries. At soccer games in Europe or in Latin America, there’s hundreds of people who sometimes die.”

One of the sadder episodes in major league baseball was played out in the skies above Toronto more than a half-century ago.

In the very early morning of Sept. 17, 1935, Brooklyn Dodgers outfielder Len Koenecke was beaten to death by the pilot after becoming rowdy in a chartered airplane.

A few Dodgers were flying home from St. Louis to New York, rather than take the train. The 30-year-old Koenecke, who had a history of depression and a recent arm injury hampering his .283 season, had been put off a commercial airliner in Detroit for drunkenness.

He chartered a plane there, but would pay for it to go only as far as Buffalo.

Nearing Toronto, Koenecke suddenly attacked the pilot and then commenced a battle with the co-pilot, whom he bit and punched.

As the plane pitched around the sky out of control above what now is Etobicoke, the three men wrestled before pilot Joseph Mulqueeny finally was forced to hit the player over the head with a fire extinguisher. Repeated blows fractured Koenecke’s skull and he was dead before the plane crash-landed on the infield of the old Long Branch Race Track, around what now is Kipling and Evans Ave.

I’ve seen a few other news stories claiming Koenecke was the first airplane terrorist ever, but this episode hardly seems like terrorism to me. I first read about it in Bill James’ Historical Abstract from the mid-’80s, with James noting that Mulqueeny also had to fight off some angry dogs as he left the plane following the landing. Baseball players have been involved in a lot of ugly, violent incidents, but this one is maybe the most bizarre baseball death I’ve ever heard of.

“I went to spring training with the Giants after finishing the 1949 season with them,” Milne said. “And in April, against Pat McLaughlin of Brooklyn, I hit the bases-loaded, pinch-hit inside-the-park grand slam homer.”

That is that story. A longer one was told in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer of Monday, May 4, 1998:

The Mariners set aside an entire weekend for their kid fans, and catcher Dan Wilson joined in the festivities by riding a two-day cycle.

Wilson hit a rare inside-the-park grand slam yesterday afternoon to go along with his single, double and triple Saturday night as the M’s won the final two games of a three-game series against the Detroit Tigers and climbed out of the American League West basement.

Wilson’s second career inside-the-park homer came in the first inning when Seattle supplied left-hander Randy Johnson with a five-run lead. The M’s expanded it to an eight-run cushion with five more runs in the second inning – three on an Edgar Martinez homer – and then held off the Tigers, 10-6, before 44,488 at the Kingdome.

Wilson’s slam ended a nine-pitch battle with Tigers right-hander Frank Castillo.

After fouling off four consecutive outside pitches on a 2-and-2 count, Wilson clobbered a hanging curve, rocketing it into the gap in left-center field. Left fielder Luis Gonzalez nearly made a sensational catch at the wall, but the ball hit the fence and bounced away from both Gonzalez and center fielder Brian Hunter, who was shading Wilson to right-center.

“When Danny hit it, I knew there was no way the center fielder was going to catch it,” Mariners manager Lou Piniella said. “But their left fielder made a good effort to come as close as he did.”

The ball rolled toward center field and Wilson kept running.

“I didn’t know what was going on,” Wilson said. “I didn’t know where the ball was when I got to second base, and I picked up the coach (Steve Smith) who was waving me on.”

Wilson raced into third base and then chugged the remaining 90 feet.

“I just kept going,” he said.

As he went past third base, the fireworks prematurely exploded overhead.

Wilson easily beat the throw, sliding home with the major league’s 171st inside – the – park grand slam and the first in seven seasons.

After the jaunt was completed and Wilson caught his breath in the dugout, M’s pitching coach Stan Williams fanned Wilson with a towel.

“It’s a weird feeling. A strange feeling, like there is no oxygen in the stadium after that,” said Wilson, who hit his first career insider last Sept. 10. Against the Tigers. At the Kingdome. With Hunter playing center field.

“I swear, it happened the same way,” said Hunter comparing the two. “He fouled off four or five pitches and then hit a ball in exactly the same place. He gets some nice bounces here.

“Once the ball starts rolling on this stuff (artifical turf), all you can do is chase it. This is the second time (Wilson) has done this. Next time, I guess I’ll play him straightaway.”

Wilson, batting with two outs, fell behind 0-and-2 before settling into a battle royal with Castillo.

“He just kept battling and I tried to make a good pitch,” Castillo said. “On the last pitch, I figured he must be sitting on a fastball. I tried to do too much with a curve and hung it up there. I think I could have hit it – that’s how bad it was – and it pretty much did me in.”

Here are the 9 inside-the-park grand slams that preceded Wilson’s:

8/28/91 Chico Walker Cubs

9/1/90 Mike Greenwell Red Sox

8/14/90 Luis Polonia Angels

6/2/89 Junior Felix Blue Jays

6/21/87 Bob Brower Rangers

6/9/85 Terry Pendleton Cardinals

7/19/82 Tom Brunansky Twins

9/26/80 Ben Oglivie Brewers

6/10/79 Jim Essian Athletics

On July 25, 2011, the Salt Lake Bees had one as well. The Salt Lake Tribune wrote:

When was the last time anyone witnessed an inside-the-park grand slam — that wasn’t in Little League? Like, never.

“I never did,” said Bees starting pitcher Jerome Williams.

“You did now,” said the guy who pulled it off, Jeremy Moore.

In a weekend of wacky baseball goings on at Spring Mobile Ballpark, Salt Lake (44-58) pulled off the rare grand slam on Sunday, thanks to Moore and a bright sun.

The Bees also needed just two hits to score their first eight runs in a 10-2 victory against Tacoma (51-51). It was their fifth victory in eight games. . . .

But that Salt Lake first inning was something to talk about. And it had to be to top the Bees’ 10-run first inning Saturday, which included a more-routine grand slam , and an 18-9 win.

Tacoma starter Mauricio Robles had walked the bases full. Then with two out, Moore, who had been within a triple of a cycle Saturday, sent a high fly ball to deep left. It was a makeable play, only Rainiers left fielder Carlos Peguero lost the ball in the setting sun.

Peguero took two tentative steps toward the infield, hands raised high. The ball landed at the base of the wall. The swift Moore easily beat the throw home.

“I kind of knew when he missed it,” Moore said. ” I knew my speed.”

Apparently the last MLB player to hit an inside-the-park grand slam was Randy Winn of the Tampa Bay Devil Rays on Oct. 3, 1999, according to baseball-fever.com.

“Wahoo” Sam Crawford holds the post-1800s MLB record for inside-the-park home runs with 51 out of the 97 he hit in or out of the park. Not coincidentally, Crawford also has the record for most triples in an MLB career, with 309. But Baseball-Almanac says Jesse Burkett has the all-time record, with 55.

By comparison, in 2000 11,215 Americans earned at least $10 million, a number probably inflated by the tech bubble that burst that spring. I count 14 MLB players in 2000 with at least $10 million of salary, or .125%. So, the percentage of players in the $10-million plus class went up by about nine times over the course of the 2000s. Meanwhile, the average players’ salary went from $1.988 million in 2000 to $3.24 million in 2009. So, at the MLB level wealth became much more highly concentrated among the richest players as the decade wore on.

By the way, here’s a chart from the AP showing how MLB salaries grew from 1989 to 2000:

Here is part of the exchange between “SC/BP” and Goossen, who died early in 2011. You can read the whole interview at Hardball Times.

SC/BP: How did you feel about Sick’s?

GG: Loved it. When I was a kid we watched old Hollywood movies about baseball, they weren’t these luxurious ballyards – they were ballyards like Sick’s. Nothing better than the advertisements on the walls and they were all different. There isn’t a ballpark like Sick’s Stadium. There isn’t a ballpark like Wrigley Field. There isn’t a ballpark like Fenway. I loved those parks. The lighting could have been better. I loved it. Of course I did very well there. I hit double-digit home runs there in very few games. Loved it.

SC/BP: What did you do after the 1969 season?

GG: That was a journey that broke my heart. I used to say, “well I played and they got rid of me.” To me, Joe Schultz who managed Seattle was the smartest manager I ever met in my life. You know why? He played me! It’s the truth. I deemed him a genius. And not knowing whether we were going to leave Seattle, well, we were there in spring training on the last day and had no idea. I thought if we stayed in Seattle and Joe was still there I would have been the starting first baseman. No doubt. I hit .309 in Seattle. Ten home runs, 24 RBI’s in 57 times at bat which is…I should have played even more when I was with Seattle.

Dave Bristol was the manager in Milwaukee – or Seattle at the time. We didn’t get along well at all. I damn near didn’t make the club, much less start. I broke camp with them and ended up with Milwaukee. Not for long though, about a month and Bristol got rid of me.

SC/BP: Besides his tactical abilities, what did you think of Joe Schultz?

GG: He was great with the players. I mean, by the time they get to the big leagues, what are you going to tell them? Their path is sort of marked. The human element like in football or any other sport means so much. You really want to go out and win for them. I wanted to go out and win for Joe so badly. He was a good man. A good man to play for.

SC/BP: What did you think about the crowds in Seattle?

GG: There is not a thing about Seattle that I didn’t love. I mean if we had stayed here and I played 20 years here and the Dodgers wanted me or Chicago – I wouldn’t take any money. I was the happiest guy in the world and part of it was my teammates. A lot of it was my teammates. There was not an ego on the team.

There were guys who were up and coming down. Or guys who never got a chance. There were guys who had been on World Series teams like Ray Oyler for Detroit. They were the greatest bunch of guys I’d ever been around in my life.

A strong earthquake rattled across 15 states from Missouri to South Carolina and parts of Canada yesterday evening, shaking skyscrapers and a major-league baseball stadium and triggering alarms at a nuclear plant. There were reports of minor damage and one minor injury.

The tremor, centered near Lawrenceville, Ill., 55 miles north of Evansville, Ind., was the largest in that part of Illinois in nearly 20 years, caving in part of a roof, breaking windows and cutting some telephone service in three counties.

The National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo., said the quake occurred at 6:49 p.m. (CDT) and registered 5.0 on the Richter scale. A quake of that magnitude can cause considerable damage.

Reports of people feeling the quake came in from Missouri, Minnesota, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Tennessee, West Virginia, Virginia, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and South Carolina, and also from several cities in Ontario.

“It was scary, but I must admit, it gave me a real thrill,” said nursing supervisor Becky Baker at Home Hospital in Lafayette, Ind. “I didn’t know what it was. I never felt anything like that before.”

Near Erie, Pa., Catherine Shaw, 76, and her husband, John, were watching television in their apartment in Harborcreek Township when the quake hit.

“We don’t have rocking chairs,” she said. “Our chairs are pretty solid,” but they “started rocking back and forth.”

At Tiger Stadium in downtown Detroit, slugger Kirk Gibson was at bat against the Milwaukee Brewers when the earthquake hit.

“You could look through the glass in front across the other side of the press box and see a kind of shaking,” Tiger spokesman Craig Shea said. “It was swaying even.” The press box at the stadium, one of the oldest parks in the major leagues, sits atop the third deck.

“I think this will serve as a reminder that we do live in an area that can have earthquakes ,” said Gregg Durham, a spokesman for the Illinois Emergency Services and Disaster Agency. “A lot of people had their wits scared out of them.”

And USA Today added:

The most recent comparable Midwestern quake occurred July 12, 1986, when a jolt centered in Auglaize County, Ohio, registered 4.2 on the Richter scale. The strongest in several years occurred Jan. 1, 1986, when an earthquake centered about 30 miles northeast of Cleveland had an estimated magnitude of 5.0.

“It is considered a moderate earthquake ,” said Waverly Person at the National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colo. “It’s unusual to have one this size in the Midwest.”

Steve Thibideau, 27, of Union Lake, Mich., a suburb of Detroit, timed the tremors he felt with a stopwatch he happened to have in hand: 2 minutes, 39 seconds.

“It was just kind of odd, everything vibrated and shook. It was pretty strong for 10 or 15 seconds. I was out in the garage checking on my fishing gear and everything started jumping up and down. … I could see the worm on the end of my fishing pole jumping up and down.”

Many people didn’t feel a thing. “I’ve got 500 customers up here right now and I haven’t heard a peep out of them,” said Julie Weaver from the restaurant on the 95th floor of Chicago’s John Hancock building.

But behind Mississippi Tavern in Fort Madison, Iowa, a man leaning against a wall felt the quake. “He said that the wall was moving. I said, `No, it ain’t – you’re stoned,’ ” recalled a friend, Tony Elmore, who was standing nearby.

As the power lines to the bar began to swing, Elmore said, “I saw the building swaying an inch either way. I never seen a train or anything move a wall like that.”

Baseball fans at Tiger Stadium in Detroit got a scare when the stadium began shaking.

“The press box began swaying, moving back and forth like an amusement ride. It was quite scary,” said Detroit News Sports Editor Joe Falls. However, it apparently did not affect Tiger Kirk Gibson, who slammed a triple to center field right after the tremor. [The quake and triple came in the bottom of the 1st, by the way.]