RIP Ernie .. Mr. Cub, indeed !
Posted on 01/23/2015 8:09:54 PM PST by Beave Meister
I loved earnie banks. he had a very big number one on the card used to play this game when i was a kid.
All Star Baseball is one of the two most popular baseball board games of the last sixty years,[citation needed] and has been honored as one of the fifty most influential American board games of all time.[by whom?] It was manufactured by Cadaco-Ellis and designed by baseball player Ethan Allen.
The game first appeared in 1941 and a special version is still sold today. It was the best-selling baseball board game of all time,[citation needed] and is the only such game to have been distributed through mass market channels and toy stores for any extended period of time.[citation needed] The annual versions of the game were discontinued in the mid-1990s due to the loss of market share to video games and greatly increased player licensing costs, but a commemorative version was issued in 2003.
Unlike more simulation-focused competitors, most notably Strat-o-Matic Baseball, ASB is aimed at a younger audience and is simpler to play. The initial target audience was boys 9–12 years old. It simulates batters’ performance well, but makes no attempt to model the performance of individual pitchers.
Nevertheless, many fans passionately bought each year’s cards and collected statistics from neighborhood leagues, some amassing as many as 2,500 games worth of paper box scores and comparing those totals with the actual players’ statistics.
Ernie Banks was my boyhood hero. He came to the Cubs in 1953, the year I was born. I lived a couple miles from Wrigley Field and saw him play hundreds of times.
Very sad news.
He was one of the greatest ever, and nobody ever had as much fun playing the game.
Also, one of the last links to the Negro Leagues, having played for the Kansas City Monarchs.
Although Mickey Mantle will always be my favorite baseball players, I would surely put Ernie Banks as second. I grew up in the 50’s when baseball was king and the NFL was just an afterthought. I miss those days and those players who made the game great!
He was my first baseball hero. I grew up in the west burbs, and went Wrigley once a season with my dad.
Long time Cub fan Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam was at a Cubs game and threw out the first pitch and sang Take Me Out To the Ballgame and the seventh inning stretch. And Ernie was at the game too. So Ernie went up to him and said, “You’re a Cubs fan, you should write a song about the Cubs, a really great song.” So Vedder came up with this one. And when Pearl Jam played at Wrigley Field on night he sang it and had Ernie come up on stage. It was great.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVRN64ebdqs
Sad day not just for Cubs fans, but for anyone who loves the Great Game.
Each bat had a player's signature, and there really was a difference. The Eddie Matthews bat was very thin at the handle and thick at the barrel end. The Nellie Fox model had a very thick handle and a small barrel.
I was too little for the first half of his career, but for the second half of his career, I saw most of the games he played, hundreds in person and hundreds more on Channel 9. Got to meet Ernie Banks a number of times. He and the Cubs and Wrigley Field were a big part of my youth.
A fine gentleman. RIP.
Ernie Banks. Saw you play once. ‘Hope I see you again.
That was pretty cool, two of my favorite things, Pearl Jam and Mr. Cub
Condolences to family and friends of Ernie Banks. R.I.P., sir.
Too bad he was a HOF caliber guy on a rotten team.
Hearing these stories makes me respect him even more.
Holy Cow! (pun intended) how many wives did this guy have? He sure was a lover of women.
Today was a very sad day indeed. I have been a life long Cub fan born and raised in Chicago.
Ernie Banks and Ron Santo are my two all time favorite Cubs.
The 1969 Chicago Cubs team is represented in the Hall of Fame by Ron Santo, Ernie Banks, Billy Williams and Fergie Jenkins. Another pitcher from that team Ken Holtzman who threw two no-hitters for the Cubs.
Banks had 106 RBIs that year
Mid fifties I had an Ernie Banks outfielders glove.
(I’ve always been out in left field). :)
RIP Ernie .. Mr. Cub, indeed !
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