Hall of Famer Gibson dead at 84
By almost any account, Stan Musial was considered the greatest St. Louis Cardinals player. By the same accounts, Bob Gibson, the Hall of Famer who died at age 84 Friday night in Omaha under hospice care after fighting pancreatic cancer for more than a year, was considered the franchise's greatest pitcher.
Gibson's death came on the 52nd anniversary of perhaps his greatest game, a record 17-strikeout performance in Game 1 of the 1968 World Series.
Gibson, like Musial a rarity who played his entire career (1959-75) with the Cardinals, set club records for games won at 251 and complete games at a staggering 255, let alone a franchise-best 56 shutouts, strikeouts (3,117) and innings pitched at 3,884.
Gibson had five 20-win seasons, two with 19 victories and another of 18. He was so good in 1968 that baseball had to change its rules. Gibson compiled a modern-day best earned run average of 1.12 while winning 22 games and throwing 13 shutouts to lead a parade of pitching dominance in baseball and, for 1969, the height of the mound was lowered by 33 percent, from 15 inches to 10.
This didn't seem to make a whole lot of difference, though to the hard-throwing righthander, who was 20-13 with a 2.18 ERA in 1969 while pitching 314 innings, nine more than his previous season and striking out 269 hitters, one more than he had in 1968.
Tigers not ruling out Hinch, Cora: General manager Al Avila said Detroit is not ruling out the possibility of hiring AJ Hinch or Alex Cora for its manager vacancy.
Hinch and Cora were suspended through the 2020 postseason for their roles in the Astros' signstealing scandal.
The Astros fired Hinch and general manager Jeff Luhnow on Jan. 13 and Cora lost his job managing Boston the next day. Cora spent the 2017 season as bench coach on Hinch's staff with Houston.
“Really, I can't say that I've eliminated anybody,” Avila said. “The cheating scandal is not a good thing, obviously.
“They're serving their suspensions, and once their suspensions are over, then they'll be free to pursue their careers.”
GOLF
Bradley leads by 2 at Jackson
Keegan Bradley made three straight birdies on the back nine to take the lead and closed with another short birdie putt on his way to a 7-under 65 for a twoshot lead over J.T. Poston and Charley Hoffman at the Sanderson Farms Championship in Jackson, Miss.
Bradley, whose victory in the BMW Championship at Aronimink two years ago was his only title in the last eight years, was at 13-under 131.
Hataoka takes lead at Shoprite LPGA Classic: Nasa Hataoka birdied two of the last three holes for a 4-under 67 and a one-shot lead in the Shoprite LPGA Classic at Galloway, N.J.
Hataoka. the 21-year-old Japanese player with three LPGA Tour victories, birdied the par-4 16th and par-5 18th to get to 11-under 131 at Seaview's Bay Course. She hit her approach to 4 feet on 17, and chipped to 3 feet on 18.