ON THIS DATE
July 2 is a bonanza of Bay Area birthdays: Joe Thornton (41); Alex Morgan (31); Jose Canseco (56) — and twin Ozzie, too; Angel Pagan (39); former A’s slugger and Gold Glover Tony Armas (67). 1902: John McGraw becomes manager of the New York Giants, a position he will hold for 30 years. 1903: Ed Delahanty, the reigning AL batting champ, dies at 35 after a mysterious fall into Niagara Falls. (Sounds fishy.) 1909: The Chicago White Sox steal 12 bases, including home plate three times, in a 15-3 rout of the St. Louis Browns. (Pitcher slow to the plate, catcher has a rag arm.) 1921:The Jack Dempsey-Georges Carpentier heavyweight fight, the first million-dollar gate in boxing history, ends in fourth-round KO. (Dempsey.) 1930: Carl Reynolds becomes the second player in history to homer in three consecutive innings, going deep in the first, second and third for the White Sox. 1933: The St. Louis Cardinals lose 1-0 in both games of a doubleheader, the first in 18 innings. 1937: Richard Petty turns 83 today. (Vrooom, time flies!) 1938: Helen Wills Moody wins her eighth and final singles title at Wimbledon. 1941: Joe DiMaggio homers to extend his hitting streak to 45 games, surpassing Wee Willie Keeler’s 1897 record. 1966: Billie Jean King wins the first of her six singles titles at Wimbledon. 1984: Johnny Weir, who along with Tara Lipinski forms a broadcast team that makes figure skating fun to watch, turns 36 today. 1988: Steffi Graf ends Martina Navratilova’s six-year reign as Wimbledon champion with a 5-7, 6-2, 6-1 victory. 1994: Colombian defender Andres Escobar, 27, is killed outside a bar in Colombia after his own goal in a 2-1 World Cup loss to the United States. 2005: Venus Williams beats top-ranked Lindsay Davenport 4-6, 7-6 (4), 9-7 in the Wimbledon final for her first major title in nearly four years. 2012: Raiders great Ben Davidson, a big man with a big mustache, dies from prostate cancer at 72. 2013: Homer Bailey of the Cincinnati Reds pitches his second no-hitter in 10 months and the first in the majors this season.