Where Have You Gone: Choo-Choo Coleman Edition

I've been laying low for a while. I'm way behind on post commitments, trade posts, and others things. I'm fine, doing great actually, just exceeding busy.

For instance: the last two weeks I was in Honduras doing some work. Good stuff, but I'm pretty tapped at the moment.

When I think of the disappeared, I think of Choo-Choo Coleman. He's Unibomber-style off the grid. Never heard of a public appearance, much less a ttm. There are a few GREAT Choo-Choo stories out there, and I'd like to think that, like the mythical Pumpsie Green disappearing with Gene Conley for a few days of anonymous debauchery, Choo-Choo is out there somewhere doing his thing and doing OK. 

Right before I went to Honduras I happened upon an antique store in Fargo and came across this Choo-Choo display card for cheap, so I bit. It's oversized but, despite the printed sig, the serendipity of the find made it seem like Choo-Choo had sent that out there just for me to find, almost with my name on it.

Have a good one everybody and goodnight Pumpsie Green, wherever you are!

Dick Allen for the Hall

One of Daddy D's all-time favorite nicknames is "Choo-choo," as in Choo-choo Coleman. He wants me to post on Coleman so bad he sent me a few Choo-choos to post.

However, there are a few things that need to come before. While looking up some info on Choo-choo I came across one of those abandoned message boards you'll find from time to time: established 2001, a thread from '03, nothing new since '04. At one point folks were exchanging "Choo-choo Coleman was so stupid..." stories when someone stated something to the effect that Coleman, like Dick Allen, came up in the Phillies farm system, positing that Coleman, like Allen, learned to be curt and stand-offish with reporters, managers, and fans alike because of his experience coming up through the minors.

There's even a paper written about it, here. It ain't for the faint of heart.

I got this card from the .50 cent bin at the local, and will admit that until I took a hard look at the stats I had no idea how good he was. Lifetime OPS of .912, OPS+ 156. Dude had power and a good bit of speed. If you check out his Baseball Ref page, towards the bottom you'll see he's a border-line HOFer based on the various Bill James smell tests. In fact, there's a blog dedicated to getting him in: Dick Allen Hall of Fame.

If you look around a bit, there are a lot of stories about Allen and his bad attitude, (see Rice, Jim) and I imagine that has a lot to do with his not being in the HOF, as it did with Rice until this year. Hopefully that will be corrected soon. And I say that as someone who has disliked the Phillies from the 80's to the present, so I'm not pulling for one of "my guys."

Have a great one!