First Pitch Thrown at New York Mets Jewish Heritage Day is a Real Matzo Ball

Last Sunday was a winning day for the New York Mets at Citi Field. Not only did they beat the Seattle Mariners 6-3, but they gave their fans a special treat when rapper Matisyahu threw out a matzo ball as the first pitch.

As Shiryn Ghermezian wrote in The Algemeiner,

The Grammy-nominated Jerusalem singer plucked the matzah ball directly out of a container of soup, presented to him by fellow Jew and star of The Flash, actor Ezra Miller, before throwing the opening pitch from the mound to Miller at home plate. A video that Matisyahu shared on Instagram shows the matzah ball breaking apart into millions of pieces when Miller tried to catch it with his baseball glove.

The matzah ball used in the pitch was made by Miller, who adjusted a family recipe to make a “denser ball” for Sunday’s game, according to the New York Post.

A reporter for MLB.com who covers the Mets recounted the scene on social media: “The Mets are going all-out for Jewish Heritage Day at Citi Field. Matisyahu threw a ceremonial first pitch and performed live between innings. Ike Davis, Ty Kelly, Art Shamsky and Josh Satin were recognized on a scoreboard feature. The organist even played The Chanukah Song.”

Enjoy!

A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO MAY NOT BE VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY ON SOME COMPUTERS AND TABLETS.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.

Throwback Thursday Comedy Showcase: Phil Foster Sings "Let's Keep the Dodgers in Brooklyn" in 1957

The Brooklyn Dodgers moved to Los Angeles after the 1957 baseball season. Most Brooklyn fans were not happy with the move. Comedian Phil Foster expressed the feelings of Dodger fans in a song he sang 65 years ago on the Ed Sullivan Show, Let's Keep the Dodgers in Brooklyn.

Phil Foster (1913-1985)was born in Brooklyn, New York as Fivel Feldman. He took his stage name's surname from Foster Avenue in Brooklyn. 

He had his first taste of performing when he was a child, when he and his pals began singing and dancing in front of movie theatres. Then he began appearing in amateur shows, competi
ng for prizes. With him on occasion was another beginner named Jackie Gleason.

Foster made his debut as a night club comic in Chicago in the late 1930s when he was pushed out on the floor suddenly to fill in for a stand-up comic. "I just got up and talked," he says. "I didn't know you were supposed to have an act. But I was offered the job at $125 a week."

He always intended to go back to acting, but, staying with the money, he rapidly made a reputation in night clubs and found himself in constant demand from New York to Birmingham to Seattle.

During World War II, Foster served in the United States Army. Upon his discharge, he returned to New York and become a variety show favorite with an act comprising stories based on his curious childhood in Brooklyn. 

Enjoy!

A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO MAY NOT BE VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY ON SOME COMPUTERS AND TABLETS.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.

  

 #Throwback Thursday      #TBT

Israel's Baseball Team Hopes for Olympic Medals in Tokyo

Israel's i24 news is reporting that the Israel baseball team is heading to Tokyo to be one of six countries competing for medals in the sport that few Israelis follow or even know about. The Israeli team will be playing against the United States, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, and the Dominican Republic.

Most of the more than 40 members of the team are Jewish Americans who played in the big leagues. They got their citizenship and passports and qualified to represent Israel in the games.

As Cody Williams wrote in the New York Post,

Amid a group of stalwarts in the world of baseball, Israel has been a nation on the rise in the sport in recent years. They have shot up into the top 25 of the world rankings in recent years, including making a run in the World Baseball Classic back in 2017. However, this will be the country’s first appearance ever in the Olympics.

The major factor differentiating the 2017 WBC squad from the group heading to Tokyo is that the Olympics have stricter eligibility requirements, essentially requiring all players to be naturally born Israeli citizens or to have made aliyah (Jewish return to Israel to become a citizen). For the WBC, The Law of Return allowed virtually any Jewish baseball player to join Team Israel.

The first game between Israel and the USA is scheduled for 6 am on Friday.

Play ball!

A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO MAY NOT BE VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY ON SOME COMPUTERS AND TABLETS.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.

70-Year-Old Gwen Goldman Becomes NY Yankees Bat Girl After 60 Year Wait

In 1961, ten-year-old Gwen Goldman wrote a letter to the New York Yankees asking to be a bat girl. The response she got would make modern girls bristle. Team manager Ron Hamey wrote:

“While we agree with you that girls are certainly as capable as boys, and no doubt would be an attractive addition on the playing field, I am sure you can understand that in a game dominated by men a young lady such as yourself would feel out of place in a dugout.”

As Julia Gergely wrote yesterday in The Forward,

Although it wasn’t the response she had hoped for, a note with the Yankees letterhead was still exciting, and Goldman remained a fan.

She never expected the Yankees to reach out after all these years to right their wrong.

Brian Cashman, the Yankees GM since 1998, reached out to Goldman after hearing the story from her daughter. “A woman belongs everywhere a man does, including the dugout,” he read out loud to Goldman from a new letter on a surprise Zoom call with her family.

As part of the Yankees HOPE Week Initiative, Cashman invited Goldman to work as a bat girl for a game. “Some dreams take longer than they should to be realized,” his letter finishes, “but a goal attained should not dim with the passage of time.”

After 60 years, Goldman's dream was realized in a game against the Los Angeles Dodgers on Monday.

A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO MAY NOT BE VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY ON SOME COMPUTERS AND TABLETS.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.

Israel World Baseball Update: It Was Good While it Lasted

Not long after we posted today's story about Team Israel's success in leading the World Baseball Classic, we got word that the team was defeated by Japan, 8-3, eliminating them from the competition.

After the Netherlands beat Cuba 14-1 earlier in the day, Israel knew that it would have to defeat Japan to maintain any chance of reaching the semifinals at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. But winning the first four games of the tournament, they fell short in Japan.

Although they were disappointed with the loss, Team Israel will plan to return next year and gain satisfaction at their success in the first round of the tournament.

Better luck next year!

Israel Maintains Best Record in World Baseball Classic

Israel has a baseball team, and a succesful one, at that. Who knew? 

Team Israel's surprising successful baseball team is still holding the best record so far this year in the World Baseball Classic despite losing its first game to the Netherlands.

As JTA reported yesterday,

Israel was the lowest-ranked team to qualify for the showcase tournament, coming in at 41st in the world. But last week in the first round, the Israelis squeaked past third-ranked South Korea, 2-1, in extra innings, outscored fourth-ranked Taiwan, 15-7, and defeated ninth-ranked the Netherlands, 4-2, to finish first in Pool A with a 3-0 record.

This is the first year that Israel has qualified for the tournament. In 2012, its inaugural WBC squad narrowly missed advancing past the qualifiers.

Most of the players are American Jews, among them several former major leaguers. WBC rules state that players who are eligible for citizenship of a country may play on its team. Jews and their grandchildren, and the grandchildren’s spouses, have the right to become Israeli citizens.

A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO IS NOT VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.

Mandy Patinkin Sings Take Me Out to the Ball Game and God Bless America - in Yiddish!

On Sunday we posted two videos of Brooklyn chasidim singing the National Anthem and God Bless America before a baseball game in Coney Island. This chorus, whose first language is Yiddish, sang the two American patriotic songs in English (with a little help from a smartphone.)

Today we're posting the flip side. American singer and actor Mandy Patinkin released a CD album a few years ago that included his rendition of Take Me Out to the Ball Game and God Bless America -- in

Yiddish! The audio clips were turned into a video by MyZeidi Video Productions.
  
We think it's appropriate to share this gem during this 80th anniversary year of Hank Greenberg's rookie year with the Detroit Tigers. Greenberg was the first Jewish superstar in all of American professional sports. He attracted national attention in 1934 when he refused to play on Yom Kippur, the holiest of Jewish holidays, even though the Tigers were in the middle of a pennant race and he never claimed to be a religiously observant, practicing Jew. Greenberg is widely considered as one of the greatest sluggers in baseball history.

Enjoy!

(A SPECIAL NOTE FOR NEW EMAIL SUBSCRIBERS:  THE VIDEO IS NOT VIEWABLE DIRECTLY FROM THE EMAIL THAT YOU GET EACH DAY.  YOU MUST CLICK ON THE TITLE AT THE TOP OF THE EMAIL TO REACH THE JEWISH HUMOR CENTRAL WEBSITE, FROM WHICH YOU CLICK ON THE PLAY BUTTON IN THE VIDEO IMAGE TO START THE VIDEO.)

The Shot Heard 'Round the World and Ralph Branca -- the Jewish Catholic Pitcher

Almost every year we hear of a famous person who suddenly discovered or revealed that they had Jewish roots. The list includes Madeline Albright, champion ice skater Oksana Baiul, John Kerry, Richard Holbrooke, and Wesley Clark.

Yesterday, in an article on the New York Times sports pages, Joshua Prager reported that Ralph Branca, the Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher who served up the fastball that Bobby Thomson of the New York Giants turned into the "shot heard 'round the world" in 1951, was also a member of the tribe. The resulting home run gave the pennant to the Giants, who then lost the World Series to the New York Yankees.

It turns out that Branca's mother, a practicing Catholic who had baby Ralph baptized, was herself the daughter of Jewish parents in Hungary. She never told the boy about his Jewish heritage. It was discovered only because Prager, in writing a book about the home run, mentioned that Branca's mother's maiden name was Berger. With the help of genealogists in Hungary, Prager found the documents that provided the proof that she was indeed Jewish.

You can read the whole story in this lengthy article from the Times. We'll share with you just one vignette, as reported by Prager after meeting Branca for lunch at a Westchester country club:

Our Friday lunch at the club ended. I mentioned to Branca the approaching Sabbath.

“I have to get my money from Mrs. Lichtenfeld,” Branca said.

What? I asked. Branca explained. He told me that as a boy in Mount Vernon, he had lighted the stove for a Jewish neighbor every Friday night. He had been a Shabbos goy, doing something that was forbidden for Jews to do on the Sabbath.

Here was a memory that elevated experience over genes, that affirmed Branca’s sense of self. He was a Catholic, not a Jew.

"If I was Jewish, I couldn’t have done it,” he said. He added, “I’m not going to sell my soul for a penny.”

Here's a look back at that memorable day when Branca and Thomson made baseball history -- "The Giants Win the Pennant! The Giants Win the Pennant!"  Enjoy.

Jews And Baseball: An American Love Story - Now Showing At Film Festivals

On Friday we blogged about two words (Beatles, Shabbat) that are not often, if ever, seen in the same sentence.  Today we shift from the world of music to the world of sports and introduce you to a new film that brings together another unlikely pair.

The film is Jews and Baseball:  An American Love Story, and it's been playing around the country at Jewish Film Festivals from New York to San Francisco.  Festival screenings are scheduled from now through next April from California to Connecticut (here's the schedule.)

16,700 Major League baseball players.  160 of them have been Jews.  But they have had an impact far beyond their numbers.

Dustin Hoffman narrates this celebration of the impact Jewish major leaguers have had on America’s favorite pastime, and on the lives of American Jews. Featuring archival footage of unforgettable games, and interviews with star players Sandy Koufax, Al Rosen, and Kevin Youkilis, among others, and baseball personalities such as Commissioner Bud Selig, Mets owner Fred Wilpon, former sportscaster Larry King, and executives and fans like Charles Bronfman. 

You don’t have to love baseball to be moved by this story. It's a joy for male and female viewers, young and old.  We'll be on the lookout for release dates for the DVD and for its availability for rental on Netflix.  In the meantime, enjoy the trailer!