BeltwayVol
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Apr 29, 2005
- Messages
- 1,441
- Likes
- 4
Claim: Actor Kevin Costner was caught in bed with the wife of Orioles infielder Cal Ripken, Jr. in August 1997, forcing the Orioles to cancel a game so that the distraught Ripken's consecutive-game streak would not be in jeopardy.
Cal Ripken, Jr. was allowing Kevin Costner, the actor, to stay at his house, following the wrap of "The Postman". One day, Ripken left for Camden Yards to play in a game. Somewhere between his home and the stadium, Cal realized that he had left something back at his house, and turned back to retrieve it. Upon arriving at his home, he found Kevin Costner in bed with his wife, Kelly. Cal then proceeded to beat the crap out of Costner, to the point that Costner was unable to make any publicity opportunities for a time. Cal then called the Orioles, and told them he wouldn't be coming in to play that day. Upon hearing this, the owner reminded Cal about his streak, telling him The Streak would end if he didn't play that day. Cal told him it was impossible for him to come in, so there went the streak. Reportedly, the owner told him not to worry, because he would take care of it. That night, the game was cancelled due to "electrical failure" with some lights on the field. The caller said that their was no problem with the lights, that everything else, including the hotels and restaurants that are part of Camden Yards, worked perfectly. The next day, the lights were fixed, Cal was able to play, and the streak stayed intact.
Variations: In some versions Ripken fails to appear for the day's scheduled game because he is too distraught to play; in others he misses showing up for the game because he's gone to a hospital emergency room (apparently having received worse injuries than the person he "beat the crap" out of).
Origins: On 6 September 1995, Baltimore Orioles infielder Cal Ripken, Jr. broke a record long thought to be unassailable when he played in his 2,131st consecutive baseball game, surpassing the mark of 2,130 set by Lou Gehrig back in 1939. Ripken would go on to play in a total of 2,632 straight games before finally sitting one out on 20 September 1998.
One of the most remarkable aspects of Ripken's most remarkable of streaks was that he started every game (i.e., no pinch-hitting, pinch-running, or late-inning defensive substitution appearances), voluntarily left a game before the seventh inning only four times (he was also ejected twice by umpires), and at one point played every single inning of every single game for over five years. In other words, Ripken didn't even come close to missing a game during his streak -- except, the legend above claims, for one day in August 1997, when Ripken was unable to make it to the park for that evening's scheduled game, and a mysterious malfunction in the lighting system (allegedly deliberately created by an Orioles employee) forced the cancellation of the game and thereby preserved Ripken's streak intact.
A scheduled 14 August 1997 game between the Orioles and the Seattle Mariners was cancelled due to lighting problems, but there was nothing "mysterious" about it. A ground fault interrupt kept tripping the circuit breaker each time the lights in the right-field bank were turned on, and the game's 7:35 P.M. starting time was pushed back as a crew worked on the problem. (That the businesses surrounding Camden Yards in Baltimore did not experience similar problems is not strange, as Camden Yards is on a separate portion of the city's power grid.) The crew got the bank of lights working by 8:45 P.M., but about 20 bulbs failed to illuminate, and the umpiring crew had to make the decision whether to allow the game to begin. Crew chief Al Clark finally postponed the game at 10 P.M. after determining that shadows at home plate created unsafe playing conditions, but his decision might have been different had fireballer Randy Johnson not been scheduled to start for the Mariners that evening. Given that Johnson is a left-hander who throws extremely hard, and the lighting outage occurred on the first-base side (i.e., the side on which batters would be picking up the ball as the southpaw Johnson threw towards home plate), the risk of serious injury to a batter was deemed too great to allow the game to proceed -- it was cancelled and played as part of a double-header the following day.
Whether the electrical outage was "mysterious" or not, it wasn't concocted to keep Ripken's streak alive by forcing the cancellation of a game he would otherwise have missed. News reports of the day's events prove Ripken was present at the ballpark, suited up and ready to play; both fans and reporters noted him sitting in the dugout and playing catch along the sidelines that evening. This current legend is simply a recycling of a three-year-old tale someone concocted based on a long-standing friendship between Ripken and actor Kevin Costner, some four-year-old rumors of the Ripkens' having marital difficulties, and the unusual cancellation of a game due to lighting problems.
Actor Kevin Costner and Cal Ripken, Jr. met in 1990 at a premiere of Costner's film Dances with Wolves and began what Costner described as a "burgeoning friendship." Before a game during the 1991 season, Costner took batting and fielding practice with the Orioles, played catch on the sidelines, went through stretching exercises in the outfield, and batted and took grounders with Ripken. Costner was often seen taking in Orioles games from the stands at Baltimore's Camden Yards, sometimes sitting with Ripken's wife, Kelly. In late 1997, rumors began circulating that the Ripkens had separated, Cal was staying with a teammate, and a divorce was imminent. The rumors included claims of infidelities on both sides, with the male interloper named as anyone from "an Orioles trainer" to Costner (who at the time lived about an hour from the Ripken ranch). From such rumors was the "mysterious game cancellation" legend concocted back in 1998.
The Ripkens are still married, and we have no idea what (if any) relationship existed between Kevin Costner and Kelly Ripken. When this legend was repeated by a couple of hosts on Fox Sports Radio in June 2001, an angry Costner called the show the next day to deny it and tell the hosts that if they had claimed the story was true, "I was going to take your heads off." Costner maintained that he has met Ripken's wife only twice in his life, that he has probably spent no more than 10 minutes with her altogether, and that he has never been to the Ripken home. Since Costner has been noted sitting in the stands for whole games with Kelly Ripken, his "10 minutes" and "twice in his life" claims might be underestimates, but whatever Costner's relationship with the Ripkens, he didn't make necessary some Machiavellian maneuvering on the part of the Orioles to keep Cal from missing a game.
62 Days Until Tennessee Exposes The Urban Myth!!!
Cal Ripken, Jr. was allowing Kevin Costner, the actor, to stay at his house, following the wrap of "The Postman". One day, Ripken left for Camden Yards to play in a game. Somewhere between his home and the stadium, Cal realized that he had left something back at his house, and turned back to retrieve it. Upon arriving at his home, he found Kevin Costner in bed with his wife, Kelly. Cal then proceeded to beat the crap out of Costner, to the point that Costner was unable to make any publicity opportunities for a time. Cal then called the Orioles, and told them he wouldn't be coming in to play that day. Upon hearing this, the owner reminded Cal about his streak, telling him The Streak would end if he didn't play that day. Cal told him it was impossible for him to come in, so there went the streak. Reportedly, the owner told him not to worry, because he would take care of it. That night, the game was cancelled due to "electrical failure" with some lights on the field. The caller said that their was no problem with the lights, that everything else, including the hotels and restaurants that are part of Camden Yards, worked perfectly. The next day, the lights were fixed, Cal was able to play, and the streak stayed intact.
Variations: In some versions Ripken fails to appear for the day's scheduled game because he is too distraught to play; in others he misses showing up for the game because he's gone to a hospital emergency room (apparently having received worse injuries than the person he "beat the crap" out of).
Origins: On 6 September 1995, Baltimore Orioles infielder Cal Ripken, Jr. broke a record long thought to be unassailable when he played in his 2,131st consecutive baseball game, surpassing the mark of 2,130 set by Lou Gehrig back in 1939. Ripken would go on to play in a total of 2,632 straight games before finally sitting one out on 20 September 1998.
One of the most remarkable aspects of Ripken's most remarkable of streaks was that he started every game (i.e., no pinch-hitting, pinch-running, or late-inning defensive substitution appearances), voluntarily left a game before the seventh inning only four times (he was also ejected twice by umpires), and at one point played every single inning of every single game for over five years. In other words, Ripken didn't even come close to missing a game during his streak -- except, the legend above claims, for one day in August 1997, when Ripken was unable to make it to the park for that evening's scheduled game, and a mysterious malfunction in the lighting system (allegedly deliberately created by an Orioles employee) forced the cancellation of the game and thereby preserved Ripken's streak intact.
A scheduled 14 August 1997 game between the Orioles and the Seattle Mariners was cancelled due to lighting problems, but there was nothing "mysterious" about it. A ground fault interrupt kept tripping the circuit breaker each time the lights in the right-field bank were turned on, and the game's 7:35 P.M. starting time was pushed back as a crew worked on the problem. (That the businesses surrounding Camden Yards in Baltimore did not experience similar problems is not strange, as Camden Yards is on a separate portion of the city's power grid.) The crew got the bank of lights working by 8:45 P.M., but about 20 bulbs failed to illuminate, and the umpiring crew had to make the decision whether to allow the game to begin. Crew chief Al Clark finally postponed the game at 10 P.M. after determining that shadows at home plate created unsafe playing conditions, but his decision might have been different had fireballer Randy Johnson not been scheduled to start for the Mariners that evening. Given that Johnson is a left-hander who throws extremely hard, and the lighting outage occurred on the first-base side (i.e., the side on which batters would be picking up the ball as the southpaw Johnson threw towards home plate), the risk of serious injury to a batter was deemed too great to allow the game to proceed -- it was cancelled and played as part of a double-header the following day.
Whether the electrical outage was "mysterious" or not, it wasn't concocted to keep Ripken's streak alive by forcing the cancellation of a game he would otherwise have missed. News reports of the day's events prove Ripken was present at the ballpark, suited up and ready to play; both fans and reporters noted him sitting in the dugout and playing catch along the sidelines that evening. This current legend is simply a recycling of a three-year-old tale someone concocted based on a long-standing friendship between Ripken and actor Kevin Costner, some four-year-old rumors of the Ripkens' having marital difficulties, and the unusual cancellation of a game due to lighting problems.
Actor Kevin Costner and Cal Ripken, Jr. met in 1990 at a premiere of Costner's film Dances with Wolves and began what Costner described as a "burgeoning friendship." Before a game during the 1991 season, Costner took batting and fielding practice with the Orioles, played catch on the sidelines, went through stretching exercises in the outfield, and batted and took grounders with Ripken. Costner was often seen taking in Orioles games from the stands at Baltimore's Camden Yards, sometimes sitting with Ripken's wife, Kelly. In late 1997, rumors began circulating that the Ripkens had separated, Cal was staying with a teammate, and a divorce was imminent. The rumors included claims of infidelities on both sides, with the male interloper named as anyone from "an Orioles trainer" to Costner (who at the time lived about an hour from the Ripken ranch). From such rumors was the "mysterious game cancellation" legend concocted back in 1998.
The Ripkens are still married, and we have no idea what (if any) relationship existed between Kevin Costner and Kelly Ripken. When this legend was repeated by a couple of hosts on Fox Sports Radio in June 2001, an angry Costner called the show the next day to deny it and tell the hosts that if they had claimed the story was true, "I was going to take your heads off." Costner maintained that he has met Ripken's wife only twice in his life, that he has probably spent no more than 10 minutes with her altogether, and that he has never been to the Ripken home. Since Costner has been noted sitting in the stands for whole games with Kelly Ripken, his "10 minutes" and "twice in his life" claims might be underestimates, but whatever Costner's relationship with the Ripkens, he didn't make necessary some Machiavellian maneuvering on the part of the Orioles to keep Cal from missing a game.
62 Days Until Tennessee Exposes The Urban Myth!!!
