About this episode
Hall of Famer Rod Carew discusses his career and his life both before and after baseball. Plus tales of a future Hall of Famer demoralized by the Dodgers and Carew encountering racist gamesmanship in civil rights-era Florida. TABLE OF CONTENTS A Dodger Says Uncle*Rod Carew and the Poisoned Handshake*Rod Carew: Hall of Famer in the Pandemic*A Private Player in the Public Eye/A Father’s Promise*It’s All for the Best*Are All the Greatest Hitters Obsessed?/The Number-One Tool*Free-Swinging but High-Contact*Is Being a Great Hitter About Intelligence or Memory?*“Super-Loner?”*Rod and Reggie*Against the Shift/How to Hit Nolan Ryan*Childhood Abuse and Putting the Anger Aside*Meeting Jackie Robinson*Vs. Mariano Rivera*When the Brewers Swept the Knee*The Steal of Home Year and After*Billy Martin in Minnesota*Could Gene Mauch Manage Today?*Carew and Griffith*Leaving the Twins*Goodbyes. The Infinite Inning is not only about baseball but a state of mind. Steven Goldman, rotating cohosts Jesse Spector, Cliff Corcoran, and David Roth, and occasional guests discuss the game’s present, past, and future with forays outside the foul lines to the culture at large. Expect stats, anecdotes, digressions, explorations of writing and fandom, and more Casey Stengel quotations than you thought possible. Along the way, they’ll try to solve the puzzle that is the Infinite Inning: How do you find the joy in life when you can’t get anybody out?