Two Tales of Two Cities

A recent story on Joel Hanrahan on MLB.com reminded me of my favorite all-time trivia question. More on Hanrahan in a moment, but back to the trivia question. Who is the only player to play for two teams on the same day in two different cities and get hits for for two teams in the same day?

Joel Youngblood was a member of the New York Mets in August of 1982. In a day game at Wrigley Field he lashed a two-run single off future Hall of Famer Fergie Jenkins. Following the game, he was traded to the Montreal Expos. After jumping on a flight to Philadelphia, he arrived in time to pinch hit in the seventh inning. Once again, he managed to single off a future Hall of Fame pitcher, Steve Carlton.

Not a bad day's work for Mr. Youngblood. I wonder how many players got hits of two HOFers on the same day.

The Hanrahan story is actually a tale of three cities, Washington, Philadelphia and Houston. On May 5, 2009, the Nationals and Astros were tied 10-10 after ten innings. Our protagonist, Joel Hanrahan, shut down the Astros in the top of the 11th inning. With the Nationals batting in the bottom of the inning, the game was suspended due to rain.

On June 30, Hanrahan was traded to the Pirates in the Nyger Morgan/Lastings Milledge deal.

Nine days later, Hanrahan was in Philadelphia enjoying a a day-off before the Pirates began a series with the Phillies. He soon learned that he had been declared the winning pitcher in the continuation of the suspended game completed in Houston because the Astros would not play in Washington again during the 2009 season.

There are more strange twists in this story. You may want to read more:

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20090709&content_id=5791406&vkey=news_mlb&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb