National Scrabble Day

I've always been a big fan of board games. Monopoly, Trivial Pursuit, Battleship, checkers... you name it, I'll play it. Maybe it's because I enjoy the strategy. Maybe it's because the stimuli keeps my overactive imagination occupied. Maybe it's because I relish the opportunity to gather round a table with family and friends for an evening of enjoyment. Heck, perhaps it's all of the above reasons. However, one thing is for certain - I will never get bored with board games.

One particular game that holds a special place in my heart is Scrabble. When my sister was a colicky infant - up all night and crying uncontrollably - my father, brother, and I would sit on the living room floor and test our vocabularies for hours while dad simultaneously rocked the baby. I mean, it was too loud to sleep and we needed something to distract our minds from the raucous sobbing. This little bit of family bonding meant a great deal to me and I'm pretty sure I can thank my baby sister for my school district spelling bee championship in seventh grade.

The reason I bring this all up is that, apparently, today is National Scrabble Day. The Hasbro trademarked creation has been around since 1948 and is sold in 121 countries with 29 different language versions. Why we have a national holiday to honor the crossword-based game is beyond me, but I'll sure as heck take any excuse to bust out the board after dinner tonight.

But, what does any of this have to do with baseball cards? This is a baseball card blog, right?

    =  29

Longtime Cubs hurler and current Giants disabled list resident, Jeff Samardzija, is famous for his tremendously difficult to spell surname.  Lord knows I can never confidently press "publish" on a post which makes mention of the Notre Dame product without cross-checking Baseball Reference.  I can only imagine what fits he put the editors at the Chicago Tribune and Sun Times through.  With that, Jeff - while better known as "Shark" - was often nicknamed as "Spellcheck" or "Scrabble," in reference to the random jumble of letters that is his last name.

Out of curiosity, I decided to see just how many points "Samaradzija" would earn in the game of Scrabble.  Of course, since it's a proper name, it would not be a legal play; but, in theory...

With the coveted "Z" and "J" tiles generating most of the oomph, the name generates twenty-nine points.  That's not bad at all; although, if one were to play the names of former Cubs players, Samardzija would not be the highest earner.

  =  29

Another former Cubs moundsman, Fred Baczewski (9 games, 1953), actually ties the "Shark" with twenty-nine tallies and with less letters, to boot.  Another "Z" is found, but the wealth is spread out a lot more here, with three, four and five-point tiles making appearances.

Now, I couldn't stop going down the road at this point - I had to figure out which player in Cubs history would have the most valuable last name in the game of Scrabble.  In the franchise's loooooong history, lords knows that they have had some mouthfuls on their active roster.

  =  13

  =  13

Here's another pair of hurlers whose family names have twisted the tongues of Cubs fans in the past.  Unfortunately for them, neither Pisciotta nor Tiefenauer combine for much in the way of scoring.  Thirteen is definitely not an embarrassing score for a turn in Scrabble, though it's hardly anything to write home about...

...much like the Cubs tenures of journeyman Bobby Tiefenauer (6.08 ERA in 13.1 innings for 1968).

= 21

Hargesheimer has the second longest last name in Cubs history; but, unlike the three men tied ahead of him, it's much more difficult for the human mind to figure out how these syllables form a pronounceable word. His lone season in the Windy City came in 1983, one year after Harry Caray shifted from the South Side to the North Side... someone please tell me that video exists of everyone's favorite drunkard struggling to pronounce this mish-mash!

For all his trouble, though, all Mr. Caray would earn from his struggle would be twenty-one points.  Good, but not great, and still behind a handful of other Cubs.

 = 26

  =  26

Tied for third most in my far-from-comprehensive research are yet another pitcher and, finally, a position player.  Apparently, those that man the mound are more naturally inclined to have peculiar names; is it a competitive advantage in distracting hitters?

Joe Schaffernoth might get points through the shear amount of letters on his name tag; however, sometimes less is more.  It's tough to beat Matt Szczur (pronounced "Caesar," somehow) and his two "Z's"... especially since in the real game you only get one such tile.  We'll suspend that disqualification though, since proper nouns aren't legal plays anyway.

  =  28

The hat-less Vic Roznovsky edges out Szczur and Schaffernoth by two tallies, on the strength of yet another "Z" and some four and five-point letters  This ranks him second on the list of best Cubs Scrabble names of all-time... or at least of my half an hour of semi-distracted research.  Speaking of which, Topps might be trying to tell me that this is an Orioles card, but they can't distract me from the fact that Vic is clearly wearing a Cubs uniform in this photograph; the blue and red trim on his color give it away.

Alright, it's all come down to this, which Cub has the highest scoring Scrabble name?  Drumroll please:

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The all-time, Scrabble king is Zizzer-Zazzer-Zastryzny - another two-Z technicality.  How appropriate that this quirky title should fall upon a lefty reliever?

With that, we've reached the end of my little exercise, inspired by National Scrabble Day.  Out of curiosity, what names from your favorite franchise's history would be best to drop on the game board?  Am I the only person who's brain is wired like this?  Will my wife kill me if I try to play "Roznovsky" in our game tonight?  So many questions begging to be answered!

Happy National Scrabble Day, everybody.