can tell you is the horse is thriving on it, Appleby said.He came o

I remember two things about my first major league baseball game: Dale Murphy homered, and somebody -- probably Jose Uribe -- got into a pickle. I believe he escaped that pickle, but what I really remember is the pickle itself, and somebody nearby yelling Pickle! Thats what I remember, which is to suggest that the two most significant events in baseball are home runs and pickles.The sport of baseball would largely disagree. Heres a snapshot of major league baseball rundowns as they actually are:It lasts less than four seconds. Tyler Naquin dutifully backs away from the opponent with the baseball, as his contract requires, but once a rundown begins the outcome is basically conceded. Jose Altuve simply runs until he reaches Naquin, who slumps his shoulders and allows defeat. As the play officially ends, Altuve and Naquin seem almost to be sharing the same goal: closure. Altuve, for a moment, if you pause it just right, looks like a Boy Scout helping an elderly lady cross the street.I want to tell you about Josh Harrison, though. Harrison is an unexceptional baseball player who has had his moments. His player page tells you he is a utility player with a broad range of skills that dont stand out. He does it all, but only OK. He has never led the league in an offensive category. But he is the best in the world at something extremely small, which probably describes almost all of us (whether we know it or not). At least the thing Harrison is the best in the world at shows up in highlight packages: He is the king of the pickle, which, 30 years from now, I hope will be one of the things I definitely remember from this game.We have nine episodes to demonstrate Harrisons rundown skills. Many of these episodes will end in outs, these being, after all, rundowns. Episodes have been assigned chronologically, but we will bounce around a little bit.4, 5, 6: Peak HarrisonEpisode 4: June 27, 2014The key detail here -- besides the outcome -- is the helmet. What Harrison attempts with each rundown is something like entropy: The longer the rundown persists, the less orderly it becomes, particularly because Harrison keeps introducing countless shifts of pace and direction to thwart any sort of coagulation. The helmet is quickly out of this play, but for a moment there is a bouncing helmet in the middle of a baseball play, and no matter how many rundown drills the Mets performed in spring training they definitely did not run a drill for when theres a bouncing helmet on the field.Ultimately, if Harrison can stay in the pickle long enough, this chaos will affect everybody: Eventually the pitcher will be involved in the play and trip on his feet, or the left fielder will come down and get in the way, or somebodys coverage will get blown, or the baseline will end up so drastically redrawn that nobody knows where it is anymore -- the last of which is exactly what happened in this play.Harrison, literally on his tummy in the infield grass, has disappeared from Ruben Tejadas concern. Tejada considers Harrison out of the baseline and thus out without a tag, and for just a moment he gives up on the play. The umpire does not see it this way. The umpire and Tejada are operating from different maps. Harrison does not consult maps. He simply follows his nose toward the nearest safe place he sees, which in this case happens to be third base.Time spent in rundown: 12.36 seconds Changes of direction: 6 Touches of ground: 7 Times down, by rules of college football: 3 Steps: 38 Score that play: 1-6-5-6 ... ... which is the House Bill that: repealed in Pennsylvania a law requiring physicians to obtain informed consent from patients for treatment of breast disease.Episode 5: July 27, 2014This is, simply, the most audacious baserunning Ive ever seen. Harrison overslides the second-base bag on a stolen base. His momentum spins his body around, so that he is on his knees, facing a man with a baseball, and five or so feet from second base. His solution to this: Run somewhere else. If youve ever taken a screenwriting seminar, youll recognize in this a perfect first act: Hero living unextraordinary life is jolted out of it by an instigating event. Forced to make a choice, he embarks on a heros journey that will require he confront various obstacles until he reaches his goal. Harrison embarks.As Rockies manager Walt Weiss would say after the game, Weve got to get an out there. I look at a rundown as a free out. This is exactly Josh Harrisons elevator pitch: Everybody knows a rundown is a free out. What my career presupposes is, what if its not?Time spent in rundown: 13.16 seconds Changes of direction: 6 Touches of ground: 5 Steps (estimated): 40 Score that play: 2-6-5-6-1-4-2 ...? ... which is phone number for: Cerritos Auto Sales of Wallingford, Connecticut.Episode 6: Sept. 10, 2015Josh Harrison had a narrow hallway when he was growing up, and it is to this that his brother attributed?his pickle skills in a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review story:The long hallway that led from the front door to the kitchen was much more than just a hallway. It also was a baseball diamond, football field and even basketball court for Harrison and his older brothers, Vince Jr. and Shaun. It was narrow, so maneuvering around opponents required some skill.Vince Jr. thought about that hallway earlier this season when he watched his youngest brother -- nicknamed Magic Feet from his youth football days -- dodge and duck his way out of a rundown to land safely on third base in a game against the New York Mets.If I had a dollar for every phone call and text I got after that, and a lot of it was my friends, Shauns friends, Joshs friends going, Thats Magic Feet! Thats from the games we played in that hallway! said Vince, 34. Im not the only person who thought there was a direct correlation.Harrisons best chance in this rundown was probably when first baseman?Adam Lind had the ball, and second baseman Luis Sardinas was closing in on him to take the throw. Sardinas might have gotten too close, and there might, might, have been a moment Harrison could have accelerated past him before Lind could have delivered the throw. Instead, Harrison waits for the throw, reverses, and then reverses again, trying to use Sardinas momentum against him. There are moments I suspect Harrison prefers staying in the rundown to actually beating the rundown, which is just spurious speculation, but its how I was when I was a kid playing in a hallway.Time spent in rundown: 7.12 seconds Changes of direction: 4 Touches of ground: None before the tag Steps: 9 Of which steps how many might be considered high: 3 Score that play: 2-4-3-4 ... ... which is the Lego part number for a: Knob Stone 2x4x2 piece1, 2, 3: Prequel HarrisonEpisode 1: Sept. 2, 2011Harrisons first rundown in the majors is still a year away, but this play -- made in just his 48th career game -- is a nice introduction to Harrison the baserunner. We see shortstop Starlin Castro go deep into the hole to field a grounder, and we see second baseman Darwin Barney race over to first base to back up the throw. There are only two middle infielders, and weve just accounted for them both, as has Harrison, who produces the only play of 2011 that would be logged into official records as Double To Shortstop (Ground Ball to Weak 3B).There is always a certain amount of math involved in exploiting a rundown, in finding the precise moment when the base is most vulnerable to charge. Here, Harrison uses that math to pre-empt a pickle. It is the literal opposite of a rundown -- rather than lots of defenders, there are none -- but we consider it canon anyway.Episode 2: Sept. 24, 2012We have here a few elements that will be seen again in later episodes, including just the faintest hint of a loping high step, the desperation drop to the ground and Ruben Tejada. But Harrison is still young here, and his skills are not yet well-developed. He doesnt expand the baseline, staying right on the line the entire time. He doesnt pick a vulnerable defender and attempt to run past him, he doesnt use the ground as a balancing aid, and but for a single juke he doesnt do much to disrupt the defenders timing. He is cooked, and while he shows more emotional resistance to this fact than the average pickled baserunner, he has not developed any plan for defeating it. When we see a shot of him head-on, he is grimacing, not yet having fun.Time spent in rundown: 7.12 seconds Changes of direction: 4 Touches of ground: None. Steps: 17 Score that play: 4-6-5-2-5 ... ... which is the postal code for: Santa Rosalia, in the state of Jalisco, Mexico.Episode 3: June 30, 2013Harrison is out here, as nearly all runners in nearly all rundowns will be, but give him credit: He got the catcher, Rob Johnson, to do exactly the wrong thing, leaving his feet and sailing past Harrison, opening up a possible lane for Harrison to advance forward to a run only 30 or so feet away. The umpire rules Harrison out on the tag, even though Johnson tagged him with an empty glove (the ball in his throwing hand). Even had the umpire noticed that, Harrison would have likely been out on the throw, but remember: The out in a rundown is considered all but automatic, so it is a considerable victory to force a tumbling catcher to make an off-balance flip from his stomach into a congested throwing lane. Over the course of 8.61 seconds, Harrison improved his chances of survival from maybe 1 in 100 to maybe 1 in 4, or so.Time spent in rundown: 8.61 seconds Changes of direction: 7 Touches of ground: 3 Steps: 19 Score that play: 1-5-2 ... ... which is: barely worth noting here at all.7, 8, 9: Sequel HarrisonEpisode 7: Aug. 9, 2016Harrison defies my hypothesis that he simply likes pickles and finds reasons to stay in them. Here, he abandons a budding rundown but earns a free stolen base with an akimbo slide. Thats another way to do it!Episode 8: Aug. 11, 2016Derek Norris, the Padres catcher, does the one thing that Harrison cant beat: He holds the ball, stays on his feet, and (mostly) keeps his body between Harrison and the next base. In most of these plays, Harrison tries to find a pitcher or a catcher to isolate against, and once Norris gets the ball Harrison is intent on beating him. Its fun to watch and, for just a moment, at 0:09 in that highlight video, with the ball snug in Norris catchers mitt instead of throwing hand, Harrison seems to have daylight for a dash home. But he misses the moment, perhaps discouraged by a crowded running lane that includes not just the pitcher but the umpire and a bat. Reversing himself, he lets Norris back into the play and snuffs his own chances.Time spent in rundown: 8.55 seconds Changes of direction: 6 Touches of ground: None Steps: 19 Score that play: 6-2 ... ... which is:?probably the appropriate way to handle an overactive Josh Harrison in a rundown.Episode 9: Sept. 8, 2016Alas, Harrison is again undone by baseballs decision to play on loose pebbles. His final spasm, though -- his pathetic little attempt at rolling away from Brandon Phillips, as though there might be some alternate ending -- is a career of Harrison rundowns in a nutshell: Until youre out, youre safe. There are no bonus points for helping the other team make it official. And maybe, just maybe, Brandon Phillips mom will call him to dinner in the nick of time.Heres another thing I remember: When we were kids, we would play pickle at recess for weeks in a row. Thered be 20 or 30 of us darting from one base to the other, trying to avoid the two kids with gloves who were it. It was just tag, of course, but tag with narrow boundaries and extra challenges.Baseball is, essentially, tag with narrow boundaries and extra challenges. In fact, when Slate challenged readers to describe the sport in 150 words or less, the winning entry began:Baseball is like tag, except the only way you can tag someone is with the ball. There are two teams: the fielders, who try to tag the other, the batters. The batters goal is to lap the field, without being tagged.Its also, essentially, other things. Its also a stick-and-ball game, where the point is to hit the sphere as far as possible. Its also a darts-type game, where the point is to throw a sphere into a small zone with as much velocity and accuracy as possible. Every year, in fact, it becomes more and more of those games: On a per-plate-appearance level, home runs were hit more frequently in 2016 than any year in history. Strikeouts were higher than ever, too, the 10th year in the past 10 that a new record was set. You could imagine a history of baseball where the tag elements were emphasized, and these many decades later we all cheer for the worlds best tag players. Instead, there is less call than ever for it.So it goes for Josh Harrison. We get to make a lot of choices in this world -- whether to juke, to high-step, to sprint, to fall flat, or to let ourselves be put out. We dont, alas, get to choose which athletic skills earn worldwide adulation.Thanks to Rob McQuown and Baseball Prospectus for research assistance.Denis Potvin Islanders Jersey . "It doesnt get any better than that," Giambi said. 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The victory improved the Czech pairs impressive cup doubles record to 14-1.A Geelong Cup, a Bendigo Cup and a Lexus Stakes are already in the bag for English trainer Charlie Appleby in his first foray into Australian racing.Now he will try to claim Australias biggest race at Flemington on Tuesday when he saddles up two runners in the Melbourne Cup.Applebys runners in Victoria this spring have already done the Godolphin trainer proud and he has Qewy and Oceanographer in the Cup.Appleby sent five horses to Australia for the spring carnival and said so far things had gone fantastically well.Scottish was billed as the stables main carnival player and he ran second in the $3 million Caulfield Cup and will run again in Saturdays $2 million Emirates Stakes (2000m).Qewy won the Geelong Cup (2400m) with Oceanographer third. Francis Of Assisi won the Bendigo Cup, while Second Wave was unplaced in the Moonee Valley Cup.Oceanographer secured his place in the Melbourne Cup with a barnstorming Lexus Stakes win on Saturday.Appleby was pleased with how Oceanographer came through the race but also admitted he was heading into the unknown by running him in the Melbourne Cup three days later, his third start in 13 days.From my point of view its something weve not done. All I can tell you is the horse is thriving on it, Appleby said.He came out of Geelong well, he eats well, and hes got a good mind. And what weve seen this morning, theres no negatives. Hes eaten up. Hes had a jog around the track. I cant give a negative.Its a conccern.dddddddddddd Weve just never done it before, so we really are going into an unknown with him.Oceanographers Lexus win elevated him to second favourite at $6.50 while Qewy is at $21.People said yesterdays performance was obviously exciting and historically its been a race that can throw up a horse that can run very well in the Melbourne Cup, Appleby said.Personally I love Qewy. Hes a horse whos got a great profile.He ran very well back in two festival races at Ascot and at Goodwood and what he did at Geelong, I know it was a front-running performance and people will say thats what he should be doing, but that was a mile and a half and on Tuesday it sounds as though its going to be a genuinely run two miles.Thats going to suit him down to the ground.But again you just cant knock what Oceanographers doing at the moment.Appleby said the two horses had different profiles and racing styles.Qewy we know is an out-and-out stayer but I felt what he did in the Geelong Cup was impressive for a horse we bought back in trip, he said.He said Oceanographer was a horse who needed to be ridden colder and liked to come charging home as he did on Saturday.Hes stepping up in trip again which I dont see that being any problem, but hes doing the three-day back-up which I cant tell you how thats going to pan out, Appleby said. ' ' '