The Man Who Named the Taters

George Scott called them taters. That word is still in the game's vocabulary fifty years later, which is a strange kind of immortality for a man most casual fans could not pick out of a lineup.

The 1975 season should have made him famous. He led the American League in home runs with 36, in RBI with 109, and in total bases with 318, and he did it in Milwaukee County Stadium, which was not built to flatter right-handed hitters. He was 31 years old, playing beside Hank Aaron in the twilight, on a Brewers team that lost 94 games. He finished eighth in the MVP voting.

That is the part that gets lost. Scott was not a compiler and he was not a slugger who couldn't field. He won eight Gold Gloves at first base, and for a decade he was arguably the best defensive first baseman alive. He was a 250-pound man from Greenville, Mississippi, who moved like someone half his size around the bag and hit the ball hard enough that a teammate named him Boomer on the spot.

Nothing about him has changed. What changed is the lighting. Numbers that got you a nice write-up in the Milwaukee Journal in 1975 would get you a national broadcast package and a nickname on a highlight show now. The player was always the player. The stage just moved.