Today In Revisionist Sports History

Sep 2nd 1901 Teddy Roosevelt utters the famous line "Speak softly and carry a big stick." Roosevelt then took the field and hit two home runs, leading the Executive Branch slow-pitch softball team to a 10-2 victory over the Legislative Branch.

Sep 1st 1998 The Houston Comets beat the Phoenix Mercury in the decisive Game 3 of the first-ever WNBA Finals series. Following a single-game championship in the league's inaugural season in 1997, the '98 Finals switched to a least-awful-of-3 series.

Aug 31st 1995 Judge Lance Ito rules that only two tapes of racist comments by LAPD detective Mark Fuhrman can be played in the O.J. Simpson trial. Ito said that Fuhrman’s tapes of racist comments about black people could be played, but not his tapes of racist comments about Asians.

Aug 30th 1998 Toms River, N.J. becomes the first American team to win the Little League World Series since 1993. Deformed and freakishly huge thanks to growing up amongst radioactive nuclear waste, the New Jersey children were America's only hope of beating the teams full of 20 and 30-somethings from overseas.

Aug 28th 1887 Star Pointer becomes the first horse to break the two-minute-mile barrier when he is timed at 1:59.50 at a track in Readville, Mass. Star Pointer crushed runner-up Roger Bannister by more than two minutes.

Aug 27th 1977 Bump Wills and Toby Harrah of the Texas Rangers hit back-to-back inside-the-park home runs on consecutive pitches against the Yankees. Thus ended Yankees manager Billy Martin’s brief experimentation with an eight infielder, one outfielder defense.

Aug 26th 1947 Don Bankhead of the Brooklyn Dodgers becomes the first black pitcher in major league history. Batters remarked that Bankhead’s curveball had a much funkier break than any they’d seen before.

Aug 25th 1973 Allan Abbott sets a world record by pedaling a bicycle 140.5 mph on the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah. Abbott would have continued on to a higher speed but the inside of his thighs chaffed so badly his legs separated from his torso.

Aug 24th 1985 Don Baylor of the New York Yankees ties a major league record when he is hit by a pitch for the 189th time in his career. The game was halted to honor Baylor for his feat, but mainly to attend to his fractured forearm.

Aug 23rd 1989 Pete Rose agrees to a lifetime ban from baseball after being accused on gambling. Rose agreed to the ban after seeing that Vegas had 20:1 odds that he would not accept a ban.