When (Tommy) Holmes headed toward his consecutive-game batting record, he used an old bat given to him by his third-base coach, Del Bissonette, who became the Braves' manager later in the season. "I cracked my bat when the streak reached about 20 games," Holmes once recalled. "I had some others but none I liked particularly. We had an off day, and Bissonette said: 'I'll get you a bat. I'm going up to my home in Maine. I'll bring you back a piece of concrete from my attic.' "It was like a rock," Holmes remembered. "It had been aging. But I tried it in batting practice and I liked it." - Sportswriter Richard Goldstein in the New York Times (April 15, 2008)