Willie Stargell

by Frank Garland

  Stargell opted not to play winter league ball following the 1964 season, electing instead to undergo surgery to repair the same knee he had damaged while trying out for football at Encinal High School. The Pirates off-season, meanwhile, was marked by upheaval and change. With Murtaugh moving from the manager’s office to a role that would include a mix of scouting and instructing, the team was in the market for a new field manager and hired Harry Walker, son of a major leaguer and younger brother of another big leaguer, Dixie Walker, a former National League batting champion. Known as “The Hat,” Harry was considered a hitting guru of sorts, and while he was able to work his magic with a couple of the Pirates—most notably outfielders Manny Mota and Matty Alou, the latter of whom would go on to the win the National League batting title in 1966 with a .342 average—he did not draw rave reviews from Stargell largely because he decided to platoon the Bucs’ big bopper. That meant Stargell would play largely against right-handed pitching and see fewer plate appearances against left-handers—an approach that Stargell did not support, given his selection to the NL All-Star team a year earlier in his first season as a fulltime starter.

  Willie kicks up dust as he slides safely into third base (courtesy Pittsburgh Pirates).

  The Pirates got off to a sluggish start in Walker’s initial season, but won 62 of their last 108 games to finish 90–72, good enough for third place behind the eventual World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers and the runner-up San Francisco Giants. The free-swinging Buccos also recaptured the hearts of Pirates fans, who streamed into Forbes Field at a much more robust clip than they had the previous season. The club drew 909,279 fans, an increase of 20 percent.

  Despite Walker’s platoon strategy, Stargell was chosen to his second straight All-Star team and finished with numbers good enough to place him 14th in the league’s Most Valuable Player voting. In 533 at-bats, Stargell collected 145 hits, mashed 27 home runs to go with 25 doubles and eight triples and drove in 107 runs while finishing with a .272 batting average and a .501 slugging percentage. He also walked 39 times—more than double the previous year’s total of 17. Also on the rise, though, was his strikeout total, as his 127 whiffs were fourth in the league. It was in 1965 that he also began to show more signs of his prodigious power. In the month of May, Stargell clubbed 10 home runs and drove in 20 while batting .320, and he topped himself the following month when he struck 10 more home runs and drove in 35 runs in just 106 at-bats. There were also several memorable individual clouts. On June 8, leading off the bottom of the second inning of a scoreless game against Houston’s Dick “Turk” Farrell, Stargell became one of a select group of left-handed batters that included Willie McCovey of the Giants to hit a ball over Forbes Field’s massive left-field scoreboard. Just 16 days later, his monstrous power surfaced once again, this time before a crowd of 28,867 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, when he twice took Hall of Fame right-hander Don Drysdale deep and added a three-run homer off John Purdin. Then in the eighth off left-hander Mike Kekich, Stargell hit a long drive down the left-field line, barely missing a fourth homer when it struck a railing in front of the stands near the bullpen. He would settle for a double in what would prove to be a 13–3 Pirates victory punctuated by five home runs in all. “Six inches higher—even four inches higher—it’s his fourth home run of the game,” said GM Brown, who accompanied the club on that road trip.13

  Frank Finch, reporting for the Los Angeles Times, called Stargell and the Pirates’ long-ball effort “the most violent display of slugging power in Dodger Stadium’s four-year history.” “I don’t want to hear any more complaints from our players that this park is too big,” Dodgers general manager Buzzie Bavasi said afterward. “The Pirates proved it isn’t.”14 Stargell, meanwhile, was understandably ecstatic. “Those three homers were the thrill of my life,” he said.15 The outburst boosted his home run and RBI totals to 20 and 54, respectively, and it appeared he had a legitimate shot at reaching his spring training goals of 40 home runs and 130 RBIs.

  Hot hitter: Willie’s bat was on fire—literally—in this promotional photograph taken before a game at Pittsburgh’s Forbes Field in 1965 (courtesy National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York).

  Stargell capped his breakout first half with a show at the All-Star Game at Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington, Minnesota, going 2-for-3 with a base hit off starter Milt Pappas and then a two-run bomb off hometown hero Jim “Mudcat” Grant, who would later cross paths with Stargell both as a teammate on the Pirates and on a memorable off-season journey to the battlefields of Vietnam. After the home run, he sped around the bases rather than go into a slow home run trot. “I took my time running the bases on the very first home run I ever hit, and my high school coach gave me a dressing down for show-boating,” Stargell laughed after the game. “And I haven’t trotted since.”16

  The good times that came with the 1965 season only got better the following year in what would prove to be Walker’s second and final full season with the Bucs. A quick start helped the Pirates rise to the top of the National League standings by the beginning of May and they remained on top until the final month of the season, when a flat final 45 games turned what could have been a season to remember into a second straight third-place finish behind the league champion Dodgers and bridesmaid Giants. Pittsburgh, led by Stargell and eventual Most Valuable Player Clemente, owned a 70–47 record at one point but slogged to a 22–23 mark down the stretch and wound up three games in back of Los Angeles.

  On the whole, Stargell had another outstanding campaign, as the powerful cleanup hitter established career highs in home runs (33), batting average (.315) and RBIs (102). Stargell was selected to the All-Star Game for the third straight season after slugging 22 home runs and driving in 63 while hitting .337 in 75 games before the break. Included in that stretch was one remarkable two-game burst where he collected nine consecutive hits against the Houston Astros in Pittsburgh. Afterward, he brushed aside the back-to-back performances and swore he wasn’t concerned about trying to tie—or break—the National League record for consecutive hits, which stood at 10 and was held by eight players. “Honest, I’m not interested in records. I can’t be an individual. The name of this game is team.” Interjected teammate Andre Rodgers, “He means it. Willie’s that kind of guy.” Stargell acknowledged that it was great to be close to the record “because a lot of great people have played in this game” but said he didn’t want to establish unreal expectations—something he believed happened the previous year when he hit 10 home runs in a month. “I began to get the idea the public expected me to hit a home run every time I swung. I learned a lesson—just swing and the home runs will come.”17 Stargell had a premonition his streak would end before the next game when he broke his bat in pre-game batting practice. He had used the same bat to rap out nine straight hits and 13 in the previous four games. He was correct, as the streak ended in the first inning when he grounded out to short against the Cardinals’ future Hall of Fame right-hander Bob Gibson. But he wound up going 2-for-5 that night and helping the Bucs to a 9–1 victory.

  In assessing the club’s 1966 shortcomings and trying to address them for 1967, the Pirates brain trust decided that hitting wasn’t the problem. Indeed, Clemente—one of five Pirates to finish in the top 23 of the MVP balloting—put up numbers of 29 homers, 119 RBIs and a .317 batting average in 1966. Alou, Walker’s pet hitting student, won the batting title with a .342 mark. Stargell made his presence known once again and shortstop Gene Alley, who shared a few meals with Stargell back at Don’s Café in Grand Forks of the Northern League, wound up 11th in the balloting after hitting .299 with seven home runs and 43 RBIs. Ol’ reliable Mazeroski, meanwhile, chipped in with 16 home runs and 82 RBIs while batting .262. And first baseman Clendenon broke through in the power department, slugging 28 home runs and driving in 98 runs while matching Alley in the batting average department. Although the starting pitching performed reasonably well—all five starters finished with records above .500—manag
ement turned its attention to the mound corps in the off-season, sending knuckleballer Wilbur Wood to the Chicago White Sox for veteran Juan Pizzaro and bringing in Dennis Ribant from the New York Mets in exchange for Don Cardwell.

  The club did make one major deal that did not involve pitching, sending former bonus baby Bailey and future Yankees GM Michael to the Dodgers for veteran infielder and base-stealer supreme Maury Wills. A shortstop for the Dodgers, Wills was tabbed as the Bucs’ starting third baseman, and his steady presence was expected to pay huge dividends for a team that had legitimate aspirations as a title contender, given its previous two seasons. Many oddsmakers agreed, favoring Pittsburgh to win the 1967 National League pennant. Pirate players liked their own chances, and why not? As Blass—who had won 11 games in his first full season in 1966—said, the team had future Hall of Famers in right field (Clemente), at second base (Mazeroski) and in left field (Stargell). “Hit the ball to them—I’m going to get a sandwich,” he cracked, referring to his gifted teammates. “It was rather reassuring. And as Virdon always said, it’s nice to drive to the ballpark when you know you’re going to get six or seven runs every night.”

  Although Stargell was still young—he was starting just his fifth full season in the big leagues—Blass said the gifted outfielder was beginning to show signs of the leadership that he ultimately would display in huge quantities later in his career. “Willie started becoming somewhat quotable,” Blass said. “He was always accommodating and always kind of a steady figure, so the press liked him. And the fans loved him—he hit home runs and had a gun for an arm.”

  He was also beginning to make his presence felt off the field, showing teammates and opponents alike how much fun baseball could be. During a particularly rough stretch at the plate, Stargell took a bat and buried it in the ground near one of the Forbes Field dugouts. He pounded it in such a way that only a few inches of the barrel stuck out of the ground; a longtime Pittsburgh journalist named Roy McHugh said the bat “remained as immovable as the legendary sword of Kumasi, in Ghana, planted two centuries ago by an Ashanti sorcerer, who said the nation would endure as long as the sword remained in place.” Even heavyweight boxing champ Cassius Clay—later and better known as Muhammad Ali—couldn’t extract it, and neither could Joey Diven, described by McHugh as a “celebrated Pittsburgh strong man.”18 Then one day, Chicago Cubs third-baseman Ron Santo happened by and—voila—he extracted the bat. While Santo was a slugger of some repute, he was no physical brute at 6-feet and 190 pounds. Even Santo didn’t know what to make of his heroics. “He had this bat and it was known that if anyone could pull it out of the ground, you’d get a beer,” Santo recalled in a 2010 interview. “Willie was a funny guy and a great guy, too, and one day I was walking down the tunnel and he says, ‘Ron, come here—nobody’s been able to pull this bat out.’ I’m looking at it in the ground and the barrel was sticking up. I don’t know how he got it in there, but I had a feeling it would be pretty tough to do. So I said, ‘Well, OK.’ But I knew this must have been impossible knowing Stargell. So I gave it a try and I pulled the barrel out. And he was amazed.”19

  Little did Stargell know that teammate Clendenon had taken a crowbar to the bat and loosened it up before Santo’s attempt.

  Stargell’s fun-loving nature soon became well known, and influenced multiple generations of Pirates. He often would point out that the umpires don’t yell “Work ball!” at the start of a game, but rather “Play ball!” Still, once the game started, he was a focused professional, intent on winning games and terrorizing pitchers. He had several in particular whose lives he made miserable—Ted Abernathy, for one. A right-handed reliever who threw sidearm and submarine, Abernathy had virtually no chance against Stargell. In 10 career at-bats against Abernathy, Stargell collected six hits, including a home run and two doubles, and he walked eight other times for an on-base percentage of .778. “Poor Ted Abernathy—he’s probably in a psycho ward,” Blass said. “Willie just pummeled him. It was just cruel. We’d turn our heads so we wouldn’t have to see the carnage. It was like a white-gloved butler serving you a chest-high hanging slider—‘Here, sir, I believe this is yours.’” But others had the young slugger’s number. Take Joe Hoerner, for example—over their careers Stargell would manage just four hits in 29 at-bats against Horner for a paltry .138 average—and he struck out nearly half of the time (14). “I remember Willie talking about trying to hit Hoerner,” Blass said. “He said it’s like ‘eating soup with a fork.’” Stargell was quoted as saying the same thing about two other tough lefties with stronger pedigrees—Hall of Famers Sandy Koufax and Steve Carlton.

  The Pirates were a loose club under Walker. Blass recalled that in one of the three years Walker managed the club, the team broke spring training and did a bit of barnstorming on its way north to open the season. One of the stops was in Birmingham, Alabama, and Blass said Walker stood up in the plane and announced that a picnic would be held near Leeds, Alabama, where Walker lived. “Willie got up and asked, ‘Do you know where we are?’ referring to the racial climate of the south at the time. ‘Are us black boys invited?’ And Harry said, ‘Yes, Willie—we’re going to use your ribs.’ Then Willie comes walking up with a sheet over his head. We had quite a bunch.”

  People noticed the talent—and they also noticed the club’s complexion. Literally. The Pittsburgh Courier, in February, noted that it was very possible that the Pirates could field eight “Negro” players in their starting lineup, with second-baseman Mazeroski being the only exception. As of 1966, the Courier reported, no major league team had ever sported more than seven minority players in a starting lineup. The Courier praised Pirates management for “making it almost mandatory for Negro fans to keep at least 3,500 of their kind seated in Forbes Field seats this summer.”20 Nothing much was said about that development during that particular summer, but much would be written about a day four years later when, with no fanfare, the Pirates rolled out the first all-minority starting lineup in big-league history.

  While the players were feeling confident heading into the ’67 season, both GM Brown and field manager Walker were not pleased when Stargell arrived for spring training weighing 225 pounds—15 pounds heavier than the two had hoped. Once again, some home cooking had more than a little something to do with it, as Stargell—whose divorce from Lois became final early in 1966—had remarried in the off-season. His new bride was the former Dolores Parker, a Pittsburgh native whom Stargell had met at a fashion show. The two began a serious relationship following Stargell’s divorce and it culminated in marriage in November of 1966.

  Stargell’s winter full of good eating not only drew rebukes from Walker and Brown, but the GM hit Stargell where it truly hurt—in the pocketbook—as he fined him $1,500 for showing up in Florida overweight. The media wasted no time in pouncing on Stargell’s weight issue; a headline in the Pittsburgh Press on March 1 blared, “Mrs. Stargell’s cooking too good” and a smaller sub-head announced that Stargell had to shed 15 pounds. Said Stargell, “I just got married in November and my wife’s a good cook.” According to the local media, team doctor Joseph Finegold’s diet was to include no potatoes, no desserts and very little liquids. “I want you to weigh 210 pounds when we leave here,” Walker told Stargell. “And 210 hard pounds.”21

  Whether it was the weight issue, a lack of game preparation or something else, Stargell got off to an exceptionally slow start in 1967, carrying a .193 batting average with seven home runs and 17 RBIs into the month of June. The media zeroed in on Stargell’s weight. The Post-Gazette’s Charley Feeney wrote that Stargell’s weight was just as much a conversation piece as his “anemic average.” Feeney also wrote that Stargell and Walker had a difference of opinion regarding Stargell’s optimum playing weight. Walker wanted Stargell at 215, but Stargell said he had his best season the previous year when he played at 222. Stargell told Feeney that his attempts to shed weight in spring training may have cost him. “Losing all the weight made me weak when the season started,”
he said. “I wanted so much to get off to a good start, especially since there was so much talk about my weight.” Despite his struggles, he said he would maintain a positive attitude. “When I get in there again, I will keep swinging. I will think of getting base hits—not of making an out.”22 Somehow, the rest of the bats in the Pirates lineup held steady and the team remained several games above the .500 mark through late June. But with the favored Bucs sporting a break-even 42–42 mark, the front office had seen enough and sent Walker packing on July 18. In the process, the club brought back former skipper Murtaugh to manage for the rest of the season.

  The change didn’t yield positive results, as the Pirates went on to finish a disappointing 81–81, good for sixth place in the 10-team National League. For Stargell, the year was equally disappointing in terms of his personal statistics. He did rally from his slow start and, by mid–August, the Post-Gazette’s Feeney was singing a different tune. “His batting average is a rising .275 and those left-handers who were supposed to be death on murderous Willie are being clobbered by his big bat along with the right-handers,” he wrote. “‘Let Willie alone’ is the new Buc theme. The people who wanted Willie to weigh about 215 pounds when the season opened are beginning to see their mistake. A 230-pound Stargell carries a lot of power and contentment. He’s a growing 230 and he’s no longer hurting. The only ones hurting now are rival pitchers who must challenge Big Willie and his big bat.”23

  Still, Stargell’s .271 batting average, 20 home runs and 73 RBIs marked his lowest production in all three categories since he became a fulltime player in 1964. As far as Brown was concerned, there was no mystery to Stargell’s drop in productivity. “I thought he got heavy—he got too heavy,” he said. “He really wasn’t playing well.”