Strange & Amazing Baseball Stories

by Gutman; Bill

  So despite some follies like the Pennant Porch, baseball can say thanks to Charles O. Finley. He did have some lasting ideas.

  While many of the crazy promotions are gimmicks to bring fans in to see losing teams, there have been some ideas that have backfired on winning teams as well. By now, baseball teams should have learned a lesson. Don't give away anything that isn't valuable enough for the fans to want to keep. And don't give away anything that can be converted into a missile.

  Take the case of the Reggie Bar. When Reggie Jackson came to the New York Yankees as a free agent in 1977, he did a lot of talking, both with his mouth and his bat. After he became a World Series hero that year, he remarked that he ought to have a candy bar named after him. He was referring, perhaps jokingly, to the Baby Ruth candy bar, which many people mistakenly think is named after the great Yankee legend, Babe Ruth.

  But a candy manufacturer heard Reggie and took his words to heart. Thus was born the Reggie Bar, a circular-shaped candy with a colorful wrapper. Naturally, the Yankees liked the idea and went along with a promotion the next year that saw a Reggie Bar given away to each paying customer.

  Unfortunately, the Reggie Bar was not a bat, cap, ball, or a T-shirt, the kind of giveaway that guarantees the fans taking their free gift home. Not everyone likes candy, and with its circular shape, the Reggie Bar could be converted into an instant frisbee.

  You guessed it. The players, grounds crew, and umpires spent most of the game picking up Reggie Bars that were thrown periodically from the stands. And when the original Reggie appeared at the plate or made a catch in the field, the bars really sailed.

  It was the last of the Reggie Bar giveaways. In fact, while Reggie continued to be a superstar, the Reggie Bar did not. In a few years it was off the market.

  In many ways, baseball is the most traditional of all the sports. Yet in many ways it's the most outlandish. For years, baseball uniforms have been pretty standardized. But every now and then, someone gets an idea to change things.

  Take the uniforms. From time to time, teams have decided to take a bold step when it comes to baseball fashion. It undoubtedly began way back in the nineteenth century. For instance, back in 1883 there was another Mets team, the Metropolitans of New York. They lasted for just five years in the old American Association, but the players on the club wore sealskin shoes, something rather unheard of in those days.

  Then in 1916, the Brooklyn Dodgers decided to try something new. Some say it was because the crosstown Yankees introduced pinstriped uniforms the year before. Anyway, the Dodgers took the field in checkered uniforms, which seemed to embarrass the players more than anyone. Needless to say, the uniforms were quickly discarded.

  It was Charles O. Finley who started the next trend in the early 1970s with the Oakland A's. He introduced colored uniforms. That was one new idea that worked and many teams began to use colors other than the traditional gray and white. Done within reason, it was a positive change. But in 1976, the Chicago White Sox took it one step further.

  The Sox owner at the time was none other than Bill Veeck. As usual, he had to be different. On August 8, the Sox took the field decked out in white shirts with blue lettering.., and navy-blue shorts! It was the first time a baseball club had ever worn shorts, and the White Sox players took a terrible ribbing. The opposing Kansas City Royals collapsed in laughter as did many of the fans.

  Though the Sox won the ball game, they lost the fashion show. The shorts were quickly discarded in favor of the standard uniform pants. It was an example of an idea carried too far. Somehow, shorts did not befit major league baseball players. Besides, wearing them could make sliding an extremely painful proposition.

  But it will happen again, in some form or other. Sooner or later someone will sit up and say, "Hey, have I got a great idea." So stay tuned. The game's not over yet.

  Chapter 3

  ONLY ON THE DIAMOND

  While baseball isn't the only game in town, it can definitely be the weirdest. Perhaps it's due to the game's long history; or maybe just to its nature. But a glance down memory lane in baseball turns up an abundance of mysterious, strange, and amazing stories that can entertain for hours on end. Some of them happened long ago, some recently. But one thing is certain. They couldn't happen in any other sport. Only on the diamond.

  Big Ed Delahanty was one of baseball's earliest superstars. The first and most talented of five Delahanty brothers to make the majors, Big Ed was born in 1867 and played professional baseball from 1888 until 1903. In that time he compiled a .345 lifetime batting average, hitting the coveted .400 mark twice.

  In an era of the dead ball, Big Ed was a slugger who could slam the ball farther than most of the other players of his generation. In July of 1897, he became the second player in history to belt four home runs in one game.

  Then in 1902, at the age of thirty-four, Big Ed jumped from Philadelphia of the National League to Washington of the new American League. He was still good enough to be the AL's leading hitter with a .376 mark. The following season, Ed Delahanty was again hitting over .300 and showing little sign of slipping despite his thirty-five years. In June, however, manager Tom Loftus suspended Delahanty for drinking. Big Ed followed the team to Detroit on July 3, but left the ballpark before the game was over. No one can be certain what happened on that fateful day, but baseball historian Robert Smith pieced together this account:

  Delahanty wired his wife to meet him in Washington, then boarded a late afternoon train for New York. On board, according to witnesses, Delahanty downed five cocktails. He behaved so boisterously the train's conductor had no choice but to put him off at Fort Erie, Ontario, on the Canadian side of the International Bridge.

  Delahanty lurched off in pursuit of the train. On the bridge, according to Smith, a watchman named Kingston saw a figure drop out of sight, through the tracks. Below roared the Niagara River. Delahanty's body was recovered a week later, twenty miles downriver. Big Ed Delahanty's career and life ended suddenly on the International Bridge in one of baseball's strangest mysteries.

  An on-field death in Toronto a couple of years ago almost spelled big trouble for New York Yankee star Dave Winfield. The Yanks were visiting Exhibition Stadium in August of 1983 for a series against the Blue Jays. Shortly after the game began, the Yankee outfielders were tossing a warmup ball back and forth before the start of an inning.

  Winfield, the leftfielder and one of the league's best players, grabbed the warm-up ball, whirled around, and fired it off the field in the direction of the Yankee bullpen. What he didn't see was a seagull that was walking on the field in foul territory. Wouldn't you know it, the ball scored a bull's-eye, hitting the gull and killing it instantly.

  As a batboy gingerly put a towel over the fallen bird and carried it from the field, Winfield put his arms out as if to say, hey, I didn't mean it. But the Toronto fans suddenly acted as if the Yankee slugger had killed the team mascot. They not only began booing but also started throwing all kinds of junk his way.

  That wasn't all. After the game, Winfield found himself being placed under arrest. He was charged with cruelty to animals, and under Canadian law faced a possible jail term. It took a $500 bond to spring him so he could leave town.

  Fortunately, cooler heads finally prevailed, and within a few days the charges against Winfield were dropped. But one thing's for sure. Dave Winfield will probably never throw another practice ball off the field without looking carefully. Very carefully.

  As Dave Winfield learned the hard way, you've got to be careful where you throw a baseball. But there was an instance on the diamond when a player knew just where he wanted to throw it. Only he couldn't. Mother Nature wouldn't let him.

  It happened at the 1961 All-Star Game. The midseason classic was being played at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. The park had been opened a year earlier to accommodate the Giants after the team had come to the West Coast from New York in 1958. Leaving the antiquated, rundown Polo Grounds, the club looked forward to playing
in its new ballpark.

  But Candlestick was built alongside the Bay, and the winds coming off the water often played havoc with everything on the ballfield. When the All-Star Game began it was a hot July afternoon. But by the seventh inning the wind was whipping up. That's when Giants' relief pitcher Stu Miller entered the game for the National League.

  Miller was a little guy and threw a variety of offspeed pitches. The wind gusts were actually helping him because the ball was moving more than ever. But then, with a runner on first, the wind really did its thing.

  After getting the catcher's sign, Miller came to his set position and started to deliver. But just as he began his motion, a sixty-mile-per-hour gust of wind came across the field and literally blew Stu Miller off the mound! He had to struggle to keep from falling over. Needless to say, he didn't complete his delivery.

  The plate umpire had no choice but to call a balk, allowing the runner to advance a base. It was the first balk of Miller's long career, and perhaps the only balk in baseball history called because a pitcher was blown off the mound. After the game, one of Miller's teammates suggested the next time he pitched at Candlestick he wear lead shoes.

  It wasn't an ill wind, but an ill-thrown ball that caused an embarrassment to Stan Musial. Stan the Man, one of the most respected and talented ballplayers, proved that anyone can fall victim to a strange or freak play that could only happen on the diamond.

  The year was 1959 and the thirty-eight-year-old Musial was approaching the end of a brilliant career that would see him finish with a .331 lifetime batting average and seven National League batting titles, as well as a host of other records. But with all those Hall of Fame credentials, Stan the Man probably remembered a play that happened on June 30, 1959, as well as anything.

  St. Louis was playing the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field and Musial was at bat in the top of the fourth inning. Stan had worked the count to three and one, when pitcher Bob Anderson threw an inside fastball that the plate umpire called ball four. The pitch also got away from catcher Sammy Taylor and Musial headed for first base. But instead of retrieving the loose ball, catcher Taylor, joined by pitcher Anderson, began arguing with umpire Vic Delmore that the ball had hit Musial's bat, and therefore should be a foul.

  Then things began happening quickly. As Musial reached first, several of his teammates, seeing that Taylor hadn't gone after the ball, began yelling at him to run to second. But as Stan took off, third baseman Al Dark ran over and picked up the ball, firing it to shortstop Ernie Banks, who was standing about ten feet to the shortstop side of second base.

  Meanwhile, as the argument continued at home plate, umpire Delmore automatically took a new ball out of his pocket and handed it to Taylor. Pitcher Anderson, seeing Musial running to second, grabbed the ball from his catcher and fired toward second. Only his throw was wild and went out into center field.

  All Musial saw was a baseball flying out into center, so he got up and started toward third, only to run smack into shortstop Banks, who tagged him with the original ball. If you're totally confused by now, you're not alone. So were the Cardinals, the Cubs, and the umpires.

  After another argument, and then a conference between the umps, Musial was ruled out, because he was tagged with the original ball. The error had been made by the plate umpire who put the second ball into play. And while Stan the Man probably didn't realize it then, that one base on balls caused a lot more trouble than any of his 3,630 lifetime hits.

  While Stan Musial had to deal with two baseballs, there recently was a player who had to deal with two teams in one day... and got to play for both of them. Joel Youngblood was a popular utility player for the New York Mets in the late 1970s and early 1980s. He had a good stick, a great throwing arm, and could play second, third, and the outfield. A handy guy to have around.

  On August 4, 1982, Youngblood was the starting centerfielder as the Mets played host to archrival Chicago. In the third inning, he smacked a solid single off the Cubs' Ferguson Jenkins, driving home two runs. Imagine his surprise a couple of innings later when he was suddenly removed from the game. He was even more surprised to learn the reason for his removal. He was no longer a New York Met!

  While the game was in progress, the Mets had completed a trade with the Montreal Expos, and Youngblood was one of the players involved. It would have been easy and certainIv anderstandable if Youngblood had gone home for a day or so to think about what had just happened. But a ballplayer is a ballplayer. Noticing that the Expos were playing in nearby Philadelphia, Youngblood left Shea Stadium and got to Philly as fast as he could.

  When he arrived, the game was still going on, so he got a Montreal uniform and went into the dugout. Within minutes, Youngblood found himself in the game, as a sixth inning defensive replacement in the outfield. And when he got a turn at bat shortly afterward, he slapped a single off Philly ace Steve Carlton.

  Joel Youngblood must have had a lot to think about that night. He had started a game in New York and wound up the day playing in Philadelphia. Along the way he became the only player in major league history to get base hits for two different teams in one day.

  The great Ted Williams never had a chance to get hits for two teams in one day. He spent his entire career with just one team, the Boston Red Sox. But Ted got plenty of hits, many of them memorable ones, like belting a home run his last time at bat in the major leagues in 1960.

  Of course, when you hit as many baseballs as Ted Williams, there have to be a few strange and amazing ones. In the late 1940s, the Philadelphia Athletics had a pitcher named Lou Brissie, who had come to the majors after World War II. While in the service, Brissie had seen a great deal of action and was wounded. But he recovered to make it to the majors in 1947.

  One day the Athletics' left-hander was facing Williams and gave Ted one he liked. He whipped his powerful bat around, but instead of pulling the ball toward right, hit a sharp line drive right back up the middle. CLANG! The sound was unmistakable. Like the ringing of a bell! But the ball seemed to have struck Brissie on the leg. Everyone in the park wondered what had happened.

  The ball had hit Brissie, all right, and it had made a loud clang.

  Seems as if the wounded war hero had a metal plate on his leg to

  protect a war wound. Williams's blast had connected with the plate.

  Fortunately, Brissie wasn't hurt. He continued to pitch in the majors

  until 1953, but no one ever rang his bell again.

  There was another famous explosion off the Williams bat that is always remembered, even today. It came at the All-Star Game in 1946. Ted was en route to a four-for-four performance, with a pair of homers and five RBIs in a game that was never in doubt. The American League drubbed the National, 12-0. But one of Williams's homers that day would become a legend.

  The pitcher was Rip Sewell, a Pittsburgh righthander good enough to win 143 games in his career, including a pair of 21-game seasons. Sewell was as colorful as he was good, for he had a trick pitch called the eephus. It was a high, lazy floater that arched some fifteen feet above the ground and often plopped through the middle of the strike zone when it finally came back to earth.

  Sewell delivered the eephus with the same motion as his fastball, so while it was an obvious gimmick that the fans enjoyed watching, it was also effective. Before the All-Star Game began, Ted had asked Sewell if he would throw him the eephus if they faced each other. Sewell said he would, and Williams, being a student of hitting, immediately sought out some advice. He asked his All-Star teammate, the Yanks' Bill Dickey, how he thought the eephus could be hit.

  "By stepping up on it," Dickey said without hesitation.

  Sure enough, Sewell got into the game and Ted came up. The pitcher remembers Ted shaking his head, as if to say, "Don't throw it," but Sewell nodded, indicating that he would. On the first pitch, Sewell threw the eephus. Ted stepped up and fouled it off for a strike. The crowd was already going wild, enjoying the action. So Sewell threw another. This one was wide of the pl
ate and Ted watched it for a ball. Still being a pitcher who liked the upper hand, Sewell crossed Ted up and fired a fastball down the middle for strike two. But he couldn't resist another eephus.

  This time Ted was ready. He watched the ball floating toward home plate, then took a quick step up in the batter's box and timed it perfectly. The ball took off like it was shot out of a cannon. It rocketed on a line into the rightfield bullpen for a home run. Ted grinned as he circled the bases, the roar of the crowd in his ears. On the mound, Rip Sewell was grinning a little, too.

  It might have been a freak pitch, some entertaining trickery, but the eephus wasn't easy to hit. In the ten years that Sewell used it, Ted Williams was the only player ever to hit it out of the park.

  A 12-0 score in an All-Star Game, such as the one in 1946, is nothing to be laughed at. The players on the losing team have their pride. But one consolation is that the game doesn't count in the standings. Regular season slaughters hurt even more, and perhaps the all-time hurt occurred on June 8, 1950.

  That day, the St. Louis Browns were in Boston for a game against the Red Sox. The Browns were not in a very good mood when they arrived at Fenway Park that morning. They had good reason. The day before the Red Sox had buried them by a 20-4 score. A humiliating defeat like that can work one of two ways. It can make a team angry and hungry for revenge. Or it can leave a club dispirited and ripe to be taken again.

  The Red Sox must have wondered which St. Louis team they would see. Well, for an inning and a half they couldn't be sure. The game was scoreless. Then in the bottom of the second the question was answered. The Sox scored eight times, and it opened the floodgates. In the third they scored five more, and in the fourth got seven. By the fifth inning the hitters must have been tired of swinging the bat and running the bases. They only scored a pair, making it a 22-3 game after five innings.