As Purdue’s starting quarterback, senior Bernie Allen played a prominent role in both wins. Many years later, long after his professional baseball career was ended, Allen recalled, “What I am most proud of in regards to my football career at Purdue was that I never lost to Notre Dame or Indiana. Those two in-state schools were, and still are, big rivals for Purdue.”1 In particular, one game he most enjoyed “was when I kicked a field goal to beat Ohio State, 24-21. Woody Hayes [the legendary Ohio State coach] had said I was too small to play football in the Big Ten, so I was happy to prove him wrong face to face.”2 In the end, whether or not Allen was too small to play football never really mattered, because all he ever wanted to be was a baseball player.     

Born on April 16, 1939, in East Liverpool, Ohio, Bernard Keith Allen was one of the greatest all-around athletes in the history of East Liverpool High School. A star in baseball, football, and basketball (in which he was named a High School All-American), Allen was inducted into the school’s Athletic Hall of Fame as a member of the inaugural class of 1982. One of five children born to Thurman and Fern Allen, Bernie no doubt emulated the athletic prowess of his father, who played baseball and was an avid golfer. Thurm, as he was known, spent 47 years employed by the Smith and Phillips Furniture Company, from which he retired in 1981 as vice president and general manager.

When Bernie graduated from high school in 1957, his athletic skills were in high demand at the collegiate level, but he had also drawn notice in major-league baseball. Ultimately, Purdue proved largely an afterthought. “Previously,” Allen told Sports Collectors Digest, “I had visited Ohio State and met with coach Woody Hayes [following which he received Hayes’s rebuff that he was too small to play Big Ten football]. I was only 6-foot, 180 pounds. I was planning on going to Colgate, but the August after I graduated from high school, Billy Elias, who was a Purdue assistant football coach, came down and watched me play in a summer baseball tournament. He convinced me to [at] least visit the campus. My mom, dad, and I visited Purdue and we really liked the campus.

“I made it clear that baseball was my number-one sport. The scholarship was for football, as there weren’t many full baseball scholarships in those days. I was intent upon playing pro baseball, but I wanted to get an education first.” Additionally, “The Yankees were very interested in me at that time.” Nonetheless, Allen enrolled at Purdue University.

At the time, freshmen didn’t play varsity athletics, so Allen became the sixth of nine quarterbacks on the freshman team’s depth chart, a circumstance that worked in his favor. “The freshman team was actually cannon fodder for the varsity,” he recalled. “The quarterbacks above me … kept getting hurt as they went up against the varsity. … By the time I got to play against them late in the year, I was getting comfortable with the system. I completed some passes against the varsity and caught the attention of the coaching staff [which included future New York Yankees owner, and Allen’s future boss, George Steinbrenner, whom Allen recalled as ‘an excellent recruiter’]. At the end of the season, the freshman team had a big intrasquad game, and I was named MVP of the game.” The following season, Allen joined the varsity.

In that first varsity season, Allen was a starting defensive back on the best defensive team in the country; during the season’s last several games, he also saw action at quarterback. Yet Allen also was a standout on the varsity baseball team, for whom he was named the season’s MVP, and that drew the consternation of football coach Jack Mollenkopf, who, Allen said, “kept telling me I wouldn’t even make the baseball team. He wanted me to give up baseball and concentrate on football.” Thus began yearly battles with the pugnacious football coach.

As his junior season got under way in 1959, Allen was slated to be the second-string quarterback behind Ross Fichtner, who went on to become a successful defensive back with the Cleveland Browns. While Allen continued to pursue his dream of playing major-league baseball, Coach Mollenkopf demanded his presence at football practice. “In the spring of my junior year,” Allen recalled, “I agreed to leave baseball practice early to go to football practice. Mollenkopf claimed we were supposedly putting in a new offense. After a couple of days,” however, “I realized that the offense wasn’t new, only the terminology.” Nevertheless, Mollenkopf’s needling paid dividends to the football program, for in the season’s second game Fichtner broke his collarbone, and Allen assumed the starting position. He remained the starter for the remainder of that season and all of the next.

By his senior season, Allen was firmly entrenched as Purdue’s starting quarterback. His availability for that role, however, wasn’t a certainty. “I almost packed it in after my junior year,” Allen reflected, “as I wanted to put my brother through college.” For the final time, Mollenkopf railed against Allen’s lack of commitment to football; but to pursue his passion, Allen again weathered Mollenkopf’s wrath, in exchange for a singular moment.

“I missed the first two days of football practice as I was playing [baseball] in the NABC tournament in Wichita.” There, “I got to face Satchel Paige. … Admittedly, he was at the end of the line, but still, it was Satchel Paige.”

Returning to Purdue, Allen faced his tormentor. “My punishment for missing two days of practice was that Mollenkopf was only going to let me play defense in our first game of the season, against UCLA. It was real hot, so I didn’t mind only getting to play defense. We were down eight points when we got the ball back for the final time, with about a minute to go in the game. As I came off the field with the defense, Mollenkopf told me to get back in there and throw the ball. … We ended up scoring a touchdown. We went for two and scored. It ended up 27-27. As I came off the field, Mollenkopf said, ‘You’ll start next week versus Notre Dame.’ I remarked, ‘Don’t do me any favors.’ The next week, we went out and beat Notre Dame 51-19.”  

That season Allen was named the football team’s MVP. In an era of run-dominated football, he completed 59 percent of his passes, threw for 765 yards, and tossed five touchdowns. Allen’s 54 points led the team in scoring, as he rushed for four touchdowns and kicked 21 points after touchdown and three field goals. He also punted 38 times for a 34.9-yard average. In his three varsity football seasons, Allen completed 49 percent of his passes for 1,200 yards, threw for 10 touchdowns, and tossed 11 interceptions. 

With his collegiate football career over, there was never a question of playing the sport professionally. “I never had any desire to play football after college,” Allen later recalled. “In fact, I played football only to get an education. I never really enjoyed it.” And of Allen’s availability for National Football League teams, he said, “There never was any doubt in my mind at that time. I received many phone calls from pro grid teams, but I told them not to waste a draft pick because I wanted to play baseball.”3

The turning point in Allen’s future professional baseball career came the afternoon of the football team’s upset victory over the Minnesota Gophers. “After the game at Minnesota, as we made our way out of the locker room and onto the bus, the Minnesota fans came up and congratulated us on how well we had played. I remembered those gracious fans a few months later when I was trying to decide whom to sign with. It came down to the Twins and the New York Mets. I took half as much money to sign with the Twins. … The Mets weren’t really even in existence at that point. They were just out signing players. The Tigers had wanted to sign me as a catcher, but I knew they had just signed Bill Freehan, whom I had played against in college [Freehan attended the University of Michigan]. I knew how good of a catcher he was.” So Allen signed with the Minnesota Twins, and began what became a 10-year career in the major leagues. (Allen, who batted .360 in three varsity seasons at Purdue, was signed by Twins scout Dick Wiencek.)

Allen played just 80 minor-league games before reaching the majors. After signing in 1961, he spent two weeks with the Twins before they sent him to the Charlotte (North Carolina) Hornets, in the Class A South Atlantic League, where he finished the season. Over that span, Allen was mediocre at the plate, .241/.324/.320, but proved a major-league-caliber fielder. The following spring, Allen made the Twins roster, spent the entire season with the team, and took over as the starting second baseman. With the exception of 41 Triple-A games four years later while he was recovering from an injury, Allen never again played in the minor leagues.

On Opening Day 1962, Allen took his place as the Twins’ starting second baseman. He replaced one of baseball’s most enigmatic personalities. The previous fall, Billy Martin, in his lone season as a player with the Twins, had ended his 11-year playing career. Outplayed by Allen during spring training of ’62, Martin was subsequently released by Minnesota. Allen always remained grateful to Martin for the veteran’s mentoring, in spite of their competition.

“Even though Billy knew that I was trying to replace him, he taught me to truly play second base,” Allen later explained. “Billy emphasized that it was important for the older players to help the younger players learn how to be major leaguers. … Billy also taught me to be serious on the field. It’s okay to have fun off the field, but you have to play like a pro on the field. It’s a business.”

Indeed, Allen never forgot Martin’s advice. Years later, after he’d been traded to the Washington Senators, Allen developed “my own little entourage – Toby Harrah, Jeff Burroughs, Tom Grieve, and Jim Mason. They followed me around all season. I was glad to help them.”

(After he retired, Allen often accepted invitations to play in Martin’s golf tournament. “[Martin] would take me around the room, telling people that I was the player who forced him to retire as a player. That made me feel great, but actually it was Father Time who made Billy retire.”)

On the field Allen never enjoyed a finer season than his rookie year of 1962. In fact, he rarely again even approached the offensive numbers he posted that season. With a slash line of .269/.338/.403, Allen, who typically batted seventh, ahead of shortstop Zoilo Versalles, set career highs in almost every offensive category, including impressive power totals of 27 doubles, 7 triples, 12 home runs, and 64 RBIs. Defensively, too, Allen was stellar. Only once after that season did he produce a better fielding percentage over a full season than that year’s .983, the fifth best average in the league among second basemen; and in 158 games he turned the league’s third highest number of double plays. Allen received one first-place vote in the Rookie of the Year balloting (the Yankees’ Tom Tresh won the award), and was named to the Topps All-Rookie team. It was a heady season; yet it marked the pinnacle of Allen’s career.

If Allen’s rookie season announced him as one of baseball’s rising stars, the next two years frustratingly quieted any acclaim. In 1963, as the Twins, under manager Sam Mele, looked to improve on 91 wins and a second-place finish, Allen inexplicably got off to a dreadful start. After an 0-for-4 performance on June 21 that left his batting average at just .197, Allen was temporarily benched in favor of Johnny Goryl, before recovering his stroke to finish the season with a .240 average. Years later, Allen blamed his poor performance that season on a change in stances, explaining, “I was a spray hitter that first season. The following spring they told me I couldn’t hit with my stance, so they changed me to become a pull hitter. I figured they knew more than I did, but maybe they didn’t.”4  Allen’s defense suffered too, as his fielding percentage dropped to .976. That year, he started only 110 games. (Ironically, in April 1964, Mele stated, “I want [Allen] to learn to become more of a punch hitter, something like Nellie Fox. He [Allen] hit well to left field two years ago. When Bernie tries to pull the ball, he has trouble.”5)

Things got even worse in 1964, although for a moment Allen seemed to regain his footing. For all intents and purposes, that season effectively marked the end of his tenure as a full-time player. It began in the spring, as Allen engaged with Goryl in a hard-fought battle to retain the second-base job. After working extremely hard at all facets of his game, Allen won the Opening Day start, yet began the season with just one hit in his first nine at-bats, before he exploded with four hits in his next seven, including a two-homer game on April 18 at Washington. By the next afternoon his average stood at .313, and it appeared that his 1963 season had been an aberration.

“We moved Bernie up closer to the plate so he would be more aggressive with the bat,” Mele remarked about coaching the left-handed hitter. “He had to swing hard or get jammed. It worked. He’s been swinging well ever since.”6 

Likewise, Allen’s defense returned to his rookie-year heights, as Twins owner Calvin Griffith attested. “Bernie’s looking sharp in the field,” Griffith said, “much like he did two years ago. He has made several good plays going far to his left. I think he’s improving his range.”7

As with his hitting, coaches offered Allen much advice on ways to improve his defense. “One coach,” he said, “had me standing on my toes with my arms hanging down low. I almost fall on my face when I try that. When I was a quarterback, I used to get a good start moving laterally. But I was bent over just enough to get my hands under center.

“That’s the way I like it in baseball – bend over just enough to put my hands on my knees. Then I get lower as I move left or right. When I start too low, I usually stand up and then move, which slows me down.”8

After his impressive start, Allen tailed off significantly; his batting average bottomed out at .149 on May 13. By June 13, however, Allen had raised it to .220, and his fielding had regained its efficiency. Then it all fell apart on the infield dirt in Washington. On the 13th the Twins led, 2-1, in the bottom of the fifth. Leading off for the Senators, Don Zimmer drew a walk, and left fielder Chuck Hinton came to the plate. As Allen recalled, “It was a hit-and-run play. Chuck Hinton hit the ball to Zoilo Versalles at short. The grass was tall, so the ball was slow in getting to him. Zoilo made a soft toss which I had to wait on. …9 The runner and ball got to me at the same time, Don Zimmer giving me a cross body check that tore up the ligaments in my left knee.”10

It was a devastating injury, the kind that in those days typically ended careers. After missing almost two months, Allen returned on August 4, played 10 games, then missed a week before returning on August 21. With  a batting average of just .214, he saw his season end prematurely on September 1. Allen wasn’t operated on until October, and then only because he sought medical advice on his own from the Minnesota Vikings’ orthopedic surgeon, who diagnosed tears in both medial collateral and anterior cruciate ligaments.

“By the time they operated,” Allen recalled, “the ligaments had shriveled up.”

Surgeons took part of the hamstring from Allen’s left leg and used it on his knee. “The doctor said I had a 50-50 chance of ever being able to play any type of sport again, and zero percent chance of ever playing baseball. … The average career at that time was four years. You had to play five years back then to get a pension. The rehab was very painful. I had to wear an iron boot everywhere I went, to build up the strength in my leg.”

Allen was disappointed in the team’s reaction to his injury. “What really upset me was that I didn’t receive a card or a call from anyone in the Twins front office. Then, to top it off, they wanted to cut my salary from $12,000 to $10,000 in 1965.”

Allen would never again be the same player he was as a rookie.

As luck would have it, the Twins went to the World Series in 1965. In the aftermath of his injury, Allen missed the chance to participate. Still rehabbing his knee, he was on the disabled list from the beginning of the season until June 4. He returned on June 22 and played 19 games, but was eventually sent to Denver in the Pacific Coast League.

“They had told me I would be called up before the rosters were expanded in September,” Allen said. “That way I would be eligible for the World Series. Right before I was to go back up,” though, “I dove for a ball and broke my thumb. That ended my year right then.”

Much to Allen’s disappointment, he failed to receive a World Series ring. “I got seven-eighths of a share [of the Series winnings], but I didn’t get a ring. That’s what I really wanted. Mudcat Grant, Jim Kaat, and others went to the front office on my behalf. I’ve never forgotten that slight. A few years later, Johnny Klippstein dropped his ring and the diamond broke. That must have been some fine diamond,” he said with sarcasm. As things turned out, Allen’s time in Minnesota was almost through.

Throughout Allen’s time with the Twins, likely motivated by his injury and undoubtedly with a thought to his post-playing career, he displayed an interest in business matters both in and outside the sport. In 1962 infielder Rich Rollins had joined the Twins, and Allen and Rollins forged a friendship; both were from Ohio, shared the same birthday (although born a year apart), were roommates on the road, and had adjoining lockers during home games. Following Allen’s injury, pitching coach Johnny Sain gave him a book called Think and Grow Rich, a treatise on positive thinking written by 83-year-old Dr. Napoleon Hill, who had been teaching his principles since 1908. Allen read the book during a two-week stint in the Army Reserve and asked Rollins to read the book. The two took Dr. Hill’s course and together opened a Napoleon Hill Academy franchise in Minneapolis. A year later, after Allen was traded, they sold the franchise, and then opened an agency in St. Paul, Minnesota, for the Wayne National Life Insurance Company (partly owned by Al Kaline). Although they were then playing for different teams, Rollins handled PR for the firm, while Allen did some selling.11 Theirs was a friendship that lasted beyond their playing days.

The year 1966 was Allen’s final season with the Twins. On December 3, after a season in which he split time at second base with César Tovar, Allen and pitcher Camilo Pascual were traded to the Washington Senators in exchange for reliever Ron Kline. Announcing the trade in its December 17, 1966, edition, The Sporting News reported that “Allen was a play-me-or-trade me malcontent” who had batted just .238, but was playing well until June, when he reinjured his knee. In contrast, Allen later contended, “I got traded for a very simple reason. I was the players’ rep on the Twins. Being a players’ rep in those days was a surefire way of getting yourself traded.”

Having endured a pay cut with Minnesota, to $10,500, Allen was anxious for a pay raise with his new team. “George Selkirk, who was a former Yankee player, was the Washington GM,” Allen remembered. “He and I had a tough time negotiating. We negotiated through the mail.” In the end, Selkirk increased Allen’s salary to $15,000. His teammates quickly voted in Allen as the Senators’ player rep.

Over the next five full seasons with mediocre to poor Senators teams, Allen evolved into the role of a part-time second baseman, splitting time with such players as Bob Saverine, Frank Coggins, and Tim Cullen; he also saw some action at third base. Still able to generate some occasional pop in his bat (in 1969 he produced the second highest home run and RBI totals of his career 9 and 45), Allen’s batting average with the Senators was .237. During his first year with the team, in which he batted a dismal .193, Allen was diagnosed with astigmatism in his right eye, particularly hampering to a left-handed hitter. As a result, Allen tried wearing glasses at the plate, but later remembered, “I could never adjust to wearing glasses, but I found it possible to wear a contact lens in my right eye. My left eye was fine, so I decided to wear only the necessary lens.”12 Ultimately, he added, “the eye didn’t hamper me as much as the knee injury, which still bothers me in cold weather.”13

By his final season in Washington, Allen was being used only sparingly by manager Ted Williams. Although the team had finished 10 games over .500 and in fourth place in the American League East during Williams’s first season, 1969, two years later they had fallen to 63-96 and fifth place. That year Allen started just 24 games at second base, and he later recalled Williams as “the most egotistical man I’ve ever met in my life.”14

“The first year he managed he wasn’t bad at all, but he lost communication with the players last season [in 1971].”15

One day in late July 1971, Williams asked Allen, “How are you?” and Allen responded, “I’d be better if I were playing more;” after that “he never said hello to me the rest of the year. I don’t know what I did to him, but he just refused to play me.”16

“When you have six hits in your last seven times at bat and can’t start against a right-handed pitcher the next day, I don’t know what I’m supposed to think of him.”17

By then Allen knew he was no longer in the Senators’ plans. After the 1971 season the team moved to Texas and became the Rangers, and on December 2, 1971, the Rangers traded Allen to the New York Yankees for two left-handed relievers, Gary Jones and Terry Ley.

Allen was cheered by the move, “chiefly because I had always admired Ralph Houk.”18 Acquired as a backup to second baseman Horace Clarke, Allen initially thought he might be a candidate to play third base, but when the Yankees acquired Rich McKinney, Allen understood what his role would be. 

“I never got a chance to talk to Ralph until spring training,” Allen said. “He told me exactly what job he had planned for me, then didn’t deviate. The whole Yankee organization has treated me better than any I’ve ever been with.”19

In all, Allen played 84 games for the Yankees in 1972, splitting time equally between second and third base. In May the Yankees traded their player rep, Jack Aker, to the Cubs, and as with his two previous teams, Allen was elected to replace him.

The next season was Allen’s last. In August the Yankees sold his contract to the Montreal Expos, for whom he played his final 16 games. In November the Expos asked waivers on Allen and gave him his unconditional release, at which point he chose to retire.

“I knew I was going to hang it up at the end of that year,” Allen recalled 25 years later, “even before I was traded. The Expos wanted me to come back, but I knew it was time to call it quits.”

In retirement, Allen became a successful businessman, yet also took an opportunity to keep his ties with the game. An old college classmate owned a sporting-goods store in West Palm Beach, Florida, so Allen relocated with his first wife, Sharon, and four children to become the store manager. Coincidentally, at the same time the Expos had a Class A team in town, the West Palm Beach Expos of the Florida State League. The owner of the store purchased the team when it came up for sale. Jim Fanning, the Expos’ GM, approached Allen and asked his opinion regarding a manager, and after assessing the candidates, Allen suggested Felipe Alou. During the team’s homestands, Allen coached first base and instructed the infielders.

Allen also kept tabs on old friends from his playing days, such as Roy Sievers, with whom Allen often played in golf tournaments, and who stood in as best man at Allen’s wedding to his second wife, also named Sharon.

In 1982 Allen became Midwest representative for the Ferro Corporation, a performance materials company based in the Cleveland suburbs. His territory covered western Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. Allen and his second wife (his first marriage ended in 1987) had two sons, four daughters, and seven grandchildren, and lived in Carmel, Indiana.

As of 2015, Allen still resided in Carmel.

Sources

The author attempted to interview Bernie Allen for this biography, but was unsuccessful.

Sincerest appreciation to SABR member Bill Mortell for his research contribution.

Bernie Allen player file from the National Baseball Hall of Fame,Cooperstown, New York

baseball-reference.com

NewspaperArchive.com

retrosheet.org

The Sporting News

sports-reference.com

Notes

1 Sports Collectors Digest, November 20, 1998. Unless otherwise noted, all of the Allen quotes in this biography are taken from this article.

2 The Sporting News, July 15, 1972. Note: Allen’s field goal came in the third quarter, and put Purdue ahead 17-14. After a subsequent touchdown that put Ohio State ahead, 21-17, Allen led Purdue on a drive that culminated in the game-winning touchdown, after which he kicked the extra point.

3 Ibid.

4 Ibid.

5 The Sporting News, April 18, 1964.

6 Ibid.

7 Ibid.

8 Ibid.

9 Sports Collectors Digest, November 20, 1998.

10 The Sporting News, July 15, 1972.

11 The Sporting News, February 4, 1967.

12 The Sporting News, July 15, 1972.

13 Ibid.

14 Unidentified clipping dated March 9, 1972, in Allen’s Hall of Fame file.

15 Ibid.

16 Ibid.

17 Ibid.

18 The Sporting News, July 15, 1972.

19 Ibid.

William Robert Allison was born on July 11, 1934, in Raytown, Missouri, located about 10 miles southeast of Kansas City. His parents, Robert “Lou” and Frances (Witte) Allison, were hard-working, industrious people who provided Bob and his two younger siblings, Jim and Frances (known as Frankie), a solid, middle-class life. Bob got his first lesson in baseball from his father, a construction worker and former semipro catcher. He began playing organized baseball by the time he was 11 years old and attending Chapel Elementary School. He was a big, rugged, and agile youth, and his favorite sport was football. At Raytown High School he was a standout in multiple sports, starring at quarterback and fullback on the gridiron, playing in the front court in basketball, and running track. He was “something of a legend around Raytown,” read one report.2 Although his school did not have a baseball team, Bob played in the highly competitive Ban Johnson League in the Kansas City metro area.

After graduating from high school in 1952, Allison enrolled on a football scholarship at the University of Kansas, about 50 miles from home in Lawrence. He was a fullback on the Jayhawks football team in 1952 and 1953, and played baseball in 1954 for legendary coach, Floyd Temple, in his first of 28 years guiding Kansas. At 6-feet-3 and weighing 200 pounds, the right-handed Allison might have had the prototypical build for a professional fullback, but he garnered more attention as a hard-hitting, rough-and-tumble infielder-outfielder for Milgram in the Ban Johnson League in the summers of 1952-1954. “At 18, he could out throw most big leaguers I saw,” said one of his former coaches.3 Scouts from the New York Yankees, Chicago White Sox, St. Louis Cardinals, Milwaukee Braves, New York Giants, Cleveland Indians, and Washington Senators were on his trail in Kansas City and Lawrence. “Tom Greenwade, who discovered Mickey Mantle, came to the university to see me,” said Allison. “He gave me all the sweet talk about the Yankees, and I must admit that I was surprised. [Senators scout] Ray Baker had told me that it was easier to make it in the Washington organization than with some of the richer clubs.”4 The decision to pursue a career in baseball became more immediate when Allison lost his athletic eligibility for the fall of 1954 due to poor grades. According to the Associated Press, the Senators signed Allison on Baker’s recommendation on January 24, 1955.5

With a bonus of $4,000 in hand, the 20-year-old Allison reported to the Class B Hagerstown (Maryland) Packets of the Piedmont League in 1955. He batted .256, but showed little power, slugging just .332. The Senators invited him to spring training in 1956 for a look-see. Although Washington sportswriter Shirley Povich praised him for his “big swing and determination,”6 Allison was over his head and was subsequently assigned to the Charlotte (North Carolina) Hornets in the Class A South Atlantic League, where his average dipped to .233.

In Charlotte Allison roomed with 20-year-old Harmon Killebrew, in his first year in the minors. Killebrew had signed with the Senators two years earlier for a reported $30,000 bonus; because of the bonus rule in effect at the time, he was required to spend his first two (agonizing) seasons on the big-league squad. The two prospects became lifelong friends and accompanied each other on their arduous journey to the big leagues. The following season, with the Double-A Chattanooga Lookouts, Killebrew developed into a slugging sensation, belting 29 home runs to lead the Southern Association, while Allison batted just .246 and hit only two home runs, though his 11 triples tied for the league lead. Despite his weak hitting, Allison had established a reputation as good center fielder with excellent range and a rifle arm.

Back with Chattanooga in 1958 after another trial with Washington in spring training, Allison blossomed, batting .307 and slugging .446, and earned a call-up to the Senators when the rosters expanded in September. On September 16 he made his major-league debut, playing center field and batting leadoff, and going 1-for-4 in a loss to the Cleveland Indians. Allison appeared overmatched at the plate (7-for-35), but according to The Sporting News “can handle centerfield.”7 Allison honed his skills in the Cuban Winter League, leading Almendares to the league championship and earning a berth on the all-star team while experiencing a front-row view of the Cuban Revolution.8

Allison’s rookie season with the Senators in 1959 defied all expectations. His size, speed, strength, and athleticism inspired awe. Team trainer George “Doc” Lentz, who had worked for the Senators for 31 years and also for the Washington Redskins, called the now 220-pound, muscular Allison “the strongest man I ever handled.”9 Club owner Calvin Griffith praised him as having “the best arm that has come to our outfield since Jackie Jensen.”10 Said coach Ellis Clary, “I know he’ll scare the daylights out of the opposition. Man, when he runs down the line from home plate I can hear the ground shake.”11 But despite this praise, many felt that Allison would not even make the team because of his poor hitting. Boston sportswriter Hy Hurwitz wrote that Allison “should be shipped out” during camp while Senators beat reporter Bob Addie noted that “none of the scribes covering the team in training camp thought much of Allison.”12 Shirley Povich cautioned, “[Allison’s] not a power hitter.”13 His manager, Cookie Lavagetto, was even more direct in his evaluation, “He was the worst you ever saw at the plate. He chopped at the ball like he had an axe in his hand.”14

Dubbed the “hardest worker in camp,” Allison recognized that his future in the big leagues rested on improved hitting.15 Roy Sievers, renowned for his graceful swing, proved to be most influential on the youngster. “He had me move closer to the plate so I could reach the pitches,” said Allison. “He also taught me not to lunge.”16 A classic line-drive hitter, Allison’s new approach helped him temper the tendency to pull the ball. He impressed Lavagetto with his work ethic, “He’s a curious kid. If he makes a mistake, he’ll talk about it. Bob studies pitchers,” said his skipper.17

Allison made an immediate impression on fans with his energetic style of play. He opened the 1959 season with a nine-game hitting streak, including his first home run. He began in right field, moved to left, and then took over center field in the 12th game of the season, making Albie Pearson, the 1958 Rookie of the Year, expendable. (He was traded on May 26.)

With only 28 home runs in four years in the minors, no one expected Allison to develop into a home-run threat. But he surprised everyone. On June 5 Allison collected a career-best five hits (in five at-bats) and walloped two home runs for the first of 16 times in his career, yet the Senators lost to the Detroit Tigers, 7-6. By the end of July, Allison had clouted 27 round-trippers, and was named to the AL All-Star team for the second of two games scheduled that season, although did not play. “He can run, he can throw, he swings a good bat,” wrote Bob Addie.18 Allison intimidated baserunners with his accurate arm, but also tested Lavagetto’s patience for occasionally showboating and overthrowing the cutoff man to show off his arm strength, thereby permitting runners to advance.

Despite slumping the final two months of the season, Allison finished with 30 home runs and batted .261; he also knocked in 85 runs despite hitting in the two-hole for just over half of his at-bats. More than a slugger, he led the AL in triples (9) and finished fifth in stolen bases (13). He topped off the season by winning the Rookie of the Year award. The Senators were accustomed to losing, and finished in last place in 1959, but they treated their fans to a home-run barrage. En route to a new team-record 163 home runs, Allison, Killebrew (42), and Jim Lemon (33) became just the seventh trio of teammates to blast 30 round-trippers in one season, and the first in the AL since the 1941 New York Yankees with Joe DiMaggio, Charlie Keller, and Tommy Henrich.

After another offseason playing winter ball in Cuba, Allison reported to spring training in 1960 with high expectations. Calvin Griffith, the perpetually cash-strapped owner of the club, pronounced him an untouchable and rebuffed offers to sell the young star. Moved to right field, Allison got off to a torrid start. In his first seven games he collected 17 hits in 30 at-bats and drove in 12 runs. He caught President Dwight Eisenhower’s pitch on what turned out to be the last home opener for the Senators in Washington. Batting primarily in the third spot, usually in front of Lemon, Allison hit .328, scored 35 runs and knocked in 33 through the first 50 games, and seemed destined for stardom. But just as the Senators were putting together a winning record for three consecutive months (June, July, and August) for the first time since 1952 to begin September with a winning record, Allison commenced a prolonged sophomore slump, batting just .205 in his last 95 games. More disconcerting to the Senators was Allison’s loss of power –  just 15 home runs for the season. One of those, however, was a dramatic two-run walk-off blast in the 10th inning to defeat the New York Yankees on July 5. While the Senators floundered in September to finish in fifth place, Griffith became willing to listen to trade offers for Allison.

It was not a surprise when the Senators moved to Minnesota in the offseason. Griffith, the adopted son of former owner Clark Griffith, had begun exploring relocation options soon after taking control of the team in 1955. Since breaking the one-million mark in 1946, the club had struggled mightily at the gate, finishing last in attendance every year since 1955. Griffith, whose primary source of income was the baseball club, also complained that the location of Griffith Stadium, in the historically black neighborhood of Shaw, kept fans from the games. In the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area, he hoped to reap the same kinds of financial rewards that the Boston Braves, Brooklyn Dodgers, and New York Giants did after relocating in the 1950s.

Ignoring trade rumors, Allison got off to another hot start in 1961 as the Minnesota Twins played their first six games on the road. In their season opener, he walloped the first home run in Twins history,  a deep line-drive blast to left field off Whitey Ford in the club’s convincing 6-0 victory over the New York Yankees. Three games later, he blasted two round-trippers and drove in a career-high seven runs in a Twins’ victory over the Baltimore Orioles. Two more games of two home runs followed in mid-May at Metropolitan Stadium, located in Bloomington, about 11 miles due south of downtown Minneapolis. Though the Twins finished in seventh place (70-90) in the year the AL expanded to 10 teams, the club finished third in attendance, proving that major-league baseball could succeed in the Upper Midwest where cool, indeed cold, temperatures in April, May, and September were the norm. Allison placed seventh in home runs (29) and RBIs (105) while drawing a career-high 103 free passes (fifth best in the AL).

Allison was an immediate favorite in Minnesota. As the first player to establish year-round, permanent residence in Minnesota, he helped Minnesotans forge a strong bond with their recently relocated team. He, his wife (his high-school sweetheart, Betty Shearer, whom he had married in 1956), and their three children, Mark, Kirk, and Kyle, were fixtures at the ballpark and in the community. Allison had matinee-idol good looks – tall, dark, and handsome with brownish black hair and hazel-green eyes – and played with an ethos that endeared him to fans and the media. He had all sorts of nicknames, from Paul Bunyan and Mr. America to Muscles, all which played on his Herculean physique. “He plays hard and he plays every second of every game,” commented The Sporting News.19 Called a “throw back to the old times,” Allison was “Old School” when it meant playing an all-out style like the 1920s or 1930s.20  He crashed into outfield fences going after balls and made daring, diving catches. Though not conventionally fast like Mickey Mantle or a great basestealer like Luis Aparicio, Allison was an excellent and fearless baserunner. His specialty was breaking up double plays, barreling over shortstops, many of whom he outweighed by 50 to 60 pounds.

In 1962 the Twins were the youngest team in the AL and had assembled a nucleus of players who helped transform the club to a pennant winner in 1965, and laid the foundations for the team’s success throughout the decade. Killebrew (age 26) and Allison (27) in the outfield, Zoilo Versalles (22) at shortstop, Rich Rollins (24) at third base, and catcher Earl Battey (27) were All-Star selections in the 1960s. The Twins farm system produced other future All-Stars who joined them: outfielders Jimmie Hall in 1963 and Tony Oliva in 1964, and second baseman Rod Carew in 1967.

Allison was hampered by several early-season injuries in 1962, including a pulled rib muscle and spiked fingers, and experienced a drop in his power numbers through early June. Nonetheless, the Twins briefly took over the top spot in the AL that month. “I’ve never seen the kind of spirit we’ve got on the club,” said Allison.21 Manager Sam Mele, who had replaced Cookie Lavagetto during the previous season, relied on the long ball; all eight position players swatted at least 11 home runs as the club set a new team record with 185. Allison regained his power in June and put together one of the most productive stretches in his career, hitting 27 round-trippers and knocking in 86 runs in 108 games from June 9 through the end of the season. On July 18 Allison and Killebrew became the first set of teammates in big-league history to wallop grand slams in the same inning when they accomplished the feat in the first frame of a 14-3 laugher against the Cleveland Indians at the Met. Minnesota finished with 91 victories, five behind the New York Yankees. In an era when high batting averages and low strikeout totals were the signs of good hitters, Allison – who struck out a lot and seldom hit for a high average – did not receive as much credit for his production as he probably should have. He finished third in runs (102) and seventh in RBIs (102), joining Norm Siebern of the Kansas City Athletics as the only AL players in triple digits in both departments; he also finished eighth in home runs (29) and fifth in slugging (.511).

Sluggers Killebrew and Allison were affectionately known as “Mr. Upstairs and Mr. Downstairs.” Whereas the “Killer” clouted legendary arcing homers, Allison ripped bullets that cleared the fences. The ever modest Allison claimed, “I’ve never been much of a long-ball hitter,” and added, “I swing down at the ball and I’m more of a line-drive hitter.”22

Using a wider batting stance and a heavier bat, Allison enjoyed arguably his best season in 1963 in an offensively depressed era. He was named Player of the Month by Fleer in April (five home runs and 18 RBIs in 19 games) while his teammates struggled and the club dropped into last place. “Allison is only doing what comes naturally when he plays Paul Bunyan so it is no surprise that he’s trying singlehandedly to carry the Twins,” wrote UPI after the slugger connected for three home runs for the first and only time in his career, against the Indians on May 17.23 On the strength of his league-leading 21 home runs, Allison was named a backup on the AL All-Star squad. (He struck out against Houston’s Hal Woodeshick in his only at-bat.) Despite being briefly sidelined in August when a pitch from Dean Chance of the Los Angeles Angels broke a bone in his right hand, Allison finished third in the AL in home runs (a career-best 35), fourth in RBIs (91), third in walks (90), and second in slugging (.533). He paced the circuit with 99 runs scored, marking the first time that the AL leader failed to reach 100 in a full season since Elmer Flick in 1906. The Twins proved to be a streaky team, winning 91 games, but finishing in a distant third place, 13 games behind the Yankees. They also established a new team record with 225 home runs – 113 of them from Allison, Killebrew (45), and Hall (33).

Twins beat reporter Arno Goethel once referred to Allison as the “unknown outfielder.”24 Soft-spoken off the field, yet articulate, Allison shunned the spotlight, played in the shadows of Killebrew and Oliva, and was rarely mentioned in discussions about the best outfielders in the early to mid-1960s. He played any position the team asked, moving from center field to right field, to first base in 1964, and then to left field in 1965 to accommodate younger players or improve the team. “I don’t care where I play,” he told sportswriter Dick Gordon. “I don’t think moving around affects my play and I like being able to play more than one position.”25 On the field Allison exhibited a completely different persona. Managers and teammates acknowledged him as the vocal team leader. Minneapolis sports reporter Max Nichols praised his “take charge instincts” and noted that he’s the “holler guy” on a team filled with “silent types.”26

The Twins fell to sixth place in 1964 with a 79-83 record despite a league-leading 221 home runs. Four of those home runs came consecutively against the Kansas City A’s when Oliva, Allison, Hall, and Killebrew connected in the 11th inning of a 7-3 victory. Allison was a jack-of-all-trades, starting 90 games at first base and 45 in the outfield (at all three positions). He was a starter in his third and final All-Star appearance (he went 0-for-3 with a walk). Allison’s season ended about a week early when he was hit by a pitch from Lew Krausse of the Kansas City A’s and broke a knuckle. With 32 home runs, 86 RBIs, and a career-best .287 average, Allison set career-best marks in slugging (.553) and on-base percentage (.404).

The 1965 Twins were an unusually deep team, with seven legitimate All-Star position players, and two more on the pitching staff. Three new coaches, Johnny Sain, Jim Lemon, and Billy Martin, helped forge them into a mentally tough and fundamentally sound team. In first place for the overwhelming majority of the season, the Twins overcame injuries to key players to pull away from the pack in August and September and cruise to their first pennant, seven games ahead of the Chicago White Sox, with a record of 102-60.

Allison started out the 1965 season in left field, his third different position in as many years. He put up typical numbers (.267, 12 HRs, 34 RBIs) until he was hit on the right wrist by a pitch from Boston’s Jerry Stephenson on July 6. Diagnosed with a fractured wrist, Allison missed 10 days. He struggled after his return (batting just .199, though he hit 11 homers and knocked in 44 runs in 68 games) and was often platooned with Sandy Valdespino, a speedy, left-handed-hitting rookie. About four weeks after Allison’s injury, Killebrew suffered what appeared to be a season-ending elbow injury in a collision at first base with Baltimore’s Russ Snyder on August 2.

The Twins’ pennant was a testimony to the team’s depth and team-oriented attitude. “We find a different way to win every day,” said Allison. “This team is a bunch of fighters.”27 With Allison bothered by a sore wrist and Killebrew out seven weeks, the Twins relied on a collective effort. “No player on this club has dominated the clutch hitting role,” wrote Max Nichols.28 Don Mincher belted 22 home runs and replaced Killebrew at first base, Oliva batted .321 to capture his second successive batting crown, and Versalles led the league in runs scored (126) and extra-base hits (76) and won the AL MVP award.

The Twins lost the 1965 World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers, whose other-worldly ace, Sandy Koufax, hurled shutouts in Game Five and Game Seven (on two days’ rest), but Allison’s remarkable catch in Game Two has endured as one of the most memorable in Series history. In the fifth inning of a scoreless game, with a man on first and no one out, Allison made a diving backhanded grab of Jim Lefebvre’s sinking line drive to left field. He caught the ball with his glove just off the ground in fair territory and skidded on the soggy field across the foul line. “It was the greatest catch I’ve ever seen,” said Killebrew.29 The Twins went on to win the game, 5-1, to take a two-games-to-none lead in the Series. Like his teammates, Allison struggled against Dodgers pitching. In five games (he did not start Games One or Four against Don Drysdale), Allison went 2-for-16. One of those hits was a two-run homer in Game Six off Claude Osteen. The last of his nine strikeouts accounted for the final out in Game Seven.

In 1966, Allison, now 31 years old, lost his position in left field to Valdespino and saw only limited action in an injury-plagued season. On July 23 he suffered his fourth hand/wrist injury in as many years when a pitch from Boston’s Jim Lonborg fractured his left wrist. “You can’t blame the pitchers for pitching me tight,” said a philosophical Allison. “That’s part of the game.”30

In light of a miserable campaign (8 homers and 19 RBIs) Allison endured an offseason filled with trade rumors, but the Twins had no viable options in left field. Two of his supposed replacements, Valdespino and Andy Kosco, had failed to lived up to their hype. Allison reclaimed his position as the everyday left fielder, though he was often replaced for defensive purposes late in games. With the Twins floundering in sixth place (25-25), Cal Ermer replaced Mele as skipper and ignited the team. They won 24 of their next 36 games, culminating in a doubleheader sweep of the California Angels on July 16 to pull to within a half-game of first place. In that twin bill, Allison went 3-for-5 with two home runs (one as a pinch-hitter) with five RBIs and three runs scored. Throughout August and September, Minnesota battled Boston, Chicago, and Detroit in one of the most exciting pennant races in league history. In first place entering the final weekend of the season and with just 1½ games separating four teams, the Twins were swept by Boston in a two-game series to finish in second place. Allison finished with a .258/24/75 line.

Collectively, the Twins struggled in 1968, the “Year of the Pitcher,” and fell to seventh place, their worst finish since their inaugural season in Minnesota. The players failed to respond to skipper Cal Ermer, whose authority players openly challenged, leading to some high-profile confrontations, such as one with Carew. Owner Calvin Griffith conceded that Ermer had lost control of the club. Allison, who had hurt his right knee the previous season, needed regular cortisone shots to play in the field. In his last season as an everyday starter, Allison was still an offensive threat, clouting 22 home runs (tied for eighth in the AL) and slugging .456 (sixth).

Although he was reduced to a role player in 1969, Allison looked forward to playing for Billy Martin, whose aggressive, daring style he appreciated. Martin considered Allison excellent coaching material (Allison turned down Martin’s offer to join his staff in Detroit in 1971).  In his autobiography (with Peter Golenbock), Number 1, Martin called Allison “my leader behind the leader on the bench.”31

En route to the AL West crown in the first year of realignment, Allison was involved in an ugly scene with Martin and pitcher Dave Boswell in August. At a local watering hole in Detroit, the Lindell Athletic Club, Boswell began arguing with pitching coach Art Fowler. Allison intervened as peacemaker and took Boswell outside to cool off. Boswell took out his frustration on Allison, knocking him out (with a sucker punch, according to some reports), whereupon Martin rushed outside. In the now infamous fight, Martin beat up his pitcher, who was subsequently hospitalized.32

Allison was placed on waivers during spring training in 1970, but there were no claims on the 35-year-old with creaky knees. Relegated to an occasional start and pinch-hitting duties, Allison saw sporadic action for manager Bill Rigney, who had replaced Martin and led the Twins to their second consecutive AL West crown. For the second year in a row, the club lost to the Baltimore Orioles in the ALCS and Allison went hitless in a combined 10 at-bats, both series sweeps. At the conclusion of the season, he announced his retirement. In his 13 years with the Senators-Twins, Allison hit 256 home runs, knocked in 756 runs, and batted .255.

On September 9, 1971, the Twins celebrated B.A.T. Day (Bob Allison Tribute Day), marking the first time a professional athlete had ever been feted with his own day in Minneapolis-St. Paul. The broad-shouldered, down-to-earth Allison was wildly popular as much for what he did off the field as for his accomplishments on the diamond. “[Allison] has been unmatched in the team’s history as a tireless good-will ambassador in Twinsland,” wrote Arno Goethel.33 Long associated with the Easter Seals, Allison worked tirelessly on behalf of sick children, visiting hospitals and raising money.

Allison was well positioned for his post-baseball career. Since his early days in Minnesota, he had worked in the offseason for Coca-Cola, and began working for the company full-time in 1971, moving into sales. His association with the soft-drink company gave rise to one of his funniest monikers, “Bubble-Up.” Allison maintained close ties to the Twins and former teammates, and participated in reunions and special events with the club. In 1989 he retired with his wife to a resort community north of Fountain Hills, in the desert of Arizona. An avid outdoorsman, Allison anticipated playing golf, hunting, hiking, and traveling.

Not long after retiring from Coca-Cola, Allison was tragically diagnosed with ataxia, a rare, incurable disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and gradually impairs coordination. As the disease progressed and his health began to fail, Allison and his family established the Bob Allison Ataxia Research Center at the University of Minnesota.

Bob Allison died at the age of 60 on April 9, 1995, from the effects of ataxia. He was buried in Rio Verde Memorial Gardens, in Rio Verde, Arizona. Said close friend Jim Kaat, “This guy had the ideal body. Very durable. He was a hard-nosed player, and played every day. He was always so fit. Everyone marveled at his condition.”34 “When I think of Bob Allison,” remarked former Twins owner Calvin Griffith upon learning of Allison’s death, “I think of brute strength.”35 

Sources                                                                                                                                 

Bob Allison player file at the National Baseball Hall of Fame, Cooperstown, New York.

Ancestry.com

BaseballLibrary.com

Baseball-Reference.com

Retrosheet.com

SABR.org

The Sporting News

Notes

1 Leonard Shechter, “A Hitter Has to Have a Killing Desire,” in Sport, September 1964, quoted from Bill James, The New Bill James Historical Abstract (New York: Free Press, 2001), 825.

2 The Sporting News, September 23, 1959, 3.

3 Ibid.

4 Ibid.

5 Associated Press, “A Boy Here to the Senators,” Kansas City Times, January 25, 1955, 16.

6 The Sporting News, March 14, 1956, 4.

7 The Sporting News, October 8, 1958, 26.

8 The Sporting News, January 28, 1959, 8.

9 The Sporting News, September 23, 1959, 3.

10 The Sporting News, April 1, 1959, 18.

11 The Sporting News, November 25, 1959, 3.

12 The Sporting News, February 3, 1960, 6; The Sporting News, September 23, 1959, 3.

13 The Sporting News, April 1, 1959, 18.

14 Whitney Shoemaker (Associated Press), “Bob Allison Crowds Ted’s Frosh Record,” Gastonia (North Carolina) Gazette, August 5, 1959, 24.

15 The Sporting News, April 8, 1959, 32.

16 The Sporting News, November 25, 1959, 3.

17 The Sporting News, September 23, 1959, 3.

18 Ibid.

19 The Sporting News, June 29, 1960, 21.

20 Ibid.

21 The Sporting News, June 16, 1962, 16.

22 The Sporting News, August 29, 1964, 3.

23 United Press International, “Bob Allison’s Three Homers Spark Twins,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 18, 1963, 6.

24 The Sporting News, January 22, 1965, 8.

25 The Sporting News, January 16, 1965, 20.

26 The Sporting News, July 11, 1964, 11.

27 The Sporting News, August 21, 1965, 13.

28 Ibid.

29 The Sporting News, October 23, 1965, 6.

30 The Sporting News, January 21, 1967, 25.

31 Billy Martin with Peter Golenbock, Number 1. Billy Martin (New York: Dell, 1981), quoted in Bill James, 826.

32 Myron Cope, “A Little Love, A Few Lunches, Make a Team,” Life, September 19, 1969, 79-82.

33 Arno Goethel, “The Citizen Who Never Whiffs,” St. Paul (Minnesota) Pioneer Press, August 2, 1970.

34 Bob Cohn, “Rare Illness dims life for ex-Twins slugger,” Arizona Republic (Phoenix), October 27, 1991. articles.chicagotribune.com/1991-10-27/sports/9104070130_1_earl-battey-mudcat-grant-watches.

35  Phil Pepe, “Star-Crossed Twin,” New York Daily News, October, 14, 1990, C46.

Battey was born in Los Angeles on January 5, 1935, to Earl and Esther Battey. In his own words, “I was the oldest of three brothers and seven sisters. My father was a construction foreman in Whittier, just outside metropolitan Los Angeles. He pitched for the Seventh-Day Adventist Church, and my mother, believe it or not, caught for the Nine-O ladies team that played at church outings.”1 Battey attended Jordan High School in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles. There he was scouted by the White Sox. According to Bob Vanderberg, Chicago Tribune assistant sports editor, “Billy Pierce told me the story that when the Sox were in California training, Paul Richards after practice asked Billy to go with him to see a high-school game. When Billy asked why, Richards told him about a great young catcher [Battey] who supposedly was the best in the country.”2 White Sox scout Hollis Thurston signed Battey to a $3,999 contract. His mother was ill and his family needed the money. At that time, a player signing for a bonus of $4,000 or more had to be kept on the major-league roster for at least two years.

After high school the White Sox sent Battey to play for Colorado Springs in the Western League in 1953, and then to Waterloo in the Three-I League in 1954, where he hit .292, played in 129 of Waterloo’s 135 games and was the league’s rookie of the year. He spent most of 1955 in Triple-A, with Charleston, West Virginia, of the American Association. In a 1964 book that Jackie Robinson put together concerning integration in baseball, Battey said he encountered segregation for the first time playing in the minors. His Los Angeles neighborhood had a mix of races and no segregation. In the minors there was no problem at the ballpark, but he was forced to eat and sleep apart from his white teammates in some of the road cities, including Wichita and Louisville, as well as at home during the year he played for Charleston.3 He was a late-season callup to the White Sox when the roster expanded and made his first appearance in September of 1955. He also played in Chicago briefly at the beginning and end of 1956, but spent most of that year with Toronto of the International League, where he hit .178 in 101 at-bats. Of that season, Battey explained: “I was knocked out in a play at home plate. I suffered a knee injury that kept bothering me when I finally got back in the lineup.”4

Healthier, Battey hit .331 in winter ball in Venezuela and impressed new manager and former catcher Al Lopez during spring training with the White Sox in 1957. When the major-league roster was cut to 28 on Opening Day and then 25 a month into the season, Battey stayed with the team. He continued to impress defensively as a fill-in when regular catcher Sherman Lollar needed a rest. On June 4 the White Sox were in first place with a five-game lead, and Battey was one of a number of bright spots. Manager Lopez said, “I’ve tried to rest Sherman Lollar as often as possible. Having a good young catcher like Earl Battey gives us the chance to rest Sherman, of course. The development of Battey has been one of my pleasant surprises.”5 Battey’s hitting didn’t hold up, however. Later in June Lollar broke his wrist in a game against the Orioles and Battey and Les Moss shared the catching duties as Lollar missed 41 games. Lopez said: “Neither can measure up to Lollar. Lollar would have won one more game against the Yankees. Battey was up with the bases loaded and he struck out. We went on to lose, 6-5.”6 Battey hit only .174 in 48 games with the White Sox that year and in August he was optioned to the Los Angeles Angels of the Pacific Coast League. His hitting improved at that level and in winter ball in Venezuela he again hit over .300. He hit well in spring training of 1958 (“I now have the confidence that I can hit major-league pitching.”7) and made the major-league roster again. He showed more power (eight home runs in 68 games) and spent the whole season in the majors for the first time, but still hit only .226.

The 1959 season was catcher John Romano’s first full season with the White Sox, and his presence limited Battey’s playing time. In a preseason article, the Chicago Tribune speculated about moving Lollar to first if Battey or Romano began to hit with power.8 Romano did, and caught 38 games while hitting .294. Battey appeared in only 26 games, catching in 20, as he hit .219. Lollar won his third consecutive Gold Glove as the No. 1 backstop. Battey made the White Sox World Series roster in 1959, but saw no action as Lopez relied on the veteran Lollar to start all six games. (John Romano didn’t do much better; he got one at-bat in the Series.)

The 1959 team had been built on pitching, speed, and defense. Before the 1960 season began, the White Sox traded some of their young players in order to get some established power. The management wanted 1957 American League home-run champion Roy Sievers from the Washington Senators. The Senators asked for Battey and infielder Sammy Esposito, but Lopez opposed that trade, saying he was “reluctant to give up ‘two players who figure to be regulars for the Senators.’”9 In early April 1960, however, the White Sox offered Battey, minor-league first baseman Don Mincher, and cash for Sievers, and the Senators accepted.

Lopez was right; Battey became a regular for the Senators in 1960. No longer in the shadow of Sherm Lollar, he blossomed into an American League star. He led the league in games caught by a catcher (136), putouts, and assists, but also in errors and passed balls, and he won the first of three consecutive Gold Gloves. Washington won more than 70 games for the first time since 1953 and Battey was voted the team MVP. The right-handed batter drove in 60 runs and hit .270. He finished eighth in AL MVP voting.

The Senators moved to Minnesota and were renamed the Twins for the 1961 campaign. Battey hit over .300 for the only time in his career (.302) and hit 17 homers as he caught in 131 games. He asked for a $1,300 raise from the Twins’ owner, Calvin Griffith, but Griffith was noted for being tight with a dollar. “I was quite elated with my season,” Battey recalled. “I had never hit over .300 in the majors. But he said, ‘We finished in seventh even with you hitting .302,’ and he didn’t see any reason for a raise.”10

Metropolitan Stadium was an exciting place for the Twins in the next couple of years. Both the Twins and the Los Angeles Angels challenged the Yankees in 1962 before falling back. The Twins finished second by five games. Battey made the All-Star team for the first time, getting 150 votes from the players and coaches to Romano’s 84. Both the AP and UPI postseason polls voted him the best catcher in baseball. He had 17 home runs at the All-Star break the next year and was again voted the starter for the American League, outpolling eventual league MVP Elston Howard, 196 to 70, in the vote among players and coaches. Despite 26 homers, he was fourth in homers for the power-laden Twins. Harmon Killebrew had 45, Bob Allison, 35, and rookie Jimmie Hall, 33. Killebrew finished fourth in league MVP voting and Battey was seventh. The Twins led the league in homers (225), runs (767), and batting average (.255), but were eighth in defense. They won 91 games, but finished third behind the Yankees and White Sox.

The Twins dropped below .500 in 1964 for the first time since 1961. Battey was injured several times, but still caught 125 games. His most spectacular injury occurred when he was knocked out hitting his head against a chair after making a diving catch over a railing on May 10.11 He had reported to spring training at 260 pounds, a fact that caused the Twins to make $1,000 of his salary dependent on reporting at no more than 230 pounds the following spring. He also reinjured his right knee and was batting .220 at the end of June, but rallied to finish with .272. He did not make the All-Star team in 1964.

In 1965 the Twins, behind great pitching from starters Jim Grant, Jim Kaat, and Jim Perry, excellent relief work from veteran Al Worthington, and an excellent offense led by batting champion Tony Oliva, won 102 games and took the American League pennant by seven games over the White Sox. Always known for his great arm, Battey threw out 26 of the 54 runners who attempted to steal with him behind the plate that year, according to Retrosheet data. Earl hit .297 and was selected to start the All-Star Game. Though he struck out only 23 times all season, he fanned five times in the World Series against the Dodgers, including twice against Koufax, with two runners on in the first inning and with one runner on in the ninth inning of Sandy’s three-hit shutout in Game Seven. A factor in Battey’s .120 hitting performance in the Series was an injury he sustained in the seventh inning of Game Three. He hit his throat against a dugout railing in Dodger Stadium while chasing a foul pop hit by Willie Davis. He left the game, but returned to start every game in the Series. Nonetheless, the Dodgers stole nine bases in winning the three games played in Los Angeles after losing the first two in Minneapolis.

The Twins kept essentially the same lineup in the following year, 1966, and won 89 games, but couldn’t keep pace with the Baltimore Orioles and finished in second place, nine games out. Battey’s batting average dropped to .255, but he made the All-Star team as a reserve after Bill Freehan outpointed him among votes from the players and coaches, 111 to 95. Over the first six years of the Twins’ residence in Minneapolis, Battey had, despite frequent injuries, played in 805 of the Twins’ 972 games.

The 1967 season was Battey’s last as a player. It was the year of the exciting four-team race for the pennant among the Twins, White Sox, Tigers, and Red Sox, but Earl was frequently injured and lost his starting job to Jerry Zimmerman. On May 18, after Jim Kaat was knocked out of the box for his eighth consecutive start, manager Sam Mele sent Kaat to the bullpen temporarily and benched Battey. Zimmerman injured his finger on July 17 and Battey played for a while, but then he was placed on the 21-day disabled list on August 9 after a foul ball dislocated his thumb. He ended up playing in only 48 games that year, catching in 41, and hitting .165. The Twins finished in a tie for second place, one game out. He announced his retirement on November 3 after a season “plagued by injuries.”12

In April of 1968, Battey “accepted a job as baseball consultant to Consolidated Edison … to help run the [NYC] power company’s part of a baseball-community relations program.”13 It was known as the Con-Ed Answer Man program. Con-Ed would buy Yankees tickets and give them free to inner-city kids. The youngsters attended the game with Battey, “combination chaperone and the Con-Ed Answer Man (He answered their baseball questions).”14

In 1980 Battey enrolled at Bethune-Cookman University in Daytona Beach, Florida. He finished his undergraduate studies in 2½ years. After graduating he taught high school and coached baseball in Ocala, Florida.

Battey was named the catcher on the Twins’ 40th-anniversary all-time team in 2000, and attended a reunion ceremony. He died of cancer on November 15, 2003. He and his wife, Sonia, had five children (Earl, Corey, Darren, Brenda, and Barbara) and, at the time of his death, four grandchildren.

Since his death a number of Twins teammates have recognized Battey’s contribution during the 1960s. “Earl was a great storyteller, and he could tell them both in Spanish and English,” second baseman Frank Quilici said. “He had the biggest personality on the team. That was as close a group of players as I’ve been around, and Earl was probably the main reason.” Harmon Killebrew said, “Earl had two very important things going for him. He was a fun guy in the clubhouse. More importantly, he had everyone’s respect, because he had sore knees, sore hands, sore everything, but he stayed in the lineup. I didn’t realize how good of a catcher Earl was until he was gone.”15 Sam Mele, his manager from midway through 1961 to midway through 1967, said, “He was one of the best catchers I had in my life. He ran the pitching staff, I don’t mind telling you: He was the leader of my ballclub.”16

Earl Battey had a great career with the Twins, and one can only wonder if the White Sox would have been better off keeping him. As one White Sox blogger has noted, the Sox came close in 1964, and if they had kept one or two their young nucleus of future All-Stars — Battey, Johnny Callison, Norm Cash, Barry Latman, or John Romano — they might have won a pennant in the 1960s.17 In an interview with the Chicago Tribune in 1968, farm director Glen Miller shook his head, “as if to say ‘never again,’ when he [thought] of John Callison, Earl Battey, and Norm Cash, all of whom were Sox property.”18

An updated version of this biography appeared in “A Pennant for the Twin Cities: The 1965 Minnesota Twins” (SABR, 2015), edited by Gregory H. Wolf. An earlier version appeared in SABR’s “Go-Go To Glory: The 1959 Chicago White Sox” (ACTA, 2009), edited by Don Zminda.

Notes

1 Jack R. Robinson and Charles Dexter, Baseball Has Done It (New York: J.P. Lippincott Company, 1964), 183.

2 Mark Liptak, “Remembering Earl Battey,” Whitesoxintereactive.com aka FlyingSock.com, 2004.

3 Robinson and Dexter, 184.

4 “Battey to Stay with Sox,” Chicago Defender, April 27, 1957

5 David Condon, “In the Wake of the News,” Chicago Tribune, June 4, 1957.

6 Edward Prell, Chicago Tribune, August 2, 1957.

7 Russ J. Cowens, “Lopez Lauds Battey,” Chicago Defender, March 18, 1958.

8 Edward Prell, Chicago Tribune, January 20, 1959.

9 Edward Prell, “Lopez Opposes Sox Deal for Sievers,” Chicago Tribune, March 30, 1960.

10 Jon Roe, LaVelle E. Neal III, and John Millea, “Memories of Calvin,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, October 21, 1999.

11 A Smashing Catch,” UPI Telephoto, Chicago Tribune, May 11, 1964.

12 Chicago Tribune, November 4, 1967.

13 Chicago Tribune, April 23, 1968.

14 Blog posted by “Tim” on March 21, 2007, in response to “Absence of African-Americans in Baseball: Crisis or Fact of Life?”, “Extra Bases” section of 108 magazine, 108mag.typepad.com/extra_bases/2007/03/absence_of_afri.html.

15 Patrick Reusse, “ ’65 in 05: A Twins Reunion,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, August 19, 2005.

16 Jim Souhan, “Twins Notes: Battey joins team Hall,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, June 6, 2004.

17 Mark Liptak, “Remembering Earl Battey.”

18 Richard Dozer, “Meetings May Determine ‘Untouchables’,” Chicago Tribune, September 19, 1968.

David Wilson Boswell was born on January 20, 1945, in Baltimore to Grover W. “Buck” and Marceline Boswell. Raised in a tight-knit, working-class community on the east side of the city, Dave began playing baseball by the age of 8 or 9, and was taught by his father, a pit crane operator at a local steel mill and a former amateur heavyweight boxer. Baltimore was a hotbed for amateur baseball, and Boswell learned from some of the city’s renowned coaches. At the age of 14, he pitched and played outfield for coach Sterling “Sheriff” Fowble, whose team, Gordon’s Stores, counted Al Kaline as an alumnus.2 Boswell amassed an impressive 28-2 record at Calvert Hall College High School, in nearby Towson; however, he gained he gained national exposure hurling for a sandlot team, Leone’s, coached by Baltimore Orioles scout Walter Youse, who fed players to big-league clubs.3 

Boswell’s exploits on the mound and the plate drew scouts from all 20 major-league teams. A child prodigy, Boswell tossed batting practice for the Orioles at 14, had a tryout with the Pittsburgh Pirates at 15, and learned to throw a forkball from Pirates reliever Elroy Face. Said then Orioles president Lee MacPhail, “We ranked [Boswell] and Wally Bunker as the best pitching prospects in the country.”4 By Boswell’s senior year, rumors swirled that he might be the next $100,000 bonus baby, but the prep phenom suffered an arm injury that scared away scouts. Though he had an opportunity to sign as an outfielder, Boswell returned to Leone’s after graduating in 1963 to prove that his arm was healthy. In late summer, the 18-year-old signed with the Minnesota Twins on the recommendation of scout Ed Dunn for a reported $15,000 to 20,000 bonus.5 In 2014 Boswell was named to the 1960-2009 All-Baltimore Amateur Team.6

Boswell’s meteoric rise to the big leagues began in the Florida Instructional League, where he struck out 37 batters in 21 innings in the fall of 1963, thereby earning an invitation to the Twins’ spring-training camp in Orlando the following spring. Hailed as one of Minnesota’s “hottest prospects,” but not expected to make the team, the 19-year-old was a late cut and assigned to the Bismarck-Mandan (North Dakota) Pards in the Class A Northern League.7 He got off to a rough start (1-6), but turned his first year in professional ball around and was named to the league’s midseason all-star team. After posting a 7-11 record and 3.88 ERA in 160 innings for the league’s worst team, Boswell was promoted in August to the Charlotte Hornets of the Double-A Southern League. His four wins in six starts and a stellar 2.85 ERA earned him a mid-September call-up to the big-league club.

On September 18, 1964, just about 15 months after graduating from high school, Boswell made his big-league debut by starting against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park. “My first pitch  . . . was to Felix Mantilla,” recalled Boswell with a chuckle in an interview with John Swol, “and it was a home run, the next batter was a rookie named Tony Conigliaro and on the first pitch he hit a double off the wall that would have been a home run in most parks.”8 Despite surrendering four hits, five walks, and three runs in three innings, Boswell escaped with a no-decision. Five days later he limited the Kansas City Athletics to five hits over eight innings and whiffed nine to pick up his first victory, 2-1. His 2-0 record and 25 strikeouts in 23⅓ innings in four starts with the Twins suggested a promising future. Boswell was back in the Florida Instructional League in the fall, but a broken ring finger on his pitching hand (the first of what seemed to be annual injuries he suffered while in the Twins organization) cut his season short.9

With higher personal and organizational expectations in 1965, Boswell joined a deep Twins staff, led by Mudcat Grant and Jim Kaat and mentored by Johnny Sain, in his first year as manager Sam Mele’s pitching coach. Slatted for middle relief to start the season, Boswell tossed 9⅓ scoreless innings over his first three appearances to earn a start. He was pummeled (four runs in two innings) and picked up first big-league loss, but was undeterred. “Sain really gives you confidence,” Boswell once said.10 Equipped with an arsenal of fastballs, sliders, curves, and slow curves (the latter two he learned from Sain), Boswell flashed moments of brilliance in his final four appearances in May (including three starts) by yielding just one earned run and 11 hits in 26⅓ innings (0.34 ERA) while punching out 24 batters. Despite his success, Boswell was criticized for not going deep in games; however, he suffered from blisters on the middle finger of his right hand throughout his career. Boswell claimed that the painful blisters, which developed around the fourth inning, were caused from gripping the ball too tightly, and often required him to take extra days of rest between starts.11 Following two commanding victories (10 strikeouts against the Boston Red Sox and his first big-league complete game, a six-hitter against the New York Yankees on July 9), Boswell seemed to reach his stride. Sandy Padwe of the Newspaper Enterprise Association praised him as “one of the Twins’ biggest surprises,” but the promising righty was diagnosed with mononucleosis before his next start.12 

Expected to be out about four weeks, Boswell suffered a bruised shoulder in a car wreck and missed almost 40 days. Not the same pitcher when he returned on August 17, Boswell did not win another game, and finished with a 6-5 record with a 3.40 ERA in 106 innings for the pennant-winning Twins. In Minnesota’s disappointing seven-game loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series, Boswell saw action only once. In Game Five, he relieved Kaat in the third inning and tossed 2⅔ innings, yielding three hits and a run in the Twins’ 7-0 loss to Sandy Koufax.

Splitting his time between starts and relief outings to start the 1966 season, Boswell was only 0-4 on June 1 despite a sturdy 3.07 ERA. He then commenced the best stretch in his big-league career, winning 12 of 13 decisions. Over those 15 starts, Bos, as his teammates called him, completed seven games, struck out 112 batters in 111⅔ innings, including 10 or more four times. On July 30 at Metropolitan Stadium he tossed the best game of his career, a one-hitter, and whiffed 11 Baltimore Orioles to record the first of his six career shutouts.

Among the hottest pitchers in the majors, Boswell was paid arguably the highest compliment to a power pitcher when the Associated Press tabbed him the “Koufax of the AL” after his nifty four-hit complete-game victory with 10 strikeouts over the Boston Red Sox on August 3.13 Notwithstanding his success, Boswell was suffering from an aching shoulder, the result of getting hit by a line drive on July 26, and had difficulty throwing his heater. “He can get by on his breaking stuff  when he hasn’t got his good fastball,” said Sain.14 He was diagnosed with bursitis after his winning his eighth consecutive decision on August 7 to tie a Twins team record. Bothered by pain the rest of the season, Boswell started just one more time among his four appearances. He finished with an impressive 12-5 record to lead the AL with a .706 winning percentage, and posted a 3.14 ERA in 169⅓ innings.

Boswell was a fun-loving teammate, often described in various press reports as “colorful,” “a free spirit,” or even a “flake.” In response, Boswell once said, “I’m not goofy, I am loose.”15 He had a good sense of humor, and loved to joke with his teammates and go out for beers. He was also known for his malapropisms and impressions, especially of animals. “It was the most fun I’ve ever had in baseball,” said Quilici about the years together as roommates. “That character was a lot of fun on and off the field.”16 Boswell was known to have pet baby alligators at one time, carried a revolver during spring training, and shot snakes from his room. “You gotta have a little bit of boy in you to play this game for a living,” he said.17

But the 6-foot-3, 185-pound pitcher was also fiercely competitive, had a low boiling point, often argued strikes and balls with umpires, and chewed out teammates for fielding errors. His temper led to several highly publicized off-the-field fights with alcohol lurking in the background. Though teammates praised Boswell’s winning, gung-ho spirit, syndicated sportswriter Joe Falls offered a different view in the aftermath of the pitcher’s fight with Billy Martin. Falls tabbed him one of the “Awful All-Stars” and a player he would not want on his team.18

During spring training in 1967, Boswell abandoned his three-quarters motion in favor of an overhand delivery in order to overcome nagging pain. The result was disastrous. He yielded 16 runs (14 earned) and walked 16 in just 12⅔ innings in his first four starts and was relegated to the bullpen. He worked closely with new pitching coach, Early Wynn, to refine his mechanics. “Wynn has a theory that if you throw until you are tired enough, you will revert to your natural form,” said Boswell.19

He returned to the starting rotation on May 21 and tossed a complete game and fanned 11 to defeat the California Angels for his first victory of the season. This commenced a dominant stretch during which he won eight of 12 decisions, struck out 104 batters in 98 innings, and posted a stellar 2.66 ERA. Boswell’s surge coincided with the Twins’ struggles which culminated in Mele’s dismissal after 50 games with the team in sixth place at 25-25. While the team squabbled and endured a fight between outfielders Tony Oliva and Ted Uhlaender (which Twins beat reporter Arno Goethel and the AP claimed Boswell provoked by refusing to put away a gun he was playing with),20 the squad caught fire under mild-mannered manager Cal Ermer and battled the Boston Red Sox, Detroit Tigers, and Chicago White Sox in a tense four-team pennant race.

As if following a well-rehearsed script, Boswell developed tendinitis in his elbow in mid-July and was bothered by pain the rest of the season.21 He had his moments of brilliance (such as his three-hit shutout of the New York Yankees on August 19 and a six-hit shutout against the Tigers on September 2 to put the Twins into first place), but struggled with his fastball.

With a one-game lead over the Red Sox and the Tigers and just two games to play, the Twins lost both games in Fenway Park in Boston’s “Impossible Dream” season to finish in second place. After the team’s collapse (they lost five of their last seven games, five of which were started by Jim Kaat and Dean Chance), Boswell voiced his displeasure with Ermer for skipping his last scheduled start. “I feel like our club’s talent is being surpassed because of personal differences between the players and manager,” said Boswell ominously.22 He finished with a 14-12 record, struck out a career-high 204 (in 222⅔ innings), posted a 3.27 ERA, and was the second most difficult pitcher to hit (6.5 hits per nine innings) in the AL for the second consecutive season.

In 1968 the Twins were decimated by injuries (most notably to Harmon Killebrew, who tore his hamstring in the All-Star Game, as well as to Rod Carew and Oliva) and experienced their first losing season since relocating from Washington. Echoing Boswell’s insights from the offseason, Arno Goethel reported that Ermer had lost the respect of the team by his failure to discipline players and halt the incessant in-fighting.23 Boswell got off to a good albeit inconsistent start to the season. On May 29 he tossed a three-hit shutout with 10 strikeouts to defeat the Cleveland Indians, 1-0. Always adept at the plate, Boswell knocked in the game’s only run on a sacrifice fly.

Throughout his career, Boswell fashioned himself as a hitter, and raised the eyebrows (and sometimes the ire) of teammates by claiming he could hit .260 if he played in the field. For his career, he batted .202 (74-for 367) with four home runs and 22 runs batted in.

In 1968 Boswell hit at a .233 clip, three points above the AL cumulative average in the “Year of the Pitcher.” But for the fourth consecutive season, he suffered an injury that hampered his effectiveness the rest of the season. On July 18 against the Red Sox, Boswell collided violently with catcher Russ Nixon while tagging him out at home plate. “It feels like I broke my back,” said Boswell after the game.24 To his credit, Boswell, who suffered strained ligaments in his sacroiliac area, returned to the mound and retired Mike Andrews to record the complete game and even his record at 8-8. After a stint on the disabled list, he returned three weeks later but notched only two victories (both complete games) and finished with his first losing season in the majors, 10-13, while posting a 3.32 ERA in 190 innings.

Boswell looked forward to the chance to play for manager Billy Martin, who, after four years as a Twins coach, took the reins of the team in 1969 and promised to build an aggressive, fundamentally sound ballclub. The 24-year-old pitcher got a scare in spring training when he sliced two tendons on his left hand while cleaning a fish, but was ready for the beginning of the first season of realignment. In seemingly the best health of his career, Boswell logged a career-high 12 innings in a no-decision against the Chicago White Sox on July 14, and sported an 11-9 record at the All-Star break, helping the Twins to a four-game lead in the AL West.

On August 6 Boswell was involved an infamous brawl that overshadowed much of his success in 1969 and unfortunately has served as his most enduring legacy. The event was hushed up for four days until Billy Martin held a press conference to explain why his pitcher was not with the team on its road trip. Though many versions of the story exist, the final results were clear. According to Minneapolis Star reporter Mike Lamey, Boswell confronted coach Art Fowler at a Detroit watering hole, the Lindell Athletic Club, after Fowler threatened to inform Martin that the short-fused pitcher had refused to run wind sprints earlier in the day.25 After a heated argument ensued, teammate Bob Allison pulled Boswell outside to calm him down. The course of the subsequent events is still murky and disputed. Boswell flattened Allison (by one account even kicked him when he was on the ground), after which Martin supposedly came rushing out of the bar. The alcohol-infused brouhaha ended with Boswell lying unconscious on the ground. Boswell denied claims that he attacked his manager. “He really mauled me,” said Boswell of Martin. “He isn’t telling the truth if he said I went after him.”26 Martin assessed the situation unapologetically, “I started to hit him in the stomach. I worked up and hit him in the mouth, nose, and eyes. He bounced off the wall and I hit him again and he was out cold before he hit the ground.”27  Boswell was hospitalized and reportedly required 20 stitches in his face. Said Quilici about his roommate, “He was beaten to a pulp.”28

The fracas cast doubts on Boswell’s future with the team. The battered pitcher ultimately met with team owner Calvin Griffith, who fined him an undisclosed amount, but did not suspend him. “In no way will this hurt the team,” said Martin about the fight.29

Boswell returned to the mound on August 18 and in the words of Dick Couch of the AP enjoyed a “remarkable late season surge.”30 In his final 11 starts (from August 22 to October 1), Boswell went 8-3 with a 2.81 ERA. The stretch was highlighted by an overpowering, career-high 14-strikeout performance in a complete-game victory over the Seattle Pilots on September 19. After notching his 20th and final victory of the season, against the Pilots on September 28, the contrite Boswell commented, “Give the credit to Billy.”31  Despite missing almost three weeks recovering from his brawl, Boswell set career high in wins, starts (38), and innings (256⅓). He finished with a robust 3.23 ERA despite not registering a shutout among his 10 complete games for the division winners.

Boswell’s career came crashing down in Game Two of the ALCS versus the Baltimore Orioles on October 2 in Memorial Stadium. Through 10 innings, Boswell and Orioles southpaw Dave McNally were locked in a scoreless duel. Lacking his best stuff, Boswell escaped a bases-loaded jam in the second inning with no outs. When he struck out Frank Robinson to end the 10th, he felt an excruciating pain in his arm. “I threw him a slider and it was a rocket,” he told John Swol. “He didn’t even swing at it. By the time I got back to the first-base line going back to the dugout, my arm felt like it was going in to my jaw. Then I went out and still tried to pitch.”32 Boswell issued walks to two of the first four hitters he faced in the 11th before yielding to reliever Ron Perranoski with two men on. The next batter, pinch-hitter Curt Motton, lined a walk-off single to right field for a dramatic, 1-0 victory and collared Boswell with loss. The Twins were swept in the best-of-five series.

Boswell endured trade rumors during the offseason, but was back with the club in spring training, unlike Martin, who was replaced by Bill Rigney. In an attempt to overcompensate for his ailing arm, Boswell developed back problems in camp. Lacking his fastball and unable to extend in his follow-through, Boswell was ineffective. He lost his first five starts and was finally put on the disabled list in early August with a 3-7 record and an unsightly 6.42 ERA in 68⅔ innings. During the Twins’ celebration after clinching their second consecutive AL West crown, Boswell was involved in another fight with a teammate, catcher Paul Ratliff, at the team hotel, and required medical attention.33

A shell of his former self, Boswell spent 1971, his final full season in baseball, on an odyssey. After the Twins released him in spring training, he signed with the Detroit Tigers, and was reunited with manager Billy Martin. Their reunion lasted less than two months (and just 4⅓ ineffective innings). Released again, Boswell finished the season with his hometown Orioles, including a demotion to their Triple-A farm club, the Rochester Red Wings.

Following his release by the Orioles in 1972 and an abbreviated comeback attempt in 1973, Boswell retired from baseball. In eight big-league seasons, he won 68 games and lost 56, logged 1,065⅓ innings, and posted a 3.52 ERA. He completed 37 of his 151 starts. “I would have pitched until my arm fell off,” Boswell once said about his approach to pitching. “I never want to quit when I’m out there. No matter what the situation – you’re tired but you push yourself.”34

According to his obituary, Boswell worked for the Carling-National brewery in Baltimore, as well as a beer distributor after his baseball career.35 A lifelong baseball fan, he also served as a pitching coach for Grand Slam USA baseball.

On June 11, 2012, Boswell died at the age of 67 from a heart attack at his home in Joppatown, Maryland. He was buried at Moreland Memorial Park, in Parkville. He was survived by his wife of 47 years, Eleanor “Lou” (nee Smith), sons Dan and Jason, and daughter Christina.

Sources

Dave Boswell player file at the National Baseball Hall of Fame, Cooperstown, New York

Ancestry.com

BaseballLibrary.com

Baseball-Reference.com

Retrosheet.com

SABR.org

The Sporting News

Notes

1 “Shooter News: Minnesota Twins ‘Character’ Dave Boswell Dies,” TwinsCities.com, June 12, 2012.

2 Doug Brown, “Fowble, coach 46 years on sandlots, dies at 76,” (Baltimore) Sun, December 10, 1991.

3 “Leone’s and Ijamsville to Play Thursday,” The News (Frederick, Maryland), July 5, 1961, 14.

4 Jacques Kelly, “Dave Boswell, major league pitcher,” (Baltimore) Sun, June 13, 2012.

5 The Sporting News, March 21, 1964, 25.

6 Keith Mills, “1960-2009 All-Baltimore Amateur Team,” Pressbox, July 15, 2014. pressboxonline.com/2014/07/12/1960-2009-all-baltimore-amateur-baseball-team

7 The Sporting News, March 21, 1964, 25.

8 John Swol, “Dave Boswell interview,” Twins Trivia.  twinstrivia.com/interview-archives/dave-boswell-interview/.

9 The Sporting News, December 5, 1964, 27.

10 The Sporting News, November 20, 1965, 13.

11 The Sporting News, September 23, 1967, 11.

12 Sandy Padwe, “For Mele and the Twins,” The Index-Journal (Greenwood, South Carolina), July 10, 1965, 6.

13 Associated Press, “Dave Boswell Is Koufax of AL,” Janesville (Wisconsin) Daily Gazette, August 4, 1966, 12.

14 The Sporting News, October 1, 1966, 12.

15 The Sporting News, August 19, 1967, 26.

16 “Shooter News: Minnesota Twins ‘Character’ Dave Boswell Dies,” TwinsCities.com, June 12, 2012.

17 The Sporting News, December 10, 1966, 29.

18 The Sporting News, August 30, 1969, 35.

19 The Sporting News, June 10, 1967, 1.

20 The Sporting News, January 6, 1968, 45; Associated Press, “Ermer Won’t Discuss Oliva-Uhlaender Tiff,” Kansas City Times, June 22, 1967, 2D.

21 The Sporting News, July 29, 1967, 9.

22 The Sporting News, January 6, 1968, 45. To be fair to Ermer, Boswell was clobbered in his last start, a loss to the New York Yankees on September 23 (yielding four hits, six walks and four runs in just 2⅓ innings) and again in his last appearance of the season (surrendering three runs in one-third inning of relief) in a loss to the California Angels two days later.

23 The Sporting News, August 24, 1968, 12.

24 United Press, “Twins Rake Bell, Bosox in 7-2 Rout,” Winona (Minnesota) Daily News, July 18, 1968, 14.

25 The Sporting News, August 23, 1969, 31.

26 Associated Press, “Dave Boswell Sits Out Unofficial Suspension,” Cumberland (Maryland) News, August 12, 1969, 12.

27 The Sporting News, August 23, 1969, 31.

28 Patrick Reusse, “Site of Boswell-Martin fracas closes up shop,” knoxnews.com, December 12, 2002.

29 UPI, “Fighting Twins Minus ‘One Weakness,’ ” San Bernardino County (California) Sun, August 12, 1969, 21.

30 Dick Couch (Associated Press), “”Stottlemyre, Boswell Become 20 Game Winners in American League,” The Daily Republic (Mitchell, South Dakota), September 29, 1969, 12.

31 Ibid.

32 John Swol, “Dave Boswell interview,” Twins Trivia.  twinstrivia.com/interview-archives/dave-boswell-interview/

33 The Sporting News, October 17, 1970, 29.

34 Jacques Kelly, “Dave Boswell, major league pitcher,” (Baltimore) Sun, June 13, 2012.

35 Ibid.

Carneal was born on May 10, 1923, in Richmond, Virginia. His father, Charles, was not in good health and died when Carneal was 7 years old. His mother, Edith, worked as a milliner and was helped by her mother in raising Herb.

Carneal said he visited some Civil War battlefields in Virginia as a youth but was never a student of history. “Richmond was still a very segregated city when I was growing up, although I never gave the matter much thought. A black youngster around my age hung around with my friends and me all through elementary and junior high school, and played baseball and football with us just like anybody else.”

Carneal said he developed his love of baseball from his mom. His high school, John Marshall in Richmond, didn’t have a baseball team, but he played some American Legion baseball as a center fielder and pitcher, despite a “fastball that wouldn’t have broken a pane of glass.” Carneal had little time for sports when he got into high school because he worked for Imperial Tobacco Company every afternoon.

He and his mother attended semipro games on weekends and sometimes a game of the Richmond Colts of the Piedmont League. Carneal and his friends developed loyalties to the Washington Senators and went to Griffith Stadium to see them play in 1939, Herb’s first major-league game. Carneal was also a fan of the St. Louis Cardinals during the time of the Gas House Gang, and had the chance to chat with Pepper Martin at an exhibition game that was rained out. In 1942 he saw the Cardinals in the World Series at Yankee Stadium, traveling with his friends to New York, where they attended the third game and the fifth and final game.

“As a kid, I was like most of my friends, crazy about baseball and other sports. Maybe I was a little crazier than most. By the time I graduated from high school, I had decided that I wanted to spend my life in sports, but I had realized early on that it wouldn’t be as a player.”

As was the case with a future Minnesota Twins colleague, Ray Christensen, Carneal played dice baseball games with his friends and announced the outcome dictated by the dice in a play-by-play manner.

After high school, Carneal began working at WMBG Radio in Richmond, doing mostly booth announcing. At night he tried to pick up baseball broadcasts from elsewhere, listening to the announcers and dreaming of getting such a job. He got his first shot at sportscasting at WMBG, filling in for another announcer at a boxing match.

In 1945 Carneal responded to an ad in Broadcasting magazine, sent an audition tape, and landed a job at WSYR Radio in Syracuse, New York. He initially broadcast football games for a high school in Watertown, about 70 miles away, and worked his way into basketball at Syracuse University. He also announced games of the Syracuse Nationals of the National Basketball League (a forerunner of the NBA) and did the public-address announcing at MacArthur Stadium for the Syracuse Chiefs of the International League. Occasionally Carneal did re-creation play-by-play of major-league baseball games.

While in Syracuse, Carneal became part of a school of announcers assembled by the Atlantic Refining Company and did college football games around the region. He recalled a humorous story from that time. “When I was assigned the Colgate-Bucknell game in Hamilton, New York, I arrived the night before the game, had a room at the Colgate Inn, and put together my spotting board of the numbers and names of the different players organized by their positions. I used India ink, which wouldn’t run if it got wet. Back home in Syracuse, I couldn’t find my bottle of India ink. The next year, I was assigned another Colgate game in Hamilton. I stayed in the same room at the Colgate Inn and there was my bottle of India ink, still on the desk.”

After five years in Syracuse, Carneal moved to Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1950 and called the games – from the ballpark at home and through recreations for road games — for the Springfield Cubs of the International League. His first broadcasts for the Cubs were from spring training in Haines City, Florida. “The Cubs’ stadium was a few miles south of Highway 28 in a rather swampy area,” Carneal recalled. “One day Ben Taylor, a young prospect trying to make the team, was running in the outfield and stumbled over an alligator. That’s the fastest I’ve ever seen anyone run off the field.”

Even more memorable to Carneal than an alligator in the outfield was his trip to spring training. On his way to Florida, he stopped in Richmond and met Katherine Meredith, a Richmond native who was living in Atlanta at the time and was back in her hometown visiting her aunt. Kathy and Herb had never met before, but once an introduction was made, they hit it off. Kathy visited Springfield that summer and was in the studio as Herb did a re-creation of a game. The crew always stood during the seventh-inning stretch, and as they did, Herb produced a ring and proposed. “Kathy and I were married on September 12 of that year, right after the Cubs’ season ended. When I started broadcasting games in the majors, where the season extends longer than in the minors, I was never free on our anniversary. Years later, when I was with the Twins, someone asked what we did on our anniversary. I said, ‘Every other year, when the Twins are at home on September 12, Kathy has a real treat. She gets to go to a ballgame.’”

While in Springfield, Carneal continued announcing college football for the Atlantic Refining Company. He also got his first shot at hockey, doing games for the Springfield Indians of the American Hockey League.

After the 1953 baseball season, Carneal landed a job with KYW in Philadelphia to announce different sports. Major-league baseball wasn’t part of the plan, but when the Phillies and Athletics expanded their television coverage, they needed another announcer for radio and Carneal got his chance. He became the swing man, announcing home games on WIBG for the A’s and WFIL for the Phillies. The arrangement ended after one season when the Athletics moved to Kansas City. Carneal said, “I still had a good sports job with KYW, but I was hooked on announcing baseball.”

He stayed in Philadelphia through 1956, when a sponsor shift in Baltimore created an opening with the Orioles. During a time when sponsors called the shots on announcers, National Brewing Company switched its sponsorship from the Orioles to the Washington Senators. Chuck Thompson moved with the company to Washington, and Carneal was hired by the new sponsor, Gunther Brewing Company, to work with Ernie Harwell in Baltimore.

“When he [Harwell] took me under his wing in 1957, I learned a lot about baseball and other aspects of life. In Cleveland, on my first road trip with a baseball club, a night game was scheduled, but it rained all afternoon. At 4:30 Ernie phoned to tell me the game had been postponed, but at 5:00 he took me out to the stadium anyway for the pregame meal in the press room. ‘No sense letting all that good food go to waste,’ he said.”

Another sponsor shakeup with the Orioles after the 1961 season left Carneal out of a job. Fortunately for him, an opportunity came up in Minnesota.

Actually, Carneal had two opportunities in Minnesota. He was hired by CBS Television to announce Minnesota Vikings games. (At the time, CBS assigned broadcast crews to each individual National Football League team.) He was also hired to join the Minnesota Twins broadcast crew for 1962.

Carneal worked with Ray Scott and Halsey Hall, and the three covered all the games on radio and television. Scott left the crew after the 1966 season and was replaced by Merle Harmon. The three continued on radio and television through 1969. After that, the Twins had separate broadcast crews to handle the duties. In 1970 Carneal still switched between the two media, but in 1971 he began working exclusively on radio.

He had a variety of partners through the years. Frank Quilici, after being fired as Twins manager, moved into the booth with Carneal in 1976. In the 1980s Joe Angel spent a few years with Carneal, who recalled his partner sometimes being too colorful. “Angel, who became my broadcast partner in 1984, liked to manage from the broadcasting booth, and some of his attempts at humor didn’t go over well with Midwestern listeners,” related Carneal in Hi Everybody! “Once at Yankee Stadium the message board announced that the next night would be Latin American Night. Joe read the message on the air and added, ‘I wonder what they’re going to give away for Latin American Night — hubcaps?’ On another occasion he read some information on a pitcher from Jamaica, New York. Joe said, ‘Jamaica? No, just shook hands.’”

Angel lasted three years with the Twins before moving on. In 1987 Carneal got a partner, John Gordon, who would be with him the rest of his career. Carneal remained the lead announcer, calling the beginnings and endings of games while Gordon covered the middle innings. Carneal ceded another inning, the seventh, after Kathy died in June 2000. At the Metrodome, Kathy had a seat below the broadcast booth. In keeping with his seventh-inning-stretch proposal to her 50 years earlier, Herb made a point of looking to her in the middle of the seventh inning, and they waved to one another. Carneal told the story at Kathy’s funeral and, upon returning to the broadcast booth, found that he couldn’t look down to her seat in the seventh inning. From that point on, he announced the first three innings of Twins games and didn’t resume until the eighth inning.

In 1996 Carneal received the Ford Frick Award from the Baseball Hall of Fame. In 2001 he was inducted into the Minnesota Twins Hall of Fame.

“Announcers who cover games that are nationally broadcast should remain neutral, but since I’m the announcer for just one team, I think it’s okay to indicate that I’m pulling for the Twins,” Carneal wrote in his autobiography. “Although listeners can detect more excitement in my voice when the Twins are doing well, I’m not a cheerleader on the air.”

Carneal’s friendly and familiar delivery stayed a part of Twins baseball, although when he hit 70, he had to cut back at times. A heart-valve replacement in 1993 caused him to miss more than two months of the season. As he approached his 80s, Carneal scaled back and began working only a portion of home games.

“I think I’d have trouble giving up announcing completely,” he said in 1995. “I want to keep going as long as the fans want to listen to me.” The fans wanted to listen to him, and Carneal continued on the air for the rest of his life.

He was in the Twins’ plans for the 2007 season, but he had health problems that winter and spent six weeks in the hospital with edema. On April 1, the day before the Twins’ first game of the season, he died at the age of 83. He was survived by his daughter, Terri, and a grandson, Matthew.

Judd Zulgad, writing of his death in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, said Carneal could “never be called flashy or a character, but he combined his slight Southern drawl with a low-key approach that never made him seem bigger than the broadcast.”

Zulgad’s colleague at the newspaper, Patrick Reusse, concurred. “He left the happy screams to us. … What Herb Carneal did was describe precisely what was occurring in front of him and allow us to react. When you consider hysterical play-by-play is now often the norm, Herbie deserves lasting admiration for the trust he placed in all of us.”

An updated version of this biography appeared in “A Pennant for the Twin Cities: The 1965 Minnesota Twins” (SABR, 2015), edited by Gregory H. Wolf.

Sources

Much of the material in this article is derived from Hi Everybody! by Herb Carneal with Stew Thornley (Minneapolis: Nodin Press, 1996). Unless indicated otherwise, all quotations attributed to Carneal are from this book.

Reusse, Patrick, “Generations of Twins Fans Lose a Distinctive Voice of Summer,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, April 2, 2007, 1C.

Zulgad, Judd, “Hello to a New Season, Goodbye to an Old Friend,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, April 2, 2007, 1A.

Peter William Cimino was born on October 17, 1942, in Philadelphia. His parents, Peter and Philomena, first met at St. Ann School in Philadelphia as teenagers. They were married in 1941 and had two children, Pete and another son, David.

Both parents were extremely supportive of Pete’s athletic endeavors and seldom missed an opportunity to see their son play. He enrolled at Bristol High as a freshman in the fall of 1956. It was not long before he began to garner notice for his all-around athletic ability. On August 2, 1957, he registered six strikeouts in a complete-game 8-4 victory over Phoenixville to capture Bristol’s first Babe Ruth League state championship. In April 1958, as a member of the Bristol High Warriors, he hurled a one-hit shutout with eight strikeouts in a 7-0 victory over William Tennent. As a member of the basketball team, he scored 30 points in a 107-62 victory over Palisades High on December 16, 1958. Bristol finished the regular season with a 20-2 record, and Cimino scored 16 points in an 85-54 victory over Upper Dublin to advance to the District 1 Class B championship. Bristol lost the title game to Darby, 71-69, in a matchup that featured multiple overtimes. Among Cimino’s 20 points was a last-second shot to tie the game and force the second overtime.

And so it went. Cimino was back on the mound for his junior season the following spring, tossing a complete-game win with nine strikeouts against William Tennent on May 14. Between his performance on the diamond and his prowess on the hard court, expectations were high for his senior year. Before the year was out, Pete Cimino more than exceeded even the highest of them.

Starting a contest against visiting Palisades on January 22, 1960, Cimino was averaging 23 points per game for the season. He scored 20 points in the first quarter alone. “It was halfway through the first quarter and Pete had quite a few points, and Coach [Chic] D’Angelo said we were going to go for the league record for Pete,” recalled Jack Wichser, a Bristol teammate, in a 2012 interview.1 He added 24 more in the second quarter, leaving him just 18 points shy of the single-game Lower Bucks County League record of 62 points held by Lou Klein of Delhaas. He pumped in 32 more in the third quarter to easily surpass the record and then finished strong with 38 points in the fourth quarter for a game-high total of 114. Bristol won the game 134-86. Cimino shot 44 of 79 from the field and 26 of 29 from the foul line, and his 114-point total was only 6 shy of the then national scholastic scoring record of 120 points in a game. As of 2014 the total was tied for fourth all-time and remained the Pennsylvania state record.2 Cimino was more than willing to share the spotlight for the accomplishment, stating, “I can’t begin to give the other fellows enough credit. The way they got the rebounds and passed off to me is what made it possible.”3 Looking back on the game many years later, Cimino recalled that his mother was not there to see it. “My father telephoned her at halftime and she was visiting my grandmother and he told her she better come up to the game because I was scoring a lot of points. She said she wasn’t coming up because the other team wasn’t very good – and I think that was the only game she missed.”4 News of Cimino’s game made national headlines and earned a mention in The Sporting News.5

Cimino contributed 25 points in a season-ending, losing effort to Columbia in the Pennsylvania state basketball playoffs. He shared First-Team All-State honors with Richard “Dick” Allen of Wampum, who would go on to a productive 15-year career with 351 home runs in major-league baseball. With the basketball season drawing to a close, it was time for Cimino to turn his attention back to the pitcher’s mound.

Cimino’s perfect game and no-hitter in May certified him as a prospect in the eyes of several scouts, but on May 20 it was reported that he had accepted a scholarship to play basketball at Rider College.6 Three weeks later, the Associated Press reported that the Washington Senators had signed Cimino for a $12,000 bonus. He was signed by club vice president Joe Haynes. He was assigned to the Senators’ Wytheville, Virginia, farm team in the Class D Appalachian League. Of his signing, Cimino said, “I passed up several basketball scholarships to play baseball. School wasn’t for me.”7

Cimino was more or less a one-pitch pitcher, relying almost exclusively on a hard, rising fastball. He had some control issues. In his first professional season, at Wytheville, he finished with a 6-2 record and a 3.43 ERA for the league’s first-place team. After the season he spent the winter playing in the Florida Instructional League before finding himself with the Wilson Tobs of the Carolina League in 1961. The Tobs had the best record in the league, but Cimino struggled to a modest won-loss mark of 4-5 and a 5.61 ERA.

In 1962 Cimino was invited to participate in spring training with the major-league club, now in Minnesota. Although he was not expected to make the club, it was a sign of the high regard in which the Minnesota Twins held him. According to club president Calvin Griffith, “Often, just the spring-training association with major leaguers in camp helps some of these youngsters to mature more quickly. They realize they go first-class in the majors and it develops a greater desire to attain big-league status.”8 The Twins once again assigned Cimino to Wilson in the Carolina League. While his record for the season was just 12-13, he managed 190 strikeouts in as many innings, and frequently overpowered the opposition. On April 30 he tied a 17-year old Carolina League record by striking out 20 batters in a 7-3 win over the Burlington Indians. He struck out the side in the second, third, sixth, and eighth innings, as well as the final two batters in the ninth to tie the record. On July 1 he tossed a no-hitter against the Winston-Salem Red Sox, striking out eight and walking one while retiring the first 22 batters he faced. Nine days later, he recorded 14 strikeouts in a 5-1 win over the Kinston Eagles.

Cimino returned to the Florida Instructional League in October, and after pitching a three-hit shutout against the Reds on November 16, he was mentioned in The Sporting News along with several other young Twins pitchers as showing “great promise.”9 The Twins promoted Cimino to the Dallas-Fort Worth Rangers of the Triple-A Pacific Coast League to begin the 1963 season. In May he was optioned to the Charlotte Hornets of the Double-A South Atlantic League. On July 19 he hurled 13 shutout innings before allowing two runs in a 4-3 loss to the Chattanooga Lookouts in an 18-inning contest. By the end of July Cimino was ninth in the league with a 2.80 ERA and 81 strikeouts in 103 innings of work. On August 22, he tossed a three-hit, 3-0 shutout over Nashville to lower his ERA to 2.50 in 127 innings. His performance earned him a recall to Dallas-Fort Worth, where he picked up a win in three scoreless innings of relief work against Oklahoma City on August 27.

After once again pitching in the Florida Instructional League, Cimino entered the spring of 1964 as one of the Twins’ top pitching prospects. In April he was sent to minor-league camp for reassignment and ended up with the Triple-A Atlanta Crackers. On May 14 his wife, Barbara, gave birth to their second child, Michael, while visiting her husband during a Crackers stay in Rochester. The couple already had a daughter, Darlene.

The Crackers were easily the worst team in the International League, and from time to time the players and coaches had to do what they could to keep things loose. On June 4, while visiting the Columbus Jets, Cimino and fellow pitcher Jim Merritt bought a four-foot rubber snake in an effort to scare catcher Chuck Weatherspoon, who was known for his fear of snakes. The June 20, 1964, edition of The Sporting News detailed what happened next:

“They put it under a pillow and tried to lure Weatherspoon to their room, but he was intent on more sleep. Their plot foiled, Merritt and Cimino left for breakfast. While they were gone, a maid came in to tidy up the room. You guessed it: When she saw the snake, her screams woke everyone on the floor. She insisted she had been bitten and only after the calming effects of a sedative and a long rest was she ready to return to work.”10

Once again Cimino’s overall numbers for Atlanta were not overwhelming, but from time to time he still dominated his opponents. On July 7 he allowed just one hit and an unearned run in a 1-0 loss to Jacksonville. Four days later he tossed a five-hitter to beat Columbus, 6-2. He contributed a grand slam to his own cause.

Although Cimino began the 1965 season with the Triple-A Denver Bears in the Pacific Coast League, many expected that a solid performance would earn him a shot with the big-league Twins before the end of the season. His 9-7 record, 3.70 ERA, and 91 strikeouts in 90 innings of work warranted a September call-up. Unfortunately for Cimino, when the call came, he was on the disabled list with a fractured pitching hand. The result is that he appeared in only one game for a 1965 Twins team that won the American League pennant and faced the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series. On September 22, 1965, Cimino retired Paul Blair, Boog Powell, and Brooks Robinson with three straight fly outs in a perfect ninth inning of a 5-2 loss to the Orioles. Of his first and only big-league appearance that year, Cimino later recalled, “I got through it without allowing a hit. So I have the lowest ERA in the majors – 0.00. Boy was I shaking after I finished that inning! I sat on the bench and couldn’t stop shaking.”11

Cimino spent that winter pitching for the Ponce Lions in the Puerto Rican League. He eagerly anticipated the start of the 1966 season and his chances to stick with the Twins as a reliever. He reported to spring training in Orlando a week before the February 21 start date. “… I’m going early so I can get a jump on things. And I’m 215 pounds and want to get down to 205,” he said.12 With only a few open roster spots, Cimino expected stiff competition, adding, “And they’ll be a few fighting for them. It will be a tough struggle but I’m confident.”13

Cimino performed well in the spring and claimed one of only two open spots on the pitching staff. Manager Sam Mele called him and right-hander Dwight Siebler “the most improved pitchers in our camp.”14 On April 5 Cimino received word that he had made the club, after which he called his parents in Bristol to share the good news.

The 1966 Twins finished a distant second behind the Baltimore Orioles. For his part, Cimino proved a useful member of the bullpen. Initially he did not see much action, but generally he pitched well when the opportunities came. He earned his first big-league victory on June 9 against the Kansas City Athletics with two scoreless innings of relief. The game was notable because Minnesota tied a major-league record by hitting five homers in a single inning in the seventh, Cimino’s final frame.

By August Cimino’s quality work was sparking speculation that he was the heir-apparent to the 37-year-old Al Worthington as the ace of the Minnesota bullpen. He worked hard to develop a curveball, taught to him by Twins pitching coach Johnny Sain. “Before Sain taught me this, I was never able to throw a curve in my life,” Cimino remarked.15 Mele envisioned Cimino offering the club some flexibility in the future, commenting, “He still gets a little wild sometimes. He needs experience. But he can become a good reliever. And he can become a starter too, if we get in a jam and I need one. He’s strong and can pitch a lot of innings.”16 But as the season wound down, Cimino grew less and less effective. He took his fourth loss, against the Boston Red Sox, on August 21, surrendering two runs in two-thirds of an inning. Three days later he blew a save opportunity in the ninth inning in a long relief appearance in Washington. On August 28 against the White Sox, he allowed three hits and walked three in 2⅔ innings while taking his fifth loss of the season. On October 2 he made his final appearance of the season, tossing two scoreless innings in the first game of a doubleheader against the Orioles. He wrapped up his rookie season with a disappointing record of 2-5, but despite some control trouble, his ERA was a very healthy 2.92.

By mid-October, it became clear that club officials did not necessarily view Cimino as the future savior of the Minnesota bullpen. The October 15, 1966, issue of The Sporting News included an article discussing club president Calvin Griffith’s desire to bolster the bullpen in the offseason, stating, “Griffith wants help in the relief pitching department. Griffith felt Pete Cimino did not show that he was quite ready to take over the lead.” In late October the Twins hired 300-game winner Early Wynn to replace Johnny Sain as the club’s pitching coach. Among his expected tasks was to further the development of young pitchers Jim Roland and Cimino.

Cimino spent a portion of the offseason traveling with teammates Tony Oliva, Sandy Valdespino, and Earl Battey as part of the Twins winter banquet tour. They were scheduled to appear at over 90 dinners across the Midwest. But before the tour was over, Cimino found himself traded to another team.

On December 2, 1966, Minnesota sent Cimino, outfielder Jimmie Hall, and first baseman Don Mincher to the California Angels for former Cy Young Award winner Dean Chance and a player to be named later. Cimino acknowledged shock over the deal, telling reporters, “I had no idea they were thinking of trading me since I thought I’d be here several years to help them. But maybe it’ll work out since I’ll have more opportunities to pitch with the Angels.”17 In the weeks that followed, statements from Angels officials made it clear that they considered Cimino a priority in the deal. Angels manager Bill Rigney acknowledged, “We did not make the trade until Pete was included.”18 In assessing the trade, The Sporting News noted that after observing Cimino in the Pacific Coast League, Angels pitching coach Bob Lemon was impressed, and that “initially, Cimino will be provided a starting opportunity, but he will likely go on to relief.”19

In March 1967 a minor controversy occurred when new Angels first baseman Don Mincher said he thought the Twins gave away too much to acquire Chance. He told reporter Ross Newhan, “I firmly believe the Twins gave up too much. I could see the Twins giving up one or two of us, but not all three. … I am especially high on Cimino. He’s going to be a great pitcher.”20 The comments garnered a diplomatic response from Chance, who offered, “And that Pete Cimino could be a good pitcher. That is quite a bit of talent to give up.”21

The 1967 California Angels finished with a winning record of 84-77, in fifth place in the American League. Cimino was optimistic about his prospects for the season, and after 14 appearances, he boasted a 2-1 record and a solid 2.81 ERA. Against the White Sox on May 26 he entered in the second inning and went the rest of the way for the win, striking out seven in 7⅔ scoreless innings. He began working with Lemon on a new curveball to increase his effectiveness and prolong his career. But in August he hit a rough patch in which he allowed nine earned runs in five appearances totaling 9⅓ innings, pushing his ERA from 2.70 to 3.40. He finished the season with a modest 3-3 record, 80 strikeouts, and an uninspiring 3.26 ERA in a career-high 88⅓ innings of work. Of the trade that brought Cimino from the Twins, Angels general manager Fred Haney said bluntly, “Mincher has done a fine job. Hall has been adequate. Cimino has been less than expected.”22 Having failed to meet the club’s lofty expectations, Cimino looked to sharpen his skills as a member of the San Juan club in the Puerto Rican league over the winter.

In 1968 Cimino made only early-season four appearances with the Angels, allowing two earned runs in a total of seven innings. His final appearance in the major leagues came on May 7 against the White Sox. He allowed three hits and one earned run in 1⅔ innings of relief. Shortly thereafter the Angels sent him to Seattle in the Pacific Coast League. His demotion was one of many over the course of the 1968 season as the Angels struggled to a disappointing 67-95 record and an eighth-place finish. He pitched well in Seattle, posting a 3-0 record and a 2.57 ERA in 21 innings. He ended the season with the El Paso Sun Kings in the Double-A Texas League. The team won the Texas League title but Cimino pitched in only two games. They were the final innings of his career.

Cimino held a job driving a truck for a beverage company for 19 years, and then worked for a chemical company for two years before retiring. On May 23, 1992, Pete married Linda, a woman with whom he had reconnected after initially meeting in Virginia when they were both 17 years old. In a 2010 letter to the website Kentucky Baseball, he wrote, “We really liked each other but got separated for 30 years. Then we found each other again, got married, and have lived happily for 18 years.”23 In retirement, he spent time with his wife, his two children, and his three grandchildren.

Looking back on his time in the big leagues, Cimino said he had fond memories and few regrets:

“I always wanted to play pro ball. I realized my dream. Unfortunately, it didn’t last as long as I would have liked. But nevertheless, I was there. In the majors everything was first class all the way. In the minors you had to put up with those long bus rides through the South – maybe 10 or 14 hours on a bus. And they only gave us a few dollars for meals. So you had to eat at a greasy spoon. It was the best you could do. But it still seems worth it.”24

Notes

1 articles.philly.com/2012-03-02/sports/31117286_1_bristol-area-jack-wichser-bristol-high-school.

2 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_basketball_players_who_have_scored_100_points_in_a_single_game.

3 “Prep Basketeer Rips Cords For Total of 114 Points,” Hutchinson (Kansas) News, January 24, 1960.

4 articles.philly.com/2012-03-02/sports/31117286_1_bristol-area-jack-wichser-bristol-high-school

5 James Enright, “Big O’ on Edge? Fans Wondering,” The Sporting News, February 3, 1960.

6 “Land Prep Star,” Sandusky (Ohio) Register, May 20, 1960.

7 “Twins’ Rookie Turned Down Hoop Offers to Try Mound,” The Sporting News, March 8, 1961.

8 Tom Briere, “Twins Invite Farm-Club Pilots to Join Huddles at Orlando Base,” The Sporting News, January 24, 1962..

9 Fed Lieb, “Hall, Oliva and McCabe Spark Twins’ Six-Game Win Splurge,” The Sporting News, December 1, 1962.

10 “Lowly Crax’ Hijinks Liven Dull Situation in Columbus,” The Sporting News, June 20, 1964.

11 Max Nichols, “Twin Problem Kids Roland, Nieson and Cimino Eye Hill Jobs,” The Sporting News, March 26, 1966.

12 Dick Dougherty, “Pete Cimino Heads South To Get Jump On Training,” Bucks County Courier Times, February 15, 1966.

13 Ibid.

14 Max Nichols, “Great Cesar’s Ghost, Twins Find Zoilo’s Sub in Wraith-Like Tovar,” The Sporting News, April 16, 1966.

15 Max Nichols, “Twins Making Bow to Cimino As Crown Prince of Bull Pen,” The Sporting News, September 10, 1966.

16 Ibid.

17 Ray Di Lissio, “Trade Comes as Shock to Pete Cimino,” Bucks County Courier Times, December 3, 1966.

18 Ross Newhan, “Rubio Choice Gem in Jewel Kit of Angels,” The Sporting News, December 24, 1966.

19 Ibid.

20 Ross Newhan, “Slugger Mincher Sees Deal As Real Calamity for Twins,” The Sporting News, March 11, 1967.

21 Max Nichols, “Dean Holds His Fire In War With Angels,” The Sporting News, March 25, 1967.

22 Ross Newhan, “It’s Official – Angels Will Rehire Rigney,” The Sporting News, October, 1967.

23 kentuckybaseball.blogspot.com/2010/02/pete-cimino-1965-1968-major-leaguer.html.

24 Ibid.

Gerald Eugene Fosnow, born on September 21, 1940, in Deshler, near Toledo in northwestern Ohio, was the second of two children born to Harry and Dorothy Fosnow. He and his sister, Joan, grew up on their parents’ 400-acre farm. Fosnow recalled his earliest memory of wanting to be a big-league pitcher.1 To that end, he pitched countless hours to his father. A bellwether day came when his father could no longer catch his pitches. Gerald’s cousin became the new receiver. Speed, then accuracy, became the goal; later hitting a tire nailed to the barn helped him develop consistency in the strike zone. Small for his age, Fosnow was undistinguished until his senior year at Deshler High School. Sprouting seven inches between junior and senior years, he became a dominant pitcher who helped his team to a district championship in 1959 and gained him the attention of several scouts.

Detroit and Cleveland showed the most interest. Indians scout Charles LeCrone arranged for Fosnow to come to Cleveland Stadium for a tryout. In a simulated game against college and semipro players, he struck out six in three innings, impressing the Indians, who offered a $500 signing bonus. Fosnow wanted to try out with the Tigers, who had offered to look at him in Toledo. However, his father, a devoted Indians fan, persuaded him, after some arguing, to sign with Cleveland.

Cleveland assigned Fosnow to the Selma Cloverleafs of the Class D Alabama-Florida League in 1959. At 18, he was the youngest player on the team, where he played with future major leaguers Max Alvis, Larry Brown, and Doc Edwards. He got off to a fast start, winning his first nine games. The Sporting News carried almost weekly notice of Fosnow’s exploits, which included pitching Selma’s first shutout of the year, defeating Panama City 2-0, then later beating Pensacola 7-4 while striking out 14.2 Subsequently, The Sporting News reported Fosnow winning his eighth straight game.3 His performance continued to impress, leading Fosnow to consider that perhaps he ought to receive a raise. He was underpaid, like most rookies, earning $150 per month. Writing the Cleveland head office, he requested a $25-a-month increase.

Indians general manager Frank Lane had a reputation for his epic – and acrimonious – salary battles with such major leaguers as Rocky Colavito and Roger Maris. One has to wonder how the front office viewed an 18-year-old rookie’s request for a pay raise in midseason. If Lane was going to haggle with Colavito over $1,500, a Class D player would receive scant – and disdainful – attention.4 The Indians denied Fosnow’s request; if he continued to do well he would see an increase the following year.

Fosnow was 9-0 when he lost his first game in late June; he went on to compile a 15-4 record.5 His 3.42 ERA was well under the league average of 3.97.6 Selma finished second. In the best-of-five semifinal playoffs, Fosnow pitched a no-hitter against Pensacola, walking just one batter.7 Selma went on beat the Dothan Cardinals for the league championship.

The next season the Indians promoted Fosnow to the Minot Mallards of the Class C Northern League, where he posted a 13-9 record and tied for the league lead in shutouts. He pitched in 40 games, starting 21. Then Fosnow’s career took a curious turn. In 1961 Cleveland assigned him to Dubuque of the Class D Midwest League, seemingly a demotion. In an interview Fosnow said he did not recall why he was demoted, but Cleveland had cut its eight affiliate teams in 1960 to five in 1961.8 After pitching in seven games for Dubuque, and despite a 3-1 record, Fosnow was released. He recalled going to the ballpark and finding someone else wearing his uniform number. He confronted manager Pinky May, who could not adequately explain Cleveland’s decision to let him go. After offering May a few choice words, he vowed, “I will make it to the majors.” Fosnow did not pitch the rest of 1961.                     

Fosnow signed with the Minnesota Twins before the 1962 season after he impressed scout Dick Wiencek while pitching in a tournament.9 The Twins placed Fosnow at Wilson of the Class B Carolina League, where he went 12-12, striking out 187 batters in 209 innings and posting a 2.84 ERA. Next year, the Wilson Tobs – and Fosnow – moved up to Class A. He went 13-9 and pitched in the league all-star game. 

Fosnow’s performance earned him a promotion to Triple-A Atlanta in 1964. Manager Jack McKeon made him a short reliever. Fosnow did well in his new role. In late June, he became particularly effective. Called on to make an infrequent start, he threw a complete game to snap the Crackers’ 10-game losing streak. The next day Fosnow won in relief, and just two days later he relieved again for another victory. He pitched 16 innings during these three appearances, giving up just six hits.10 While Fosnow was proving particularly effective, the Twins needed help.

Minnesota was in the pennant race as the American League season neared the halfway point. The Twins had an explosive offense; they would lead the league in runs scored thanks to the power of Harmon Killebrew and Bob Allison and the hitting of rookie sensation Tony Oliva. What they did not have was pitching, especially in the bullpen. Bill Dailey and Bill Fischer, counted on to be mainstay relievers, had disappointed. (Dailey was released and after Fischer injured his ankle, he was placed on the voluntary retired list and became a scout.11) The Twins purchased Johnny Klippstein and Al Worthington from the Philadelphia Phillies and the minor-league San Diego Padres respectively. They also decided to bring up Fosnow as well.

Fosnow pitched in a losing effort for the Crackers on June 26.  Three days later he appeared in his first major-league game, facing Baltimore at Memorial Stadium. He came into the game in the seventh inning with the Twins down 4-1 and walked Jackie Brandt, the first batter he faced. After getting two outs (the second, Boog Powell, on strikes), he gave up a home run to Norm Siebern. The Orioles eventually won 6-3.

Fosnow next pitched three weeks later against the California Angels, throwing two scoreless innings in a blowout game. His performance the rest of the season was subpar, as he appeared in just five more games. Fosnow recalled asking Twins manager Sam Mele for more opportunities to pitch, arguing that he would do better if allowed to pitch more. “Give me a chance; let me get my feet wet,” Fosnow urged the manager.12  

Among the factors working against Fosnow at the time was the combined effectiveness of Klippstein (1.97 ERA) and Worthington (1.37). Fosnow finished the year with a 0-1 record and a 10.97 ERA in seven games. The Twins finished sixth. 

Fosnow had not pitched well, but he had redeemed his pledge to Pinky May that he would pitch in the majors some day. Sadly, his making the majors came too late for his father to enjoy it. The elder Fosnow had died in 1962 never having had the opportunity to see him pitch in the majors.13

Fosnow’s substandard performance for Minnesota made his position on the roster tenuous. Mele liked his potential, but was concerned about a lack of control, saying, “He’s got the stuff if he gets it over the plate.”14 Fosnow had his work cut out for him in the offseason. He did have a few factors working in his favor. As solid as Klippstein and Worthington’s performance had been, they were 37 and 36 respectively. Fosnow was 24 and he was a left-hander – always a plus on a pitching staff.

Assigned to the Florida Instructional League at season’s end, Fosnow did well. Then he pitched for San Juan in the Puerto Rican winter league, also impressing with his performance.15 While pitching in Florida, he came under the tutelage of Johnny Sain, the Twins’ new pitching coach, who went to work on his technique and pitch repertoire. In a subsequent article in The Sporting News, Fosnow’s description of how Sain worked with him illustrated why Sain was one of the most respected pitching coaches in the game. “For the first time, I can throw a curve ball and change of pace and know I will get them over the plate,” Fosnow said. “I throw everything side arm and my curve always was flat. Sain watched me a while, them he asked if I ever had a dip in my curve. I told him no one had ever taught me how to do it. So he showed me how to bend my wrist and hold the ball farther back in my hand. Now it dips.”16  

During spring training, Fosnow made his mark; at one point he had given up one hit in 12 innings over five appearances.  Mele added to his earlier comments, “I need a left-hander for late-inning relief. We’ve been trying to get Fosnow ready for that job.”17 His strong performances continued, enabling him to make the Opening Day roster. 

Fosnow joined a team not expected to do well; the Baseball Writers Association of America picked them to finish fifth. The consensus was that while the Twins’ offense was peerless, lack of pitching and defensive limitations would consign them to the list of also-rans.18 There was a more serious problem – a sense of lethargy. They had finished second and third before tumbling to sixth in 1964. With the team’s disappointing performance, owner Calvin Griffith publicly questioned their apathetic play and lack of commitment, suggesting that Mele fine players when the occasion warranted it. During spring training, Mele did just that, pulling shortstop Zoilo Versalles out of an exhibition game for indifferent effort. It turned the team around, generating a new attitude and paying immediate dividends.19  

On Opening Day, it was apparent that Mele had gained a higher opinion of Fosnow’s abilities. With the score tied 4-4 in the top of the 10th at Metropolitan Stadium, Mele called on Fosnow to relieve Jim Kaat who after pitching solidly, gave way to a pinch-hitter in the ninth inning. Fosnow held the New York Yankees scoreless in the 10th and 11th. Nearly 50 years later, he recalled the thrill of striking out Roger Maris to end a Yankees scoring threat. In the bottom of the 11th, César Tovar singled Bob Allison home to win the game. For Tovar, winning the game was redemptive – he had committed an error in the ninth that allowed New York to tie the score. 

It was the first of the Twins’ 102 victories for the season. It was Fosnow’s first major-league win. He later joked that he was only 19 wins from his 20th victory of the season.20 The win had significance beyond winning on Opening Day: It came at the expense of the Yankees, who had won five straight pennants and were favored to win a sixth by the same writers who saw the Twins finishing fifth.

Fosnow was Mele’s go-to hurler in the Twins’ next game. Entering in relief of Camilo Pascual against Detroit with the score tied 4-4 in the sixth; he soon faced future Hall of Famer Al Kaline with a runner on first. Trying to keep the ball down, he missed high and Kaline hit what turned out to be a game-winning home run. Not found in the box score was that before Kaline batted, Dick McAuliffe had hit a line drive off Fosnow’s hand. The Sporting News noted approvingly, “Fosnow pitched three more innings, striking out four after that” – a performance that demonstrated to his teammates Fosnow’s grittiness.21         

A little over a week later Fosnow faced New York again, this time at Yankee Stadium, a daunting experience for most young players. Fosnow entered the game with Minnesota leading 7-2 in the eighth. Facing the likes of Mickey Mantle and Maris, he held the Yankees scoreless to gain (retroactively) his first save. The victory provided a further psychological boost for Minnesota – vanquishing the favorite team, this time in their backyard. 

By the end of April the Twins were in first. As the season progressed, they melded into a team that believed in itself, and believed that something special was developing. Mele felt that the win on Opening Day was in a game they would have lost the year before after allowing the Yankees to tie it.22 Fosnow reminisced that everyone was pulling for one another and that the clubhouse was loose.23 Oliva felt the same: “There was no jealousy on this team. If you failed, there was always someone there to pick you up. I was happy for everybody.”24 Jimmie Hall’s observation was more succinct, “We’re together and we’re winning.”25         

Mele continued using Fosnow regularly. Catcher Earl Battey appreciated his ability, telling him he was the most difficult pitcher of the Twins to catch because of how his pitches moved. Fosnow threw a pitch described as a “heavy ball,” a fastball that as it neared the plate dropped several inches. He became more effective as the season progressed. 

On July 4 the Twins and Cleveland were tied for the American League lead. The next day Minnesota took sole possession of first place, sweeping a doubleheader from Boston as Cleveland lost to Chicago. Less than a week later the Twins had opened their lead over the Indians to four games as they hosted the Yankees. New York was 13½ games behind as the last game before the All-Star break took place. Despite their substandard record, many still felt the Yankees a viable contender, fully capable of making a run for the pennant.

The July 11 game went into the last inning tied 4-4. Two Twins errors contributed to the tie, offsetting a home run by Versalles. Mele called Fosnow in to hold New York. With two outs and Yankees at first and third, Roger Repoz hit a high bouncing ball down the first-base line. Running down the baseline, he made contact with Fosnow as the ball dropped to the ground. Repoz was called out for interfering with Fosnow, apparently ending New York’s scoring opportunity. But Yankees manager Johnny Keane protested the call, contending Fosnow had possession of the ball but dropped it, thus negating the interference call. The umpires reversed their call. Repoz was safe at first and a Yankee runner scored, giving them a 5-4 lead. Mele argued but could not get the umpires to go back to their original call. He notified the umpires he was playing the game under protest.

Lurking in the back of everyone’s mind was that this was the sort of break the Yankees had been capitalizing on over the years, the type that opened the gates for them to get back in the race. Keane brought Pete Mikkelsen in to save the game. With two outs and a runner on first, Killebrew slammed a 3-and-2 fastball over the left-field fence to turn what would have been a disheartening loss into a rousing victory. The win erased the last vestige of hope New York had for a comeback and essentially determined that this was to be Minnesota’s year. The victory was Fosnow’s third of the season – and his last in the majors.   

Sometime before pitching against New York, Fosnow had hurt his arm. He told the writer it happened in Kansas City a week earlier. He woke up the morning after pitching against the Athletics feeling as if a knife had been stuck into his arm.

After the All-Star break, Fosnow was called in to relieve Jim Grant, who being pummeled in the first inning by the Royals. Fosnow didn’t do much better, giving up three runs in 1⅓ innings before leaving the game. It proved to be Fosnow’s last major-league appearance. With his arm rendering him ineffective, Minnesota had no choice but to replace him on the roster. He was optioned to Denver and replaced by Garry Roggenburk. In 36 major-league games, all in relief, Fosnow had a record of 3-4 with two saves and a 5.65 ERA.

Fosnow’s arm miseries did not go away. He went 3-3 with a 5.14 ERA in Denver while watching from afar as Minnesota took the pennant by seven games over the White Sox, then lost the World Series to the Dodgers in seven games. Several weeks after the Series ended, Fosnow got a check for $4,422.90, two-thirds of a Twins player’s share of the World Series revenue.26                                             

When Fosnow was hurt, pitchers faced the stark choice of “pitching through” their ailment, resting with hope that the pain might disappear, retiring, or trying a new method of treatment, cortisone shots. (Sandy Koufax’s career was extended in part because of cortisone.) After the season Fosnow saw a physician who took x-rays and determined that he had not torn any muscles, but had pulled a tendon. The physician recommended cortisone injections. Fosnow agreed. The doctor admonished him to refrain from throwing for 24 hours after the procedure. The treatment worked; he was pain-free. 

Invited to spring training in 1966, Fosnow pitched well in exhibition games; however, he was dropped when the Twins made their final cuts.27  Fosnow’s name came up in a potential trade that would have sent him to Boston in exchange for catcher Bob Tillman. Mele advised Calvin Griffith to make the transaction if possible, but it never came about.28 Optioned to the Charlotte Hornets in the Southern League, Fosnow went 5-9 for the sixth-place club. He struck out 93 batters in 98 innings, the best strikeout rate of his professional career. 

Fosnow was invited to spring training in 1967, only to be optioned out again. Convinced he was not going anywhere with the Twins organization, he asked for an opportunity elsewhere. The Twins obliged and Fosnow joined the Spokane Indians for the 1967 season. He pitched well, posting a 4-1 record with a 2.51 ERA as Spokane won the western division championship. Manager Roy Hartsfield, in his end-of-season report, acknowledged Fosnow’s solid work, but concluded that he was no longer major-league material.29 Furious with Hartsfield, Fosnow sought out the advice of his friend Tommy Lasorda, then managing the Ogden Dodgers in the Pioneer League. Lasorda, a realist, essentially told Fosnow there were not many options available to him.

When Fosnow was with the Twins, he became acquainted with several officials of Gulf Oil who were fans. Several times he left tickets for them to attend games when the Twins played the White Sox at Comiskey Park. His new friends advised him to look them up should he need a job after his baseball career ended. 

Fosnow, 27 years old with a family and only a high-school education, decided it was time to get out of baseball, and called to see if the offer still held. An interview a few days later consisted entirely of a discussion about baseball. His interviewer eventually told him there was an opening in Anderson, Indiana, with Gulf in marketing. Fosnow took the job and began a long association with Gulf and later Chevron, which took over Gulf. He was employed at various locations in the Northwest. Later he joined American Personnel Services supervising the advertising, buying, and merchandising for more than 100 stores. Eventually he moved to Florida, where he retired.  

As of 2014, Fosnow and his wife, Diane, lived in DeBary, Florida. Their marriage was the second for both; there are. three children and four grandchildren. Fosnow gives time to the MLB Alumni Association, participating in clinics it runs for young players, offering tips on how to play the game and advice on how to conduct themselves off the field.30 

In The Cool of the Evening, Jim Thielman described how the 1965 Twins kept in contact with one another over the years the way a close-knit high-school class might. Celebrity golf tournaments, local events, and travel plans were coordinated to get together. Fosnow eagerly joined in. Ticking off a list of how several teammates were doing, he specifically described keeping in touch with Jim Grant on a regular basis. As teammate Frank Kostro said, “You just cannot believe how these friendships were such a genuine part of the deal.31         

Summing up, the farmer’s son who wanted to pitch ever since he could remember did fairly well. He made the major leagues and pitched on a pennant-winning team. If you doubt it, just ask Jerry Fosnow. He’ll show you his ring for being a member of the 1965 American League champions.                

Notes

1 Phone interview with Jerry Fosnow, May 18, 2014 (hereafter cited as Fosnow interview)..

2 “Minor League Highlights: Alabama-Florida League,” The Sporting News, May 27, 1959, 38.

3 Minor League Highlights: Alabama-Florida League, The Sporting News, June 24, 1959, 38.

4 Bob Vanderberg, Frantic Frank Lane, Baseball’s Ultimate Wheeler-Dealer, (Jefferson, North Carolina:  McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers, 2013), 83, 90-91.

5 Unless otherwise noted, all records are from baseball-reference.com/ or retrosheet.org/.

6 J.G. Taylor Spink, ed., in collaboration with Paul Rickart and Cliff Kachline, 1960 Baseball Guide (St. Louis: The Sporting News, 1960), 316.

7 “Indian Farmhand at Selma Posts Gem in Playoff Game,” The Sporting News, September 2, 1959, 39.

8 Fosnow interview; Baseball Reference.com.

9 Max Nichols, “Ex-High School Pals Fosnow, Reese Together as Twins,” unidentified publication dated April 24, 1965, in Fosnow’s file at the Baseball Hall of Fame, Cooperstown, New York.

10 “International Items,” The Sporting News, July 4, 1964, 36.

11 Jim Thielman, Cool of the Evening: The 1965 Minnesota Twins, (Minneapolis: Karl House Publishers, 2005), 110-111; “Rest Cure Working Wonders – Killer Goes on Homer Rampage, The Sporting News, June 13, 1964, 11..

12 Fosnow interview.

13 Ancestry.com.

14 Max Nichols, “Ex-High School Pals.”

15 “Torrid Boswell Temper Chilled By 5-Day Ban,” The Sporting News, November 14, 1964, 26; “Crabbers Tip Their Caps to Hurler Talbot,” The Sporting News, December 19, 1964, 27.

16 “Twin Hurlers Salute Sain – Master Tutor,” The Sporting News, March 13, 1964, 25.

17 Max Nichols, “Eight Rookies to Dot Twin Roster,” unidentified, undated publication I Fosnow’s Hall of Fame file.  

18 “Yanks, Phils Picked by Writers, Fans,” The Sporting News, April 17, 1965, 1.

19 Thielman, 2-3.

20 Ibid, 75.

21 “Injury Wave Claims Five Twins In First Two Games of Campaign,” The Sporting News, May 1, 1963, 18.

22 Thielman, 74.

23 Fosnow interview.

24 Thielman, 215.

25 Thielman, 116.

26 “Dodgers’ Series Slice: $10,297 each,” Chicago Tribune, October 28, 1965, E1.

27 “Great Cesar’s Ghost, Twins Find Zoilo’s Sub in Wraith-Like Sub,” The Sporting News, April 16, 1966, 22.

28 “Red Sox Seek Twins Fosnow,” Boston Globe, February 1, 1966, 17.

29 Fosnow interview.

30 Fosnow interview.

31 Thielman, 239.

Charles Richards “Dick” Gordon was born on January 15, 1911, in St. Paul, Minnesota, the son of Charles William Gordon (1861-1939) and Charlotte (Bishop) Gordon (1874-1960). His grandfather, Richards Gordon (1829-1911), had immigrated from Ireland in the 1840s and co-founded Gordon & Ferguson, a well-known Minnesota fur trading company. Late in the 1800s the company began the manufacture of fur clothing using the Field & Stream trademark on its products, which continues. Dick’s father, Charles, took over and was running the company by the time Dick was born. Dick had an older sister, Virginia, born in 1908, who died in 1923 at the age of 15.

Because of the success of their business, the family was wealthy by the time Dick was born. He grew up in his grandfather’s home, where three generations of the family lived together, along with several servants. He attended the St. Paul Academy prep school, where he was editor of the school newspaper. The headmaster of the school said that Gordon was a better writer than F. Scott Fitzgerald, who had attended the school more than a decade earlier.1

While in high school Dick got a job as copy boy at the St. Paul Dispatch, supposedly by walking in and talking himself into the job.2 When he went to Princeton University he wrote for the student newspaper, the Daily Princetonian. During the US Open golf tournament at Interlachen Country Club in suburban Minneapolis in 1930, he talked to professional golfer Bobby Jones, and was able to break the story of Jones’s forthcoming retirement from the game.3 This earned Gordon the nickname Scoop, and helped as an entry point into the world of sportswriting. While at Princeton Gordon even attended the 1929 World Series, where he saw the famous game in Philadelphia between the Athletics and the Chicago Cubs in which the A’s scored 10 runs in an inning to come back from an 8-0 deficit and win.4

After graduating from Princeton, Gordon joined the St. Paul Pioneer Press as a sportswriter. After a few years there, where he met and worked with many local writers and sports celebrities, he moved to Chicago in 1939, where he began writing for the Chicago Daily News.

When the US entered World War II, Gordon enlisted in the Marine Corps, and served in the Pacific as a combat correspondent. One of his stories, about an Army baseball team on Guadalcanal, became his first published article in The Sporting News.5 After two years in combat and promotion to sergeant, he returned to Minneapolis, where he worked as a recruiter for the Marines, and where he met his future wife, Adelaide Washburn, who had taught at the University of Minnesota and worked for the Red Cross during the war. The couple married in Minneapolis on April 26, 1945, just days before the victory over Germany.

The couple had three children: Charles was born in 1946, Robert in 1951, and Richards in 1953, and they lived in St. Paul all their lives. “I worked in Minneapolis, but I always lived in St. Paul,” Dick said.6 Adelaide kept the house together while Dick traveled for work, sometimes taking the family with him but often as not going by himself. He wrote letters to his sons all his life, whether they were away at camp or after they had become adults and moved away from Minnesota.7

Gordon regularly took his boys to sporting events, where they met many famous athletes. His son Charlie recalled that at one baseball game he was introduced to Willie Mays, Ted Williams, and golfer Sam Snead.8

“He would be the first to admit that he was not a great athlete, but he loved sports,” Gordon’s son Dick said.9 Gordon was even able to poke fun at his own sporting ability in print: “Now, Pop, don’t feel badly if your son’s high school efforts, on gridiron, court, rink or diamond, top your own prior performances at that level. That would be par for the course, as the author’s three male offspring will be the first to point out.”10

While Dick was working, Adelaide looked after the family and occupied her time on numerous charity boards, with organizations as diverse as the Schubert Club (a performing-arts organization, where she started a music therapy program), the Junior League, her alma mater Smith College, and church groups. The couple played various sports together including tennis and golf, and she attended all her children’s sporting events, whether Dick was able to make it or not.

At the end of the war Gordon returned to his old job as a sports reporter for the Chicago Daily News. He soon left there, though, because during his time away at war, “Some 4-Fer (military reject) stole my job.”11 He returned home to Minnesota, joining the Minneapolis Star as a sportswriter. He stayed there from 1946 to 1976 and continued his side work writing for numerous national publications. Over the years Gordon wrote many articles for The Sporting News and Baseball Digest, starting in the 1940s and continuing through the 1970s. He also became one of the earliest writers for the new national weekly magazine Sports Illustrated in the 1950s.

Gordon covered local sports including the Minnesota Twins, the Vikings, and his favorite subject the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers football team. “He was a walking history of University of Minnesota sports,” said fellow writer Will Shapira.12 Before professional sports came to Minnesota, Gordon said, the Gophers were “the only game in town. From when practice started the day after Labor Day until the bowl games, Gopher football was the big sports story every day. We only took time out for the World Series.”13 He would regularly write about college football, including the history of the Little Brown Jug, the trophy fought over by the Gophers and the University of Michigan, which he called “an insignificant 35-cent crock from a Hennepin Avenue variety store.”14

Gordon also covered national and international sports, including the 1960 Olympics in California. There he wrote about the US men’s hockey team for Sports Illustrated. “He always considered that the true miracle on ice,” Gordon’s son Charlie said.15 He presaged the modern era of sports reporting, all-access all-the-time, when he complained about not being able to talk to the athletes. “You couldn’t go into the Village and you couldn’t go into the locker room,” he said.16

Gordon regularly covered baseball as a beat writer in Minneapolis, writing about the minor-league Minneapolis Millers and St. Paul Saints, and the efforts to bring a major-league team to the area, culminating in the arrival of the Minnesota Twins in 1961. He continued to write about the Twins for years afterward, and once noted that his favorite player was Harmon Killebrew. He never hid from you. If he had a bad day at the plate, he didn’t try to duck the reporters after the game.”17

Gordon’s output was legendary, and his wide range of sports coverage was too. Even within a single sport he could write about many different topics. For example, with the Twins at their peak in 1964-65, he wrote several articles about the team and its players (Killebrew, Al Worthington, Tony Oliva), but also composed a profile of Walter Alston, a comparison of fathers and sons in the major leagues, a discussion of whether Luke Appling or Joe Cronin was the second-best shortstop of all time, and a look at shortstops in the majors and how their job had changed. This range of articles showing both statistical and historical knowledge was in many ways a precursor to the modern baseball researcher.

Gordon was elected vice chairman of the Twin Cities chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America in 1969 and 1971 and chair in 1972, and in 1974 he was honored as Minnesota Sportswriter of the Year by the National Sportscasters and Sportswriters Association.

His greatest quality was his memory, and the ability to recall long-ago events. “I miss him terribly, but what I most miss is all the information he knew,” son Richards Gordon said of his father. “He had an unbelievable memory.”18 He took this knowledge, added in great detail from his conversations with players and officials, and created well-rounded stories that involved the reader at every step. “Gordo’s game stories were exemplary. He would featurize them – he was ingenious at digging up things,” said Will Shapira.19

During the 1970s Gordon wrote about the possibility of a new stadium for the Vikings and Twins, one of several Minnesota writers who saw the need for the area to develop, and he also wrote about social issues involving sports, including a 1974 story about the implementation of Title IX at the University of Minnesota.20

After retiring in 1976, Gordon wrote special pieces for the Minneapolis Star until 1982 and continued writing for the Highland Villager in St. Paul in his retirement. He never stopped writing, although in his final column for the Villager he wrote, “This column may well be my last contribution to the Villager. Age 96 and 11 months seems an appropriate time to quit hitting – and missing – the keys (as in typewriter, not computer).”21

Adelaide died in January 2007, and after 61 years together Dick obviously missed her. “I hate being alone. I hate it!” he said.22 He lived the last part of his life in an assisted-living center in St. Paul, and died on December 8, 2008, aged 97. He left a large family, and a long legacy of great writing that covered a wide range of Minnesota sports history.

Notes

1 “Charles Richards Gordon,” obituary, Minneapolis Star Tribune, April 19, 2009.

2 Don Boxmeyer, “At age 96, newsman finally stops his own press,” St. Paul Pioneer Press, January 28, 2008.

3 “Bobby Jones Praises Professional Golf For Preventing Rise of False Amateurs,” The Daily Princetonian, September 29, 1930.

4 Charley Walters, “Fans urge contract extension for Minnesota Gophers football coach Tim Brewster,” St. Paul Pioneer Press, October 16, 2008.

5 Dick Gordon, “Long Pacific Win Streak Wrecked by Leathernecks,” The Sporting News, November 12, 1943: 12.

6 Boxmeyer.

7 “Charles Richards Gordon,” obituary, Minneapolis Star Tribune, April 19, 2009.

8 Joe Christensen, “Dick Gordon, longtime Twin Cities sportswriter, dies at 97,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, December 8, 2008.

9 John Brewer, “Twin Cities’ sportswriter was ‘a walking history,’ mentor,” St. Paul Pioneer Press, December 13, 2008.

10 Dick Gordon, “The Second Generation Doesn’t Take First Honors,” Baseball Digest, March 1964, 35.

11 Boxmeyer.

12 Brewer.

13 Boxmeyer.

14 Boxmeyer.

15 Christensen.

16 Seamus O’Coughlin, Squaw Valley Gold: American Hockey’s Olympic Odyssey (Lincoln, Nebraska: iUniverse, 2001).

17 Boxmeyer.

18 Brewer.

19 Brewer.

20 Dick Gordon, “U Plans No Women’s Sports Scholarships,” Minneapolis Star, November 14, 1974.

21 Boxmeyer.

22 Boxmeyer.

With the Twins leading 2-0 in the bottom of the sixth, second baseman Frank Quilici was intentionally walked to bring Mudcat to the plate. Grant drilled a home run to left-center to give the Twins a 5-0 lead. He became just the second American League pitcher to hit a home run in a World Series. Mudcat forced a Game Seven by beating the Dodgers with his pitching and hitting. He went the distance, giving up one run on six hits, striking out five batters and walking none. “I really didn’t know how long I would go,” said Grant. “I just figured I’d go as long as I could for as hard as I could.”1 Mudcat got the Twins to the seventh game, but they fell short against Sandy Koufax, 2-0.

James Timothy Grant was born on August 13, 1935, in Lacoochee, Florida. Lacoochee, then a lumber town, is about 40 miles north of Tampa. He was one of seven children born to James and Viola Grant. Like many of the residents of Lacoochee, James Grant, Sr. worked at the lumber mill, but he died when Mudcat was two and the responsibility fell to Viola to provide for the family. She worked during the day at a citrus canning factory and took in domestic work as well.

Jim was a three-sport star (football, basketball, baseball) at Moore Academy in Dade City, Florida. He also competed on the semipro sandlots for the Lacoochee Nine Devils. Grant was mostly stationed at third base in those days because he had such a strong arm. He earned an athletic scholarship to Florida A&M University to play football and baseball.

Grant left Florida A&M during his sophomore year because of financial constraints on his family. He sought work to help out at home, saying, “Somebody had to start earning money and sacrifice.”2

Grant relocated to New Smyrna Beach, Florida, and found work as a carpenter’s helper while he lived with relatives. It was the keen eye of Cleveland Indians bird-dog scout Fred Merkle that started Grant on his way to life as a professional baseball player. Merkle worked the State Negro Baseball Tournament at Daytona Beach when Grant was a senior in high school, but Grant was only 17, too young to sign a contract. When Merkle heard that Grant had left Florida A&M, he tracked Mudcat down in Daytona Beach to sign him up with Cleveland.

The Indians held their minor-league camp in Daytona Beach and offered Grant a tryout. It was here that his moniker was bestowed upon him. “A guy named Leroy Bartow Irby saw me, decided I was from Mississippi and called me ‘Mudcat,’” recalled Grant. “I didn’t know him very well, and I didn’t pay attention to what he called me. The old Yankee pitcher Red Ruffing was the coach in charge of making the minor-league assignments. He read off names and the fields where the players were to report. The first day I heard him say ‘Mudcat Grant, field number two.’ I thought there was another Grant in camp, that I would be the last one standing there. I wouldn’t hear my name so I would just float around the different diamonds.”3

Grant straightened out the name confusion, but he would forever be known as Mudcat, a nickname that he came to embrace. He left Florida for the first time in his life, traveling to North Dakota to pitch for Cleveland’s Class C affiliate, Fargo-Moorhead of the Northern League. There were many cultural differences between Lacoochee and Fargo, most notably an absence of blacks living in Fargo. Although Fargo was not the segregated South, Grant still found racial bias.

But he didn’t let his new surroundings affect his pitching ability. After losing his first game of the season, Grant won 12 in a row. He was the league’s Rookie Pitcher of the Year, completing the season with a record of 21-5 and an ERA of 3.40. After a brilliant season at Class B Keokuk (Iowa) of the Three I (Illinois-Indiana-Iowa) League in 1955, he landed at Reading of the Class A Eastern League, where he endured his first losing season in pro ball (12-13). That winter Grant played winter ball for the Willard Blues of the Colombian League, where he was voted unanimously as Player of the Year. His record was 9-7 including a no-hitter against Vanytor. Manager Don Heffner also played Grant at second base and the outfield between his starting assignments. Mudcat hit nine home runs to finish second in the league.

Grant was assigned to San Diego of the Pacific Coast League in 1957 and went 18-7 with a spectacular ERA of 2.32 and 178 strikeouts. “I’ve never seen a young pitcher come along as fast as he has,” said San Diego general manager Ralph Kiner. “He wants to learn and is willing to take advice. That is a big point in his favor.” Mudcat directed the credit to Padres pitching coach Vic Lombardi. “When I joined the Padres, Vic Lombardi took me in hand and taught me a lot,” he said. “When I make a mistake out there on the mound, Vic tells me so I won’t repeat it.”

Grant reached the major leagues with the Indians at the start of the 1958 season. Larry Doby was reacquired during the offseason from Baltimore, giving Grant an older black player to lean on, and Doby took him under his wing. “You figured because you made the majors, you now were on equal terms with the other guys. But that wasn’t the case,” said Grant.4 He started the third game of the year, winning his debut 3-2 over Kansas City. He went the distance, striking out five batters. He won two of his next three starts, sporting a 3-0 record with a 1.85 ERA, but leveled off and finished the year at 10-11. He struck out 111 batters, but walked 104. Grant’s lack of control would be a burden during his early years in Cleveland. After Joe Gordon took over as manager when Bobby Bragan was fired, Grant spent as much time relieving as starting. Cleveland finished in fourth place with a record of 77-76, closing out the year winning 13 of its final 18 contests.

Spurred on by such a strong finish, Indians fans greeted the 1959 season with high hopes. The Indians finished second in the AL behind the Go-Go White Sox, and Mudcat finished the year at 10-7 with an ERA of 4.14. Six of his 10 wins came against the Senators (he won all six decisions against Washington and was 11-0 all-time at Griffith Stadium), but he started less frequently than he did in 1958.

The next season was one to forget for Grant. For the second year in a row, he took the hill for 19 starts in 1960, posting a 9-8 record with a 4.40 ERA. He walked 78 batters and struck out 75. On September 5 Grant started in Detroit, pitched seven innings and struck out 10, but lost, 4-3. It was his career high for punchouts; he equaled it three more times.

The 1960 season ended early for Grant, and with a loud thud, the result of an ugly incident. On September 16 the Indians were at home getting ready to play the Kansas City Athletics. Before the game, as the National Anthem was being played, Grant got into an argument with bullpen coach (and Texas resident) Ted Wilks. “I was standing in the bullpen, singing along with the National Anthem as I always do,” Mudcat said. “When it got to that part ‘home of the brave and land of the free’ I sang something like ‘this land is not so free. I can’t even go to Mississippi.’ It was something like that and I sang it in fun. Wilks heard me and called me a (racial) name. I got so mad I couldn’t hold myself back. I told him that Texas is worse than Russia. Then I walked straight into the clubhouse.”5

Grant dressed and left the park without telling manager Jimmy Dykes, who had no idea what had happened. Dykes suspended Grant for the rest of the season without pay, which Grant accepted. “Jim called me after the game and told me he had made a big mistake,” said Dykes. “I said, ‘Yes you did and there’s nothing I can do about it now. The suspension sticks.’” Wilks apologized for his remarks, which Grant refused to acknowledge. “I’m sick of hearing remarks about colored people. I don’t have to stand there and take it,” said Grant.6 Wilks left the organization after the season.

With Dykes in charge, Grant finally found some stability in his career in 1961. Rather than shuttling him between the starting rotation and the bullpen, Dykes used Grant exclusively as a starter. Mudcat started 35 games and responded with his best season to date, leading the team in wins (15), complete games (11), innings  pitched (244⅔), and shutouts (3), and was second in strikeouts (146). He won six straight starts from May 15 to June 7. “I figured this was my fourth year with the team and if I was going to have a good season, this should be it,” he said. “When did I realize that I had won a steady job? I still haven’t come to the point of saying to myself ‘I’m a starting pitcher.’ We fellows who are starting now can take nothing for granted. Some of those fellows in the bullpen can replace us.”7

“Grant is an entirely different pitcher now,” said his former manager, Joe Gordon, who managed Kansas City in 1961. “He concentrates on every pitch. He had to grow up. But not everybody grows up as fast as Mud did. Some of them have to reach 27 or so. What’s Grant, 25?”8

Just when things were going Grant’s way, he was told to report to active duty in the US Army on November 2, 1961. Grant reported for a year of duty at Fort Belvoir, Virginia, where he pitched for and managed the base’s team. Grant was able to pitch on weekends with the Indians. He received a 30-day furlough and beat the Yankees, 7-1, on May 11, but developed a sore arm during that period. Grant was discharged from the Army early and rejoined the Indians for good in mid-July. He managed two 10-strikeout efforts in September, one a loss to Baltimore, the other a win against Los Angeles. He finished the season with a 7-10 record and a 4.27 ERA.

For the Indians, 1963 was a long season as they finished in fourth place, 25½  games behind New York. Mudcat finished with a record of 13-14 and an ERA of 3.69. He achieved his career high in strikeouts with 157, walked 87 and pitched 10 complete games.

For several offseasons, Grant had worked in the Indians ticket office. Now he was part of the Community Relations team, and he was in demand to speak at churches, businesses, and colleges. He made more than 100 public appearances in the offseason between 1963 and ’64. He also started a nightclub act, “Mudcat and the Kittens.” Grant, who was an accomplished singer with a voice he described as “somewhere between a baritone and a tenor,” fronted the group, which played in jazz clubs all over Cleveland and once appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.

A bright spot for Jim and his wife, Lucile, known by most as Tiny, was the birth of their first son, James Timothy III. They later adopted another son, Rusty.

After getting got off to a rocky start in 1964, Grant found himself shipped to Minnesota for pitcher Lee Stange and infielder George Banks on June 15. “I’m sure this trade will help both ballclubs,” said Minnesota manager Sam Mele. “Grant is a good all-around man and we’ll use him as a starter. He’s been having his troubles and we hope he can straighten himself out.”9 Turn it around he did. With the Twins, Mudcat posted a record of 11-9 with a 2.82 ERA. He struck out more than twice as many as he walked and threw 10 complete games. He started July on a four-game winning streak, lowering his ERA from 3.86 to 2.62. The Indians and Twins finished the year with identical 79-83 records, 20 games off the pace.

In 1965 the Twins were embarking on their fifth season since relocating from Washington, and everything came together for them as they made their first appearance in the World Series. Trailing Cleveland by a half-game on June 30, the Twins went on a 22-9 run in July and never looked back, finishing with a record of 102-60, seven games ahead of Chicago.

Grant enjoyed his best season in the majors. His name was all over the AL statistical leader board at the end of the season as he led the league in wins (21) and shutouts (six), was second in complete games (14), and third in innings pitched (270⅓). He pitched in the All-Star Game on July 13 at Metropolitan Stadium. (Grant was on the 1963 squad but didn’t pitch.) The only downside was that Grant led the league with 34 home runs allowed. He was the leader of a pennant-winning staff in which no starter had an ERA over 3.50 (Grant 21-7, 3.30 ERA, Jim Kaat 18-11, 2.83, Jim Perry 12-7, 2.63, Camilo Pascual 9-3, 3.35). Mudcat was named The Sporting News American League Pitcher of the Year, and was the first black pitcher in the American League to win 20 games in a season, as well as the first black AL pitcher to win a game in the World Series.

What was the cause of Mudcat’s fine season? He claimed that he was the same pitcher in Minnesota as he had been in Cleveland, except that the Twins had the potential to score more runs to back him. But Mudcat also was quick to give credit to his new pitching coach, Johnny Sain. Sain, a great pitcher with the Boston Braves, taught Grant a new pitch. “It’s a fast curve,” said Grant. “Johnny Sain is teaching it to several of the guys. I’ve never had a real good fast curve before. I’ve always had a good fastball, a change of pace and a slow curve. They said I needed to change speeds. I’ve always been able to change off my fastball, throw a straight slow ball up there. But until this year, I never thought in terms of spinning the ball. That’s where Sain helped me.” Grant’s former batterymate in Cleveland, John Romano, noticed the difference, saying, “This isn’t the same Grant that I used to catch. He never had a curve when I caught him.”10

In 1966 the Twins were enthusiastic as they reported to spring training at Tinker Field in Orlando. Grant initially held out for a bigger contract, but eventually signed and reported to camp. He started the season poorly, posting a 5-12 record at the All-Star break with an ERA of 3.28. “Last year I pitched well enough in tough games until the late innings,” Mudcat said. “Then a lot of times our guys would come along and score. This year I’ve been pitching well until late innings and losing. I haven’t pitched as bad as my 5-12 record in the first half indicated. But maybe I can make it better by pitching better. I’m going to try.”11

After meeting with Mele and Sain at the break, Grant did turn himself around, going 8-1 the rest of the way. Despite his turnaround and Kaat’s 25 wins, the Twins could not catch Baltimore for the pennant. Kaat, who won the Gold Glove for a fifth time, said, “I’ve always had the reputation as a good fielder, but I think it’s a lot of publicity. I got a couple of Gold Glove Awards as the best-fielding pitcher in the major leagues, but in my mind, the award should go to Mudcat Grant, who is a much better fielder then I am.”12

It should have been an omen to Grant when he started the 1967 season on the shelf. He was struck in the forearm during the last week of spring training, and missed the first two weeks of the season. Mele had fired Sain at the end of the 1966 season, and he himself was let go when the Twins got out of the gate playing at .500. Cal Ermer, who was the skipper at Triple-A Denver, took over the reins. Many of the current Twins had come through the minors under Ermer’s watch and supported the change. Due in part to injury, Grant made only 14 starts, and did much of his work out of the pen. He finished with a 5-6 record and a 4.72 ERA. The Twins narrowly lost the pennant in a final-weekend showdown with the Red Sox.

Because of Ermer’s erratic use of Grant and his injuries, Grant was looking for a fresh start and an exit from Minnesota. He got his wish when he and shortstop Zoilo Versalles were shipped to Los Angeles for catcher John Roseboro and pitchers Ron Perranoski and Bob Miller. Grant was elated to be joining the Dodgers. “During last season I felt so terrible, I couldn’t be happy,” remarked the right-hander. “It was a problem between the Minnesota manager and management and myself. Some of it was racial, too. They made me feel as though I wasn’t even a man. I’d pitched only 95 innings and it isn’t because of my knees, either. I have lived with the knee trouble for years. But I told them I couldn’t remain with them and wanted to be traded.”13 Dodgers manager Walter Alston used Grant out of the bullpen. Indeed, he made only four starts in 37 appearances, going 6-4 with a 2.08 ERA. “I tell you, he’s working his tail off for us,” said Alston.14

Before the 1969 season, Grant was selected by the Montreal Expos in the expansion draft. He made 10 starts with a record of 1-6 before being dealt to St. Louis for pitcher Gary Waslewski on June 3. Pitching in long relief, Grant went 7-5 for the Cardinals. At the end of the year, St. Louis sold Grant to Oakland. Pitching exclusively out of the bullpen, the 34-year-old Grant showed he had plenty left in the tank as he had 24 saves, a 6-2 record, and a sparkling 1.83 ERA. From May 17 to June 16, Grant pitched 28 innings  and allowed one earned run, lowering his ERA to a minuscule 0.79. Oakland sold Grant to Pittsburgh in mid-September. He pitched in eight games, all in relief, for the Pirates.

The 1971 season was Grant’s last. He started the season in Pittsburgh but was sold back to Oakland on August 10. He saved 10 games for the two teams. Grant appeared in the League Championship Series against Baltimore and pitched two scoreless innings in Game Three. Released after the season, he was unable to make the Indians out of spring training in 1972 and pitched in 49 games with the Iowa Oaks of the American Association before retiring.

In retirement, Grant tried his hand at many jobs in and out of baseball. He worked in the Indians community relations office and was the analyst on Indians TV broadcasts. He later worked on broadcasts for the Athletics. At the request of Hank Aaron, the Atlanta Braves’ director of player personnel, Grant was a pitching coach for the Durham Bulls of the Class A Carolina League in the mid-1980s.

Grant later worked for an Anheuser-Busch distributor and for Nationwide Advertising in Cleveland, and was the spokesman for many sponsors. He wrote a book in 2005 called The 12 Black Aces, which detailed the lives of 12 black major-league pitchers who had won 20 games in a season.

Grant moved to Los Angeles, where he became a community activist and public speaker. As the number of black players has dwindled in the major leagues, Grant worked to counter the downward trend. Part of the problem, he said, is that former major leaguers need to take the responsibility to spread the word about baseball. “We just gotta motivate them to play and we’ve got to be around,” Grant said in 2008. “We haven’t been around enough. Now, part of that is the African-American ex-players’ fault, too, because we haven’t been there. Even though we see tons of children, we haven’t been in the inner city like we should.”15 Grant may have had something to do with that very issue right within his own family. His nephew, Domonic Brown, was drafted by the Phillies in the 20th round in 2006 and made his big-league debut in 2010 for the Phillies.

Postscript

Grant died at the age of 85 on June 11, 2021, in Los Angeles.

Sources

Pluto, Terry, The Curse of Rocky Colavito (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1994).

Thielman, Jim, The Cool of the Evening (Minneapolis: Kirk House Publishing, 2005).

The Sporting News

Sports Illustrated

Baseball Digest

National Baseball Hall of Fame Archives

minors.sabrwebs.com/cgi-bin/index.php

retrosheet.org

sabr.org

Notes

1 Article, publication unknown, in Grant’s file at the Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York.

2 Ibid.

3 Terry Pluto, The Curse of Rocky Colavito, 66-67.

4 Pluto, 68.

5 Cleveland Plain Dealer, September 18, 1960

6 Ibid.

7 Baseball Digest, August 1961, 5-7.

8 Ibid.

9 Cleveland Plain Dealer, June 16, 1964.

10 Jim Thielman, The Cool of the Evening, 55.

11 The Sporting News, July 30, 1965, 9.

12 The Sporting News, October 23, 1966, 14.

13 Los Angeles Times, March 9, 1968.

14 Sports Illustrated, April 28, 1968.

15 Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 15, 2008.

Calvin Griffith was born Calvin Robertson on December 1, 1911, in Montreal, Quebec. Calvin was the second child of seven children born to Jane Davies and James Robertson, who married in 1908. His family included an older sister, Mildred (who later would marry Washington shortstop Joe Cronin), a younger sister, Thelma (who would marry Washington pitcher Joe Haynes), and younger brothers Bruce, Sherrod, Jimmy, and Billy. Jimmy and Billy were twins born in 1921. By that time the situation with his family had become a struggle due to James’s alcoholism, which eventually would cut his life short in 1923 at the age of 42.

In the summer of 1922 the family was visited by James’ sister Addie Robertson Griffith, wife of Clark Griffith, the owner of the Washington Senators. It was soon decided that Calvin (age 11) and his younger sister Thelma (age 9) would return to Washington, and move in with the Griffiths, who had no children of their own. From this point on Calvin and his sister were raised as members of the Griffith family. Upon the death of Calvin’s father a year later, the rest of the Robertson family moved to Washington. Although Calvin and Thelma were never formally adopted, they did have their names legally changed – in Calvin’s case from Calvin Griffith Robertson to Calvin Robertson Griffith.

Calvin began his involvement with baseball as the Washington batboy in 1922. This role continued through a world championship season of 1924 and the American League championship season of 1925. In 1928 the 16-year-old entered Staunton Military Academy, graduating in 1933. After Staunton, Griffith attended George Washington University for two years. During his time at Staunton and George Washington, he played baseball as a pitcher and catcher.

In the spring of 1935, Griffith left George Washington and went to work for Washington’s Chattanooga farm club as secretary-treasurer, and in 1937 he took over as head man. With the team struggling in mid-season, Clark fired the manager and enlarged Calvin’s duties to include field manager. In 1938 the elder Griffith moved Calvin to the same all-inclusive post with their affiliate in Charlotte. In 1941 Clark called Calvin back to Washington to take over a newly opened position with the big league club as assistant secretary, head of concessions.

Over the next 14 years, Calvin took over more and more of the responsibilities of his uncle. Specifically he began attending league meetings in place of Clark, along with taking charge of making player trades and negotiating contracts with media outlets.

Clark Griffith died on October 27, 1955, and on November 1, at age 43, Calvin was elected president of the Washington Nationals. In the reorganization, brother-in-law Joe Haynes was named roving minor league pitching instructor; brother Sherry Robertson became assistant farm director; brother Billy Robertson assumed the position of supervisor of Griffith Stadium personnel and maintenance; and brother Jimmy Robertson remained as director of concessions. Calvin and his sister Thelma had inherited 52 perecent of the Nationals’ essentially debt-free franchise. The ballclub and the stadium were valued at approximately $4 million.

By 1955 the Washington franchise had suffered through years of poor performance and attendance. Rumors of offers from Louisville, Los Angeles, and Minnesota’s Twin Cities were confirmed by Griffith in the authorized biography written by Jon Kerr in 1990. But political difficulties in moving a franchise out of the nation’s capital likely led to the delay in any transfer of the Senators. An article in the January 15, 1958 Washington Post, bylined by Griffith, said: “I have lived in Washington, D.C., for about 35 years. I attended school here and established many roots here. The city has been good to my family and me. This is my home. I intend that it shall remain my home for the rest of my life. As long as I have any say in the matter, and I expect that I shall for a long, long time, the Washington Senators will stay here, too. Next year. The year after that. Forever.”1

Later that year, a Shirley Povich article in Baseball Digest detailed Griffith’s testimony before the US Senate’s Anti-Trust Committee. There Griffith tried to backpedal, explaining that what he had said in the Post did not mean that he would stay should the club no longer be able to financially function in Washington.2

With many large cities clamoring for major league baseball and baseball dragging its heels on expansion, in 1959 a New York lawyer named William Shea championed the creation of a new eight-team major league. Shea was largely interested in replacing the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants, who had departed for the West Coast in 1957. The threat of Shea’s Continental League sparked further talks by the American and National Leagues regarding expansion. Part of this discussion included consideration of the Minneapolis-St. Paul area as an expansion site, or alternatively, as a site for relocation of Griffith’s Washington franchise. Griffith had been promised a guaranteed annual attendance of 750,000 and an estimated $430,000 media contract by the Twin Cities delegation. Part of a possible expansion plan included the addition of a new team in the nation’s capital, as Griffith’s possible relocation of the Senators was being challenged in the courts at the time by minority owner H. Gabriel Murphy.

The next year expansion finally became a reality. The National League voted at a meeting on October 17, 1960, to expand to New York and Houston, with those teams beginning operation for the 1962 season. In a meeting on October 26, the American League voted to expand to 10 teams for the following season (1961). Calvin Griffith would be allowed to move his franchise to Minnesota, with a new American League franchise replacing his in Washington.

The Senators were greeted warmly in Minnesota. Ticket orders rolled in for the opening of the 1961 season. Minneapolis sportswriter Sid Hartman probably put it best:

The Senators became the Minnesota Twins, moved into Met Stadium, took over the concessions business, and there were relatives all over the place: Joe Haynes, Thelma Haynes, Sherry Robertson, Billy Robertson, Jimmy Robertson. You didn’t know who was in charge of what. Your reaction was, “What is this? We didn’t get a ballclub. We got a family.” It was like being around the Beverly Hillbillies.

And then there was this guy Howard Fox. He wasn’t a relative, but he was the guy hanging out at Woodhill and Wayzata Country Clubs with Calvin. We wondered, “How does Fox fit it?”

…

It was an odd organization, but who cared? It was terrific to have major league baseball. The Upper Midwest went crazy, sending buses throughout the summer from every little town in Minnesota, the Dakotas, Iowa, Nebraska, and even Montana.3

The Twins were very successful at the gate from the beginning. From 1961 though the 1970 season Minnesota topped one million in attendance each year, including totals of over 1.4 million in four of those years: 1962, 1963, 1965, and 1967. The team also showed dramatic improvement on the field. With last-place finishes in four of their last six seasons in Washington, the Twins started with a seventh-place finish in 1961 (in the expanded 10-team American League), jumping to second in 1962 and third in 1963. After a sub-par 1964 season, the Twins won the American League pennant in 1965 and came close in 1967.

Much of the improvement was due to quality players that were signed and developed in the Senators/Twins farm system, most notably Hall of Famer Harmon Killebrew, outfielders Bob Allison, Jimmie Hall, and three-time batting champion Tony Oliva, shortstop and 1965 MVP Zoilo Versalles, and pitchers Camilo Pascual and Jim Kaat – all important members of the 1965 pennant-winning ballclub. By the end of the decade the system had also produced future Hall of Famers Rod Carew and Bert Blyleven.

Calvin was not above interjecting his opinions or directives when it came to his managers. Most fortunately, he insisted that Sam Mele stick with rookie Rod Carew during the 1967 season, when Carew was making the jump from playing Single-A ball in 1966.

In the mid-1960s, Griffith’s son, Clark II, joined the organization. Joe Haynes passed away in 1967 due to a heart attack at age 49; Sherry Robertson died due to injuries suffered in an automobile crash in Houghton, South Dakota, in 1970 at the age of 51. George Brophy took over as farm director for Sherry Robertson, and Howard Fox became even closer to Griffith as a confidant/advisor.

By the end of the 1968 season, Griffith had been though three managers in Minnesota. Cookie Lavagetto, the holdover from Washington, was dismissed during the 1961 season and replaced by coach Sam Mele. Griffith let Mele go early in the 1967 season and replaced him with coach Cal Ermer, who lasted through 1968. After letting Ermer go, Griffith appointed Billy Martin as manager on October 11, 1968. Billy had played for the Twins in 1961, his final season. In 1965 the Twins brought Martin back to the major league club as third base coach—a position he held through the 1967 season. In 1968 Billy was sent to the Twins’ Triple-A affiliate in Denver to manage the team, clearly grooming him for the top job.

Billy’s tenure as a coach with the Twins had been controversial—most notably his physical altercation with traveling secretary Howard Fox in 1966, which had begun on a charter flight and carried over into the hotel. The two publicly made peace, but Fox would continue to dislike Martin. Another notable altercation occurred during the 1969 season when Martin fought with his own pitcher, Dave Boswell, outside a bar on August 7. This latter event did not please Griffith, who said he had warned Martin against going to the same establishments as his players before he was hired as manager. Griffith did, however, support Martin’s fine of Boswell for the incident.

The Twins won the AL West that season, the first year of divisional play, and played a best-of-five playoff series against the AL East champion Baltimore Orioles. The Orioles won the first two games in Baltimore by one run each and then beat the Twins at home 11-2. In the third game, Billy had chosen to start Bob Miller over Jim Kaat, a decision that angered Griffith.

According to Tom Mee, the Twins’ public-relations director, the decision to fire Martin came at a meeting during the World Series in New York City on October 13. Everyone in the assembled group of six was asked to express his opinion about whether or not Martin, who had finished his one-year contract, should be rehired. Everyone spoke against Martin until it got to Mee. According to Mee, the “pro-Billy” people were not there–Sherry Robertson, in particular–and only Mee ended up speaking up in favor of Martin. After everyone had spoken Howard Fox called the question, saying, “Well, what are you going to do?” to Griffith, who responded, “I’m gonna fire his ass.”4

The firing was very unpopular with fans and the media. Don Riley wrote in the St. Paul Pioneer Press the day before the firing:

Just remember what I told you. Griffith may not be popular with the masses but I don’t believe he’s stupid. If he didn’t rehire Martin, he leaves himself open to the biggest fan revolt since Gopher [University of Minnesota] fans learned there are football fields where you can see the game for five bucks.5

And in his column the day after:

Griffith couldn’t have done a more dastardly work of unpopularity if he turned down a reprieve for Joan of Arc – or got caught drilling holes in Washington’s rowboat.6

Arno Goethel, the Twins’ beat writer for the St. Paul Pioneer Press, added an analysis of the situation a couple days later. All the sources of conflict were mentioned: Martin’s temperament, the Howard Fox conflict, Griffith’s second-guessing of Billy’s managerial style, the fact that Billy did not have complete control over the make-up of his coaching staff, and that Martin couldn’t tolerate the nature of the Twins charter flights, which frequently included relatives and associates of Twins front office personnel. According to Tom Mee, the organization never fully recovered from the firing of Billy Martin as it moved into the 1970s.7

As Griffith searched for a replacement for Martin, he uttered one of his more memorable quotes: “I can’t tell you what I intend to do, but I can tell you one thing; it won’t be anything rational.”8 Griffith eventually hired Bill Rigney, and in 1970 the Twins again won AL West. Once again they lost the American League Championship Series in three straight games to the Orioles. This was to be the Twins’ last championship under Griffith’s ownership. Rigney survived as manager until 1972, when he was replaced in mid-season by Frank Quilici.

Aging stars combined with lack of replacements led to the Twins failures of the early 1970s. As the decade wore on, the change in baseball’s reserve system led to further problems for Griffith. He had been brought up in the Senators organization learning from his uncle that a baseball team was operated with a bottom line, and was concerned with making a profit, not spending money that the team didn’t have. Avoiding debt and interest payments were always paramount in his management philosophy.

After 1970 the team drew over a million fans only twice (1977 and 1979) at Metropolitan Stadium. These lower attendance figures meant less revenue for salaries, which Griffith already considered too high for mere ballplayers. Griffith reacted to the new baseball economics by futilely resisting changes brought on by salary arbitration, player agents, free agency, and the increasing importance of television revenue, which gave an advantage to teams in larger markets. As time moved on, Griffith was considered a “dinosaur” or a “vestige of yesterday” relative to the new baseball owners of the late 1970s.

On the personal side, in 1974 Griffith separated from his wife and moved out of his Lake Minnetonka home. Griffith had married Natalie Morris of Charlotte, North Carolina, in 1940; the couple had three children: Clark, Corinne, and Claire. The two never did reconcile or divorce.

On Thursday, September 28, 1978, Griffith accepted an invitation to travel south to the rural town of Waseca, Minnesota, to play golf that afternoon with his friend, sportswriter Tony Sybilrud, and speak to the Waseca Lions Club that evening. Coincidentally, Minneapolis Tribune staff writer Nick Coleman was also in attendance that night. Coleman was not there to cover the event (Coleman lived in Rochester, Minnesota, and covered southern Minnesota for the paper) but attended as a guest of his father-in-law. It was later said that during the introduction of the audience Coleman identified himself by name only and not by vocation.

Griffith’s remarks turned into a question and answer format. Griffith began to make comments about specific players and about race in general. Coleman later said, “I was wincing the whole time thinking, ‘you don’t want to say that.’”9 Coleman was not there with a tape recorder or anything with which to write, so when he returned from the meeting he wrote everything down from memory. The next day he called his editors to ask if they wanted him to write a story based on what he had heard. They called back and said yes, and that it would run in the Sunday paper.

In the most damaging part of the article, Coleman detailed:

At that point, Griffith interrupted himself, lowered his voice and asked if there were any blacks around. After he looked around the room and assured himself that his audience was white, Griffith resumed his answer.

“I’ll tell you why we came to Minnesota,” he said. “It was when I found out you only had 15,000 blacks here. Black people don’t go to ball games, but they’ll fill up a rassling ring and put up such a chant it’ll scare you to death. It’s unbelievable. We came here because you’ve got good, hardworking, white people here.”10

A few of the comments were specifically about Griffith’s star first baseman, Rod Carew. Griffith’s comments are believed to have underlined his dislike for agents and multi-year player contracts but clearly also impugned Carew’s intelligence:

Carew was a damn fool to sign that contract. He only gets $170,000 and we all know damn well that he’s worth a lot more than that, but that’s what his agent asked for, that’s what he gets. Last year, I thought I was generous and gave him an extra 100 grand, but this year I’m not making any money so he gets 170 – that’s it.11

This comment, and the comments that Griffith made about blacks, led to Carew’s public response in the papers a couple of days later, which also happened to be his thirty-third birthday:

I will not ever sign another contract with this organization. I don’t care how much money or how many options Calvin Griffith offers me. I definitely will not be back next year.

I will not come back and play for a bigot. I’m not going to be another nigger on his plantation.

How does he expect these players to respect the thing that’s across their chest – Twins – when it’s coming right from the top that he doesn’t care about the players?

He respects nobody and expects nobody to respect him. Spit on Calvin Griffith.12

Prior to the 1979 season, at the end of which Carew would be a free agent, Griffith traded him to the California Angels for four players. Time, however, softened Carew’s feelings for Griffith. In Bob Shower’s book, The Twins at the Met, Carew is included as one of the narrators. He praised Griffith for sticking with him early in his career. Recalling his Hall of Fame election, Carew also said:

When I first got the news that I was going into the Hall of Fame, he was the first person I called. It was 3 o’clock in the morning for him in Helena, Montana, and I woke him up. I called him before my mom because I owed him that much respect.13

From Griffith’s perspective the comments from the meeting were blown out of proportion and misunderstood. Also from his perspective, comments made in a Lions Club meeting were meant to stay within the walls of the Lions Club meeting. It also had been reported that Griffith had had “a few” drinks over the course of the afternoon and evening.

The Waseca talk haunted Griffith the rest of his life. Personally, I have been working in Waseca the past three years, and it appears that even the most marginal baseball fan is aware of the story. Few obituaries for Griffith in 1999 were run without mention of the Waseca talk as the low point in Griffith’s career, and his life.

In the latter years of the Griffith-owned franchise much was made of the rift that existed between Calvin and his son, Clark II. Disagreements that may have germinated when Clark did not consent to an apprenticeship in the minor leagues, as his father had done, led to the elder Griffith gradually losing trust in his son’s judgment. These disagreements manifested themselves in the organization’s response to the changing nature of the business: free agency, advertising, and negotiations between the players’ union and the representatives of management, in which Clark II played a significant role. Calvin described his relationship with Clark in a curious comment: “This is a very close-knit family. I imagine you talked to Clark yesterday, and I imagine he may have told you that we don’t talk.”14 The addition of Thelma’s son Bruce Haynes to the executive mix further complicated the question of who would eventually inherit ultimate decision-making power after Calvin finally stepped down as president.

Beginning in the early 1970s, fueled by the Minnesota Vikings’ desire to have a stadium with more capacity that could shelter the team from brutal Minnesota fall and winter weather, talks began regarding a new domed facility for Minnesota sports teams. By 1975, the year that the Twins’ and Vikings’ leases were set to expire at Metropolitan Stadium, negotiations began in earnest.

Eventually funding for the domed stadium in Minneapolis’s Industry Square location on the east side of downtown made its way through the Minnesota legislature. In July of 1979 the lease agreement was worked out with the Vikings. The Twins, on the other hand, had been sending Clark Griffith II, Bruce Haynes, and lawyer Peter Dorsey to the lease meetings with no results. Eventually Calvin entered into the lease negotiations, landing some favorable clauses for the club:

1. The Twins would get 30 percent of the stadium’s gross concession receipts up to an attendance of 1.4 million. After that they would receive 20 percent. In contrast, the Viking’s lease was for 10 percent.
2. The lease contained an escape clause which allowed the team to be released from the contract if attendance fell below an average of 1.4 million for three successive years or if the team experienced net operating losses in three successive years.
3. If the team could produce evidence of lack of attendance due to summer heat (the architects felt that the Metrodome, being mostly underground, would make air conditioning unnecessary), then the Twins were not bound to play in the Metrodome if the commission did not install air conditioning.
4. The Twins would pay no more than $700,000 of the $1.7 million needed to build the team new offices in the Metrodome.

In 1982 the Twins moved into the Metrodome after experiencing a dismal strike-shortened 1981, both at the gate and on the field. In response Griffith unloaded five high salaried veterans—a couple of whom had just been signed to large multi-year contracts by Clark—and instead relied on a group of young, untested rookies (including Kent Hrbek, Gary Gaetti, and Tom Brunansky). The season rivaled 1981 for results: the Twins went 60-102 and drew less than a million fans—this in their first season in a new stadium. The next season the Twins’ record improved to 70-92 but attendance slipped further to 858,939. The Twins were poised to test the three-year escape clause Calvin had negotiated.

Perhaps the most serious threat of relocation was to Tampa Bay. In 1983, Earle Halstead Jr., retired publisher of The Baseball Blue Book, took a potential ownership group from Tampa Bay to visit Calvin in Winter Park, Florida, during spring training. The group purchased the 41 percent of the Twins owned by H. Gabriel Murphy. Their plan was then to go after Calvin or Thelma’s ownership in the Twins and offer Calvin an opportunity to continue to run the team. The move to Tampa Bay was to take place for the 1986 season. Calvin denied that any deal had been struck and further added that if anyone was going to move the team to Florida, it would be him.15

As the 1984 season proceeded, it appeared obvious that the Twins would not draw the 2.4 million fans required to bind the team to the Metrodome lease, and the community began to worry. Local businessman Harvey Mackay organized a ticket buyout that would eliminate the escape clause and force Calvin to sell to a local buyer. Calvin claimed that this attempt, in the end, was in vain, as he could still have shown net operating losses over the three seasons at the Metrodome.

Griffith contended he felt a loyalty toward Minnesota and in the end sold the club to local businessman Carl Pohlad for a price of $32 million in payments and salaries over a period of 20 years. Calvin thought Pohlad was also buying his management team, but few were held over from the Griffith ownership. After the sale Griffith had an office in the Metrodome but was never involved in any decisions. But in the end, Griffith had not only brought major league baseball to Minnesota but also allowed it to stay there.

Three years later, when the Twins won their first World Series, it was with a core of players from the 1982 team. Both 1982 and 1987 rosters included Kent Hrbek, Gary Gaetti, Tom Brunansky, Tim Laudner, Frank Viola, and Randy Bush. Twins farmhands Kirby Puckett, Greg Gagne, Gene Larkin, and Mark Davidson also played key roles on the 1987 World Champions. The new management had also reacquired former Griffith-era stars Bert Blyleven and Roy Smalley.

Griffith died October 20, 1999, at the age of 87 due to a kidney infection, 15 years after he had sold his interest in the ballclub that was his life. He is buried outside Washington, D.C.

An updated version of this biography appeared in “A Pennant for the Twin Cities: The 1965 Minnesota Twins” (SABR, 2015), edited by Gregory H. Wolf.

Sources

Books

Andelman, Bob. Stadium for Rent: Tampa Bay’s Quest for Major League Baseball (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 1993).

Anderson, David (editor). Quotations from Chairman Calvin (Stillwater, Minnesota: Brick Alley Books Press, 1984).

Baseball Guide and Record Book. St. Louis, Missouri: Charles Spink & Son, 1960.

Brackin, Dennis and Patrick Reusse. Minnesota Twins: The Complete Illustrated History. Minneapolis, Minnesota: MVP Books, 2010.

Grow, Doug. We’re Gonna Win Twins! (Minneapolis, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 2010).

Hartman, Sid with Patrick Reusse. Sid! (Stillwater, Minnesota: Voyager Press, Inc. 1997).

Johnson, Charles. The Story of How Minnesota Got Major League Baseball (Greater Minneapolis, December, 1960), 11-13.

Kerr, Jon. Calvin, Baseball’s Last Dinosaur: An Authorized Biography (William C. Brown Publishers, 1990).

Klobuchar, Amy. Uncovering the Dome (Minneapolis, Minnesota: Bolger Publications, 1982).

Leavengood, Ted. Clark Griffith: The Old Fox of Washington Baseball (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland and Company, Inc., 2011).

McCarthy, Kevin. Baseball in Florida (Pineapple Press, Inc., 1996).

McKenna, Brian. Clark Griffith: Baseball Statesman (Lulu Press, 2010).

Minnesota Twins Media Guides, 1961 – 1988.

Thornley, Stew. Baseball in Minnesota: The Definitive History (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2006).

Periodicals

Coleman, Nick. “Griffith Spares Few Targets in Waseca Remarks.” Minneapolis Tribune, October 1, 1978.

Goethel, Arno. “Martin Showed Foresight When Named Twins’ Pilot.” St. Paul Pioneer Press, October 14, 1969.

Goethel, Arno. “Why Did Cal Bounce Billy?” St. Paul Pioneer Press, October 15, 1969.

Griffith, Calvin R. “Griffith Not Happy with Armory Stadium Site.” Washington Post, January 17, 1958.

“Griffith Nixes Report He’ll Sell Twins to Tampa Bay Group.” Sarasota Herald-Tribune. July 2, 1983.

Kahan, Oscar. “Boss of Twins Bombarded by Advance Ticket Orders.” The Sporting News, January 11, 1961, 9.

Lenehan, Michael. “The Last Pure Men of Baseball.” Atlantic Monthly, August, 1981.

Libman, Gary. “Angry Twins beat K.C. in 11.” Minneapolis Tribune, October 2, 1978.

Libman, Gary. “Angry Carew vows he will not play for Griffith’s Twins again.” Minneapolis Tribune, October 2, 1978.

“Minneapolis: Big-League Town in Waiting.” Sport. December, 1959.

Osterman, Jordan. “Griffith’s Gaffe.” Waseca County News, July 5, 2011.

Povich, Shirley. “Cal Griffith Tries to Explain.” Baseball Digest, September, 1958, 51-52.

Riley, Don. “Sports Eye Opener.” St. Paul Pioneer Press, October 13, 1969.

Riley, Don. “Sports Eye Opener.” St. Paul Pioneer Press, October 14, 1969.

Ringolsby, Tracy. “Sport Interview: Calvin Griffith.” Sport. April, 1984.

Showers, Bob. The Twins at the Met (Beaver’s Pond Press, 2009).

Sinker, Howard. “Griffith: Talk Misunderstood.” Minneapolis Tribune, October 2, 1978.

Smith, Gary. “A Lingering Vestige of Yesterday.” Sports Illustrated, April 4, 1983.

Washington Post. “Clark Griffith Brings Home 5 More Children to Adopt.” November 24, 1925.

Interviews

Griffith, Clark II. Interview with author, September 6, 2011.

Mee, Tom. Interview with author, September 7, 2011.

Notes