Danny Darwin

One of Danny Darwin’s fondest memories of his post-playing coaching career was when minor-leaguers Googled his name. “One time,” Darwin recalled, “a kid goes, ‘you lost 180 games.’” Darwin replied, “You know how long it took me to lose 180?” Another player said, “You gave up 3,000 hits.”1 Darwin snapped back, “Don’t you wanna give up 3,000 hits?”2 Before he was a name on Baseball-Reference, Darwin was a right-handed workhorse pitcher who logged over 3,000 innings for nine different teams in his 21-year career. He did it with the same confidence he had with his minor-league pupils. Known for never backing down, throwing inside, and staring down any batter who dared a glance back, Darwin was called The Bonham Bullet and Dr. Death, nicknames that barely matched his intensity.

Danny Wayne Darwin was born on October 25, 1955, in Bonham, Texas, to Robert Wayne Darwin and Ann Yvonne (Pearson) Darwin. Robert was a blue-collar worker whom Darwin described as “a very competitive person. Didn’t matter what he did. If he was the guy that was gonna mow your yard, it was gonna look better than the other guys.” Danny and his two younger brothers, Kevin and Jeff, got their love of sports from their father. “We were always competitive. He always was the person that – if you got three hits, why didn’t you get four? If you struck out seven, why didn’t you strike out eight?”3

While Danny became the best-known of the Darwin brothers, he was the only one who didn’t get drafted into Major League Baseball. His youngest brother, Jeff, was drafted by the Seattle Mariners and pitched in the big leagues for three seasons in the 1990s, split between Seattle and the Chicago White Sox. Darwin said, “Actually my middle brother [Kevin] was probably the best athlete. He was a good first baseman, good pitcher, played college ball.” But shoulder trouble derailed his path, so Kevin, who was drafted by Texas in 1982, “ended up becoming a great coach…in education his whole life.”

Darwin attended Bonham High School, where he pitched before graduating in 1974. “I wasn’t good enough to get a scholarship out of high school,” he said. “So, a good friend of mine talked me into trying out at a college.” He made the team at Grayson Community College in Denison, Texas. After a disappointing first season, Darwin considered quitting. With the encouragement of a coach, he stuck it out, and in his second year, he took off. Darwin broke several Grayson records and was named All-Region, All-Conference, and honorable mention All-American. Darwin also threw two no-hitters, including one when nearly 30 major league scouts were in attendance.4 “I don’t know what it was,” Darwin said. “I just blossomed into a kid that grew three inches and gained 30 pounds.”5

Darwin caught the eye of the Boston Red Sox, but he chose a lower offer to play with his home area club, the Texas Rangers. Rangers scout Joe Klein signed Darwin for $35,000 (plus $7,500 to finish college)6 on May 10, 1976. Texas assigned Darwin to the Class-A Asheville Tourists of the Western Carolinas League for his first taste of pro ball. As a 20-year-old, roughly a year younger than the league average, Darwin was solid out of the gate, posting a 3.62 ERA over 16 starts and a 1.41 WHIP. In 1977, the Rangers promoted Darwin to the Double-A Tulsa Drillers of the Texas League. He led the team in wins (13), ERA (2.51), and strikeouts (129) over 154 innings pitched.

In the minors, Darwin learned lessons about the game that stuck with him for the rest of his career. “The coaching that I came up with would not even be allowed today,” Darwin said. “I hit this guy three times…in one game…none of them was intentional. After the third time, he got upset, he came by me, I said, ‘Hey man, I’m not throwing at you.’ My pitching coach7 grabbed me from the chest in the dugout, and he said, ‘Please tell me you didn’t apologize to him.’ I said, ‘No, I didn’t apologize. I just told him that I wasn’t throwing at him.’ He responded, ‘Don’t you ever apologize,’ and [he] pushed me up against the wall. I think that was probably the best lesson that I learned. Because he was a great guy, but he wanted tough guys.”8

In 1978, Texas moved Darwin up to the Triple-A Tucson Toros of the Pacific Coast League. He started 23 games and went 8-9 with a 6.26 ERA. Despite his mediocre performance, the 23-year-old was one of Texas’ best pitching prospects and a little over two years after signing, Darwin was called up and made his major league debut in Arlington against the Oakland Athletics on September 8, 1978. “The first day I put on a big-league uniform and walked out onto the field in Arlington,” Darwin recalled. “Because I was from that area, I had many, many relatives and friends, friends of friends that were there.” In his team’s 11-4 loss, Darwin pitched two innings in relief, surrendering a run in the bottom of the eighth inning. “I walked out, and I went, ‘This is pretty good from a kid from a town of 6,000 people that tried out for a junior college baseball team’,” Darwin said. “That’s a moment I’ll cherish till the day I die.”9

Darwin got into three games in 1978, two as a reliever and one as a starter, foretelling his alternating roles throughout his career. In his first career start, against the Seattle Mariners on September 24, Darwin pitched six innings, gave up three runs, and earned his first win, 4-3.

Darwin started 1979 back in the minors with Tucson, where he went 6-6 with a 3.60 ERA over 13 starts. He was called back up to the Rangers for good in late June. On June 21, Darwin took a shutout against the California Angels into the ninth before allowing two baserunners and being pulled from the game. Reliever Jim Kern then gave up a game-tying double. The Rangers won the game in extra innings, but Darwin didn’t get the victory, a theme that continued throughout his career. Overall, Darwin pitched 78 innings with the Rangers in 1979, coming out of the bullpen 14 times and starting six games. He had a 4-4 record with a 4.04 ERA.

Darwin joined a group of starters like Ferguson Jenkins and relief specialists like former Cy Young winner Sparky Lyle, who had years of experience to impart. They took the young Darwin under their wing. “I don’t know what it was, maybe just my personality, but I had a lot of older guys really show me what it took to be a big-league ballplayer,” Darwin said. “That it’s something that could be here today and gone tomorrow. Don’t take anything for granted. Don’t get complacent.”10

In 1980, veteran reliever Kern went down with injuries, and Darwin pitched primarily out of the bullpen. Sharing top reliever duties with Lyle, Darwin was the most dependable pitcher on the team. Over 109.2 innings, he had a sparkling 2.63 ERA and nearly a strikeout per inning (105). His team-leading ERA topped Lyle and Jenkins and recently added future Hall of Famer Gaylord Perry. Darwin was named the organization’s Pitcher of the Year.11

Despite Darwin’s success out of the bullpen, Rangers manager Don Zimmer announced early in 1981 that he would be used as a starter. “He’s going to start, and that’s it,” Zimmer said.12 While he didn’t reach the heights of 1980 again with Texas, Darwin spent the next four seasons as the model of consistency as a starter (save for the 1982 season when he again saw his most work in relief). Over 641.2 innings, Darwin posted a 3.67 ERA, struck out 374 batters, and had a 1.31 WHIP. Of the 141 games he pitched, he started 81 and finished 43, garnering 20 complete games and five shutouts. In the strike-shortened 1981 season, the Rangers contended for the division in the first half, but their 57-48 record finished 1½ games behind the Oakland Athletics.

During that stretch, the Rangers’ longtime broadcaster, Mark Holtz, gave Darwin the nickname “The Bonham Bullet.” According to Darwin, “Mark goes, ‘You’re from Bonham, and you throw hard.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, I guess.’ He goes, ‘I’m gonna start calling you the Bonham Bullet’…Then t-shirts got made and all kinds of stuff.”13 Darwin liked the nickname because it represented his hometown.

On January 18, 1985, Darwin was involved in a four-team trade that sent him to the Milwaukee Brewers.14 “I lost 18 games in Milwaukee but look at my stats. I had 11 complete games,” Darwin said. “You don’t have 11 complete games in the major leagues now. Everything that could go wrong would go wrong. I would get beat 1-0, 3-2, 2-1. I got shut out six or seven times that year. It was such a bad year; I threw a one-hitter, and it was a home run.”15 To go with his 8-18 record, Darwin pitched his second-most innings to that point (217.2) with a 3.80 ERA and 125 strikeouts (fourth-most in his career). Darwin became a free agent after the season and signed back with the Brewers on a one-year deal worth $565,000.

The following year, 1986, Darwin got a bit more luck, going 6-8 while posting a 3.52 ERA over 27 appearances (14 as a starter). However, the Brewers were near the bottom of the standings for most of the season. On August 15, 1986, Milwaukee sent Darwin to the contending Houston Astros for Don August and Mark Knudson. “We have sought another starter as the club goes into the final seven weeks of the Western Division race,” Astros general manager Dick Wagner said. “Danny’s age gives the Astros depth for the future, as well.”16 In Houston, Darwin united with his boyhood idol, Nolan Ryan. The two became fast friends, even vacationing together in the offseason.17 Ryan gave Darwin the nickname “Dr. Death” because of the way he eyed batters who got to first base off him.

The 1986 stretch run was the closest Darwin ever came to pitching in the postseason. He was lights out as the Astros fended off the San Francisco Giants and Cincinnati Reds for the division title. Starting eight games and coming in from the bullpen in four more, he went 5-2 with a 2.32 ERA, and struck out 40 batters against nine walks. The Astros clinched the National League West on the night Mike Scott threw a September 25 no-hitter against the Giants.

In the NLCS, the Astros took on the 108-win New York Mets. The Astros won Game One, but the Mets grabbed two of the next three. After dropping a 12-inning nail-biter in Game Five, Houston went back home down 3-2 in the Series. Darwin didn’t pitch in the first five games. With Astros ace Mike Scott in line to pitch Game Seven, Darwin was lined up to start Game One of the World Series, should the Astros get there.

Game Six was one of the most memorable postseason games of all time. Houston clung to a 3-0 lead until the ninth inning, when the Mets broke through and tied the game. Over the next six innings, the game remained deadlocked before the Mets took the lead in the 16th off Jeff Calhoun. Darwin got up in the bullpen, ready to pitch should his name be called. It wasn’t, and he never got closer to throwing a pitch in the playoffs. As to why Darwin was left out, Astros manager Hal Lanier said, “I brought Calhoun in because there were a bunch of left-handers coming up. He’s proven he can get left-handers out.”18 “I was warming up,” Darwin recalled. “But you know what, I wouldn’t trade a day that I’ve had.”19

Between 1987 and 1989, Darwin settled into his role as a sturdy arm capable of pitching as effectively out of the bullpen as he did as a starter. Darwin averaged 170 innings each season, appearing in an average of 50 games each year. He posted a 3.39 ERA and an ERA+ of 106 in that time.

In 1988, as the Astros tried to stay afloat in the division race, Darwin had a 4.69 ERA (entirely as a starter) heading into the All-Star break. Lanier moved Darwin to the bullpen for the stretch run, and he put up a 2.68 ERA and 1.06 WHIP in relief. The Astros didn’t make the playoffs, but Darwin’s efforts didn’t go unnoticed. “He’s been great ever since he went to the bullpen,” Lanier said. “Sometimes a little stint in the bullpen can help you get your confidence back.”20 Darwin didn’t start a single game in 1989, and his 2.36 ERA and 1.025 WHIP were bested on his team only by Larry Andersen.

Darwin’s best season in Houston was his last there. In 1990, Darwin went 11-4 (coming out of the bullpen 31 times along with 17 starts) and led the National League in ERA (2.21) with an MLB-leading 1.027 WHIP. His 169 ERA+ was also tops in the league. In July 1990, White Sox scout Larry Monroe called Darwin “one of the best in the league” despite only “average stuff.”21 With a 2.20 ERA and a 0.95 WHIP at the end of the first half, Darwin didn’t make the All-Star team. Darwin’s bullpen mate, Dave Smith – who had a 2.48 ERA and 1.01 WHIP in 24.1 fewer innings – was Houston’s lone representative.

On August 16, Darwin got into the first of his two infamous on-field scuffles. When Cardinals first baseman Pedro Guerrero took umbrage with a high and inside fastball, he glared at Darwin. As Darwin had learned as a kid, he didn’t back down. When Darwin reached first base on a single the following inning, the two players yelled at each other before Guerrero connected with a punch, and both benches cleared. Guerrero and Darwin were each fined, but the league suspended only Guerrero.22

On December 19, 1990, Darwin signed an incentive-laden deal as a free agent with the Boston Red Sox, worth up to $12.2 million over four seasons. The injury bug bit Darwin in his first season with Boston. After three starts in April, he went on the disabled list because of a pulled muscle in his right shoulder and bronchial pneumonia. “I just hurt all over,” Darwin said.23 He came back at the end of May – going 2-5 with a 4.45 ERA over five starts – before returning to the DL in early July with tendinitis in his shoulder. He was shut down for the 1991 season, finishing 3-6 with a 5.16 ERA, and surrendering 15 homers in 12 starts.

In Darwin’s age-36 season in 1992, he got back to his old ways, pitching 161.1 innings. On August 30, against the Angels, Darwin pitched the finest game of his career. He went nine shutout innings, allowing just one hit in a 4-2 extra-inning Red Sox victory. Nonetheless, Boston took a major step back, finishing last in the East Division, 23 games behind the World Series-winning Toronto Blue Jays.

In 1993, Darwin had arguably his best statistical season. In a career-high 229.1 innings, he had a 3.26 ERA, an American League-leading 1.068 WHIP, and a career-high 5.7 WAR in 34 games, all starts. Despite carrying the seventh-best ERA and second-best WHIP amongst American League starters24 into the All-Star break, Darwin was again passed over for the Midsummer Classic. On August 18 against the White Sox at Fenway Park, he took a no-hit bid into the eighth inning. “I tried to talk to guys, but they wouldn’t talk to me,” Darwin said. “I went in the clubhouse after every inning. I’d just sit down, kick back and watch TV.” Dan Pasqua broke up the no-hitter with a triple, and Darwin settled for his third career one-hitter.25

Darwin again ran into injury trouble in his final season with the Red Sox. In 13 starts in 1994, he was roughed up to the tune of a 6.30 ERA and an 80 ERA+ (to that point a career-worst, and 20% below the league average). He then went on the disabled list with a rib cage injury. His final start came on June 15, when he gave up five runs over 2.2 innings. The MLB season finished in August because of the player strike.

As the strike persisted, the 39-year-old worked out at his home in Texas. Darwin signed with the Toronto Blue Jays on a one-year, $300,000 deal nine days after the strike ended. The Jays were looking to his veteran presence to help them compete in the challenging American League East. “From the other side, I always liked his makeup,” Toronto manager Cito Gaston said. “I always liked his approach. He’s a winner. Seeing him from this side, I can tell I was right. We just have to hope he stays healthy.”26

Darwin looked like his best self in his first two starts of 1995, going five innings and giving up just one run in each. But the wheels fell off from there. Over his next 11 appearances, Darwin gave up 53 earned runs in 55 innings. On July 18, Toronto released him. Thirteen days later, he went back home, signing a deal with the Rangers. Things didn’t go much better in Texas, where over 34 innings, Darwin gave up 27 earned runs.

In February 1996, Darwin signed with the Pittsburgh Pirates, and the 40-year-old discovered the fountain of youth. Darwin started 18 games in the first half and led his team in ERA (2.89) and WHIP (1.08). Those numbers were fifth and sixth amongst all National League starters, respectively. Once again, Darwin was snubbed for the All-Star game, and he took it personally this time. “Making an All-Star team was kind of a sour note…I thought I should’ve made it,” Darwin said. “One year, I know I should’ve made it. When I was with Pittsburgh, I was third in the league in earned run average. But I think that’s the year Jason Kendall made it, deservingly so…But I didn’t make it because I had a bonus in my contract.”27 Pittsburgh leveraged Darwin’s strong performance into a trade asset, shipping him to the contending Astros shortly after the All-Star break. Houston used Darwin as a reliever and starter, but he struggled in both roles. Over 15 appearances, he posted a 5.95 ERA as the Astros missed the playoffs.

Darwin’s most notable moment back in Houston came on August 12, when he had one of the worst starts of his career, giving up six runs over 2.1 innings to the Montreal Expos. In the second inning, Henry Rodriguez took Darwin deep and admired the homer longer than Darwin appreciated. “I’m having a bad game, No. 1, and he shows me up,” Darwin said. “Maybe I’m from the old school, but there’s no room in baseball for that.” After surrendering four more runs the next inning, Darwin plunked Rodriguez, setting off a bench-clearing brawl that resulted in eight ejections and stitches for Astros manager Terry Collins.28

“This game has gotten out of hand,” Darwin said. “Fifteen years ago, nobody did that. You hit a home run, you run the bases…Now everybody’s got their tricks, how they flip the bat. It’s getting ridiculous.”29

That offseason, Darwin contemplated retirement, but his dream of winning a World Series kept him going. In February 1997, the White Sox signed Darwin to a minor league contract and invited him to spring training as a non-roster invitee, where he pitched with his brother Jeff.30 He made the opening day roster, and over 21 games, pitched solidly (4.13 ERA) until Chicago traded him with Wilson Alvarez and Roberto Hernández to the San Francisco Giants in what White Sox fans called the “white flag” trade (their team was only three games out of first).31 Darwin appeared in 10 games for the Giants, posting a 4.91 ERA. He didn’t play in San Francisco’s NLDS loss to the Florida Marlins.

Darwin re-signed back with the Giants in December, but perhaps the most newsworthy part of the following season was his reported scrap with the Giants’ star outfielder, Barry Bonds, during an April 22 game against Pittsburgh. According to witnesses, Darwin and Bonds had a heated exchange in the clubhouse tunnel after Bonds lazily fielded a ball that led to a run.32 In a separate incident, on August 2, Darwin’s then-teammate Orel Hershiser recalled that Darwin had cold-cocked him during a brawl with the Phillies. According to Hershiser, “He said I hit him when I was pitching against him, and he wanted to get me back.”33 Darwin denied the punch, saying, “That never happened…I’m going to talk to [Hershiser].”34

In the middle of 1998, Darwin decided the season would be his last. “I didn’t have the drive. I didn’t have the desire to work hard,” he said after knowing it was time to hang up his spikes. “I said to Orel Hershiser, ‘Orel, I’m done.’ I said, ‘I don’t know if I’m coming back after the All-Star game.’ I talked to my wife, and she said, ‘Y’all got a chance to be in the playoffs,’ so I stuck it out.” Darwin pitched in his final game on September 22, 1998, nearly 20 years to the day he made his debut. “I’m proud of the fact that I was able to play as long as I did. But more so proud of the fact that I opened the door and was the one who closed it. I didn’t have someone come to me and go, ‘No, you can’t play anymore,’” Darwin said.35

Over his career, Darwin amassed 171 wins and 182 losses, with a 3.84 ERA. His wins are the most for any modern player who never made an All-Star team or played in the postseason. He’s the winningest pitcher who never won more than 15 games in one season.

Darwin finished his career with almost the same amount of starts (371) as relief appearances (345). “When you’re a reliever, you come to the ballpark every day with a chance to pitch. You have a bad game. You got a chance the next day to be in there,” he said. “As a starter…if you get knocked out of the first inning, you got four days to worry about what you need to do to be better on your next start.”36 Only 14 pitchers with more starts than relief appearances (including 10 Hall of Famers) compiled more than Darwin’s 716 career games.

After retirement, Darwin became the pitching coach for the Jacksonville Suns of the Southern League from 2006 to 2007 and the Class-A Great Lakes Loons from 2008 to 2009. “I couldn’t wait to come back into coaching. I loved that part. I loved it,” Darwin said.37 He joined the Chattanooga Lookouts as pitching coach in 2010 and the Double-A Pensacola Blue Wahoos in 2015. In April 2018, Darwin became the interim pitching coach of the Cincinnati Reds. In January 2019, he once again took over the pitching coach duties for the Chattanooga Lookouts.

Darwin’s number “3” was retired by Bonham High School in 2014.38 In 2020, Baseball America named him the ninth best undrafted free agent of all time.39 Grayson College inducted him into their Athletics Hall of Fame on November 12, 2021.40

Darwin met Hilda Serna while they each attended Grayson College and they married on January 29, 1977, in Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Muenster, Texas.41 The couple built a family-oriented lifestyle with their three daughters, Cassandra, Amanda, and Courtney, and multiple grandchildren living in Denton, Texas.42 “I coached my grandson in a select baseball team. I coached high school in a little town of Pilot Point, Texas as an assistant. I did some clinics, I’ve done some pitching lessons,” Darwin said in 2023 about how he kept busy in retirement. “I’m an avid golfer. I’m an avid hunter and fisherman. More of a hunter. I have a hunting ranch… And I’m chasing grandkids now.”43

Last revised: March 7, 2023

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Adam Darowski for his research support.

This biography was reviewed by Rory Costello and David Bilmes and fact-checked by Kevin Larkin.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, Retrosheet.org, and Shrpsports.com.

Notes

1 Darwin gave up just short of 3,000 hits, with 2,951.

2 Danny Darwin, telephone interview with Zac Petrillo, November 30, 2022 (hereafter Darwin interview).

3 Darwin interview.

4 Danny Darwin, Publicity Questionnaire for William J. Weiss, September 7, 1976.

5 Darwin interview.

6 Darwin interview.

7 According to Darwin, the coach’s name was Frank Bolick.

8 Danny Darwin, Publicity Questionnaire for William J. Weiss.

9 Darwin interview.

10 Darwin interview.

11 “Rangers sign Darwin to minor league deal,” UPI, July 31, 1995, https://www.upi.com/Archives/1995/07/31/Rangers-sign-Darwin-to-minor-league-deal/7339807163200/ (last accessed January 23, 2023).

12 “Darwin Probably starter for Rangers,” Del Rio News-Herald (Texas), March 19, 1981: 8.

13 Darwin interview.

14 The Rangers sent Darwin and Bill Hence to the Milwaukee Brewers. The Milwaukee Brewers sent Jim Sundberg to the Kansas City Royals. The New York Mets sent Tim Leary to the Milwaukee Brewers. The Kansas City Royals sent Don Slaught to the Texas Rangers. The Kansas City Royals sent Frank Wills to the New York Mets.

15 Darwin interview.

16 “The Astros Friday acquired right-handed pitcher Danny Darwin,” UPI, August 15, 1986, https://www.upi.com/Archives/1986/08/15/The-Houston-Astros-Friday-acquired-right-handed-pitcher-Danny-Darwin/6399524462400/ (last accessed January 23, 2023).

17 Darwin interview.

18 “Astros beaten, but have nothing to be ashamed of,” The Galveston Daily News (Texas), October 17, 1986: 20.

19 Darwin interview.

20 “Bell, Darwin lift Houston to 5-1 victory over Bucs,” Indiana Gazette, August 20, 1988: 20.

21 Larry Monroe, Chicago White Sox Scouting Report on Danny Darwin, October 1, 1995, https://collection.baseballhall.org/objects/16856/danny-darwin-scouting-report (last accessed January 23, 2023).

22 “White gives Guerrero a one-game suspension,” Tampa Bay Times, August 18, 1990, https://www.tampabay.com/archive/1990/08/18/white-gives-guerrero-a-one-game-suspension/ (last accessed January 23, 2023).

23 “Darwin: Shoulder Injury, Pneumonia,” Los Angeles Times, April 24, 1991, https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-04-24-sp-392-story.html (last accessed January 23, 2022).

24 Pitchers with at least 100 innings pitched.

25 “Inches from a no-hitter,” The Kokomo Tribune (Indiana), August 19, 1993: 13.

26 Henneman, Jim, “Darwin makes Jays look like shrewd shoppers,” The Baltimore Sun, May 7, 1995, https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-1995-05-07-1995127190-story.html (last accessed January 23, 2023).

27 Darwin interview.

28 “Darwin’s Lesson Leads to Brawl,” Deseret News (Utah), August 13, 1996, https://www.deseret.com/1996/8/13/19259781/darwin-s-lesson-leads-to-brawl (last accessed January 23, 2023).

29 “Darwin’s Lesson Leads to Brawl.”

30 Rogers, Phil, “Now in his 20th season in the major leagues, Danny Darwin keeps plugging away in quest of a world series ring,” Chicago Tribune, May 15, 1997, https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1997-05-15-9705150082-story.html (last accessed January 23, 2023).

31 Fromi, Jon, “14 Years Later, White Sox’s White Flag Trade Still Smarts,” Bleacher Report, July 29, 2011, https://bleacherreport.com/articles/778106-mlb-trade-deadline-14-years-later-white-sox-white-flag-trade-still-smarts

(last accessed January 23, 2023).

32 “Pittsburgh stops skid as Giants stars scuffle,” Los Angeles Times, April 23, 1998, https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-apr-23-sp-42289-story.html (last accessed January 27, 2023).

33 Brown, Larry, “Orel Hershiser says teammate Danny Darwin punched him during brawl,” Larry Brown Sports, https://larrybrownsports.com/baseball/orel-hershiser-teammate-danny-darwin-punched-brawl/147070 (last accessed January 27, 2023).

34 Daugherty, Paul, “With Matt Harvey on Cincinnati Reds, it’s Dr. Death vs. the Dark Knight,” The Cincinnati Enquirer, May 11, 2018, https://www.cincinnati.com/story/sports/columnists/paul-daugherty/2018/05/11/cincinnati-reds-2018-can-matt-harvey-turn-his-career-around-pitching-los-angeles-new-york-cy-young/601666002/ (last accessed January 27, 2023).

35 Darwin interview.

36 Darwin interview.

37 Darwin interview.

38 “Bonham Warriors retire jersey of Danny Darwin,” North Texas e-News, March 24, 2014, http://ntxe-news.com/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi?archive=55&num=88704 (last accessed January 23, 2023).

39 Glaser, Kyle, “The 25 Best Undrafted MLB Free Agents of All Time,” Baseball America, May 14, 2020, https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/the-25-best-undrafted-mlb-free-agents-of-all-time/ (last access January 23, 2023).

40 “Grayson College Announces 2021 Athletics Hall of Fame Inductees,” Grayson College, October 28, 2021, https://www.grayson.edu/news/2021/10/hall-of-fame-2021.html (last accessed January 23, 2023).

41 “To Wed In January, The Bonham Daily Favorite (Texas), December 27, 1976: 3.

42 Rogers, “Now in his 20th season in the major leagues, Danny Darwin keeps plugging away in quest of a world series ring.”

43 Darwin interview.