April 12, 1955: Baseball lifer Chuck Tanner shows he’s here to stay with a home run on the first pitch

Chuck Tanner is a household name in much of Western Pennsylvania, after a 19-year major-league managerial career that included nine seasons with the Pirates and a championship in 1979.

He was a much more remarkable manager than he was a player. In eight major-league seasons with four teams between 1955 and 1962, Tanner batted .261 with a career OPS+ of 92 and WAR of -0.2. He was a pinch-hitter in almost as many games (200) as he played in the field (202).

However, despite hitting just 21 career home runs, Tanner shared in a notable accomplishment achieved by less than 0.7 percent of all major leaguers – homering in his first at-bat, on April 12, 1955.

But perhaps Tanner’s first-at-bat glory buries the lede, as his pinch-hit home run for the Milwaukee Braves in the eighth inning tied the game they eventually won against Cincinnati, 4-2.

April 12 was Opening Day at County Stadium in Milwaukee for the home team (Cincinnati had traditionally opened at home at Crosley Field the day before, this year against the Cubs.) The Milwaukee Braves were hosting their largest opening day crowd, 43,640, since moving to the Midwest.1

The Braves had high expectations of both winning the pennant and setting attendance records that season, just their third in Brewtown.2 They finished third in 1954 with essentially the same squad, though now with another year of experience.

Milwaukee’s lineup included third baseman Eddie Mathews, runner-up for the 1953 National League Most Valuable Player Award; sophomore sensation Henry Aaron, fourth in Rookie of the Year voting; Shot Heard ’Round the World hero Bobby Thomson, recovering from a broken ankle but still formidable; two-time All-Star catcher Del Crandall;3 speedster Bill Bruton, on his way to his third straight NL stolen-base title; and rising young talents Johnny Logan and Joe Adcock.

Future Hall of Famer Warren Spahn, coming off his fifth 20-win season in six years, was on the mound for his fourth straight home opener. Tanner would eventually pinch-hit for Spahn.

Although remarking a year earlier that he “wasn’t ready” for the majors,4 the 26-year-old Tanner5 tore it up in Atlanta in 1954, batting .323 with 20 homers and 101 RBIs as the Crackers won the Southern Association championship.6

Lou Chapman of the Milwaukee Sentinel described Tanner as “a husky kid with a crew cut and a pleasing smile” and “like the boy next door,” who learned how to hit from Pirates Hall of Famer Paul Waner, the Braves’ special hitting instructor.7 After toiling nine seasons in the minors as a lefty spray hitter, Tanner took some pointers from Waner on power and started pulling the ball to right.

“I’m the kind of guy who likes to be told when I’m doing a good job and Paul gave me that necessary confidence at the plate,” Tanner said.8 Waner thought Tanner could be another Dusty Rhodes, who had risen to prominence with the New York Giants in the World Series of the prior fall. Rhodes also would be better remembered for his pinch-hitting abilities.

Like Tanner, Spahn batted as a lefty. He was a career .194 hitter, not bad for a pitcher, but certainly not the person you’d want at the plate when the team is down to its final five outs. He’d pitched well in the game, shutting out Cincinnati on five hits through the first seven innings before giving up a two-run homer to Ted Kluszewski in the top of the eighth.9 Kluszewski’s blast traveled 390 feet; he’d also gone yard the day before.10

The Redlegs’ pitcher that day was 34-year-old Gerry Staley, a two-time NL All-Star on the decline as a starter. The right-handed sinkerballer spent his first seven seasons with the Cardinals but was traded to Cincinnati in the offseason after a 7-13 1954 campaign.11 He’d allowed an RBI double to Thomson in the bottom of the first that scored Bruton, but otherwise limited the Braves to four hits at the end of seven innings. With one out in the eighth, he’d retired 10 of the last 11 batters he faced – the lone baserunner reaching on an error and forced out on a double play.

Crandall grounded out to start the eighth when Braves manager Charlie Grimm called on Tanner. The rookie stepped up to the plate and drove the first pitch he saw 325 feet to right field.

Before Tanner, six men had homered on their first major-league pitch, and four others had gone long in their first at-bat as a pinch-hitter. But only one before him – Eddie Morgan of the Cardinals, on April 14, 1936 – delivered a pinch-hit home run on the first pitch thrown to him in the big leagues.12

“I wasn’t thinking about anything in particular when I came to bat against Staley, except to try to hit the ball and get on base,” Tanner said. “Staley pitched, I swung and started for first base. I don’t know if I touched the bag in rounding it, or any of the others – I was floating on air – but I saw the bleacher fans scrambling for the ball and I turned for second and the rest of the trip to home plate was just a dream.”13

Tanner also said afterward that he “didn’t even know where the hit landed.”14

Staley fell apart quickly after Tanner’s home run. His next pitch, to Bruton, resulted in a single. Then Aaron tripled to the center-field fence to drive in Bruton for the go-ahead run – and chase Staley off the mound.

“I saw Billy running and I just kind of tried to drag it to right field,” Aaron said. “If I had taken a full swing I’da knocked it out of the ball park.”15

The Redlegs bullpen didn’t fare much better. Lefty reliever Jackie Collum walked Mathews and then was done. His replacement, righty Jerry Lane, allowed Aaron to score an insurance run on Thomson’s sacrifice fly to center fielder Gus Bell.

Milwaukee’s Dave Jolly then recorded a perfect ninth for the save.

Spahn, who allowed two runs on seven hits and one walk, with five strikeouts, had now won all three of his Braves’ home openers in Milwaukee.16 The 1955 season would not be one of Spahn’s best – he finished 17-14 with a 3.26 ERA – but he won at least 20 games the next six years after that.

Staley, tagged with all four runs on seven hits, took the loss. He would be waived by the Redlegs, after going 5-8 with a 4.81 ERA, before the season was out.17

Hitting highlights for Milwaukee included Thomson’s 2-for-3 day, even though he was still nursing a sore shoulder out of spring training. Bruton also had two hits for the Braves. For Cincinnati, Kluszewski and Johnny Temple also had two-hit days.

As for Tanner, he still seemed in disbelief even after hitting the showers.

“And to think I was ready to give it up all last spring,” he said. “It happened after the Braves sold me to the Atlanta club after using up all my options.”

“It’s hard to realize I’ve finally made it, not only the majors but getting a homer on my first try – and the first pitch too. I was more nervous after it happened.”18

Those nerves could have come from Tanner’s concern about his place on the Braves’ major-league roster when the team made further cuts on May 12.19 But Grimm said Tanner had little to worry about. “There’s a good chance Chuck will stay come cut-off time,” Grimm said. “We’ve liked him all spring. He’s got a fine, level swing and should be a good hitter.”20

Tanner then placed a long-distance call to his wife, Barbara, in their hometown of New Castle, Pennsylvania, where she was caring for their two sons, Mark, 4 years old, and Gary, almost 2.

“Looks like I’ve finally made it, honey,” he said, “and after nine years, too.” 21

Tanner had a middling rookie season, batting .247 with 6 home runs and 27 RBIs in 97 games, playing left and right field on defense. He played for Milwaukee all season and the season after that, although his hitting numbers started to diminish. He then moved around the Cubs, Indians, Red Sox, and Angels organizations before finding his calling as a manager in 1963. Tanner worked in baseball in some capacity for the rest of his life.

Perhaps his first-at-bat home run did signify the moment that he’d “finally” made it.

Sources

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

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/MLN/MLN195504120.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1955/B04120MLN1955.htm

Photo credit: Chuck Tanner, Trading Card Database.

Notes

1 This was the first year the Milwaukee Braves had opened at home. In 1953 and 1954, they played the Redlegs in Cincinnati first, and then their second game at County Stadium.

2 Red Thisted, “In Milwaukee, It’s a Matter of Only Counting Up Fans, Later Raising the Pennant,” The Sporting News, April 20, 1955: 9. The Braves hit neither of those goals – although their attendance, at more than 2 million fans, was still league-best. In the standings, they finished a distant second place (85-69) to the champion Brooklyn Dodgers, 13½ games out. It would be another two years – 1957 – before they would set that new attendance record and win the World Series.

3 Crandall also made the NL All-Star team in 1955 and five more years after that (1956, 1958, 1959, 1960, 1962).

4 Red Thisted, “First Swing in Majors Puts Tanner in Records,” The Sporting News, April 20, 1955: 9.

5 Although Tanner was born on July 4, 1928, the Braves’ media guide listed his birthdate as July 4, 1929; the team apparently lied about a lot of their players’ birthdates when they were first signed. David Briggs, “Tanner, Managed ’79 Champion Bucs, Dies,” MLB.com, https://web.archive.org/web/20110214071121/http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20110211&content_id=16621286&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb.

6 Tanner was invited to the Braves camp in 1953, but he tore a muscle in spring training and didn’t make the team.

7 Lou Chapman, “Tanner Tabbed by P. Waner as ‘Possible Dusty,’” The Sporting News, March 16, 1955: 15.

8 Chapman.

9 Lou Smith of the Cincinnati Enquirer put it colorfully: “Prior to the eighth, the Reds couldn’t have hit a circus fat lady with a hand full of buckshot at five pages in the jam. They ‘blew’ scoring opportunities in each of the first two frames and again in the fourth and fifth stanzas.” Lou Smith, “Rookie’s Punch Homer Sinks Reds, 4-2,” Cincinnati Enquirer, April 13, 1955: 40.

10 Newspaper accounts conflict on whether the ball traveled to right field or left.

11 Staley had a resurgence as a closer with the pennant winning “Go-Go” Chicago White Sox in 1959. He made both AL All-Star teams in 1960, at 39 years old.

12 Morgan, who lasted just eight games with St. Louis and then another 31 with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1937, never hit another. As of 2024, eight players have pinch-hit a home run on the first pitch thrown to them, the most recent being Willson Contreras for the Cubs on June 19, 2016.

13 Thisted, “First Swing in Majors Puts Tanner in Records.”

14 Associated Press, “New Castle Rookie Hits First Pitch for Homer,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, April 13, 1955: 18.

15 United Press, “Chuck Tanner Finds ‘Home’ in Milwaukee,” Pampa (Texas) Daily News, April 13, 1955: 8. Aaron was running so fast that he lost his hat. When asked why, the second-year slugger compared himself, perhaps presciently, to another young star: “That Willie Mays ain’t got no monopoly,” he said. “I run better with my hat off.”

16 The streak would be broken in 1956, when Lew Burdette got the Opening Day start.

17 Fortuitously, the New York Yankees would claim Staley off waivers in September. Although he would pitch just two innings for them that year (allowing three runs), he was on the bench as the team chased down the 1955 American League pennant.

18 Associated Press, “Rookie’s Homer Sparks Braves to Opening Win,” Janesville (Wisconsin) Daily Gazette, April 13, 1955: 18.

19 Until 1968, major-league rosters included an expanded “tryout period” to start the season. But teams had to trim down to 25 active players after the first month.

20 “Rookie’s Homer Sparks Braves to Opening Win.” Grimm was more emphatic with the United Press: “You’re damn right Tanner made the team with that homer. If we did anything else with a guy like that people would start wondering if we knew what we were trying to do. He’s found a home.” “Chuck Tanner Finds ‘Home’ in Milwaukee.”

21 Jack Varick, “Chuck Tanner’s Pinch-Hit Homer Sparks Braves to 4-2 Win,” La Crosse (Wisconsin) Tribune, April 13, 1955: 23.