April 5, 1974: Yaz, Yount, sloppiness, and streaker make Opening Day memorable in Milwaukee

The Boston Red Sox-Milwaukee Brewers Opening Day game of April 5, 1974, was not one to remember for fans of either crisply played baseball or proper decorum.

The on-field action included three runs scored on wild pitches or passed balls, subpar outings for both starting pitchers, and relief pitching that allowed six of six inherited runners to score. Extracurricular goings-on included frigid April cold, an on-field intrusion by a streaker, and a steady stream of objects thrown from the stands at Red Sox players.1 (A similarly rowdy, sloppy, wintry game, also involving streakers, took place the same day, 90 miles to the south, between the Chicago White Sox and California Angels in Chicago.)

Still, the game included noteworthy contributions from two future Hall of Famers who spent their entire careers with a single team. For Milwaukee, 18-year-old Robin Yount made his major-league debut, hitting ninth and playing shortstop. And for the Red Sox, established star Carl Yastrzemski provided the margin of victory with a two-run home run.

The opener at Milwaukee’s County Stadium pitted a team with great expectations against a team trying to get over the top.

Del Crandall’s Brewers had closed the 1973 season in fifth place with a 74-88 record, 23 games back. This modest-seeming finish marked the first time in its five-year history that the Seattle Pilots/Brewers franchise had won more than 70 games in a season, as well as the first time the team’s attendance had topped 1 million. The Brewers held first place as late as June 19; the previous night, they’d beaten Boston 8-3 at County Stadium as rattled Red Sox reliever Don Newhauser walked in three straight runs.2

Second baseman Pedro García finished second in the 1973 American League Rookie of the Year voting, leading the loop in doubles with 32 and adding 15 home runs. Veterans Dave May and George Scott—the latter in between two stints with the Red Sox—topped the 20-homer mark, while promising young catcher Darrell Porter added 16. On the mound, Jim Colborn (20-12) had become the franchise’s first 20-game winner; Colborn was rewarded with the Opening Day start in ’74.

The addition of Yount brought still more brightness to the Brewers’ future. He’d been a first-round draft choice in June 1973, the third overall pick, out of high school in California.3 The Brewers sent him to the Newark (New York) Co-Pilots of the short-season Class A New York-Penn League for a single year of seasoning. Playing on a dismal team that finished with a 15-55 record, Yount hit .285 in 64 games. Presciently, he was chosen to receive the league’s Stedler Award, given each year to the player forecast to go farthest in professional baseball.4

Yount’s bid to make the Brewers in spring training 1974 was initially described as a “long shot,” but his strong and steady play—combined with the weak bat and erratic glove of 1973 starter Tim Johnson—earned him the starting shortstop job.5

In the visitors’ dugout, Boston entered the season feeling renewed pressure to reach the postseason. In 1972 the Red Sox had led the AL East as late as October 1, then lost two of their final three games to Detroit to finish a heartbreaking half-game behind the Tigers. Boston slumped to 89-73 in 1973, getting their last glimpse of first place on July 10 and once again finishing well behind the division-winning Baltimore Orioles.6

A series of good-but-not-good-enough finishes cost manager Eddie Kasko his job near the end of 1973. Taking his place for 1974 was Darrell Johnson, fresh from winning the International League Governor’s Cup postseason playoffs and the Junior World Series as manager of the Triple-A Pawtucket Red Sox.7 To start his first game as a big-league skipper, Johnson tapped rejuvenated righty Luis Tiant, coming off his first 20-win season since 1968.

The Brewers immediately gave 32,761 fans something to cheer about. Ken Berry hit a one-out single in the first inning, Scott drew a two-out walk, and John Briggs belted a home run to give Milwaukee a quick 3-0 lead.

Colborn, however, also had trouble keeping the ball in the park. With two outs in the second inning, Bernie Carbo singled to left field. Bob Montgomery, starting at catcher in place of Carlton Fisk,8 followed with a homer to make the score 3-2. “It crossed my mind while I was going around the bases,” Montgomery quipped, “that the homer put me even with Hank Aaron on the season.”9

Milwaukee made the score 4-2 in the bottom of the second on a triple by Garcia and a sacrifice fly by Don Money. With his parents watching, Yount, who batted between Garcia and Money, drew a walk in his first major-league plate appearance.10

Yount’s first big-league fielding choice in the top of the third didn’t go as well. With one out and runners on first and second due to walks, Yastrzemski grounded to Yount, who tried to make the play himself at second.11 Baserunner Cecil Cooper12 spiked Yount’s shin as he crossed the bag, and Yount made a low throw to first that Scott couldn’t fish out. Rico Petrocelli followed with an RBI single.

Carbo drew a walk and Montgomery singled in another run, chasing Colborn in favor of Jerry Bell. Doug Griffin greeted Bell with a bases-clearing double that gave Boston a 7-4 lead. The rally cost Boston the services of Petrocelli, who pulled a hamstring running the bases. Infield supersub John Kennedy, a Pilot and Brewer in 1969 and ’70, took over at third base.13

Both teams moved a runner to third but couldn’t score him—Milwaukee in the fifth, Boston in the sixth. The Red Sox’ failure was especially galling as Griffin, on third, was caught trying to steal home during a pickoff play at first. The out went from Bell to Scott to Yount to Porter.

The potential lost run loomed large when Tiant’s control failed him in the sixth. Scott opened the frame with an infield hit and, one out later, Tiant walked three straight batters to hand the Brewers a run. Forkballing reliever Diego Segui, who had led the 1969 Seattle Pilots staff with 66 appearances, came on to relieve Tiant in his first appearance in a Boston uniform.14

With veteran Felipe Alou15 pinch-hitting for Yount, a Segui forkball evaded Montgomery for a passed ball, allowing a second run to score. Segui fanned Alou, then threw a pair of run-scoring wild pitches. Milwaukee scored four runs without hitting a ball out of the infield, taking an 8-7 lead. “That forkball really does things,” Montgomery said later. “He makes it tough for a catcher, but not as tough as I made it seem.”16

Twenty-year-old lefty Kevin Kobel took the mound for Milwaukee in the seventh, making his third major-league appearance. With one out, Cooper singled, bringing up Yastrzemski. “Yaz,” playing left field, had been frustrated by fans flinging everything from fruit to toilet paper to beer cans to marbles17 onto the playing field.18 He took out his grudges on a Kobel fastball, hammering the pitch into the right-field stands for a 9-8 Red Sox lead.19

That ended the scoring, but not the drama. In the top of the ninth, Boston collected three baserunners but no runs. After hitting a single and stealing second, designated hitter Tommy Harper—another former Pilot and Brewer—was put out at third base on a fielder’s choice groundball by Juan Beníquez.20 Porter threw out Beniquez trying to steal second. Eduardo Rodríguez, Milwaukee’s fourth pitcher, plunked Cooper with a pitch but retired Yastrzemski on a fly ball to end the inning.

Segui returned for the bottom half. Johnson, who replaced Yount at shortstop, led off with a double.21 Money bunted the potential tying run to third. But Segui’s unpredictable forkball was on its best behavior as he struck out Berry and May to end the game—his sixth and seventh strikeout victims. Boston Globe columnist Ray Fitzgerald quipped that the game ended on three pitches “that Davey May should hire a private eye to find.”22

Postgame discussion centered on the white-knuckle pitching performances, and on Yount’s questionable handling of his first groundball. Yount conceded that he should have stayed on the back side of second base, rather than overrunning the bag and opening himself to Cooper’s spikes: “I turned it wrong. … I know now I shouldn’t have done it that way.” His infield partner Garcia added perspective: “That’s inexperience. I did the same kind of things last year. But Yount is going to be great. … He’s going to surprise a lot of people.”23

A spectator inspired some chatter as well—and “chatter” seems like the right word to describe the young man who ran across the outfield in 40-degree weather between halves of the ninth inning, wearing only a shirt.24 One sportswriter quoted an overheard debate between two County Stadium beer vendors—one of whom called the streak “disgusting,” the other of whom said it “isn’t hurting anybody.”25 Yastrzemski, in the warmth of the Red Sox locker room, summed things up with a Hall of Fame-quality assessment: “The streaker showed me nothing.”26

Author’s note and acknowledgment

Neither the Brewers nor Red Sox had the seasons they hoped for in 1974. Boston finished third at 84-78, seven games back, while Milwaukee finished fifth at 76-86, 15 games back.

The Red Sox finally broke through in 1975, winning the AL pennant. The Brewers emerged as a competitive team in 1978 but had to wait until 1981 for their first postseason appearance. They reached the World Series in 1982 but lost to the St. Louis Cardinals; their 1974 catcher Darrell Porter, by then a Cardinal, won the World Series Most Valuable Player Award.

This article was fact-checked by Gary Belleville and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the specific sources cited in the Notes, the author used the Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org websites for general player, team and season data and the box scores for this game.

www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/MIL/MIL197404050.shtml

www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1974/B04050MIL1974.htm

Notes

1 Ray Fitzgerald, “It’s Up to Yaz to Carry Sox,” Boston Globe, April 6, 1974: 21.

2 Mike Lucas, “Boisterous Brewer Backers Make Newhauser Go Wild,” Capital Times (Madison, Wisconsin), June 19, 1973: 17.

3 The two players chosen ahead of Yount were pitcher David Clyde, by the Texas Rangers, and catcher John Stearns, by the Philadelphia Phillies. Clyde reached the majors even faster than Yount did—going straight there in the summer of 1973 without benefit of minor-league seasoning. Stearns played a single game with the Phillies in 1974, then was traded to the New York Mets in December of that year in a six-player deal that brought ace reliever Tug McGraw to Philadelphia.

4 “NY-P Lists ’73 Awards,” Elmira (New York) Star-Gazette, September 2, 1973: 2D. Kerry Dineen of the Oneonta (New York) Yankees, who reached the majors for 16 games across three seasons, beat out Yount for the league’s Rookie of the Year award. A strong runner-up for both awards was Jamestown Expos outfielder Gary Roenicke, who later played 12 seasons in the majors.

5 Associated Press, “Brewer Rookie Getting Shot,” Oshkosh (Wisconsin) Northwestern. March 12, 1974: 17; United Press International, “Rookie Wins Brewer Job,” Kenosha (Wisconsin) News, March 22, 1974: 17.

6 The Orioles won the AL East title in 1969 through 1971, the first three seasons of divisional play in major-league baseball.

7 Governor’s Cup page, Baseball-Reference BR Bullpen. Accessed online May 13, 2022. The Junior World Series was a Triple-A minor-league playoff that pitted the winners of the International League and American Association playoffs against each other.

8 Fisk’s 1974 season was limited to 52 games by injuries. He suffered a groin injury in spring training when hit by a foul tip and did not play his first regular-season game until April 26. Then he tore ligaments in his left knee in a June 28 home-plate collision with Cleveland’s Leron Lee and missed the rest of the season. “Fisk Makes First Start in DH Spot,” Boston Globe, April 26, 1974: 55. Information on the home-plate collision from Fisk’s SABR Biography Project biography, written by Brian Stevens and accessed May 13, 2022.

9 Fitzgerald. Aaron had hit career homer number 714 the previous day against the Cincinnati Reds to tie Babe Ruth atop the all-time home-run list. He hit historic homer number 715 on April 8 against the Los Angeles Dodgers.

10 United Press International, “Brewers Lose Opener—Butt Barely,” Kenosha (Wisconsin) News, April 6, 1974: 17.

11 Retrosheet and Baseball-Reference have Yastrzemski grounding out second to shortstop. But game stories written by Mike O’Brien of the Associated Press and Peter Gammons of the Boston Globe specifically mention Yount taking the groundball himself.

12 Cooper was traded from Boston to Milwaukee in December 1976 in a deal in which Boston reacquired Bernie Carbo and George Scott. Cooper remained with the Brewers through 1987, making five All-Star teams and helping to power the 1982 AL champion Milwaukee team. Another key member of the early ’80s Brewers, Ben Oglivie, had been traded from Boston to Detroit in October 1973; he reached Milwaukee via another trade in December 1977.

13 Peter Gammons, “Sox Rough Around Edges, But Win on Yaz HR, 9-8,” Boston Globe, April 6, 1974: 21.

14 Boston had acquired Segui in December 1973 as part of a six-player deal with the St. Louis Cardinals.

15 Alou played only three games for Milwaukee in April 1974, the final three of his playing career. He was released on April 29.

16 Gammons.

17 The following month, Brewers fans doused Detroit Tigers left fielder Willie Horton with beer in the ninth inning of a game; the Associated Press ran a photo of Horton wiping himself off with a towel provided by a batboy. Thrown objects posed a general security issue across all of baseball in 1974. Examples in newspaper reports included snowballs in Cleveland in April; an orange that hit Henry Aaron in the head in the visiting dugout in San Francisco in May; beer poured by Cincinnati fans on Astros outfielder Bob Watson as he lay injured on the Riverfront Stadium warning track in May; tennis balls, firecrackers, empty beer bottles, and other items during 10-Cent Beer Night in Cleveland in June; chunks of glass, bottles, screwdrivers, and nuts and bolts at Yankee Stadium in September; bottles and other debris in Pittsburgh in early October; and apples and whiskey bottles in Oakland during Game Five of the World Series.

18 Fitzgerald. Yastrzemski played 84 games at first base, 63 in left field, and four at designated hitter in 1974. He’d been primarily a first baseman in 1973, making an uncharacteristic, once-in-a-career shift to third base for 32 games near the end of the season.

19 Gammons. Yastrzemski credited Red Sox pitching coach Lee Stange with the tip to watch for Kobel’s fastball after Kobel missed with a curve.

20 Harper led both the 1969 Pilots and the AL with 73 stolen bases. As of spring 2023, this remained the highest single-season stolen-base total in Pilots/Brewers history. Harper also led the AL with 54 steals in 1973, playing for Boston.

21 Johnson had been Milwaukee’s starting shortstop in 1973 but was deposed by Yount’s arrival the following season. In 465 at-bats in 1973, Johnson collected 12 extra-base hits and posted a batting average of .213 and a slugging average of .243. In the Boston Globe, Ray Fitzgerald quipped that Johnson “should count the day a success when he gets a ball to the outfield.”

22 Fitzgerald.

23 Mike O’Brien (Associated Press), “Yount Learns Lesson, but Brewers Lose,” Capitol Times, April 6, 1974: 6.

24 Fitzgerald; O’Brien. The United Press International game story described the man as wearing a jacket, but by all accounts he was unclothed from the waist down. By streaker standards, the man was lavishly dressed; the 1974 “streaking” fad generally involved near-total nudity. The Capitol Times ran photos of two streakers from that day’s Angels-White Sox game in Chicago—one wearing only a bucket hat, the other clad only in a White Sox batting helmet.

25 Mike Lucas, “Brew Crew Starts a Streak,” Capitol Times, April 6, 1974: 6.

26 Fitzgerald.