August 10, 1958: Henry Aaron’s bat, Humberto Robinson’s stellar relief lead Braves over Phillies

The fourth-place Philadelphia Phillies seemed to have the upper hand on the defending World Series champion Milwaukee Braves once again. The Phillies had defeated the Braves in their previous five meetings in 1958, including come-from-behind victories in the bottom of the ninth the past two evenings. They threatened to make it six straight wins when they roughed up the first two Braves hurlers in the first game of an August 10 twin bill, grabbing a 6-4 lead by the third inning.

But little-used reliever Humberto Robinson came into the game and stemmed the bleeding, holding Philadelphia to just two hits and one run in the final 6⅔ innings. Henry Aaron’s RBI double in the fifth started the Milwaukee comeback, which culminated in the seventh when he smashed a leadoff triple and scored the eventual game-winning run in an 8-7 victory in front of a season-high crowd of 32,117 at Connie Mack Stadium.

The Braves began the 1958 season as the favorite to win the National League pennant.1 At the end of July, Milwaukee had a one-game lead in the standings over the surprising San Francisco Giants, who were in their first season on the West Coast after leaving Upper Manhattan. A key point in the season came at the beginning of August when the Braves swept the Giants in a four-game series in Milwaukee, giving Milwaukee a healthy five-game cushion. Aaron powered the Braves’ 10-0 blowout victory on August 2, going 4-for-4 with a home run, a pair of doubles, and three RBIs.

The Braves continued to roll, taking three of four games from the Pittsburgh Pirates on August 4-7. Aaron’s two-run homer on August 6 provided all the offense Milwaukee needed in a 2-1 victory over Pittsburgh.2

After the Braves dropped the first two games of their four-game set with the Phillies in heartbreaking fashion,3 they came into their August 10 doubleheader with a 61-45 record, six games ahead of the second-place Giants. The Phillies, at 51-52, trailed Milwaukee by 8½ games.

The 1957 NL Rookie of the Year, Jack Sanford, got the start for the Phillies in the opener. Sanford had been scuffling, posting a 7.15 ERA in his six previous appearances. His struggles continued in this contest.4

Braves center fielder Bill Bruton opened the game with a single and advanced to second on a groundout. After Eddie Mathews’ RBI single, Aaron singled to put runners on the corners. Phillies manager Eddie Sawyer, who had taken over from the deposed Mayo Smith on July 22,5 yanked Sanford and brought in another righty, Jim Hearn.

Braves left fielder Wes Covington hit into a force at second, scoring Mathews. The next batter, Frank Torre, smacked a pitch from Hearn into center field; the ball bounced over the head of Richie Ashburn for a triple, bringing home Covington and giving Milwaukee a 3-0 lead.

The pesky Phillies responded by scoring at least one run in each of the first three innings.

Swingman Bob Trowbridge, owner of a 2.61 ERA in three starts and 20 relief appearances, surrendered a run in the bottom of the first on a walk, a single, and a run-scoring double-play ball hit by Philadelphia first baseman Ed Bouchee, runner-up to Sanford in NL Rookie of the Year voting in 1957.6

With one out in the second, Bob Bowman doubled and scored when Mathews booted Humberto “Chico” Fernández’s grounder to third. Veteran catcher Jim Hegan doubled off the left-field wall, advancing Fernández to third and knocking Trowbridge out of the game. One out later, righty reliever Gene Conley uncorked a wild pitch that scored Fernández and moved Hegan to third. Ashburn extended his hitting streak to 15 games with an infield single, scoring Hegan and giving the Phillies a 4-3 lead.7

The Braves tied the game in the third on singles by Mathews, Covington, and Torre.

The Phillies regained the lead in the bottom of the frame when Conley served up a two-run homer to Bouchee. After Dave Philley’s one-out triple, manager Fred Haney pulled Conley and brought in right-hander Robinson for his first action in over two weeks and just his 13th appearance in Milwaukee’s first 107 games. Robinson stranded Philley at third by striking out Bowman and Fernández. Philadelphia led, 6-4, after three innings.

Robinson, the first Panamanian to play in the NL or American League,8 tossed a one-two-three inning in the fourth.

Mathews led off the fifth with a double off Hearn, and Aaron drove him in with another two-bagger. Aaron advanced to third on Covington’s groundout and scored on Torre’s sacrifice fly, tying the game, 6-6.

The Braves regained the lead in the sixth on an RBI double by veteran second baseman Red Schoendienst. The Phillies came right back and tied the game in the bottom of the inning on a solo homer by Fernández, his fifth round-tripper in 393 plate appearances and the third in his last seven games.

Aaron led off the seventh with a triple to center field off righty Jack Meyer, who came in to get the last out of the sixth. It was Aaron’s second triple of the season, both of which came in the Philadelphia series.9 One out later he scored on Torre’s groundout, giving the Braves an 8-7 lead. It was Torre’s fourth consecutive plate appearance with an RBI.10

Unlike the previous two games, the Braves did not cough up the lead in the late innings. Robinson was perfect in the final three frames, nailing down the one-run victory. After Fernández’s game-tying homer in the sixth, Robinson retired the final 11 batters he faced. He set down 20 of 22 batters in the game,11 limiting the Phillies to just one run on two hits. Robinson raised his record to 2-3 with the win and lowered his ERA to 3.86.

(Despite pitching effectively, the 28-year-old Robinson made only six more appearances in the Braves’ final 54 games12 – all multi-inning relief stints. From August 10 until the end of the season, he posted a 1-1 record with a 1.59 ERA. Milwaukee traded him to the Cleveland Indians in April 1959 for the soon-to-be-41-year-old Mickey Vernon.13)

Aaron fell a home run short of hitting for the cycle. He had a chance to turn the trick for the first time in his career when he batted with one out in the ninth, but he popped out to shortstop Fernández. Aaron never hit for the cycle in his 3,298 career games played. The man who reigned as the major leagues’ Home Run King from 1974 to 2007 came a home run short of the cycle seven times in his 23-year career.14

The Braves crushed the Phillies in the second game of the twin bill, 14-3, led by catcher Del Crandall’s two homers and four RBIs. Milwaukee’s potent offense contributed 33 hits in the doubleheader, 17 of which were for extra bases.

Aaron continued to hit at a torrid pace late in the 1958 campaign.15 From May 31 until September 21 when the Braves clinched their second consecutive pennant, he hit a blistering .371 with a 1.039 on-base plus slugging percentage (OPS).

The Hammer finished the 1958 season with a .326 average, 30 homers, and 95 RBIs. Although he was unable to repeat as the NL’s Most Valuable Player, Aaron finished a solid third behind Ernie Banks and Willie Mays and earned his first of three consecutive Gold Glove Awards.16

The doubleheader sweep by the Braves was a critical moment in Philadelphia’s season. The Phillies dropped seven in a row from August 12 to 19, including four more losses to Milwaukee. Philadelphia finished in the cellar with a 69-85 record, 23 games behind the Braves. It was the first of four consecutive last-place finishes for Philadelphia.

The Braves ended the season with a 92-62 record, eight games ahead of the up-and-coming Pirates. The Braves met the New York Yankees in the World Series for the second consecutive year and jumped out to a three-games-to-one Series lead. But Cy Young Award winner Bob Turley pitched a shutout in Game Five, (retroactively) earned the save in Game Six,17 and pitched 6⅔ innings of gutsy relief in Game Seven to earn the win and help the Yankees to another World Series title.18

As of the end of the 2025 regular season, Milwaukee’s major-league team appeared in the World Series only once in the next 63 seasons, the Brewers’ seven-game loss to the St. Louis Cardinals in 1982.

SOURCES

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com, Stathead.com, Retrosheet.org, The Sporting News contract cards, and the SABR biographies of Henry Aaron, Humberto Robinson, and Carl Willey. Unless otherwise noted, all detailed play-by-play information was taken from the article “Braves Jolt Phils, 8-7, 14-3, Before 32,117,” in the August 11, 1958, edition of the Philadelphia Inquirer. The author also reviewed the game stories in the Milwaukee Journal and the Milwaukee Sentinel.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/PHI/PHI195808101.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1958/B08101PHI1958.htm

NOTES

1  Fred De Luca (International News Service), “Play Ball! Eight Openers Stretching Across U.S. Starts[sic] Baseball Season,” Tyrone (Pennsylvania) Daily Herald, April 15, 1958: 8.

2  Rookie Carl Willey pitched a three-hit complete game on August 6. Willey had sparked the Braves since joining the rotation in late June. He went 8-3 with a 2.14 ERA in his first 12 starts before stumbling down the stretch. Willey finished the year with a 9-7 record and a 2.70 ERA.

3  Both games were walk-off victories for the Phillies. The Braves had a 6-5 lead in the bottom of the ninth on August 8 with reliever Don McMahon on the mound. Dave Philley tied the game with a one-out RBI single and Bob Bowman drove in the winning run with two out. On August 9 the Braves took a 4-2 lead into the bottom of the ninth. Braves starter Lew Burdette surrendered a two-run homer to Wally Post to tie the game, and Philley delivered an RBI single with two outs, giving Philadelphia a 5-4 victory.

4  Sanford had a 10-13 record and a 4.44 ERA in 1958. That offseason Philadelphia traded him to San Francisco, where he won 89 games in his next seven seasons.

5  The Phillies had lost eight of their previous nine games when the managerial change was made. Sawyer managed the Phillies for 817 regular-season games and was at the helm when they won the NL pennant in 1950.

6  Bouchee had missed most of the first half of the 1958 season after pleading guilty to two counts of indecent exposure. He returned to the starting lineup on July 3.

7  Ashburn was on his way to winning the second batting title of his career. He entered the game with a major-league-leading .345 batting average. Ashburn finished the season batting .350; runner-up Willie Mays hit .347. Ashburn’s other batting title was in 1955.

8  Robinson made his major-league debut on April 20, 1955. Several Panamanians had played in the Negro Leagues that were major leagues, including Frank Austin, who won the Negro National League batting title in 1945.

9  According to the Ballparks Database at Seamheads.com, Forbes Field was the only NL park in 1958 that was more triples-friendly than Connie Mack Stadium. Aaron added his third triple of the season in the second game of the twin bill. His fourth and final triple of 1958 came on September 12.

10  Torre extended his streak to five consecutive plate appearances with an RBI when he tripled home Covington in the first inning of the second game of the doubleheader. Torre’s career high was five RBIs in a game, set in a 9-3 win over the Giants on May 22, 1958. He enjoyed a career year in 1958, hitting .309 with 6 homers and 55 RBIs in 431 plate appearances.

11  Aside from Fernández’s home run in the sixth, the only other hit allowed by Robinson was a leadoff double by Solly Hemus in the fifth.

12  The 54 games include the 1958 World Series. Robinson was on the postseason roster, but he went unused in the seven-game series. “World Series TV Rosters,” San Francisco Chronicle, October 9, 1958: 2-H.

13  Robinson went 5-5 with a 2.98 ERA in his 33 appearances for the Braves from 1955 to 1958. He pitched only two more seasons in the majors, finishing with a career 3.25 ERA (120 ERA+) in 7 starts and 95 relief appearances.

14  Aaron fell a triple short of hitting for the cycle 29 times. He was short a single three times and a double once.

15  Aaron had a .233 batting average on May 30, 1958.

16  Banks led the majors with 47 home runs and 129 RBIs in 1958.

17  The save was not an official statistic until 1969.

18  The Braves moved to Atlanta for the 1966 season. The Seattle Pilots became the Milwaukee Brewers just before the 1970 season. As of the end of the 2025 regular season, Milwaukee’s major-league team appeared in the World Series only once in the next 63 seasons, the Brewers’ seven-game loss to the St. Louis Cardinals in 1982.