July 18, 1972: Cubs’ Billy Williams belts walk-off home run as Fergie Jenkins goes the distance

“His beautiful swing never varies,” raved Chicago Cubs beat reporter Edgar Munzel about Billy Williams. “[It’s] a marvel of repetitive action. And it doesn’t matter who the pitcher [is].1

In the midst of a torrid streak in 1972, the most productive season of Williams’s Hall of Fame career, the Whistler, Alabama, native’s extra-inning walk-off home run catapulted his club to a 2-1 victory over the visiting Cincinnati Reds on July 18. “[H]e hits the ball harder than any guy I know who is built like him – tall and slender,” lauded Cubs skipper Leo Durocher about the lithe 6-foot-1, 175-pounder.2

Unlike Williams, the Cubs (44-41) were in a deep funk as they prepared for the second game of a three-game set with the Reds to conclude a 10-game homestand. The North Siders had lost 19 of 29 games and fallen to fourth place in the National League East Divison, 10 games behind the defending World Series champion Pittsburgh Pirates.

“No matter how dismal a slump the Cubs may be in, it seldom affects Billy. He keeps hitting,” wrote Munzel.3 The 34-year-old left fielder, who had batted .295 and averaged 29 home runs and 97 RBIs in his previous 11 seasons (1961-1971), was in arguably the best prolonged stretch in his career. He entered the game batting .418 and slugging .801 with 13 round-trippers in his last 36 games. He led the NL in slugging percentage (.592) and was second in hits across the majors (113).

While Munzel declared Williams “a manager’s dream,” the easygoing Williams was unsure if he’d be heading to the All-Star Game despite his gaudy stats.4 The final tabulation of fan voting was announced the day before and Williams finished fourth behind Hank Aaron, Roberto Clemente, and Willie Stargell.5

While the Cubs scuffled, manager Sparky Anderson had transformed the Big Red Machine into the big leagues’ hottest team after their season-long slump in 1971 extended into 1972 with the club falling five games under .500 on May 10. Since then, the Reds (52-31) had won 44 of 62 games, including their last seven, to open a six-game lead over the Houston Astros in the NL West.

On the mound for the Reds was hard-throwing right-hander Gary Nolan, who burst on the scene as a 19-year-old rookie in 1967, fanning 206 and winning 14 games. Off to the best start in his career in ’72, Nolan was pacing the NL in wins (13) and ERA (1.82) despite suffering from what Reds beat reporter Ritter Collett described as “mysterious stiffness in his neck and shoulder.”6 Two weeks earlier, Nolan had received a shot from the team physician, Dr. George Ballou, in the inflamed area, but the discomfort returned.7 “It’s just a pain. I get good and loose and then it tightens up again,” lamented the injury-plagued Nolan, who had been sidelined for about half of the 1968 and 1969 seasons with shoulder pain.8

Toeing the rubber for the Cubs was Fergie Jenkins, whom Collett lauded along with Williams as “two of baseball’s most consistent performers.”9 The 6-foot-5 right-hander was coming off a sensational season, having led the NL in wins (24), complete games (30), and innings (325) on his way to the NL Cy Young Award. Entering the game with an 11-8 slate and an NL-best 15 complete games, Jenkins was en route to joining Lefty Grove (1927-1933), former Cubs teammate Robin Roberts (1950-1955), and Warren Spahn (1956-1961) as the only hurlers to win 20 or more games in six straight seasons since 1920.

The Cubs were leading the season set against the Reds, 7-3. Jenkins had accounted for three of his team’s victories while Nolan was 1-1 with a no-decision against Chicago.

A crowd of 16,716 fans filed into Wrigley Field for the 1:30 P.M. game. The cool 68-degree weather was paired with overcast skies and light drizzle throughout.10

The first five innings showcased a classic pitchers’ duel. Jenkins allowed just four baserunners: a single by César Gerónimo, two walks to Joe Morgan, and a hit-by-pitch to Pete Rose. He fanned six. Nolan matched Jenkins’ zeroes, yielding five hits and a walk. Working around a threat in the second after consecutive one-out singles by Glenn Beckert and Ron Santo, Nolan punched out Randy Hundley and Jenkins. “I was using more fastballs and curves, rather than changes,” explained Nolan.11

The Cubs took the lead in the sixth. José Cardenal led off with a single to center field. Beckert, one of baseball’s best contact hitters, smashed a one-out liner toward the mound. It appeared to be heading to Morgan for a tailor-made double play, but the ball caromed off Nolan’s outstretched glove and ricocheted into center field.12 Cardenal took third, then scored on Santo’s fly to Rose in left field.

Tony Pérez wasted no time erasing the Cubs’ 1-0 lead with his 15th homer of the season. The solo shot to left field, fueled by a misplaced slider, was just the second run allowed by Jenkins in his last three standoffs with the Reds.

Succumbing to his reoccurring neck pain,13 Nolan did not return to the mound in the seventh. In a double switch, Dominican right-hander Pedro Borbón replaced Nolan while Dave Concepción took over for Darrel Chaney at shortstop. After an inconsistent and abbreviated season with the California Angels (1969), a suspension because of altercations with Dominican Winter League umpires (1970), and two cups of coffee with the Reds (1970, 1971), Borbón found routine in 1972, making his 31st appearance of the season.

Borbón allowed the leadoff man to reach base in the seventh, eighth, and ninth but was bailed out by two twin killings and kept the game tied.

Jenkins avoided a rally in the top of the ninth after plunking Bobby Tolan. The 1970 NL stolen-base champ swiped second and third with one out. A deep fly ball from yielding the go-ahead run, Jenkins fanned Pérez and retired Denis Menke on a grounder.

Back on the mound in the 10th, Jenkins surrendered a one-out single to Joe Hague, pinch-hitting for Borbón, prompting Durocher to check on his ace. “Fergy told me he still felt strong,” Durocher recalled to the Cincinnati Post.14 “He told me if he didn’t get Concepción out not to worry because he would get the rest of them.” Concepción’s single renewed the Reds hope – “I thought we’d might beat ’em,” lamented Sparky – but groundouts by Rose and Morgan left Jenkins and the Cubs unscathed.15

Rubber-armed reliever Clay Carroll took the mound in the bottom of the 10th looking to give the Reds another chance to extend their win streak. Through his NL-most 36 appearances, the nearly-perfect Carroll held a 1.50 ERA with four wins and 21 saves, the most in baseball. His sole loss of the season was dealt by none other than the Cubs on April 30.

The Cubs had outhit the Reds 10-4, but had gone 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position and left 10 runners stranded.

With the Cubs’ 3-4-5 hitters coming to the plate, Anderson might have regretted sending his All-Star “fireman” to the mound 24 hours earlier to pitch two shutout innings in a blowout 7-2 victory over Chicago. Carroll followed his first-pitch strike to Williams with a high curveball.

Surprised by the mistake, Williams took a vicious swing, smashing the ball over the right-field fence and dramatically ending the game in 2 hours and 29 minutes.16 “He’s a sinker ball pitcher, but this pitch was right there – in the kitchen – so I went for it,” explained Williams. Carroll’s batterymate didn’t think the breaking ball was necessarily bad. “The pitch was a little high up, but give Williams the credit,” said Bench. “He’s a helluva hitter.”17

The home run was Williams’s third hit of the day and his 21st round-tripper of the season. “I believe Wrigley Field makes a better hitter out of me,” said Williams of his ballpark and its shorter dimensions compared with larger ballparks.18 “In the big park, you take that all-out swing and, as a result, you take you eye off the ball. In Wrigley Field, I know I don’t have to pump up to hit the ball out.”

“I had good stuff,” declared the typically reserved Jenkins.”19 He also revealed that home-plate umpire John Kibler admitted to having trouble tracking his pitches.20 The former Harlem Globetrotter fanned seven and walked two in his route-going affair, the ninth of eventually 14 times he hurled at 10 innings in his career.

Williams continued pounding the potato all season, finishing with 37 home runs and leading the majors with 348 total bases, along with career bests in batting average (.333) and slugging percentage (.606). The Sporting News named him Player of the Year, while he finished runner-up to Johnny Bench in the NL MVP voting. Jenkins finished the season with 20 victories and 23 complete games, the sixth straight season he posted at least 20 in each category. But he battled shoulder problems the last six weeks of the season, making just four starts in September and getting shelved two weeks before season’s end.21

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Troy Olszewski and copy-edited by Len Levin.

The July 19, 1972, edition of the Chicago Sun-Times was acquired from Richard Smiley of Chicago’s Emil Rothe chapter of SABR.

Photo credit: Billy Williams, Trading Card Database.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the authors consulted the SABR.org, Baseball-Reference.com, and Retrosheet.org websites for pertinent material and the box scores.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CHN/CHN197207180.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1972/B07180CHN1972.htm

Notes

1 Edgar Munzel, “Billy’s Bat Bright Beacon in Wrigley’s Darkest Hour,” The Sporting News. July 22, 1972: 16.

2 Earl Lawson, “Leo’s Advice Not Heeded or Needed,” Cincinnati Post. July 19, 1972: 18.

3 Munzel.

4 Munzel.

5 “Bench Tops NL at Ballot Box,” Cincinnati Enquirer, July 18, 1972: 18.

6 Ritter Collett, “Jenkins Checks Reds,” Dayton (Ohio) Journal-Herald, July 19, 1972: 18.

7 Collett.

8 Associated Press, “Fergie, Williams Too Much for Surging Reds,” Bloomington (Illinois) Pantagraph, July 19, 1972: 27.

9 Collett.

10 “Weather Report and Map,” Chicago Tribune, June 19, 1972: 10.

11 Collett.

12 Collett.

13 Lawson.

14 Lawson.

15 Lawson.

16 Jerome Holtzman, “Bunts Fail; Billy Saves Cubs in 10th,” Chicago Sun-Times, July 19, 1972: 118.

17 Associated Press, “Fergie, Williams Too Much for Surging Reds.”

18 Munzel.

19 Bob Hertzell, “Fergey Had Rather Fish,” Cincinnati Enquirer, July 19, 1972: 23.

20 Hertzell.

21 The Cubs finished second in the NL East at 85-70-1, 11 games behind the Pirates. The Reds won the NL West and beat Pittsburgh in the NL Championship Series before losing the World Series to the Oakland A’s in seven games.