July 19, 1975: Twins edge Yankees in ‘first’ American League pine tar game

Many baseball fans have heard of the 1983 game between the New York Yankees and Kansas City Royals, where George Brett temporarily lost a home run, and his mind, because of excessive pine tar on his bat.

Pine tar had been around for decades, with The Sporting News occasionally running advertisements for “JDM Kwik Grip” pine tar cans1  and “Sure Grip” pine tar rags.2 Batters used it to improve their grip while batting and occasionally pitchers used it for nefarious reasons.3 Some major-league owners, including Twins owner Calvin Griffith, a member of baseball’s Rules Committee, were concerned about the number of baseballs being used in games, including those made useless by being soiled with pine tar. A league directive in 1975 said Rule 1.10b restricting pine tar to no more than 18 inches above the handle would be enforced.4

The first AL game in 1975 where pine tar became an issue occurred on Saturday July 19, at Metropolitan Stadium in Minnesota.

The largest Twins home crowd of the season, 37,602, witnessed an unusual tripleheader of sorts. First, an old-timers game pitted the inaugural 1961 Minnesota players5 against the Twins’ World Series team of 1965. The 1961 team triumphed 4-2 in a 2½ inning game.6

A resumption of a suspended game followed the old-timers exhibition. The previous Saturday, July 12, the Twins and Yankees had played a night game at Shea Stadium, the Yankees’ home in 1974 and 1975 while Yankee Stadium was being renovated. Delayed half an hour by rain in the fifth inning,7 prolonged by 45 minutes by the teams trading ninth-inning rallies,8 the game pushed past the AL’s 1:00 AM curfew and was suspended in the bottom of the 14th, prior to the Yankees coming to bat, with the score remaining knotted at 6-6.9

Since the Twins were not playing in New York again in 1975, it was resumed before the regularly scheduled game on June 19 in Minnesota, officiated by a new set of umpires, including Art Frantz behind the plate. The visiting Twins broke through for a run in the top of the 16th inning when reserve catcher, Tom Lundstedt, lined a pinch-hit single to center, scoring Rod Carew. The Yankees struck back against Tom Burgmeier in their half of the 16th, as former Twin Graig Nettles drove in the tying run with a two-out single and Lou Piniella followed with a game-winning hit.

Left-hander Felix “Tippy” Martinez, who recorded the last out of the top of the inning, was credited with his first career win; Martinez, like Lundstedt, had been in Triple-A when the suspended game began.10

After a brief break in the action, the regularly-scheduled game began with two right-handers taking the mound: George “Doc” Medich (7-11, 3.86) for the Yankees, and the May 1975 AL Player of the Month, Jim “Bluegill” Hughes (7-7, 4.44) for the Twins. Hughes started the suspended game for the Twins while Medich pitched in relief for the Yankees. The Twins entered the game at 39-50, last in the AL West; the Yankees were 46-43, third in the AL East. The Twins played without Carew, leading the AL with a .370 batting average but out with a reported stomach disorder.11

Controversy began with two outs in the top of the first inning. New York’s Roy White singled and stole second. Thurman Munson, fourth in the AL with a .327 average, singled sharply to center, scoring White–for the moment.

But Twins manager Frank Quilici confronted the umpires and complained that Munson’s bat had pine tar on it well above the 18 inches from the end of the bat allowed by Rule 1.10b.12 Umpire Frantz measured the bat across the 17-inch width of home plate and agreed; Munson was ruled out and the run taken off the scoreboard.13 Manager Bill Virdon, Munson, and other Yankees protested to no avail. The ruling stood, and the game remained scoreless. There were no ejections, and Virdon did not protest the game.

Munson, a fierce competitor, was upset with the decision14 and later said the bat originally belonged to Willie Montañez of the San Francisco Giants and was given to teammate Sandy Alomar, Sr. in spring training. Munson said he used the bat in the previous weekend series against the Twins.15

The Yankees scored a run in the third with a walk to Alomar, batting ninth, off Hughes, who tied a club record by issuing nine total walks in the game. Even though he was leading the AL with 20 home runs, Bobby Bonds bunted and beat it out for a single, moving Alomar to second. Rich Coggins’ bunt moved up the runners, and White’s groundout scored Alomar.

The lead held until the Twins’ half of the sixth inning. A walk to Eric Soderholm and singles by Lyman Bostock and Glenn Borgmann loaded the bases with one out. Danny Thompson had been mired in a deep slump since June 1, which shaved over 60 points from his batting average and caused sportswriter Larry Batson to comment he had not been “hitting anybody very hard lately”16 and a temporary loss of his job to utility infielder Luis Gomez. But Thompson pinch-hit for Gomez and doubled to right field, scoring Soderholm and Bostock, with Borgmann cut down at the plate trying to score, for a 2-1 Minnesota advantage.

The Yankees threatened in the seventh inning on two walks and a single by Alomar, but Munson fanned with the bases loaded. In the eighth, they loaded the bases on two walks and an error by Thompson. But Cliff Johnson, pinch-hitting for Alomar despite the Yankee second baseman’s two hits and a walk, struck out, and Bonds hit into a forceout to end the inning.

The Yankees received two walks in the ninth from Hughes, whose nine walks equaled the most by a Twin since the club’s move to Minnesota,17 but left-hander Burgmeier, pitching for the second time in the evening, earned his sixth save by inducing Nettles to end the game with a groundout.

Hughes was the winner, while Medich took the loss.18 Medich’s 12 losses tied him with Joe Coleman of the Detroit Tigers for the third-most losses in the AL, trailing only Wilbur Wood of the Chicago White Sox, 13, and Gaylord Perry of Texas the Texas Rangers, 14. The Yankees left 14 men on base during the game. Despite losing an RBI, Munson led the Yankees and was fifth in the AL with 102 for the season, the first of three consecutive seasons he posted more than 100.

The opposing managers did not fare well. Virdon, 1974 Manager of the Year as chosen by The Sporting News,19 was fired on August 2, replaced by a central figure in the 1983 pine tar dispute, Billy Martin. Author Filip Bondy said Virdon’s failure to protest the July 19 game with Minnesota was a “huge mistake,”20 while Joseph Durso of the New York Times said some of the players blamed a “lethargic attitude” by the Yankees for Virdon’s demise. Most players supported Virdon.21 Virdon and the Yankees were hampered by their three .300 hitters from 1974 –Elliott Maddox, Ron Blomberg, and Piniella–all missing significant portions of the season with injuries.22

Twin Cities newspaper accounts reported that, while Twins executives were pleased with the large July 19 crowd, there was sniping between team owner Griffith and Quilici.23 The Twins were also hurt by injuries, including slugging outfielder Larry Hisle, who missed much of the season after elbow surgery, and his replacement, Steve Brye, who broke his hand.24 Quilici was fired after a season-ending 6-4 home loss to the White Sox on September 28.25

There were more pine tar disputes in the major and minor leagues in 1975 involving Los Angeles Dodgers second baseman Davey Lopes,26 Chicago Cubs pitcher Steve Stone,27 and Kansas City Royals first baseman John Mayberry,28  as well as players in the Triple-A International League and Double-A Southern League.29

Rule 2.00 noted that balls hit with a bat not complying with Rule 1.10b were illegally batted balls but offered no specific penalty.30 The 1975 rules did add a proviso, Rule 6.06d, which mandated that a batter be called out, ejected from the game, and suspended for three days when he used a “filled, doctored, or flat-surfaced bat.” This was apparently in response to players corking or filling bats with objects like superballs, to gain extra distance,31 or maybe to prevent future hijinks like Norm Cash’s 1973 attempt to use a table leg when batting against Nolan Ryan.32 

Perhaps Paul L. Montgomery, in his account of the July 19 games in Minnesota for the New York Times, summed things up best when he said the Yankees claimed a home victory after a delay of a week and a journey of 1,000 miles before a big visiting crowd, then lost a road game, albeit with unusual circumstances.33

Author’s Note

The author attended this game with his wife.  

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Bruce Slutsky and copy-edited by Mike Eisenbath. The author thanks Joe Worley for research assistance.

Photo credit: Thurman Munson, Trading Card Database.

Sources

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

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/MIN/MIN197507190.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1975/B07190MIN1975.htm

Notes

1 The Sporting News March 15, 1969: 10.

2 The Sporting News March 28, 1970: 22.

3 Dan Daniel, “Spitter Growing More Popular With Servers,” The Sporting News, August 18, 1962: 12. Rookie right-hander Dave Stenhouse of the Washington Senators admitted using pine tar as part of his pitching arsenal, perhaps accounting for his metamorphosis from minor league journeyman to AL starter in the 1962 second All-Star Game.

4 Joe Posnanski, “60 Moments: No. 44, The Pine Tar Game,” The Athletic, May 15, 2020: https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/1814682/2020/05/15/60-moments-no-44-the-pine-tar-game/?unlocked_article_code=1.4VA.TV5Q.imW8sFSk1x0m&source=athletic_user_shared_gift_article_copylink&smid=url-share-ta

5 The Twins relocated to Minnesota from Washington prior to the start of the 1961 season.

6  Pat Thompson, “Twins blow bid to woo back fans,” St. Paul Dispatch, July 21, 1975: S1.

7 Joe Soucheray, “Curfew halts N.Y., Twins in 14,” Minneapolis Tribune, July 13, 1975: 41.

8  Thomas Rogers, “Yankees-Twins Halted After 14th,” New York Times, July 20, 1975: 165.

9  Rogers.

10  Paul L. Montgomery, “Yanks Take Suspended Game, Then Lose 2-1,” New York Times, July 20, 1975: 237. The careers of Lundstedt and Martinez took wildly divergent paths. Lundstedt’s career consisted of 44 games and 65 at bats, with the run batted in on July 19 the only one of his major-league career. Martinez pitched in 546 major-league games, all but two in relief, for the Yankees and Baltimore, before finishing with four appearances for the Twins in 1988.

11 Bill Hengen, “Hisle Sidelines Again,” Minneapolis Star, July 19, 1975: 13. Carew led the AL in batting in 1975 with a .359 average.

12  Montgomery.

13  Montgomery.

14  Filip Bondy, The Pine Tar Game (New York: Scribner, 2015), 160.

15 Sid Hartman, “Munson’s Bat Trouble,” Minneapolis Tribune, July 20, 1975: 16.

16 Larry Batson, “Rangers Tip Twins 9-7,” Minneapolis Tribune, June 30, 1975: 23.

17 Joe Soucheray, “Twins split two games with Yanks,” Minneapolis Tribune, July 20, 1975: 31. When the Twins were the Washington Nationals in 1923, Grier Friday            issued 14 walks in an 11-inning game, which remains the franchise record as of 2026. The record for a nine-inning game was 13 by Dick Weik in 1949. The Twins record of nine has been tied several times, most recently by Juan Berenguer in 1987.

18 Medich, who later received a medical degree, finished the season at 16-16 with a 3.50 ERA and was 124-105, 3.80, for his 11-year major league career. Hughes was 16-14 and 3.82 in 1975. He took a line drive off his right instep during a 1976 spring training game and slumped to 9-14, 4.98, in 1976. He refused to sign a contract with the Twins in 1977. He bounced around the Pacific Coast League and Mexican League and was out of baseball after 1980. He was 25-30, 4.30, for his major-league career.  Gary Libman, “Twins send Hughes, 11 others to farm club,” Minneapolis Tribune, April 1, 1977: 69.

19 Phil Pepe, “Pilot of Year Bill Virdon—He Beat Odds,” The Sporting News, October 19, 1974: 19.

20 Bondy, 160.

21 Joseph Durso, “Lethargic Attitude Blamed by Some for Yank Demise,” New York Times, August 3, 1975:159. The Yankees finished third in the AL East at 83-77, 12 games behind Boston.

22  Official 1976 Baseball Guide (St. Louis, Missouri: The Sporting News 1980): 143.

23 Thompson. Bill Hengen, “If Cal wants to make a change . . .,” Minneapolis Star, July 21, 1975: 19.

24  Official 1976 Baseball Guide 173.

25  Tom Briere, “Twins lose manager, game 6-4,” Minneapolis Tribune, September 29, 1975: 21. The Twins finished fourth in the AL West at 76-83, 20 ½ games behind Oakland.

26  Betty Cuniberti,” Rau loses no-hitter in 8th,” San Bernadino (California) Sun-Telegram, July 7, 1975: 24. On July 6, Lopes bunted for a hit in the 6th inning of a game at Dodger Stadium against the Giants. Umpire John Kibler disallowed the hit and called Lopes out for excess pine tar on his bat. Dodgers manager Walter Alston protested the game, stating if Kibler believed the bat was illegal, he should have disallowed use of the bat prior to Lopes batting, not after the play. The protest was moot after the Dodgers won the game

27  Richard Dozer, “Cubs to Tackle N. L. East Goliaths in September,”: 16, “N. L. Flashes, Stone Loses Single,” The Sporting News, September 6, 1975: 26. Stone, batting .148, lost a hit in the third inning of a game at Wrigley Field on August 18 against the Dodgers because of pine tar on the trademark. Stone said he was unaware of the rule and the Cubs’ manager, Jim Marshall, did not protest the game, won by the Dodgers, 3-1.

28 On September 7, Mayberry hit a home run in the fourth inning against the California Angels in Anaheim, and his bat was immediately challenged by the Angels. but the umpires took no action. Mayberry homered again later in the game, won by the Royals 8-7 in 11 innings. California filed a protest with American League president Lee MacPhail. MacPhail did not uphold the protest, stating the issue was not “important enough” to replay the game, perhaps also agreeing with Walter Alston that a complaint about a bat should be lodged prior to, not after, the offending bat was used by a hitter, and the fact that pine tar would not affect the “reaction and distance factor of the bat,” as noted in Rule 1.10b.

29  “Southern League, New Rule Invoked,” The Sporting News, August 9, 1975: 39. (The umpires cited a new rule, 6.06d, dealing with “doctored” bats.) The day after the Twins and Yankees’ contest in Minnesota, the Twins’ Double-A farm team in Orlando, managed by Dick Phillips, used the rule to take away an RBI hit by Tom Poquette of Jacksonville. Poquette lost the hit and was ejected from the game won by Orlando, 3-2. On July 23, Triple-A Richmond Braves manager Bob Lemon tried the same stratagem when the Pawtucket Red Sox’ Kim Andrew singled in two runs against Richmond, but umpire Steve Fields refused to disallow the bat because only a small amount of pine tar was above the limit, aiding Pawtucket’s 3-2 win. “International League, Richmond Says Andrew Put Pine Tar Too High,” The Sporting News, August 16, 1975: 32.

30  Knotty Problems of Baseball Plus Complete Playing Rules (St. Louis, Missouri: The Sporting News 1975): 17 (rules section).

31  Knotty Problems: 40 (rules section). Bondy 144.

32  Dick Miller, “Ryan’s Smoke Sends Tigers into No-Hit Blind, The Sporting News, July 28, 1973: 15.

33 Montgomery.