May 4, 1966: Astros’ Robin Roberts hurls final shutout of his career to beat Cubs

It rained in Houston on May 4, 1966,1 but as far as 39-year-old Robin Roberts was concerned, the skies were clear. Pitching for the Houston Astros, he tossed the 45th and final shutout of his Hall of Fame career, beating the Chicago Cubs 4-0 inside the Astrodome, then in its second season.  

Roberts had come to prominence with the 1950 Philadelphia Phillies Whiz Kids. Then 23 years old and in his third season with Philadelphia, Roberts won 20 games in 1950 – the first of six consecutive 20-win campaigns – and the Phillies won their first pennant since 1915. He tied for the NL lead with five shutouts that season, the only time he led the league in shutouts.

In 14 seasons with the Phillies, Roberts won 234 games2 and pitched in five All-Star Games. But when he missed a month in 1961 with a knee injury and finished 1-10 with a 5.85 ERA, Philadelphia made him available in the 1962 expansion draft. Both the New York Mets and Houston Colt .45s passed on him, and after Roberts cleared waivers, the Phillies sold him to the New York Yankees for $25,000.3

Roberts threw 11 innings in spring training for the Yankees, but they did not use him in a regular-season game, releasing him on April 25, 1962, “so that he should have every opportunity to find a job.”4 Roberts tried out for the Baltimore Orioles, impressed club President Lee MacPhail and manager Billy Hitchcock, and was offered a contract. Roberts produced double-digit wins for the Orioles each season from 1962 through 1964.5

In 1965 Roberts, languishing in the Baltimore bullpen, requested his release, determined to show another team he could still be a starter.6 The Orioles released him on July 31; six days later he signed with Houston, which had adopted the name Astros in 1965. On August 9 he shut out the Phillies on four hits in his Houston debut. By the end of the season Roberts had made 10 starts with a 5-2 record, a 1.89 ERA, two shutouts, and a 0.934 WHIP.

Still, Roberts – now more wizened than Whiz Kid – was not assured of a place on Houston’s 1966 roster. He had undergone offseason elbow surgery to remove bone chips, and would have to convince the Astros he could still pitch. Roberts initially signed a coach’s contract, although, as Astros manager Grady Hatton explained, “Roberts is being counted on to pitch, and if he can, he will have minimal coaching duties.”7  

Roberts’ arm was healthy in spring training, and he earned a spot in the Astros’ starting rotation. He signed a player contract days before starting on Opening Day against the defending World Series champion Los Angeles Dodgers.8 He threw seven innings in Los Angeles, taking a 3-2 loss.

Despite pitching well in three of his four starts, Roberts carried a 1-3 record into the May 4 contest against the Cubs. In his previous start he gave up six hits and one earned run in eight innings, yet lost to Gaylord Perry and the San Francisco Giants, 2-1.

Pitching for Chicago on May 4 was 26-year-old left-hander Dick Ellsworth, who had a career 9-4 mark against Houston. Ellsworth had been a 22-game winner for the Cubs in 1963, but since then he had lost more often than he had won. So far in 1966, Ellsworth was 0-2; he was on his way to his second 20-loss season, topping the NL in losses at 8-22.

Roberts was not sharp in the first two innings. Don Kessinger singled to begin the game and stole second. After George Altman flied out, Billy Williams singled, sending Kessinger to third. Ron Santo grounded out; Kessinger held, and Williams took second. Adolfo Phillips grounded out, stranding the runners. Roberts yielded two more singles in the second, but again no runs.

Ellsworth was having an easier time. He walked leadoff batter Joe Morgan, who raced to second on a passed ball. But Ellsworth retired the next three Astros. He shut down Houston one-two-three in the second, giving him six outs in a row.

Roberts faced more trouble in the third. With one out, he walked Williams, who stole second during Santo’s at-bat. Catcher John Bateman overthrew the base on the steal attempt, and Willams made it to third. The rally stalled when Santo fouled out near first base and Phillips struck out.  

Houston scored the first run of the game in the bottom of the third. Bateman slapped a leadoff single and Roberts sacrificed him to second. Morgan singled to right field to score Bateman, and Morgan continued to second on Byron Browne’s error. Sonny Jackson was thrown out on a grounder to second baseman Glenn Beckert and Jimmy Wynn flied to right, ending the inning with Houston on top, 1-0.

Neither team scored in the next two innings, although Chicago loaded the bases in the fifth. Roberts retired the first two Cubs that inning on a groundout and a strikeout, running his string of outs to seven. The string was broken by Altman’s single. When Williams followed with his second single of the game, Chicago had runners at first and second. Roberts walked Santo, filling the bases, then got out of the jam by throwing a called third strike past Phillips – the third time Phillips left runners in scoring position.

The sixth was the game’s pivotal inning. Browne picked up Chicago’s only extra-base hit when he doubled off the left-field fence. Manager Leo Durocher argued without success that the ball was a home run. Browne was erased in a 3-6 double play, and Randy Hundley grounded out, ending what proved to be the Cubs’ final scoring threat.

The bottom of the frame began with Morgan being hit by a pitch and Jackson moving him to second with a single. Wynn popped to Santo near third for the first out, bringing right fielder Dave Nicholson to the plate.

Houston had obtained Nicholson over the winter in a trade with the Chicago White Sox. He was a powerful right-handed hitter prone to striking out. With the White Sox in 1963 he hit 22 home runs, drove-in 70 runs, and struck out a record-setting 175 times.9 On May 6, 1964, Nicholson launched a home run at Chicago’s Comiskey Park estimated to have traveled 573 feet.10

Nicholson entered the game hitting .278 in 36 at-bats, with no home runs and one RBI; he had grounded out and walked in his first two times up. This time Nicholson crushed a pitch to left field that struck the concrete facing under the left-field mezzanine seats, above the orange home-run stripe, and ricocheted back onto the field.11

The scoreboard immediately erupted into its 45-second explosion of color, sound, and light to celebrate an Astros homer.12 But with the ball on the field, players became confused. Cubs’ outfielders scrambled after the ball, Jackson paused at third, and Nicholson stopped at second.13  

Third-base umpire Frank Secory belatedly signaled home run, and the runners continued around the bases. Durocher charged from the dugout, arguing that Nicholson’s blast was only a ground-rule double.14 Durocher’s plea was rejected after an animated discussion; he had lost his second argument of the inning.15

With the dispute settled, the Astros pressed the attack. Chuck Harrison reached on an error by Santo and Rusty Staub singled him to second. When Bob Aspromonte singled sharply to left, Harrison was waved home; Williams threw him out at the plate. Bateman grounded out to Ellsworth, ending the action-filled inning with Houston leading 4-0.

Ellsworth was scheduled to bat first in the seventh, but he was lifted for a pinch-hitter. Billy Hoeft, in his 15th and final major-league season, pitched the seventh and eighth for Chicago, allowing a hit, a walk, and no runs.

Roberts seemed to be getting stronger; he retired the Cubs in order in the seventh, eighth, and ninth. He ended the game with 11 straight outs, five by strikeout. In nine innings he gave up seven hits, two walks, and no runs, striking out nine – his highest total since he struck out 10 on July 5, 1963. His lifetime win total reached 283.

The Astros collected their seventh win in eight games, moved into a third-place tie in the NL, and raised their record on the recently installed artificial turf to 8-4.16 Afterward Roberts said his arm was “loose and springy,” making him more confident than ever of having a good season.17

Roberts beat the Cubs again on May 18 to even his record at 3-3, but it was his final win with Houston. He was released on July 4 with a 3-5 record and a 3.82 ERA in 63⅔ innings.

Roberts was not quite done. He signed with the last-place Cubs on July 13 and made nine starts and two relief appearances. He went 2-3 with a 6.14 ERA, was released after the season, and did not pitch again in the major leagues.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Kevin Larkin and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org for pertinent information, including the box score and play-by-play. The author also relied on game coverage in the Chicago Tribune, Houston Chronicle, and Houston Post, and reviewed SABR BioProject biographies for several players.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/HOU/HOU196605040.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1966/B05040HOU1966.htm

Notes

1 Richard Dozer, “Cubs Beaten by Roberts, Astros, 4 to 0,” Chicago Tribune, May 5, 1966: 101. The heavy rain delayed the start of the Houston Champions International golf tournament, featuring Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus. Doyle Beard, “Open Golf Rained Out,” Houston Chronicle, May 5, 1966: Section 3, 1.

2 As of 2023, only Steve Carlton had more wins in a Phillies uniform.

3 The 1961 expansion draft rules required a payment of $50,000 to a team whose player was drafted.

4 Til Ferdenzi, “Curtain Goes Down on Short N.Y. Run of ‘Mr. Roberts,’” The Sporting News, May 2, 1962: 8.

5 Roberts was 10-9 in 1962, 14-13 in 1963, and 13-7 in 1964.

6 Doug Brown, “Robin, Still Sound of Wing, Flutters Out of Oriole Nest,” The Sporting News, August 7, 1965: 6.

7 “Heist Named New Houston Coach, Baker, Friend Join Scouting Staff,” The Sporting News, January 22, 1966: 20.

8 It was Roberts’ 13th Opening Day start in the National League, a record at the time, but surpassed by Tom Seaver and Carlton with 14.

9 That figure was topped by Bobby Bonds in 1969 with 187, and today Nicholson’s total is not even in the top 100 single-season strikeout totals.

10 For a poignant story about Nicholson and his lengthy home run, see, Mike Kaszuba, “Revisiting Dave Nicholson,” SABR Baseball Research Journal, Vol. 50 No.2 (2021). https://sabr.org/journal/article/dave-nicholson-revisited/. Nicholson hit .246 with 10 home runs, and 31 RBIs in 1966, his final major-league season.

11 John Wilson, “Astro Heroes Are Plentiful,” Houston Chronicle, May 5, 1966: Section 3, 1.

12 Mickey Herskowitz, “Roberts Fires 7-Hit Shutout at Cubs, 4-0,” Houston Post, May 5, 1966: 40.

13 Herskowitz.

14 Dozer, “Cubs Beaten by Roberts, Astros, 4 to 0.”

15 Earlier in the game Durocher had been confronted by home-plate umpire Ken Burkhart for directing uncomplimentary comments to Burkhart from the dugout. Dozer, “Cubs Beaten by Roberts, Astros, 4 to 0.” Those comments may have stemmed from yet another lost argument, on May 3. John Wilson, “Astros Clip Cubs, 10-2,” Houston Chronicle, May 4, 1966: Section 2, 1.

16 The Astrodome opened in 1965, but artificial turf was installed in March, 1966.

17 John Wilson, “Sonny Super Special at Short, Big Plus Astro Asset at Dish,” The Sporting News, May 21, 1966: 13.