May 6, 1951: Ted Williams’s 10th-inning home run beats the Browns

Over the first nine innings on May 6, 1951, the Boston Red Sox left 16 men on base – two shy of the American League record at the time for a nine-inning game. Still, they had a 4-3 lead over the St. Louis Browns (who had a record of 4-13 coming into the game) in the bottom of the ninth, and they had two outs and two strikes on third baseman Johnny Berardino, who could have been the final batter of the game. Berardino singled, though, and so did left fielder Ray Coleman, which tied the game, setting the stage for extra innings.

Ted Williams was the first man up for the Red Sox in the top of the 10th, and it was no small homer he hit, for his only hit of the day’s doubleheader. It was what the Boston Herald described as a “a towering drive that sailed far over the roof of the right-field pavilion at Sportsman’s Park.”1 Boston had a 5-4 lead, and the Red Sox made it stand up to secure the win.

The Browns had taken an early lead, scoring once in the first inning and again in the second. The Red Sox had put two on in the top of the first, Williams walking and shortstop Lou Boudreau being hit by 24-year-old Lou Sleater’s pitch. No damage was done; Boston had left its first two men on base of the game. Sleater was in his rookie year. He’d pitched a total of one inning in 1950.

Lefty Bill Wight, 29 years old, was the pitcher for the Red Sox. The first batter he faced, second baseman Bobby Young, tripled to center field. Berardino grounded out to Boudreau, Young scoring.

The Red Sox got two singles and two walks in the top of the second, but didn’t score, due to a double play following the first hit and a bases-loaded fly ball to second base by Billy Goodman. The Browns got their second run on a leadoff home run by center fielder Roy Sievers, who was struggling for the second season in a row after winning the first-ever AL Rookie of the Year Award in 1949.

The Red Sox scored two and tied it in the third when Boudreau reached on an error by shortstop Tom Upton and third baseman Vern Stephens followed with a two-run homer, “a long drive into the left-field stands.”2

Wight set down St. Louis in order in the bottom of the third.

The Red Sox left two more men on base in the fourth after a pair of two-out singles by center fielder Dom DiMaggio and right fielder Goodman. Williams then flied out to right field.

St. Louis reclaimed the lead in the bottom of the inning. Catcher Les Moss walked. Sievers grounded out, but Moss took second base. After Upton flied out to right field, first baseman Hank Arft doubled to right, scoring Moss.

Boudreau singled and Bobby Doerr walked in the top of the fifth. Both were left on base. Harry Mitauer of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat wrote of Sleater, “The rookie southpaw got himself in more jams than the laws allow, but managed to get out of most of them.”3

Ray Coleman singled and right fielder Ken Wood walked in the bottom of the fifth. They, too, were both left on base.

The Red Sox tied it again, 3-3, in the top of the sixth inning. Wight singled leading off. DiMaggio walked. Goodman flied out to left field. Ted Williams reached on another error by Upton at shortstop, and Boston had the bases loaded. Boudreau grounded out to third, Berardino throwing across the diamond as Wight scored the tying run. Stephens grounded out. Boston’s runners-stranded count had reached double figures at 11.

Wight walked both Sievers and, after one out, Arft. The next two batters – Sleater and Young – both grounded into force plays at second base.

Neither team scored in the seventh inning, though Boston left two more runners on base – first baseman Walt Dropo, who singled to lead off, and catcher Buddy Rosar, who walked.

Berardino walked to lead off the bottom of the seventh, but Coleman hit into a 2-6-3 double play and Wood grounded out, third to first.

Billy Goodman singled, leading off the Red Sox eighth. Williams walked. Boudreau flied out to shortstop, but Stephens walked, too, putting runners on every base. Dropo also flied out to an infielder, to third base, but Sleater then walked Bobby Doerr, forcing home a run and giving the Red Sox a 4-3 lead. Rosar flied out to center field. The walk to Doerr was the ninth walk granted Red Sox batters by Sleater.

Wight got two groundouts. Browns manager Zack Taylor had Don Lenhardt pinch-hit for Upton. He struck out.

Wight struck out as the first batter up in Boston’s ninth. DiMaggio flied out to right field. Goodman grounded out, second to first.

Arft was due up first in the bottom of the ninth, but Taylor sent Sherm Lollar to pinch-hit for him. Lollar drew a base on balls. Sleator was allowed to bat for himself. He grounded out, third to short, forcing a pinch-runner for Lollar at second base. Bobby Young struck out.

With two outs, and down to what could have been the last pitch they saw, two of the Browns came through. On an 0-and-2 count, Berardino singled to right-center field and Sleater took second base. Coleman singled to what both the Globe and Herald said was the same spot as Berardino’s hit. Sleater scored from second, and the score was tied, 4-4. Ken Wood was up and the go-ahead run was on second base. Ellis Kinder was called upon to relieve Wight, one of the 36-year-old Kinder’s AL-leading 63 appearances in 1951.  He got Wood to hit a flyball out to Goodman in right field.

The game went into extra innings. First up was Ted Williams and, as mentioned, he hit his “clear-the-works” home run, his fifth of the year and the 298th of his career.4 The Red Sox took a 5-4 lead. Two fly outs followed. Dropo singled to left, but then Doerr flied out, making Dropo the 17th Red Sox baserunner of the afternoon left stranded.

Kinder struck out Les Moss to begin the Browns’ 10th. He walked Sievers. He struck out Johnny Bero, who had taken over at short after Upton left the game. Jim Delsing pinch-hit and walked, putting the potential tying run on second and winning run on first. Fred Marsh batted for Sleater. Kinder struck out Marsh for his third K of the inning.

For Sleater, 1951 was a rough first full year. He finished with a 1-9 record and with a 5.11 ERA. But he went on to appear in 131 games over seven seasons with five clubs, finishing up his career in 1958 with the Baltimore Orioles – four years after the Browns had relocated there.

Wight pitched for eight different teams in 12 seasons, but it was Kinder who got the win on this May 6, improving to 2-0. The Red Sox moved to 9-8 on the young season. The Browns fell to 4-14. They did win the day’s second game, though, and finished the day ahead of the last-place 3-16 Philadelphia Athletics. The second game was 8-2, Browns, Al Widmar out-pitching Mel Parnell.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Victoria Monte and copy-edited by Mike Eisenbath.

Photo credit: Ted Williams, 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/SLA/SLA195105061.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1951/B05061SLA1951.htm

Notes

1 Arthur Sampson, “Sox Edge Browns, 5-4, Bow, 8-2,” Boston Herald, May 7, 1951: 7.

2 Sampson.

3 Harry Mitauer, “Browns Get Pitching, but Are Content to Take Split,” St. Louis Globe-Democrat, May 7, 1951: 1B.

4 The phrase was Clif Keane’s. See “Widmar Baffles Hose as Mates K.O. Parnell; Boston Strands 16 in Opener,” Boston Globe, May 7, 1951: 9. The Red Sox stranded 17, including the final one in the 10th. The Browns left 11 men on base. Had it not been for Upton’s two errors, resulting in two unearned runs, Sleater might have won the game.