September 22, 1957: Don Drysdale defeats Robin Roberts in Dodgers’ next-to-last game at Ebbets Field; Jim Gentile belts first home run

The Brooklyn Dodgers’ relocation to Los Angeles was not yet official on September 22, 1957, but the writing was on the wall. A week earlier, the Los Angeles City Council had voted to make 300 acres in Chavez Ravine available to Dodgers President Walter O’Malley for construction of a privately funded ballpark. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors had approved $2.74 million for grading and construction of access roads – literally and figuratively paving the way for the Dodgers. Businessman-philanthropist Nelson Rockefeller made an eleventh-hour bid to keep the team in Brooklyn, but his proposal would have cost the city $9 million and was summarily rejected by city officials.1

With the National League’s deadline for approving the Dodgers’ and New York Giants’ joint relocation rapidly approaching, only 6,662 spectators witnessed the Dodgers’ next to last game at Ebbets Field, a Sunday afternoon affair with the Philadelphia Phillies.

Any aspirations the Dodgers and Phillies had of winning the NL pennant had withered weeks earlier. With just five games remaining on the schedule, the third-place Dodgers (81-68) were 10 games behind the eventual World Series champion Milwaukee Braves. And even after defeating Brooklyn 3-2 in each of the first two games of the three-game series, the Phillies (74-75) were mired in fifth place.

Although the atmosphere at Ebbets Field was funereal and the game meaningless, Jim Gentile could barely contain his excitement. The 23-year-old rookie was making his first big-league start after six seasons in the minors. Looking back 68 years later, the native San Franciscan, whose name was not on the original lineup card, recalled the moment he found out he was playing: “I was sitting in my locker. Pee Wee Reese came over and said, ‘Jim, you’re playing today.’ I said, “No, I just hit with the scrubeenies in batting practice, I’m not playing. He said, “Yeah you are, they changed the lineup.”2

The first baseman had first been called up to Brooklyn at the end of the 1956 season after hitting 40 home runs with the Double-A Fort Worth Cats but was sent home because of a pulled leg muscle without ever appearing in a Dodgers game. With the Triple-A Montreal Royals in 1957, he again performed well, swatting 24 homers and driving in 90 runs. In two pinch-hitting opportunities since joining the big club earlier in the month, Gentile was 0-for-1 with a walk.

On the mound for the Phillies on this Sunday was ace Robin Roberts (10-20, 3.90 ERA), a six-time 20-game winner and future Hall of Famer who entered the day with 189 career wins, one shy of Grover Cleveland Alexander’s franchise record. The workhorse had averaged 319 innings pitched over his previous seven seasons but was enduring the worst season of his career. Besides leading the league in losses, he was prone to the long ball. A year earlier, his 46 home runs allowed set a National League record. So far in 1957, he had ceded 35 round-trippers.

Opposing Roberts was another Cooperstown-bound hurler, Don Drysdale (16-9, 2.67). The 21-year-old righty entered the game tied with teammate Johnny Podres for the NL’s lowest ERA.3 It would be the final start of the season for both Roberts and Drysdale.

The Phillies got the scoring started in the top of the second. After Harry Anderson led off with a single, Rip Repulski hit a line drive over the head of Dodgers center fielder Duke Snider, who misjudged the ball off the bat. The play was ruled a double and the Phillies had runners on second and third with no outs. Granny Hamner followed with a groundout to second that scored Anderson. Two batters later, Roberts helped his own cause with an RBI single to center, putting the Phils ahead, 2-0.  

In the home half of the second, Brooklyn left fielder Sandy Amorós led off with a perfectly placed bunt single down the third-base line. Gentile, hitting sixth in the batting order, then grounded a potential double-play ball to shortstop Chico Fernández, who booted the ball for an error. Later in the inning, catcher Joe Lonnett caught Gentile drifting too far off first base but sailed his pickoff attempt into right field, allowing Amorós to score from second. Roberts struck out Don Zimmer and retired Drysdale to escape further damage.

Jim Gilliam led off the bottom of the third with a single and advanced to third on consecutive groundouts by Gino Cimoli and Snider. Gil Hodges then tapped a grounder to the left side. The ball took a “sideways hop” past third baseman Ted Kazanski, allowing Gilliam to score the tying run.4

After Drysdale retired the side in order in the top of the fourth, Gentile led off the bottom of the frame still searching for his first big-league hit. Known for a swing so vicious that it sometimes caused bruising on his back, the rookie stood with a closed stance and his hands held low. “In my second at-bat, I got to 3-and-2,” recalled Gentile. “I remembered listening to Duke Snider and the other guys say [Roberts] doesn’t like to walk people. I said to myself, ‘I’m looking fastball.’ He threw me a fastball, and it went off the façade of the center-field upper deck.”5 Gentile’s no-doubter gave Brooklyn a 3-2 advantage.

Snider added to the Dodgers’ lead with a pair of two-run home runs. As Roscoe McGowen noted in the New York Times, the center fielder achieved personal milestones with each round-tripper. With his homer over the right-field scoreboard in the fifth inning, Snider joined Zack Wheat and Hodges as the third player in franchise history to reach 1,000 RBIs. Two innings later, the Duke of Flatbush hit an opposite-field line drive into the second row of the left-field bleachers for his 40th home run of the season. Snider became the second player in NL history to hit 40 or more home runs in five consecutive seasons, tying a record set by Ralph Kiner from 1947 to 1951.6

Snider’s second clout gave the Dodgers a 7-2 lead and sent Roberts to the showers. The 40 homers the Phillies starter had allowed in 249 2/3 innings would lead the NL for a fourth consecutive season. Rookie right-hander Don Cardwell relieved Roberts and retired all six batters he faced.

Drysdale kept the Phillies at bay until the ninth. Pinch-hitter Solly Hemus walked to lead off the inning and came around to score on Richie Ashburn’s one-out RBI double into the left-center-field gap. As McGowen described it, “Snider turned a somersault in an effort to catch Ashburn’s blow, but he didn’t quite reach the ball.”7 Drysdale, who scattered eight hits and six walks, retired the next two to register his ninth complete game and 17th win of the season.

Two days later, Gentile rode the bench when the Dodgers hosted the Pittsburgh Pirates in the final game at Ebbets Field. The Dodgers shut out the Bucs that day, 2-0. On October 8 O’Malley officially announced to the National League his intention to relocate the franchise to Los Angeles.

Blocked at first base by Hodges, Gentile continued to toil in the minor leagues over the next two seasons, appearing in only 12 big-league games for the Dodgers in Los Angeles. In October 1959, the Dodgers traded him to the Baltimore Orioles for players to be named later (Willy Miranda and Bill Lajoie) and $50,000. As Gentile put it, the Dodgers sold him “like an old used car.”8 In the spring of 1960, Orioles manager Paul Richards vowed to give the youngster 120 at-bats to prove himself in the majors. Gentile did just that. He became a mainstay in the middle of Baltimore’s lineup, averaging 31 home runs and 100 RBIs over the next four seasons. “By the grace of God,” said Gentile, “I made it.”9 He ended his nine-year career with 179 home runs, including one memorable blast as a Dodger.

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Jim Gentile for sharing his memories of this game in a phone call on May 3, 2025. This article was fact-checked by Thomas J. Brown Jr. and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Photo credit: Don Drysdale, Trading Card Database.

Sources

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

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BRO/BRO195709220.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1957/B09220BRO1957.htm

Notes

1 Paul Crowell, “Rockefeller Bid to Help Dodgers Ends in Failure,” New York Times, September 21, 1957: 1.

2 Jim Gentile interview with the author, May 3, 2025.

3 Podres would win the ERA title with a 2.66 mark, finishing just ahead of Drysdale’s 2.69.

4 Allen Lewis, “Roberts Gives 3 Homers, Loses 22d; Phils Fall, 7-3,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 23, 1957: 24.

5 Gentile interview.

6 Babe Ruth held the major-league record at the time with 40 or more home runs in 11 consecutive seasons.

7 Roscoe McGowen, “Brooks Score, 7-3, Behind Drysdale,” New York Times, September 23, 1957: 32.

8 Gentile interview.

9 Gentile interview.