TRIVIA WINNER: Jim Lonborg gave up Mickey Mantle's final home run. 25 points toward the person's total.
NEW TRIVIA CONTEST: You will still be required to enter the drawing as usual. However, through June 2025 you will get points depending on the complexity of the questions. Enter each week and correct answers will get those points-one guess per person per week. The reader with the most points after June's final column will get a $50 Starbucks Gift Card. Ties will be placed into a drawing. Tell your friends and sports fans who like trivia. We will keep track of your points. - YOU MUST ENTER VIA THE EMAIL AT THE END OF THIS COLUMN.
NEW TRIVIA QUESTION: Which pitcher did Willie Horton face in his final major league at-bat, and what was the result? TOTAL 50 POINTS.
[THIS IS A GUEST COLUMN WRITTEN BY MICKEY BAUCHAN - THANK YOU MICKEY]
On July 22, 1967 the Tigers beat the Yankees 11-4. Norm Cash hit a grand slam and Willie Horton a three run homer. The Tigers were in second place, three games behind the White Sox. The Yankees were having one of their rare down years in the 60’s, sitting at 39-52, a dozen games behind Chicago. On the next day the teams had a double header as they both hoped to make some headway on the first place Chicagoan's.
In the opening game it was Joe Pepitone that started the scoring with a second inning 2 run home run off Tiger southpaw Mickey Lolich. Dick McAuliffe took a Mel Stottlemyre pitch deep in the fourth and then Detroit tied it at two apiece when Stott threw a wild pitch allowing Don Wert to scamper home from third. In the 7th Roy White singled home a run to put the visitors up 3-2. In the 8th inning Willie Horton came on to pinch hit for Lolich, but he struck out. The Yankees added a run in the 9th for a 4-2 win. After starting the season 5-2, this loss dropped Lolich’s record to 5-12 on the season. It was also the last time Lolich would pitch for the Tigers for almost three full weeks.
After a short break Johnny Podres took the mound to start the second game. Meanwhile, a mere three miles away from Tiger Stadium, one of the worst riots in the history of our nation was taking place.
Sometime between that 11-4 game on Saturday and the first pitch that Lolich tossed on Sunday an ugly scene unfolded. Around 3 am that morning at an after hours club there was a celebration for the return home of a couple of Vietnam vets and the police had raided the club. Someone threw a rock at the officers and a riot erupted.
However, at the corner of Michigan and Trumbull it was business as usual. That business was baseball.
The Tigers staked Podres to an early lead in game two as Jim Landis started the bottom of the first with a home run. It stayed 1-0 into the fourth when Tom Tresh doubled home a run to tie the game. In the bottom of the 4th it was Horton, the native Detroiter, homering to put the Tigers back on top, 2-1. Before that inning was over the Tigers had added three more runs for a 5-1 lead. The game ended 7-3.
The story that came out of Detroit that day wasn’t the doubleheader split. It was the riots. Ray Lane, Ernie Harwell’s broadcast partner during the 1967 season, later said there was a thick black smoke rising all the way above the third deck above the leftfield and centerfield wall. It was so thick they assumed it was tires burning. Early on in the first game there was a call to the radio booth from the longtime Tiger’s GM Jim Campbell, with instructions to not mention the smoke.
After pitching the first game Lolich went home. Between games the players were told what was happening mere minutes from the ballpark. When the second game concluded they were told what roads were closed off and they were offered the option to have security help them. Most players didn’t shower, they just hurried home to the safety of their homes and their families.
Horton, who grew up and delivered newspapers in the area of the riots had other plans.
He didn’t shower, but he drove straight to the area the riots were taking place. In his autobiography Horton said it looked like a war zone. He stood on his car, in his full uniform, and pleaded with people to stop. He understood the reasons the people were frustrated, but he tried to tell them violence wasn’t the solution. He said they were “getting away from the purpose” by burning and looting. Horton stayed well into the night on that bloody Sunday, trying to convince anyone that would listen, that there were other ways to display civil unrest. Horton returned multiple times over the next week trying to use whatever influence he had to calm things down. This was HIS city and he didn’t want it to be destroyed like this.
Earlier I mentioned that Lolich didn’t pitch for the Tigers for three weeks.
That’s because Mickey Lolich was a member of the Michigan National Guard. He showed up at Tiger Stadium on July 24th and received a call from his commander that he was being called into duty. He spent the next few weeks assisting the National Guard as they protected a police station a few miles from Tiger Stadium. Lolich did return to the Tigers on August 11 and went 9-1 down the stretch as the Tigers finished just a game behind the Red Sox for the American League pennant.
Although I am a lifelong Tiger fan, I was too young to remember the 1968 World Series team. By the time I was 7 or 8 years old, in the early 70’s, I saw older versions of those players. They were revered for the ’68 series win. Al Kaline of course was an all time great. Jim Northrup, Bill Freehan, Cash and Lolich were still solid players during my youth. But, to be honest, I never understood the obsession with Horton. By the time I remember seeing him play, the muscular figure had“transformed” to no longer being muscle – and multiple leg injuries had sapped whatever speed he once had. I saw him as an overweight, slow designated hitter only. I knew he was a part of that 1968 team, but I never understood why he was held in such high regard. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I heard of his actions on that July evening in 1967. Since then I had more appreciation for what he did and how he literally put his life on the line for the city he grew up in and loved. THAT is why his number 23 was retired by the Tigers and if you ever make it to Michigan and visit Comerica Park – you’ll see his statue along the leftfield concourse – right next to Al Kaline and Ty Cobb and Charlie Gehringer. And rightfully so.
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