Begging For A Hit; 1968 Astros

 

TRIVIA WINNER: Congrats to David Hubert of Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, who correctly identified Jeff Torborg as the catcher who replaced Johnny Roseboro after Roseboro was hit with a bat by Juan Marichal. The Prize: Starbucks Gift Card.

NEW TRIVIA CONTEST:  By answering the TRIVIA QUESTION CORRECTLY you are automatically entered into a weekly drawing for a Starbucks Gift Card.  YOU MUST ENTER VIA THE EMAIL AT THE END OF THIS COLUMN. Don't forget to put your mailing address in with the answer so if you win we can send you the gift card in the mail.

Just a note to add; If you look at the top right hand corner of the side bar you will see a link to daily sports scores. We made an agreement with Baseball 24 in a mutual sharing situation. Hope its helpful to fans of several sports.

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NEW TRIVIA QUESTION:   Rusty Staub and Jim Wynn are separated by only 31 in one specific offensive category. Name the category. 
 
ANSWER to the Trivia question in the previous column:  Jeff Torborg was the catcher who replaced Johnny Roseboro after Roseboro was hit with a bat by Juan Marichal.

 It's been said a great pitching staff can win a pennant. That may be true but you need to have a few hits along the way. The 1968 Houston Astros are a case in point. In the year of the pitcher, the Astros were right there with the rest of the league. In some cases they were better than the rest of the NL. The club led the league in strikeouts, was third in complete games and second best in home runs allowed. Still, the club finished 10th in a ten-team league and was 18 games under .500 and 25 games out of first.

In fact, the two most exciting things which happened at the Astrodome in 1968 were the above (see the video) 24 inning game between the Astros and Mets and the March college basketball game between Houston and UCLA.

Dave Giusti 11-14, Larry Dierker 12-15, Denny Lemaster 10-15, Don Wilson 13-16 and Mike Cuellar 8-11 all were solid starters. None of the had an ERA higher than 3.31 and Cueallar 2.74 and Lemaster 2.81 were even better. Between them they competed 49 games and tossed 10 shutouts. Their WHIPs were solid and aside from Dierker's 20 Wild Pitches, there was nothing to complain about. Even the bullpen was solid if not spectacular.

However, the pitching can be great but if you can't score runs, you lose. The pitchers only allowed 68 more runs than the hitters produced. Aside from Rusty Staub's .291 BA and Jim Wynn's 26 Homers, this was a team doomed to fail. (Staub was coming off a year where he hit .333 with 44 doubles). Wynn clubbed 26 of the team's 66 home runs! That means the other 25 hitters smashed 40 dingers between them, and four of them had six each. The list includes Staub.  After Wynn, not one batter hit more than six! The Astros finished at, or near the bottom in 13 offensive categories including 9th in stolen bases with 44.

Even Harry "the Hat" Walker couldn't inspire this club to hit. Walker took over from Grady Hatton in mid-June with the club 23-38. Walker would take them to 49-52 the rest of the way. They immediately went on a 9-4 run but it was short lived. They could never put together more than a two game win streak until mid-August when they won 9 of 10. Houston actually moved up to 7th place. Then they hit a losing streak of 7-17 and it was pretty much all over. It was back to last and onto 1969.

TRIVIA CONTEST; After reading this column you can enter the weekly trivia contest for a chance to win a Starbucks Gift Card. Enter via the following email. Send 1) your answer to the trivia question at the top of the column, 2) your name, address and email so where we know where to send the card if you win 3) any comment you have on the column. One winner will be selected at random each week based on correct answers with the odds being based on the number of correct entries.  Please cut and paste or enter the following email into your email system.
                             SEND YOUR ANSWERS TO; brillpro@gmail.com  
 ==========================================================
Need to get out of a baseball hitting slump, or a golf swing slump? Order my new book  An athlete's guide to a better career." . That is for the Paperback, you can also order Kindle on that link. You can also order paperback copies directly from me via the email below for my other books."Beating the Slump;See it on Amazon for only $5.99

You can get a signed paper back copy of the above book "Tales of My Baseball Youth - a child of the sixties"  for $15 Shipping Included 
 
Use PayPal to brillpro@prodigy.net or contact us at the same email for other payment. 

Thank you to those of you who purchased my book after reading this column.        

Now Batting; Juan Marichal

 

 

TRIVIA WINNER: Congrats to Kel Kissamis of Hampshire, IL, who correctly identified the highly touted Jim Brosnan book "The Long Season" as the book we were asking about. The Prize: Starbucks Gift Card.

NEW TRIVIA CONTEST:  By answering the TRIVIA QUESTION CORRECTLY you are automatically entered into a weekly drawing for a Starbucks Gift Card.  YOU MUST ENTER VIA THE EMAIL AT THE END OF THIS COLUMN. Don't forget to put your mailing address in with the answer so if you win we can send you the gift card in the mail.

Just a note to add; If you look at the top right hand corner of the side bar you will see a link to daily sports scores. We made an agreement with Baseball 24 in a mutual sharing situation. Hope its helpful to fans of several sports.

===============================================================
NEW TRIVIA QUESTION:   Who came in to replace Johnny Roseboro when he went out after being hit by Marichal with a bat? 
 
ANSWER to the Trivia question in the previous column:  Jim Brosnan's highly touted book we were going for was "The Long Season."

To say Juan Marichal was an enigma is an understatement. In the 10 years of the 1960's he started and completed 197 games for the San Francisco Giants. Six times he won 20 or more games including 26 in 1968 and 25 in 1963. Three times he pitched over 300 innings and twice more hit marks of 299 and 295. From 1963-1969 his ERA never exceeded 2.76 and twice it was in the 2.1 range (2.13 and 2.10). 

Five times the man with the most varied pitches in his arsenal, completed at least 20 games and pitched 30 complete games in 1968. Five times he issued less than 50 walks and six times he struck out over 200 batters. Amazingly his WHIP was under 1.0 four times during the stretch. He never lost more than 13 and in 1965 he tossed 10 shutouts. He would throw at any angle and speed.

Yet, despite all of this he is best remembered for the time he took an outrageous turn and smacked the Dodger's Johnny Roseboro over the head with a bat, while standing in the batters box. 

It was a Sunday afternoon on August 22, 1965 and my father and my God Father and I were on our way to the Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles to see wrestling. My father was a major fan of "wrastlin'" and the Olympic Auditorium was the place to be for that sort of thing.  We were listening to the Dodger game on the radio and were appalled and shocked at what we heard as we pulled into the parking lot.

Up in the Bay Area, the Giants were hosting the Dodgers with Sandy Koufax facing Marichal. Two of the best pitchers of the era and of all-time as it would turn out, in a game both teams wanted to win as they battled it out in the closing days of the 1965 NL pennant race. 

The game started off tense. Maury Wills laid down a bunt single and the second time around, Marichal decked him. Koufax returned the favor by sending Willie Mays to the ground with a high fastball. When Marichal decked Ron Fairly, umpire Shag Crawford warned both teams. An ejection was coming the next time a pitch was too tight. 

What happened next is documented by both players. It was such an important game for both teams, both sides were making sure their pitcher would not be the one ejected for throwing at a hitter. They were not. It was Marichal and it came as a hitter.

In the third inning Koufax sent a pitch inside. Roseboro dropped the ball on purpose to get a good angle on Marichal who was at the plate. He positioned himself and whipped a throw back to Koufax which came dangerously close to Marichal's face. The Giant's ace said it actually did clip his nose.

Juan confronted Johnny and the two had heated words. Roseboro moved closer. Then it got ugly. Marichal clubbed Roseboro over the head with his bat. Roseboro went down and both benches emptied. A bloodied Roseboro went after Marichal and kept the pounding up until Mays came out and restrained him, bringing some peace to the party. Marichal, bat in hand, was tackled by the umpire.

"I was afraid he was going to hit me with his mask, so I hit him with my bat," Marichal said in an apology a day later.

No one was in a forgiving mood.  Bat versus mask. Hmmm. Doesn't seem like a match. Roseboro got 14 stitches, Marichal was fined $1750 and was suspended for 10 games. Roseboro did sue and the case was eventually settled for $7500. 

As for the game itself, a visibly shaken Koufax gave up four runs to the Giants, including homers by Mays and Cap Peterson. The final was 4-3 but Marichal was not the recipient of the win. Ron Herbal was. The Dodgers would go on to win the pennant and the World Series over the Twins.

Believe it or not the two men later became friends. When Roseboro died in 2002 at age 69, Marichal was one of the pallbearers and a speaker at the funeral. Marichal actually spent his last season at age 37, with the Dodgers in 1975.

TRIVIA CONTEST; After reading this column you can enter the weekly trivia contest for a chance to win a Starbucks Gift Card. Enter via the following email. Send 1) your answer to the trivia question at the top of the column, 2) your name, address and email so where we know where to send the card if you win 3) any comment you have on the column. One winner will be selected at random each week based on correct answers with the odds being based on the number of correct entries.  Please cut and paste or enter the following email into your email system.
                             SEND YOUR ANSWERS TO; brillpro@gmail.com  
 ==========================================================
Need to get out of a baseball hitting slump, or a golf swing slump? Order my new book "Beating the Slump; An athlete's guide to a better career." See it on Amazon for only $5.99. That is for the Paperback, you can also order Kindle on that link. You can also order paperback copies directly from me via the email below for my other books.

You can get a signed paper back copy of the above book "Tales of My Baseball Youth - a child of the sixties"  for $15 Shipping Included 
 
Use PayPal to brillpro@prodigy.net or contact us at the same email for other payment. 

Thank you to those of you who purchased my book after reading this column.       

The Crazy Mixed Up White Sox

TRIVIA WINNER: Congrats to Ryan Lerman of Coral Springs, FL, who correctly answered the reason Orlando Cepeda didn't play the last four games of the 12 game win streak in 1966 was because he got traded to the Cardinals whom he'd just blasted. The Prize: Starbucks Gift Card.

NEW TRIVIA CONTEST:  By answering the TRIVIA QUESTION CORRECTLY you are automatically entered into a weekly drawing for a Starbucks Gift Card.  YOU MUST ENTER VIA THE EMAIL AT THE END OF THIS COLUMN. Don't forget to put your mailing address in with the answer so if you win we can send you the gift card in the mail.

Just a note to add; If you look at the top right hand corner of the side bar you will see a link to daily sports scores. We made an agreement with Baseball 24 in a mutual sharing situation. Hope its helpful to fans of several sports.

===============================================================
NEW TRIVIA QUESTION:   What was the title of Jim Brosnan's highly touted book? 
 
ANSWER to the Trivia question in the previous column:  The reason Orlando Cepeda didn't play the last four games of the Giants 12 game win streak in 1966 was because he got traded to the Cardinals. The Cards evidently got tired of seeing him drive in runs against them.

If ever there was an "interesting" mix of youngsters and aging veterans on a team playing above their skill level, it was the 1963 Chicago White Sox. For a team with 94 wins and a second place finish, there was one statistic which stood out if for no other reason it shows how goofy this team was. Outfielder Dave Nicholson was second on the team in strikeouts to starting pitcher Gary Peters. Yep, Peters struck out 189 batters. Nicholson struck out 175 times!

     (1960 Interview with Nellie Fox)

The 23 year old Nicholson tied for the team lead in homers with 22. He tied Pete Ward. Ward also hit .295. Nicholson didn't come close at .229, but he also tied for third with RBI, trailing both Ward and Floyd Robinson who did it with only 13 homers. Ronny Hanson and Jim Landis also each homered 13 times. Three guys with 13 homers sounds like a lot of bad luck to me.

Of course the Sox had the ever present Cam Carreon behind the plate batting .274 and having his best season. The catcher was just about to embark on what would become a journeyman career. The following season he was replaced by J.C. Martin.

It was 22-year old Tommy McCraw and 35 year old Nellie Fox sharing the right side of the infield both hitting around .260. McCraw also tied for the team lead in stolen bases as he and Al Weis had 15 thefts. The bench included five more guys who had reached their 30's, and two more who were yet to reach 23. A 22 year old Ken Berry was in that group. He'd eventually become one of the best defensive players in the AL.

The pitching staff was solid and again mixed. Peters, Juan Pizarro and John Buzhardt were all 26-year old starters with Ray Herbert the oldest starter at 33 and Joel Horlen coming into his own at 25. The old man of the staff of course was 40 year old Hoyt Wilhelm. Jim Brosnan was hanging on at 33 while it was a 20 year old Bruce Howard and 22 year old Fred Talbot who would become solid major league players. 

The club battled all year long but it was another NY Yankee season. Even closing out the season 15-4 the Sox would not overcome the 10.5 game lead New York had piled on. Still 94 wins was a major accomplishment. 

The following season, with basically the same team, the White Sox actually improved to 98 wins but still finished second to the Yankees. In 1964 they gave Chicago fans hope, finishing just one game back of New York. Gone was Fox, while Bill Skowron came aboard, Wilhelm turned 41, Brosnan retired and Nicholson still led the hitters in strikeouts but he did cut them down to 126. This time, however, four pitchers out did him. 

TRIVIA CONTEST; After reading this column you can enter the weekly trivia contest for a chance to win a Starbucks Gift Card. Enter via the following email. Send 1) your answer to the trivia question at the top of the column, 2) your name, address and email so where we know where to send the card if you win 3) any comment you have on the column. One winner will be selected at random each week based on correct answers with the odds being based on the number of correct entries.  Please cut and paste or enter the following email into your email system.
                             SEND YOUR ANSWERS TO; brillpro@gmail.com  
 ==========================================================
Need to get out of a baseball hitting slump, or a golf swing slump? Order my new book "Beating the Slump; An athlete's guide to a better career." See it on Amazon for only $5.99. That is for the Paperback, you can also order Kindle on that link. You can also order paperback copies directly from me via the email below for my other books.

You can get a signed paper back copy of the above book "Tales of My Baseball Youth - a child of the sixties"  for $15 Shipping Included 
 
Use PayPal to brillpro@prodigy.net or contact us at the same email for other payment. 

Thank you to those of you who purchased my book after reading this column.