The 1976 Cincinnati Reds: Last Hurrah for the Big Red Machine

The 1976 Cincinnati Reds ALSO BY DOUG FELDMANN AND FROM MCFARLAND El Birdos: The 1967 and 1968 St. Louis Cardinals (2...

Author: Doug Feldmann

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The 1976 Cincinnati Reds

ALSO BY DOUG FELDMANN AND FROM MCFARLAND El Birdos: The 1967 and 1968 St. Louis Cardinals (2007) September Streak: The 1935 Chicago Cubs Chase the Pennant (2003) Fleeter Than Birds: The 1985 St. Louis Cardinals and Small Ball’s Last Hurrah (2002) Dizzy and the Gas House Gang: The 1934 St. Louis Cardinals and Depression-Era Baseball (2000)

The 1976 Cincinnati Reds Last Hurrah for the Big Red Machine DOUG FELDMANN

McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers Jefferson, North Carolina, and London

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGUING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Feldmann, Doug, 1970– The 1976 Cincinnati Reds : last hurrah for the big red machine / Doug Feldmann. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-7864-3854-9 softcover : 50# alkaline paper 1. Cincinnati Reds (Baseball team)— History. 2. Baseball teams— Ohio— Cincinnati — History. I. Title. GV875.C65F45 2009 796.357' 640977178 — dc22 2008049105 British Library cataloguing data are available ©2009 Doug Feldmann. All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. On the cover: Team photograph of the 1976 Cincinnati Reds (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York) Manufactured in the United States of America

McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640 www.mcfarlandpub.com

To Angie– thank you for introducing me to Cincinnati, and for your inspiring love

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Acknowledgments The author would like to thank the following individuals and organizations for their assistance in the research for this book: Chris Mallory, Tony Stoecklin, the University of Cincinnati, the Cincinnati History Museum, Western Hills High School in Cincinnati, Elder High School in Cincinnati, and the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York. Additionally, the beat writers who covered the Reds in 1976 — particularly Bob Hertzel and Tom Callahan from the Cincinnati Enquirer— provided outstanding coverage of the team. Their thoughts are quoted often herein.

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Table of Contents Acknowledgments

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Prologue

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1. Recharging the Machine

3

2. An Array of Stars

22

3. Lockout

52

4. Opening Day and a Star-Spangled Monday

83

5. Battling the Boys in Blue

107

6. The Bird Takes Flight, and the Machine Rolls On

123

7. A Nation Celebrates, and a World Competes

139

8. An Historic Finish

157

9. “The Best There Is”

183

Epilogue

219

1976 Final Major League Baseball Standings

231

1976 Final Cincinnati Reds Statistics

233

Sources of Quotations

235

Bibliography

253

Index

255

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Prologue The routine was always the same, but never grew tiresome. I would attend morning kindergarten until noon, come home to an exquisite lunch of Campbell’s tomato soup and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, click on WGN-TV to catch Bozo’s Circus until 12:30 P.M., which smoothly transitioned to the Chicago Cubs’ pre-game show that lasted until 1:00 P.M.— and then it was time for baseball. Perhaps the itinerary was a bit regimented for a five-year-old, but keeping up with the Cubs was already a part of my daily ritual. At some point during my morning kindergarten duties— in the midst of cutting out a green paper dragon, or reviewing the steps for successfully tying my shoes before being tested on the skill — I would occasionally catch myself peeking at the Cubs’ pocket schedule, affixed in its usual spot inside my desk next to the paste and crayons. Back in 1975, the schedule was printed modestly in the Cubs’ two colors of blue and red trim, appropriately representing the beautifully simple game of baseball that, at the time, was still maintaining its own basic beauty. The pocket schedule showed dark red boxes depicting the Cubs’ home games, while white boxes displayed their upcoming games on the road. Covertly glancing down at it while avoiding the repressive glare of Ms. Layton, I was temporarily comforted by noticing that this particular day’s visitor to Wrigley Field for the Cubs was the Montreal Expos, quite a beatable team. Soon, however, my eyes shifted nervously across the small folded calendar to the next set of boxes, which had the ominous abbreviation CIN printed within them. My heart sank, for I knew that coming soon to Chicago were the big, bad Cincinnati Reds with their horrifying monsters named Rose and Morgan and Bench and Perez and Foster that made my life miserable, frightening me nearly to the point of having to turn the TV off after Bozo was done. Gallantly, the loyal musketeers on my side named Kessinger and Cardenal and Monday and Madlock and Reuschel would do their best to hold the monsters at bay, but I knew that three long, painful days in front of the television were imminent. In later years, in taking a more statistical, mature and retrospective approach to the monsters, I discovered that each of those aforementioned players hit over 1

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Prologue

.400 against the Cubs in 1975 (in addition to another monster named Geronimo, who nearly led them all with a .452 mark). But back then as a five-yearold, it was simply a regular and unabated trauma, making me gasp in between bites of my peanut butter and jelly. I also realized in later years that it was possible I had a counterpart back in 1975, another five-year-old in Cincinnati whose day revolved around his own home team. For that youngster, I would imagine that the games were typically at night, with starting times dangerously close to bedtime. I would also imagine that my Cincinnati counterpart would drift off to sleep before even a few innings had been completed, but also with the comforting knowledge that his musketeers named Rose and Morgan and Bench and Perez and Foster would safely guard him against any futile enemy attack while he slept, and that the Cincy youngster’s morning would find yet another victory had been won for the home team. Growing out of kindergarten into first grade in 1976, I tried to alter the fate of the ’75 Cubs through the card-and-dice game of Strat-O-Matic Baseball, in which I felt I might help change the outcome against the Reds. Nevertheless, in the end, my summons of Oscar Zamora or Tom Dettore from the Cubs’ bullpen never seemed to stem the onslaught, as a roll of the dice always seemed to result in a homer by Bench, a key hit by Rose, or an easy stolen base by Morgan, unfortunately confirming “Strat’s” accuracy of the real game. Protected in my six-year-old world, I was naïve in 1976 to the tightening grip that money was quickly asserting upon the world of baseball. The Cincinnati Reds in 1975 and 1976, despite the horror they imposed on me, were at least a fixed body; the cast of demons was always the same, and I secretly admired the loyalty they demonstrated, which appeared to keep them together in an unbreakable bond. But before long, I became familiar with a term called “free agency” that would scatter the major league rosters to the winds— including the mighty Reds— and soon, the insular privileges of childhood were never the same. Doug Feldmann (As of this writing, living in Cincinnati, Ohio) November 2008

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Recharging the Machine Cincinnati presents an odd spectacle. A town which seems to want to get built too quickly to have things done in order. — Alexis de Tocqueville in Journey to America, 1831

In the mind’s eye of a Cincinnatian, the left arm of Reds relief pitcher Will McEnaney can still be seen flapping through the darkening New England sky, late into the evening of October 22, 1975, at Boston’s Fenway Park. The preceding summer had been one filled with high promise for Bostonians as their Red Sox club — an intriguing mixture of precocious rookies and unyielding veterans in this given baseball season — rampaged through the American League’s Eastern Division, scoring at least 108 more runs than anyone else in the standings beneath them. They were also taking advantage of an opportune moment in history in their ongoing battle with their private nemesis, the New York Yankees, as the Bronx team was in the throes of an 11-year pennant drought, the longest since manager Miller Huggins and a Red Sox sale item named Babe Ruth had first brought the New York team to prominence in the early 1920s. Even so, the local dreams were crushed yet again, as it would be another bridesmaid finish for Boston in the World Series. The 1975 Fall Classic marked only the Red Sox’s third appearance in baseball’s final round since 1946 for a team that had not captured a championship since Ruth helped them triumph in 1918. From the outskirts of April to the closing moments of September, it had appeared that this Red Sox team was one of true destiny, highlighted by first-year outfielder Fred Lynn stunning everyone with his capture of both the American League’s Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player awards. Over the stretch run, however, subtle blows to the cause had been withstood. In the most glaring instance, Lynn’s fellow outstanding freshman, outfielder Jim Rice, had his rookie season cut short by injury. Rice and Lynn had become the first rookie teammates in 25 years to drive in 100 runs each before Rice’s wrist was broken on a pitch from Vern Ruhle of the Detroit Tigers on September 21, caus3

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ing him to miss this World Series. And for now, the men from southwest Ohio were about to deliver the final blow. Even with hopes dimming, the Bostonians repelled the attacks valiantly to the end, just as they had done 200 years prior as the British repeated their charges up Bunker Hill. The last vain crack of the bat sounded forth from longtime Red Sox great Carl Yastrzemski, the man who had taken Ted Williams’ place in left field at Fenway in 1961, and who now in moving to first base had allowed Rice to become the new protector of the area. The man called “Yaz” attempted to make solid contact on a McEnaney offering and keep the hopes alive for the patriots that remained in the seats at the corner of Yawkey and Lansdowne. But Yastrzemski’s drive closed around the waiting glove of Cincinnati center fielder Cesar Geronimo for the final out, changing in that brief instant the fortunes of another city that, in many respects, had been one of Boston’s National League counterparts. Both were historic baseball places. But like Boston, Cincinnati had been a long-time World Series bridesmaid itself, having failed to hoist the game’s highest honor since 1940. Before Geronimo’s routine catch, many world events had taken place since the Reds’ last title. America and its allies had been victorious in World War II; the nation had fought to a stalemate in the Korean Conflict; and only in the past few months had the United States seen the last of its own citizens removed from a battle-torn section of southeast Asia which, for the past decade, had been generally referred to simply as “Vietnam.” Assuredly, the banks of the Ohio River had not been unlike the banks of the Charles, the home of near-misses and could-have-beens in recent summers. To add to the surreal setting surrounding the Reds’ celebration, a ghostly rain had been haunting the Boston area for the past several days. The weather stalled the Series at different points, piping up the dramatic flair of the battle and causing the Reds to hold indoor workouts at the fieldhouse of Tufts University, led by their manager, George “Sparky” Anderson. Anderson was not part of the ensuing raucous celebration that took place on the field after Geronimo’s catch; rather, he quietly slipped down the runway towards the Reds’ locker room at a gait no more excited than one of his famous, frequent trips to the pitching mound. Shortly afterwards, he gave a simple explanation for his seclusion and stoicism during this occasion, his most defining professional moment. “After six years, I had won a world championship ... I was weak. I was drained. I couldn’t have run out there on the field if my life depended on it.” Anderson had not gone to sleep until 4:00 A.M. earlier that same day due to the Herculean battle that had ensued the night before and into that very morning as well. Only hours before the winner-take-all contest, Game Six had ended with a twelfth-inning home run from the bat of Boston catcher Carlton Fisk that caromed off the left-field foul pole at 12:24 A.M., capping what Anderson had called “the greatest game ever played ... winning or losing, a man can’t lie to himself.” Moreover, shortly before Fisk’s blast, the Reds had been undone by a for-


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mer teammate in outfielder Bernie Carbo. Carbo was a player for whom Anderson had always cared deeply, having managed Carbo in the minor leagues at Asheville, North Carolina, several years earlier. Carbo, however, thought Anderson had “abandoned” him upon leaving Cincinnati in 1972 in a trade with the St. Louis Cardinals. Now, in the eighth inning of the classic sixth game, Carbo belted his second pinch-hit homer of the Series for the Red Sox, tying the score at 6–6. The pitch had been offered by McEnaney’s fellow young member of the bullpen, Rawly Eastwick, who to that point had been considered a lock for the Series MVP award, having won Games Two and Three and saving Game Five. Carbo’s blast allowed Fisk to administer the final coup de grace moments later, a ball that was caught off the foul pole by Reds left fielder George Foster. “It’s sitting somewhere in my garage at home,” Foster revealed years later upon finally claiming possession of the baseball. Fisk’s homer had redeemed his batterymate, the colorful and multi-methodological pitcher Luis Tiant, who had been victorious in Games One and Four but roughed up in the sixth contest. According to Fisk, the confusing Tiant threw 170 different pitches— if one counted all the angles from where the ball came. Tiant, as local legend had it, would look every single person in the eye at Fenway at some point during the game due to his whirling wind-up. In the locker room after the sixth game, Anderson’s third baseman, Pete Rose — a man who never allowed himself to be out-distanced in passion for the sport —concurred with his manager’s sentiment about the greatness of that contest, even though he was on the losing side of a battle that seemed to push the momentum in Boston’s favor for Game Seven. “That was the greatest game I ever played in. Absolutely the greatest. Think what that will do for baseball. I’m just proud to be part of the game,” said Rose. Joe Morgan was a few locker stools away, quietly sipping on a can of Budweiser, and as confident as the rest of his teammates, who had won 114 games during the year, including the playoffs. “Beer today, champagne tomorrow,” he pronounced. At first, these words troubled the Cincinnati writers who were covering the event, for the scribes immediately recalled the similar promulgation of Red Sox manager Dick Williams before losing the seventh game of the 1967 World Series to the St. Louis Cardinals. When asked about his Game Seven pitcher for that Series, Williams responded, “Lonborg — and champagne,” referring to the faith he held in Jim Lonborg’s right arm. Consequently, Lonborg, Williams, and the Red Sox would lose the game and series to the Cardinals. Over in the home clubhouse, Boston pitcher Bill Lee echoed the sentiments of Rose and Anderson about the supernatural character of Game Six, claiming that the series should be called a draw at three games apiece. “It’s a darn shame we have to play it,” he added, referring to the seventh contest that he would start for the Red Sox. “These teams are so close they should call the game off, declare us co-champions of the world, and stage a picnic at old Fenway.” The entire ten-hour period from the early morning of October 22 to the

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Series’ conclusion was a fitting, anxious end of a season full of anxiety, which even comes to a manager whose team wins the pennant in runaway style. For it is hardly remembered that Game Seven of the World Series was the fiftieth time that the indomitable 1975 Cincinnati Reds had come from behind to win, and it was also the thirtieth occasion that Anderson’s team had won in its last turn at-bat. Geronimo’s catch ended what many were calling the greatest World Series ever, a spectacle that had been launched in a rain-soaked ceremony with President Gerald Ford’s first pitch eleven days earlier. When news of the final out reached Cincinnati, the masses poured forth onto Fountain Square, the traditional downtown gathering space. There were more than 15,000 fans on its sidewalks when the team held its celebratory rally a couple days later, during which Rose approached the microphone and addressed the throng, saying, “The championship is home where it belongs.” The Reds’ momentum had been established in the early round of the postseason when they beat the Pittsburgh Pirates in the National League Championship Series for the third time in six years, downing manager Danny Murtaugh’s club in a three-game sweep. In the locker room after the 1975 NLCS win, star catcher Johnny Bench was seen planting a big kiss on the forehead of Anderson, his powerful right arm wrapped around the skipper’s neck while caressing a bottle of champagne in the other. It was as if Bench knew that this team was finally the one to fulfill its promise, a club that had come so close in World Series appearances in 1970 and 1972 but could not seem to make the grand, final leap. For in the first half of the decade, the Reds had virtually done it all in the National League. Under the guidance of Anderson, the 36-year-old rookie manager in 1970, the Reds had been the Western Division champions and league pennant winners; in 1972, they repeated. Cincinnati, however, was defeated in the World Series by the Baltimore Orioles and the Oakland A’s in those respective years. The Reds added another division title in 1973 despite the absence of shortstop Dave Concepcion and his broken ankle for much of the season, but were defeated in the NLCS by the upstart New York Mets, a team that during the regular season had struggled to win as many games as they had lost, finishing with a final record of 82–79. In 1974, the Reds were beaten out for the Western Division title by the hard-fighting Los Angeles Dodgers, who had taken over the division lead in the first week of the season and never relinquished it. Cincinnati finished a mere four games back at season’s end, with the Dodgers having to win nine of their final 13 games in the last two weeks to keep the division crown away from Anderson’s club. The Hollywood men battled behind the incredible performance of relief pitcher Mike Marshall, who set records out of the bullpen with 106 appearances and 208 innings pitched en route to the National League Cy Young Award and a third-place finish in the Most Valuable Player voting behind the Cardinals’ Lou Brock and the ultimate winner, Dodgers teammate Steve Garvey.


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Second fiddle no longer to the Dodgers nor anyone else, Cincinnati was the undisputed center of the baseball kingdom at the end of 1975. After a mediocre start in the late spring, the Reds overwhelmed the rest of the National League in mid-summer. By the time they had beaten ace pitcher Tom Seaver and the Mets in a comeback win on July 13, the Reds had won an average of more than four out of every five times since mid–May, posting a 41–9 record during the streak. Starting pitchers Don Gullett, Jack Billingham, and Clay Kirby went 17–0 during the stretch (even though Gullett broke his thumb on June 16 while trying to field a ball bare-handed, and would be lost for two months). When the fifty-game assault was over, the Dodgers, who had been leading the division by five-and-a-half games on May 17, found themselves chasing Cincinnati with a twelve-and-a-half game deficit, as off in the distance the Reds grew smaller and smaller ahead of them for the rest of the summer. When Cincinnati clinched the Western Division title on September 7, it was the earliest a division or pennant had ever been secured on the calendar, besting the 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers by one day. By season’s end, the Reds enjoyed a twenty-game separation between themselves and Dodgers, making it the largest closing margin since the 1906 Chicago Cubs took the National League flag by 20 games. Cincinnati’s 108 wins were also a league record for a regular season, even though the Dodgers had topped the Reds in their season series, 10–8, Cincinnati’s only losing mark against another team on the year. Furthermore, with a World Series title now finally in their grasp, the Reds had also achieved their prize on what had become the world’s brightest sports stage — that of modern television coverage. It was soon announced after Game Six of the 1975 World Series that the contest was estimated to be the mostwatched sporting event in television history to that time, as Major League Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn decided at the last minute to move the game from a scheduled afternoon start to nighttime. Game Seven, however, would quickly break the record, with a projected 75 million viewers tuning into the broadcast the following evening. And a few months later, the National Football League would enjoy its own defining moment in electronic mass media, as Super Bowl X between the Pittsburgh Steelers and the Dallas Cowboys in January 1976 transfixed a new record of 78 percent of American television viewers watching the game. Kuhn was keenly aware of the transformation taking place in baseball. The medium had been birthed in the 1950s while operating alongside radio, had grown slowly through the 1960s, and now was poised to fully explode on the American commercial market. Along with the explosion, there were gold mines of money to be made by one faction or another within the game. While Kuhn had always been wary of the divisiveness that could potentially enter the picture with the new-found revenue, he also believed that the game could capitalize on the imminent windfall, and that a true renaissance could take place. Back on May 4, 1975, Bob Watson of the Houston Astros scored what was believed to be the one-millionth run recorded in National

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League history. Many of the game’s power brokers, Kuhn among them, hoped it was no coincidence that the event occurred in conjunction with the newfound monetary treasures in the sport. It was as if baseball was indeed about to enjoy a rebirth in popularity with the American public, and it seemed that nothing could derail its momentum. (Concepcion, interestingly, had nearly beaten Watson for the honor; for almost simultaneously, the shortstop hit a home run in Atlanta against the Braves and narrowly missed crossing the plate ahead of Watson, who was scoring his run in San Francisco near that very moment.) What would actually follow into the mid–1970s, however, was a continuance of modern labor troubles that had first arisen in baseball as the 1960s were drawing to a close —caused in part by that very influx of “new money.” But seemingly impervious to the ever-worsening business side of the game was the dominance of its best team, the Cincinnati Reds, who were peaking as a dynasty in the making. Its commander-in-chief was a man of unlikely circumstances, one whose very identity was a genuine mystery to many in the Queen City when he was announced to the locals as the Reds’ new manager seven years earlier. ********** Born in Bridgewater, South Dakota, in 1934, George Anderson had moved with his family to Los Angeles when he was nine years old in the midst of World War II. His grandfather, Oscar Anderson, was a Norwegian immigrant and had settled in Iowa to become a professional painter (as George’s father would eventually become as well). Baseball started early in the Anderson family, as the sixfoot-three Oscar quickly picked up the game, and his son Elmer (George’s uncle) signed a minor-league contract with the St. Louis Cardinals. Yet even the $55 a month Elmer made playing ball during the cashed-strapped Great Depression was not enough to keep him in the game, and he returned home to assist with the family business. George Anderson always noted how his family was a great shaping influence on his morals, as would his conversion to Catholicism be later in life; he always held close to the notion of “honesty being the best policy.” While walking along a street in his Los Angeles neighborhood, young George one day came upon the campus of the University of Southern California. The baseball team was on the field practicing, and the boy gazed in awe at the first fenced-in ballpark he had ever seen. Moments later, a batted ball cleared the fence and nestled itself in the bushes near where George had been watching the action. When the student manager of the team came over to look for the ball, he discovered that George had already found it. Always honest from an early age, he tried to give it back, but the student manager said, “Go on, keep it — it’s yours.” But George was taught by his parents to never keep anything that did not belong to him and went toward the offices that adjoined the park, on a mission to find the man in charge. Little George wound


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up having a very pleasant, brief conversation with a man who introduced himself as “Mr. Dedeaux,” who was filling in for the regular USC coach, Sam Berry, who was off serving in the United States Navy during the war. Coach Rod Dedeaux asked George if he would like to become the batboy for the team. When the kid quickly agreed, it made both the boy and the ultimately legendary collegiate coach immediately happy. A few years later, Anderson used the skills he learned from the USC players and coaching staff to develop into a star player himself as an infielder at Dorsey High School in Los Angeles. Looking to broaden his baseball and monetary horizons, Anderson spent a summer during those high school years working on the rail lines in Oroville, California, to the north. It was a hard job and George got extremely homesick, but he also had the opportunity to play on a semi-pro team four nights a week as part of the deal. Upon returning to Los Angeles, Dedeaux offered him a partial baseball scholarship to attend USC, but Anderson turned it down. The influence of Anderson’s parents had never weakened within him, and while feeling badly about having to refuse Dedeaux and the Trojans, a commitment to another man took precedence. Throughout his teenage years, Anderson and his family had developed a close friendship with Brooklyn Dodgers scout Harold “Lefty” Phillips, who by Anderson’s senior year of high school had joined the Brooklyn organization after scouting for the Reds for three years. Phillips enjoyed helping Sparky develop his baseball skills, and his overall concern for the young man had impacted Anderson’s parents. A subsidized college education meant a lot to most working parents in those days, especially for those with a son like Sparky. “I only had a high school education,” he would become famous for saying, “and believe me, I had to cheat to get that.” Nonetheless, the Anderson family felt such an obligation to Phillips that Mr. Anderson and Sparky not only refused USC, but also turned down a $3,000 bonus offer for Sparky to sign with the Pirates— a substantial amount of money for the marginal professional prospect that Sparky (self-admittedly) was— in order to give Phillips the first chance at signing the boy to a professional contract. Phillips, in turn, matched the Pirates’ offer of a $3,000 signing bonus, to which Sparky and his parents agreed. Immediately, he was off to make $250 a month to play for the Santa Barbara team in the Class C California League in his first professional assignment. As soon as he arrived in Santa Barbara, Anderson found himself playing shortstop next to the team’s player-manager at second base, George Scherger, who in being 13 years his elder would cross paths with the young player in another place in the game two decades later. At his next minor league stop in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1955, Anderson became teammates with several players who would also go on to become major league managers, including Dick Williams, Norm Sherry, Danny Ozark, and Maury Wills. He continued to show rapid improvement as well as a feisty attitude — an attitude that would garner his nickname “Sparky” from the Fort Worth radio broadcaster, and one that, by Anderson’s recollection, would get

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him thrown out of 16 games that summer. Nonetheless, he rose to secure a spot on the Dodgers’ major league roster by 1958, just as the franchise was making its switch to the West Coast by moving to Anderson’s adopted hometown of Los Angeles. He was soon sent back to the minor leagues before ever taking the field at the top level. Finally, after having spent six years in the Dodgers’ organization, which simply had no room for him in the big leagues, Sparky was traded to the Philadelphia Phillies two days before Christmas in 1958, with a chance to become the team’s starting second baseman for the following season. In later years, Anderson frequently recalled the fear that was in his heart when he parked his car for the first time at the Phillies’ spring training headquarters in Clearwater, Florida, at Jack Russell Stadium. Initially, he did not want to get out of his car. After an inspirational talk from his wife, Carol, however, Sparky went ahead and worked to establish himself with his new team. And while Jack Russell Stadium is no longer in use by the Phillies, Anderson still parks in that same spot when visiting the premises, recalling the feelings of his first days as a major leaguer. Throughout that first spring training in 1959 as a 25-year-old rookie, Anderson discovered he was essentially being handed the Phillies’ second base job. But despite his excitement, Anderson noticed that he was on a Philadelphia team that did not take the game as seriously as he did. Immediately, he noticed how there was little or no structure to the Phillies’ workout regimen in spring training, which was in stark contrast to what Anderson had experienced with the strict Dodgers system. Players seemed to come and go as they pleased, ended their conditioning exercises whenever they felt like it, and went about their jobs with largely a lackadaisical attitude. And when the regular season started, Anderson found much of the same. “One day in Chicago, we were down by two, maybe three runs in the ninth,” he remembered. “I was psyching myself up like, ‘We’ve got a chance to get the Cubbies in the ninth.’ But the Phils couldn’t wait to go out one, two, three so they could run to the clubhouse, take a shower, and get to their favorite restaurant. A couple of ’em yelled out to a cab driver to wait while they were walking up the stairs to the clubhouse at old Wrigley Field, within seconds after the game was over.” The Phillies would finish last in the National League; Anderson played in 152 games but mustered only a .218 average and no home runs while batting eighth in the lineup. By spring training of 1960, Anderson had already seen enough. He was tired of the Phillies’ operations, and found himself sitting on the bench for most of the “A” team exhibition games. And by mid–May, when Tony Taylor was obtained in a trade with the Cubs, Sparky knew he was finished with the Phillies’ big league club. He was soon sold to Toronto of the International League, where he spent the rest of the season batting .227. In considering his future as a player, Anderson was not happy about having to return to the minor leagues, and turned his primary attention to a career in coaching. He was given a chance


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with Toronto in 1964, and later became the manager at different stops in the St. Louis Cardinals’ organization throughout the rest of the 1960s, supplementing his income in the off-season by working as a car salesman. When he landed his first job in the Cardinals’ system in 1965, it was the first time he encountered Bob Howsam — a man who would change the course of fate for Anderson, the Reds, and the city of Cincinnati in the years to come. In early October 1969, Anderson was still in the midst of his many stops at different minor and major league cities, trying to build a career in the nonplaying ranks of professional baseball. A new opportunity was knocking as he drove from his home in Thousand Oaks, California, to meet with California Angels officials about becoming their major league third base coach. Anderson had spent the 1969 season on the coaching staff of manager Preston Gomez with the expansion San Diego Padres, but was seeking greener pastures than the 52–110 record the Padres had sported in their first campaign. Upon his arrival at the Angels’ offices, Anderson almost immediately agreed to the offered salary of $17,000 a year with the club ($7,000 more than he had ever made as a player, the high point of which he had attained in the minor leagues at Toronto—for he would only make $7,500 in his short stint in the majors in Philadelphia). As Sparky sat in the office of general manager Dick Walsh to complete the deal, the ink was hardly dry from his signature on the contract when Walsh’s phone rang at 2:45 P.M. It was Howsam calling from Cincinnati. Now the general manager of the Reds after serving in St. Louis in the same capacity after Branch Rickey and the first reign of Bing Devine, Howsam told Walsh that Anderson was a person of interest for the manager’s job with the Reds. Dave Bristol had just been fired as the Cincinnati skipper, and Howsam, although aware of the popularity of Bristol among the players and fans, was looking to make a fresh start with the ballclub in a city that was in the process of constructing a brandnew stadium for its team. “George,” Walsh said abruptly, pulling the phone slightly down from his ear while having just retrieved the pen from Sparky’s hand. “How would you like to become manager of the Cincinnati Reds?” Anderson, understandably stunned, was in the midst of thanking Walsh’s secretary for the cup of coffee she had just brought into the room. Sparky nodded in the affirmative, and with Walsh’s hand still cupped over the speaker of the phone, proceeded to ask Walsh how much in salary Anderson should request from the Reds. “I’d say $35,000,” Walsh replied. And those were the final words spoken in the room. Anderson rose, shook his hand, and left the office, his deal with the Angels never consummated. In fact, Walsh gave him the short-lived contract with the Angels as a souvenir, one that Anderson has always retained. After Sparky left, Walsh wondered how he was going to explain to Gene Autry, the Angels’ president, how he lost a coach to another team whom he had signed only a moment earlier. “Oh well,” Walsh smiled and reasoned to himself as

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Anderson walked out the door. “At least it shows that I know how to pick a good man.” When Anderson finally had a chance to speak with Howsam on the phone and was asked about salary, he (as firmly as he could) suggested the $35,000 figure that Walsh had recommended. The seasoned Howsam politely countered him, saying that such a salary was a bit high for a first-year manager. “Would you manage the Reds for $28,500?” Howsam responded after a moment’s silence. Even though the offer was a lesser amount by nearly twenty percent, Anderson quickly agreed. He went home, anxious to share the news with Carol and their three children, but they had already heard. In retrospect many years later, what had impressed Anderson the most in meeting Howsam for the first time was that Howsam did not want “yes men” working underneath him; rather, he wished to have informed input from his subordinates, especially opinions different from his own. “Howsam is a listener,” Anderson wrote in his autobiography in 1978. “He’ll hear any man’s opinion. He doesn’t always go with your recommendation but, by God, he’ll hear you out, then make up his own mind.” Anderson also recalled that Howsam had called him once a month while Sparky was managing in the Cardinals’ minor league system, and that he always looked forward to those calls for advice and support. Howsam was a Denver native, born in 1918, the son of a beekeeper in the nearby town of La Jara. After attending the University of Colorado and serving in the United States Navy, he entered into a life of baseball and became president of the Denver club in the American Association by the age of 30 after his family had purchased the franchise. At the time, the Denver ballclub was under the auspices of the Pittsburgh Pirates, an organization which during the 1950s was enjoying a tenure of leadership from one of the game’s greatest minds. The individual who would become Howsam’s mentor was the shrewdest front-office man baseball had ever seen, a man who would “go back to the safe to bring you a nickel’s change,” as Leo Durocher used to say. The impact of Branch Rickey on the sport was felt far and wide, and young Bob Howsam reveled in it. “Mr. Rickey was one of the greatest baseball men of all time, and the best judge of baseball talent I ever knew,” Howsam once claimed. A few years earlier, Rickey had shaken the pillars of the game’s establishment with the introduction of Jackie Robinson to the Brooklyn Dodgers. He left Brooklyn to join the Pirates in late 1950, as the Brooklyn club was not able to come to terms with him on a contract renewal as club president (in September of that year, Rickey had proposed to sell 25 percent of his ownership in the Dodgers to real estate executive William Zeckendorf ). Howsam was an immediate success as the general manager in Denver, orchestrating events to a Class A (at the time, designation for a high level of the minor leagues) attendance record of more than 460,000 in his first year on the job. He would also be instrumental in bringing the Broncos to town in 1959 in the American Football League, constructing on top of a garbage dump a field


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for the team that would ultimately become Mile High Stadium. Three years after selling his interests in the Broncos in 1961, he moved to St. Louis to become the Cardinals’ general manager, replacing Devine. As the Cardinals were fighting for a pennant in August of 1964, Rickey — a Cardinal man by origin, beginning nearly fifty years earlier as a player — was brought back to St. Louis as a special advisor to Cardinals owner August A. Busch, Jr. He convinced the beer magnate to replace the tandem of Devine and field manager Johnny Keane with Howsam and Durocher, respectively. While Busch backed off on the deal for Durocher, Howsam was brought aboard. Meanwhile, Keane turned the tables on the owner, announcing that he was leaving St. Louis in October to manage the Yankees— the team he had just defeated for the world championship. Instead, Albert “Red” Schoendienst was hired as the Cards’ field general for the 1965 season. Howsam began pulling off several moves that would ultimately help bring another World Series title to the Cardinals in 1967. Even so, he would not remain in St. Louis long enough to see first-hand his full plan come to fruition. Looking for a new challenge, Howsam became employed as the general manager of the Reds on January 22, 1967, while former Cardinal great Stan Musial assumed the same post in St. Louis. Despite the near-unilateral power he now had in personnel decisions, Howsam saw a large task in front of him in rebuilding the Reds, a team that had floundered to seventh place with a 76–84 record in 1966. Cincinnati possessed the smallest scouting staff in the National League, and Howsam knew that the identification of talent for an improved farm system was paramount in order for a so-called “smaller market” team in the Reds— like the Cardinals in St. Louis— to compete with organizations that had deeper pockets (in congruence with the philosophies of his mentor Rickey). In addition to growing his own, however, Howsam also showed that he was not afraid to “pull the trigger” on large and even controversial trades. Within a year, such local Cincy favorites as Vada Pinson, Ted Davidson, Deron Johnson, Milt Pappas, Tommy Harper, and Art Shamsky were gone. Furthermore, Howsam displayed Rickey-like tactics in broadening his search for new talent by being among the first baseball executives to actively pursue young players from Taiwan, who by the 1970s were experiencing unparalleled success at the Little League World Series. By 1974, the Taiwanese team had won four straight world titles; and two players from the early years of their success— pitcher Eng-Jey Kao and catcher Lai-Hua Lee, who were now 20 and 19 years old, respectively — were contacted and signed to deals by Howsam’s chief scout, Joe Bowen. Howsam’s plan was for the players to attend spring training with the Reds in 1975. However, military commitments in Taiwan for the two young men forestalled this possibility as well as Howsam’s back-up plans of having them attend spring training in 1976 or begin their play in the rookie leagues in Billings, Montana, during the summer of 1976, if necessary. As a result of the political difficulties, the players never wore the Cincinnati uniform.

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Howsam expressed his full confidence in the young Anderson as the field manager, and Sparky’s first official act on behalf of the organization was to attend the 1969 World Series between the Mets and the Orioles as the team’s representative. Bristol was there as the Reds’ guest as well, but there was no friction between the two men. “Dave was extremely kind,” Anderson remembered about the meeting, as the two chatted about the Cincinnati personnel Sparky was inheriting. “He could have been bitter about what had happened, but wasn’t.” When Anderson returned home, the first assistant coach he hired was Scherger, the man who had been Sparky’s first manager when he arrived at his initial minor league stop as a 19-year-old player in Santa Barbara in 1953. Eight years earlier, Anderson had vowed to take his friend with him if he ever reached the major leagues as a manager. Scherger was viewed as an outstanding teacher of baseball fundamentals, so much so that he had been regularly “demoted” to lower levels in the Reds’ minor league system to instruct younger players in the finer points of the game. In fact, when Scherger realized that he was not likely to ever manage in the major leagues, he even requested a lower classification for manager in the Reds’ system than the Double-A job he was offered. “I have no name,” Scherger stated about his unavoidable anonymity factoring into his decision to work in the rookie leagues. “Where am I going? I might as well see if I can help the kids.” With the exception of serving in World War II for three years and leaving baseball temporarily to work for the A&P food company, Scherger had spent every year working in the minor leagues from 1940 until Anderson called on him to join the Cincinnati coaching staff. In doing so, Scherger estimated that he gone close to a million miles on buses, and Anderson recalled riding with him during that first summer in Santa Barbara. “We had a driver George just didn’t trust,” Sparky recalled. “The guy would drink, and George figured he was gonna drive off the road.” Anderson understood this fatherly oversight that Scherger employed, and put it into practice when he received his first managerial job at Rock Hill, South Carolina, several years later. “The guys would shout for air conditioning,” Anderson remembered about the hot bus voyages that particular summer. “I’d just tell them to open the windows and shut up.” At 36, Sparky Anderson was now the youngest manager in major league baseball, and many of the sportswriters at his first press conference in Cincinnati did not have any idea who he was; nor did some of his players, for that matter. “He didn’t have much speaking experience,” laughed Bench in recollection of Sparky’s early public appearances. “He acted as though he wasn’t sure if you were supposed to talk into that thing [the microphone] or milk it.” He nonetheless spoke confidently at that initial media gathering, and Anderson knew he had a stable of veterans on whom he could count for leadership. Along with Bench, who, although only 22, had already been the Reds’ starting catcher since the beginning of the 1968 season, the first player with whom he talked


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was Rose, a hometown star in Cincinnati since his high school cleats were scratching the dirt over at Western Hills. “Look,” Rose told his new skipper, “I’m the highest-paid player on this team, and if you need anything done, come to me and I’ll see it gets done.” Anderson responded by offering Rose the captaincy of the club, which Rose proudly accepted. Sparky would later claim that the single act of naming Rose as his captain had more to do with the Reds’ success in the 1970s than anything else. Anderson’s purpose was clear when he made the decision to elevate Rose to the on-field leadership role. “We’re not giving Peter anything he hasn’t earned,” Sparky stated at the time. “With two batting titles under his belt, Peter deserves the honor.” But to Anderson’s comfort, there was also a lot of help to go around, including the young Johnny Bench, who was coming into his own as a leader as well. “You nervous, skipper?” Bench hollered over to Anderson before their first spring training game in 1970 while shagging some flies in the outfield. “Nervous as a cat, John,” Sparky answered. “Well, don’t you worry at all. We’ll take care of everything.” Anderson simply wanted Rose, Bench, and a few others to help him enforce some of the day-to-day rules of conduct of the club, such as neatly trimmed hair and mustaches. “I’m not stupid enough to believe that hair does or does not make a man play better or worse,” Anderson once wrote, “but I believe when you operate as a team, as a group, there have to be behavior guidelines ... I felt that if we didn’t have discipline on dress and manners and cleanliness, we didn’t have anything.” In supporting Anderson, it was Howsam who insisted on the three S’s among the Reds players, even in the 1970s era of hair and mustaches that seemed ever-lengthening. It soon became club policy that all players would wear black shoes, high socks, and clean shaves (Howsam said that he insisted on black shoes because it contrasted with the ball, which was white). The Reds enforced the concept of “team” within every aspect of the players’ conduct and with every player. Howsam’s assistant, Dick Wagner, was once watching the Reds play in Atlanta from his television in Cincinnati. He noticed that Rose had scribbled “14” with a magic marker on the back of his helmet to distinguish it in the bat rack from the others. Wagner immediately called Atlanta long distance and got word to Rose to remove the numerals since they made Rose’s helmet different from those of his teammates. Soon Anderson’s imprint was on most every aspect of the players’ gameday procedures, from the time they arrived at the stadium in the afternoon to the late evening hours when they prepared to go home. In another such example, he even altered the post-game dining routine. In major league clubhouses, it is customary for a team to enjoy a bountiful spread of food after each game, but Anderson planned to end the practice at Riverfront Stadium by 1972 — at least temporarily. In the previous year, he had witnessed a rookie pitcher named Steve Blateric allow four runs in a brief stint in his first game in the major leagues. Anderson then watched as Blateric waltzed straight over to the buffet

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table in the locker room to indulge himself after the Reds lost, apparently unconcerned with how uncouth it looked to the manager and the rest of his teammates. Howsam was clear — not just with Anderson and the players, but the entire organization, especially those whom he had hired — that he expected the Reds to turn things around, and turn them around quickly. Despite Bench’s assurances in spring training, Anderson was uncertain of himself in 1970, with so much responsibility at such a young age for a manager. It did not show, at least to his National League opponents, for the Reds sprinted out of the gate with 13 wins in their first 17 games. When they beat the San Francisco Giants, 5–4, at home on May 24 for the last game ever at old Crosley Field at the corner of Western and Findlay avenues, they were leading the National League’s Western Division by nine games. When they opened their new downtown home at Riverfront Stadium on May 30, the Reds still held a nine-game lead with a record of 52–22, thirty games over the .500 mark. By the 100th game of the season on July 26, they had won 70; by season’s end, no other team would come close, as the Reds finished with a then-franchise record of 102 victories, leaving the second-place Dodgers in the dust by a 14–1 ⁄2 game margin. They proceeded to make quick work of the Pirates in the National League Championship Series, sweeping the set in three games. Anderson, however, admitted that he underestimated the American League champion Baltimore Orioles upon heading into the 1970 World Series, even though they had won 108 games during the regular season. “Somehow, I had been schooled, almost hypnotized into believing that the American League simply wasn’t in a class with the National,” he remembered. “This was going to be a cinch, even with our crippled pitching staff. It was a ridiculous assumption ... I learned something: there’s not that much difference between the best clubs in the two major leagues.” In that World Series, Anderson had nearly forgotten he was wearing a microphone for the television broadcast in the first game, the contest in which the infamous “tag” of Carbo had been placed by Baltimore catcher Elrod Hendricks’ empty glove. Carbo was called out by National League umpire Ken Burkhart before Anderson and Carbo tried to shove each other out of the way in an attempt to get to the arbiter and voice their displeasure. The Reds, decimated by injuries to key members of the pitching staff, avoided being swept with a Game Four victory in Baltimore (thanks to a three-run rally in the eighth inning for a 6–5 final), but the Orioles ended things the next day in beating a downtrodden group of Cincinnati players. The disappointment carried over to the club’s plunge to fourth place in 1971, a drop that saw the Reds finish a startling four games below .500 (79–83). In fact, during all of 1971, the defending National League champions never reached the .500 mark. Much of the problem stemmed from the outfield, the origins of which were seeded from the very beginning of the calendar year. On January 7, 1971, center fielder Bob Tolan, a seemingly budding superstar who


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had gotten nearly 400 hits in his first two seasons in Cincinnati after coming over from St. Louis, had torn his Achilles’ tendon in a basketball game at Frankfort, Kentucky. Howsam had long studied (and believed) the theory of the negative physical impact that basketball playing had on baseball players in the off-season, and had expressly forbidden the Reds’ personnel from participating in it. Tolan attempted a comeback in the middle of the 1971 season, but reinjured the tendon while doing some rehabilitation running in the outfield at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Tolan never played in a single game in 1971, and his roster spot instead went to a young George Foster, who at 22 was not yet ready for the big leagues. Foster had been acquired for shortstop Frank Duffy and minor league pitcher Vern Geishert on May 29 of that year and played in 104 games and batted .234 as Tolan’s primary replacement for most of the ’71 season. Anderson personally took the blame for the team’s demise in 1971, and felt that the team’s faltering — especially its slow 4–11 start at the beginning of the season — was a direct result of his lightening up too much during spring training after some players had complained that his 1970 spring camp was too rigorous. Sparky vowed that he would not make that mistake again, and that the Reds would return to “having their tongues hang out” by March of 1972. (Shortly after the 1972 training camp opened, Rose would soon nickname Anderson “The Exorcist,” because Rose had once said that “he worked the devil out of us.”) The return to the old methods worked; the Reds fought their way back to the World Series in 1972, and Tolan had fought his way back to become the circuit’s Comeback Player of the Year. He had proven that the Achilles had completely healed, playing in 149 games while batting .283 and stealGeorge “Sparky” Anderson was an unlikely choice ing 42 bases. to become the Cincinnati Reds’ manager in 1970, But while Tolan’s conbut the selection by Bob Howsam was proven to be the correct one (National Baseball Hall of Fame valescence was important to the Reds’ resurgence in 1972, Library, Cooperstown, New York).

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it was dwarfed by the monumental trade the team had struck in the previous off-season on November 29, 1971. It was a deal cut by Howsam and Houston Astros general manager Spec Richardson, and was later called by Anderson “the greatest trade I had ever seen.” Howsam shipped Cincinnati’s power-hitting first baseman Lee May, known as the “Big Bopper of Birmingham” for his Alabama roots, long-standing second baseman Tommy Helms, and outfielder Jimmy Stewart for Geronimo, Morgan, Dennis Menke, Jack Billingham, and Ed Armbrister. Morgan and Menke were established infielders; Geronimo and Armbrister were young outfielders with loads of promise. Billingham was an up-and-coming pitcher who would look to immediately settle into the Reds starting rotation after Houston had planned to keep him in the bullpen on a permanent basis. Menke returned to the Astros just over a year later, but Billingham, Morgan, Geronimo and (to a lesser degree) Armbrister remained to form part of the nucleus of a powerful club for several years to come. When Howsam conferred with Anderson before the deal, they both agreed that the Reds— with their recent move into the cavernous new Riverfront Stadium and its fast-playing artificial surface called “Astroturf ” that was first used in Houston’s indoor Astrodome in 1965 —could no longer afford to keep a slow team on the field in the National League, especially with other new parks built for speed opening in other cities as well. With big sluggers Tony Perez at third and May at first, the shrewd Howsam realized the team had one of the slowest infields in the game; the landmark trade, however, changed that concern virtually overnight. At the time of the deal, the young outfielder Geronimo was the one player involved that Anderson did not regard highly, and he became worried that Howsam’s determination to get Geronimo would be a hold-up in getting the deal done with the Houston front office. But Howsam insisted that Geronimo be part of the bargain, and he told Sparky to be patient, assuring him that the transaction would be consummated. The price Howsam had to pay for Geronimo consequently went up, as Stewart — another outfielder and a valuable man off the bench for the Reds— was the player Richardson required to be added to the mix from the Cincinnati side. Howsam saw much more potential in Geronimo and was happy to make the addendum. Reds assistant coach Ted Kluszewski further assured Anderson that Geronimo would develop into a bona fide hitter. Consequently, Stewart would spend only two more years in the big leagues, batting .207 for Houston while playing in a total of 129 games in 1972 and 1973. While the deal made perfect sense to Howsam, many in Cincinnati harshly criticized the move at first. Roger Ruhl, the public relations manager for the club, appeared reluctant to announce it to the local press. Lee May had just finished his best season in swatting 39 home runs, while Helms had been a twotime All-Star and a former Rookie of the Year. Menke and Morgan, meanwhile, had also been All-Stars. Nonetheless, Howsam showed he was willing to ship popular players at overloaded positions in order to strengthen the overall


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balance of the club. Moreover, especially in dealing May, he was following another Rickey principle — that a player should be traded at the height of his value. Rickey did that with star outfielder Joe Medwick in St. Louis in 1940 and on several other occasions. “We were going for something in the future,” Howsam later admitted. “I would not have been surprised — and had figured it might happen — if we had given Houston a pennant.” With the bold strokes from the brush of Howsam preparing a masterpiece canvas for the future, the Reds once again fell short of their goal of a world championship in 1972, losing to the renegade Oakland A’s in the final round, four games to three. The fortunes initially appeared to be on the Cincinnati side, as the Reds had reached the World Series on a wild pitch by Pittsburgh pitcher Bob Moose in the final game of the National League Championship Series. The Oakland ballclub was indeed a stark contrast to the polished, cleanshorn, high-knickered look of the Reds; the A’s were instead handed bonuses by tempestuous owner Charles Finley to grow long facial hair, and were loose and jovial despite the fact that they quarreled among themselves so often that the press had labeled them “The New Gas House Gang,” in reference to the famous in-fighting collection of the St. Louis Cardinals from 1934. The Series was in doubt until the final moments, as an eighth-inning Reds rally in Game Seven was short-circuited by A’s ace reliever Rollie Fingers, with his club holding on for a 3–2 victory. It was another crushing defeat for Anderson and his team, who despite holding considerable talent seemed unable to sprint through the final lap of the season. Even so, Howsam’s exploits in maneuvering personnel were not going unnoticed outside the banks of the Ohio River. A year later, in 1973, the Sporting News would name Howsam baseball’s executive of the year. It was also during the 1972 season in which Anderson was given the nickname “Captain Hook” for the first time by going to the bullpen on 245 occasions. Said Anderson, “I adopted a simple rule: in the late innings, don’t let your starting pitcher face the tying run if there are men on base. That was the system, and it worked.” And in each one of those times he went to the mound to make a change, he made a conscious effort — in compliance with the superstitious nature of baseball players— to never step on the foul line. While the casual, long-hair approach of the Oakland players appeared to suit many young men of the late 1960s and early 1970s, the majority of the other Reds players— and particularly the ones Anderson needed in Rose, Morgan, and Bench — supported Anderson’s policies on personal appearance. “The way the Reds look is appropriate to the city,” added Perez, another one of the leaders who switched to first base after the trade of May. “These people expect you to look neat and dress in the traditional way. But that is the way it should be anyway.” Interestingly, Anderson had been dyeing his hair a darker tint for the past couple of years, but stopped doing so at the age of 39 when he met the press for the team’s off-season caravan after losing to the A’s in the World Series. He

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announced to the writers that he was returning to his natural white color, a unique appearance he had always possessed as a young man (but which, he also told the press, was the product of the seventh game against Oakland). While the Reds were confident that the team being built would ultimately lead to the coveted world championship, the relationship between the Reds and Tolan deteriorated in the first half of 1973, and at the core of the feud was Anderson’s firm policies on personal conduct and grooming. Anderson noticed that Tolan arrived at spring workouts in 1973 out of shape and with an array of lazy habits. By mid-season, Tolan was in the midst of a tremendous batting slump, and was complaining about a host of new physical ailments. He also defied Anderson, Howsam, and organizational policy by growing a mustache, and when it was not immediately shaven off, a few of the players began to wonder if the manager had another set of rules for certain team members. It was unknown if Tolan’s exposure to the Oakland manner of operation had influenced him, but Anderson continued to realize he needed players like Bench, Morgan, and Rose to set an example on such matters on his club; if they did not, he would view the rules as being unenforceable. The leaders maintained their manager’s stance on these issues, but their example appeared to have little effect on Tolan. Anderson had to remind Tolan several times in 1973 to shave his facial hair. Instead of complying, Tolan responded by not only growing it thicker the next time, but ultimately cultivating a full beard. This was the final straw for the manager. Before a game in late September in Los Angeles, Anderson instructed Tolan that he was not to take the field that day. “I’m going to wear this beard, and I’m going to be on the field,” Tolan retorted. “Well, then get ready to pack your bags, because tomorrow, you’re outta here,” was Anderson’s response. Anderson instructed the clubhouse staff to not issue Tolan a uniform the next day since he was suspended without pay. The newly formed players’ union, however, informed Anderson that a player could not be taken off the payroll for an individual team’s policy on personal grooming. So the club suspended him with pay for the remainder of the season, and Tolan would miss the Reds’ 1973 playoff series against the New York Mets, which Cincinnati lost in five games. Several years later, Anderson, in his typical manner of being overly critical of himself, took the blame for the incident with Tolan escalating to the point to which it did. “There should have been a way for us to get together before the situation progressed too far,” Sparky assessed. “I failed him. I still believe this.” Most players who came through Cincinnati under Anderson’s watch happily agreed with such team policies. It was equally remarkable, however, that Anderson could not pinpoint a formula for the success. “I’ll be honest, I have no idea about handling players,” he admitted. “I am strictly myself. I wouldn’t know how to do it any other way.” And even though he could get his players


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to groom themselves, he initially felt ashamed that he could not get his teenage son, Lee, to cut his hair short as well. While his team was the cleanest-cut in baseball, Anderson felt that, as with Tolan, he had somehow failed his own son, in that he could not impart the same discipline in his own home that he could normally instill in the Reds’ clubhouse. He and Lee had argued to great ends about many topics, and Sparky recalled they were not on speaking terms for much of the 1975 season. Nonetheless, their love surmounted the disagreement, and they both ultimately found a happy medium (in length of hair as well). Carol and the children, who had always been at his side since he had been hired in Cincinnati, were consistently there for support. Anderson also found that it took a long time to earn the trust of the Cincinnati fans. “The people of Cincinnati have never loved him,” local writer Tom Callahan claimed. “He is not preoccupied with the fact, though.” Once, while driving home with the family after an especially bad loss by the Reds and a tongue-lashing from the fans, one of Sparky’s daughters, Shirlee, let her dad know that she was one of the people booing him that night from the stands in Riverfront Stadium. “Why were you booing me?” Anderson asked, befuddled at his daughter’s apparent disloyalty. “So all those people booing wouldn’t know you were my father,” she responded, to which the entire family shared a big laugh at a time when it was desperately needed. The Anderson ways would ultimately take hold of the team, however, and the city as a whole. And by 1975, the Cincinnati ballclub had solidified itself as the game’s elite outfit. When the official city-wide celebrations had calmed down at the end of October, the Reds held their private celebratory banquet for the 1975 title. After dinner at a local restaurant, Johnny Bench took the microphone. “Like our announcer Marty Brennaman says after every game we win, ‘This one belongs to the Reds.’”

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An Array of Stars We had a remarkably talented team, but Sparky was the catalyst. He believed in playing the game the right way. He believed in acting the right way. When somebody gives you that, you carry it along the rest of your life. — Johnny Bench

By the time Johnny Bench was toasting his fellow championship teammates in late October 1975, more than ten years had passed since he had been discovered on a big-league field by a coach working for the St. Louis Cardinals. It was 1965 Spring Training in Tampa, Florida, a convergence of time and place when baseball is at high tide in the Sunshine State, and the promise of a new season — and budding new superstars— is on the horizon. The Reds and the Cardinals were holding a joint practice involving their top minor league prospects, and working with the St. Louis farmhands was one of their minor league managers, Sparky Anderson, taking in the view of the entire field from a comfortable seat in the dugout. Skimming over the scene, his eyes fell upon a teenage catcher in the opponent’s uniform who was firing laser-shots down to second base with the most remarkable arm Anderson had ever seen at the position. The coach walked towards home plate to introduce himself, and asked the player his name. “John Bench, sir,” was the reply. Anderson then told the 17year-old boy that, despite his impressive skills, the cloddy old catcher’s mitt he was using was impeding the fluidity of his otherwise-strong throws. Anderson said he knew of a new “hinged” style mitt that was currently being used by Cardinals minor league catcher Bob Lanning. Using this type of mitt, Anderson suggested, might allow Bench to catch one-handed, and improve the ease with which he transferred the ball to his throwing hand and rotated his body in making throws to second base. Anderson retreated to the dugout and soon returned to the home plate area with the more modern glove. “Thank you, sir,” Bench said. Only a few days later, the young catcher had the opportunity to learn from another knowledgeable baseball veteran named Ted Williams, and he shyly 22


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asked the former Red Sox star if he would sign a baseball for him. Williams had been watching Bench for the past several days, and like Anderson, was awed by his potential. Williams whipped out a pen, and wrote on the ball, “To Johnny Bench, a sure Hall-of-Famer.” Over the next fifteen years, Bench would surpass that lofty goal. With the help of the mitt that Anderson procured, Bench would actually change the way the game was played. In a true definition of sports greatness, Bench created an irreversible shift in the mechanics of the game, much like Babe Ruth did in swatting more home runs than the rest of the American League combined for several seasons, or as Bobby Orr did in racing up the ice for the National Hockey League’s Boston Bruins as no defenseman had previously done. Bench introduced a technique that would immediately make all previous methods of catching obsolete, and it was thanks, in part, to the glove that Lanning owned (and Anderson suggested) but would never make famous. The hinged mitt — also being refined by Randy Hundley of the Chicago Cubs— allowed Bench to place his throwing hand alongside his right leg, or even behind his back if he preferred. Not only did this assist in getting his body in a proper position more quickly to throw, as Anderson presumed, it also protected the free hand from the regular assault of dangerous foul tips that caused veteran catchers’ fingers to resemble crooked tree branches by the time their careers were over. In the mid–1960s, Bench had been originally discovered by Reds scout and front office assistant Bob Thurman in a dusty area of west central Oklahoma, ten miles from Interstate 40 in the remote town of Binger. A Cincinnati friend later asked Bench where exactly Binger was located, and the player responded that it is a “half-mile past the sign that says, ‘Resume Speed.’” Born on the sixth anniversary of Pearl Harbor in 1947, he was the third and final son of Ted and Katy Bench, who two years later had a daughter as well. He excelled at basketball at Binger High School and deeply loved the sport. His father, however, encouraged him to pursue professional baseball, informing him that good catchers— especially hard-hitting ones with strong throwing arms— were always in short supply. His father, in fact, had founded the Binger Little League baseball team, and convinced Johnny to strengthen his arm by throwing a baseball 254 feet from a squatting position, which was twice the distance from home plate to second base. The young catcher was so certain that he would be a major leaguer (despite much unbelieving derision from his schoolmates) that he even practiced his autograph for hours on end, carefully crafting the signature that he would use in later years. He soon served notice of his intentions to folks everywhere when he finished his career as a pitcher for Binger High and the town’s American Legion team with an amazing 84–3 record when he was not behind the plate. On April 1, 1965, two months before Bench would graduate as the valedictorian from the school, the Binger High baseball team was involved in a serious automobile accident when the team bus flipped on a sharp curve upon returning from a

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game, falling fifty feet down an embankment. Quickly recalling some advice that his father had given him, Johnny hit the floor to protect himself. No one was seriously injured, and shortly thereafter, the fortunate Bench became part of the first formal amateur baseball draft in the modern era, selected in the second round by Cincinnati in the 1965 entry phase, with Carbo honored as the club’s first-round selection. In that same draft the New York Mets, in the process of building an imposing young pitching staff, waited until the twelfth round to claim a hurler named Lynn Nolan Ryan. Two rounds before Ryan, his future teammate in New York, Seaver, was drafted by the Los Angeles Dodgers. (Seaver did not sign, however, and went back into the 1966 draft, where he was selected by the Atlanta Braves, but a legal challenge of the Braves by several clubs would land him with the Mets instead.) Initially, the Reds offered Johnny $5,000 to sign, but his father did not consider it worthy of his son’s talent and persuaded the boy to hold out by signing a letter-of-intent to play ball at Phillips University in Enid, Oklahoma. The Reds came back with another offer of $6,000, plus up to another $8,000 in tuition if he would like to return to college after his playing days concluded. Bench and his father agreed to these terms, and he celebrated the launching of his professional career by slamming 22 home runs in just 98 games as an 18 year old in the Carolina League. In the middle of that summer, however, he missed playing in the final professional appearance by legendary Negro League pitcher Satchel Paige, who was signed for one game to twirl for Bench’s Peninsula team against Greensboro. As one example of the often-ironic twists of baseball history, a famous battery combination would not be in order for the evening, as Bench was not in the starting lineup. After swift promotions through the Cincinnati minor league system, Bench spent only a half season with the Reds’ top farm club at Buffalo in 1967 before being called up to the major leagues in late August. When he arrived in the majors, it did not take long for those around the game to notice that Bench’s physical skills were a perfect match for his chosen position. As an example, an eye specialist from the Kansas City Royals’ newly formed “baseball academy” at Fort Myers, Florida, had visited the Reds in spring training camp earlier that year. When he checked the players for peripheral vision skills, he noted that Bench was far and away the best he had ever examined. Putting his physical gifts to use, he caught a rookie-record 154 games in 1968, hit a catcher’s record of 40 doubles, and was named the NL Rookie of the Year in a close vote with another one of Ryan’s fellow prodigies in New York, pitcher Jerry Koosman of the Mets, who had signed as a free agent with the team the summer before Ryan was drafted. By the time Bench was only 22 years old in 1970, he was already manhandling the game with a dominating season of 45 home runs, 145 RBIs, and a .293 average to take home his first National League Most Valuable Player trophy (this after homering in his first All-Star Game at-bat in 1969). Inconsistency at the


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plate would plague Bench in 1971, and some fans were wondering if off-field issues were becoming too much of a distraction for the young man. Before that season began, Bench wanted a three-year, $500,000 contract from the Reds, which he did not receive. He continued to fluctuate between peaks and valleys in his personal statistics. He followed his second MVP season in 1972 with another sub-par year in ’73, then rebounded once again to post another stellar year in 1974, during which he claimed his third National League RBI title with 129, while his 33 home runs placed him second in the league to Philadelphia’s Mike Schmidt. In addition, in 1974 Bench became the only catcher in history to lead the league in total bases (315). But 1974 was also a season of change for Bench, as for the first time in his career he saw significant playing time at another position. Anderson used him in 36 games at third base, a spot Bench had played only nine total games in his previous seven major league seasons combined. Anderson felt that Bench might be wearing down from too much work behind the plate, and the new strategy allowed him to have Bench’s bat in the lineup more frequently. He played in a career-high 160 games in 1974, while laboring “only” 137 contests in the arduous catcher’s position. Bench’s general baseball acumen translated to his having the Reds’ best fielding percentage by a third baseman on the year, with his .962 mark on 77 chances surpassing the statistics of such regular players at the position as Dan Driessen (.915 in 126 games) and Darrel Chaney (.952 in 81 games). Despite his all-around play and work ethic, Bench was still viewed as inconsistent and even underachieving by many Reds fans. This was illustrated by the smattering of boos he received when his name was announced at Riverfront Stadium on Opening Day 1975. This particular reception was difficult for many to understand — not the least of which was Bench —for by the start of the 1975 season, he had ascended far above his contemporaries at catcher. He was now established as the game’s icon and standard behind the plate, even being exalted by some as the greatest catcher in the history of baseball at the young age of 27. In addition to his two MVP awards and seven-time selection as an All-Star, Bench had also swept the circuit’s Gold Glove Award at the catcher’s position since Hundley last earned the title in 1967. With Hundley and Bench revolutionizing the position with one-handed catching, some in baseball felt that the subsequent mimicking of the technique by catchers everywhere actually had a deleterious effect on pitchers, serving to shrink the strike zone in the umpires’ minds. Since the beginnings of baseball, catchers were often able to fool the umpire that a pitch outside the plate had actually “caught the corner” when the throwing hand was cupped over the glove. However, proponents of the new mitt pointed out that the overall improvements to defensive play would overcome any purported shrinkage of the strike zone. It was noted that the innovation now allowed catchers to make sweeping tags of baserunners at the plate, a technique generally impossible with older mitts, as slightly errant throws from outfielders almost always

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The imposing stance of Johnny Bench, perhaps the greatest catcher the game has ever known (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York).


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resulted in a runner scoring. Bench quickly became the model of this technique as well, adding another measure of depth to the flawless display that he crafted behind the batter’s box. Yet, even with the impact Bench had on the Reds and baseball, he could never trump the innate quality that was housed in one of his teammates— that of being a home-grown superstar. Peter Edward Rose’s arrival slightly preceded the United States’ entry into World War II, as he was born on April 14, 1941, at Deaconess Hospital in Cincinnati. Always respecting history (as well as his own place in it), Rose proudly noted, “That’s the same date that Abe Lincoln was shot, and it’s also the same day the Titanic went down.” He also relished the fact that Opening Day in the major leagues— perennially a spectacular event in Cincinnati, complete with a magnificent parade — would sometimes fall on his birthday, a coincidence that he enjoyed while growing up as a child as well as later as a major league ballplayer. The clapboard house in which Rose was raised, near the Anderson Ferry on Cincinnati’s west side, sat only a few hundred yards from the Ohio River and the New York Central Railroad. When not playing baseball or football with his friends, young Pete would get into all sorts of Huck Finn–type mischief along the shore. “My grandmother used to talk about the floods she’d seen,” Rose remembered about the area, “the river coming up maybe twenty feet over its banks. It never got to reach our house, but you knew that the river was out there.” His father was named Harry Francis Rose, who was lovingly called “Old Pete” by those who knew him, the same nickname given to Confederate General James Longstreet during the Civil War. Harry was a legendary athlete around the West Side, playing semi-pro football and baseball well into his forties, as well as being a champion amateur boxer. With the father wanting his son to try all kinds of sports, Pete was introduced to pugilism by his father, with the son making his fight debut at the age of 16 at the Finley Street Neighborhood Club. Harry kept the Rose household running with his job as a bookkeeper for Fifth Third Bank, a post (among a few other side jobs with the company) he would keep for four decades. As a young man, Harry fell quickly for his high school sweetheart, LaVerne Bloebaum, an outstanding softball player, and they had a strong desire to marry as quickly as possible. They went looking for the justice of the peace, who kept his office at the local bank on the West Side near the Rose home. When the young couple found it, the office was closed the day the impulse overtook them, so they hurried across the nearby state line to Lawrenceberg, Indiana, for the wedding ceremonies. From the time they came into the world, Pete and his siblings remembered getting only tough love from their father. “Dad was not a hug-and-kiss type of father; hell, nobody behaved like that in the 1940s,” Rose explained. “It just wasn’t natural — not like it is today, where parents feel obliged to videotape every second of their kids’ lives and dote on their every word. All the folks from his generation lived

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through the Great Depression, which made them iron tough, not soft. They had a different way of doing things. They took stock in the value of hard work and a hot meal. Soft-hearted emotion just didn’t put food on the table.” If Pete could scrape together enough friends, they would have a makeshift ballgame after climbing the steep Anderson Ferry Road, perpendicular to the river through the neighborhood of Delhi, to find an open field. If no friends were to be found or if his father was late getting home from work and unavailable for a catch, Pete would throw a baseball to himself against the brick wall at the old Schulte’s Fish House. Before the age of four, little Pete had been following his father everywhere, especially to Harry’s baseball and football games. Like his father, young Pete loved both sports equally well, and it broke his heart when his idea for trying out for the varsity football team in his sophomore year at Western Hills High School was dismissed by the school’s coaches. “I didn’t do my schoolwork,” Rose recalled of the misery into which he slipped after being denied a chance at the gridiron. “I missed classes. I remember hanging out. Doing nothing. What was the sense of going to school if they weren’t even going to give me a chance to play football?” Eventually, however, he was given a shot at making the squad. By the time he was a senior, Rose had forced the formerly skeptical West High coaches to move Charlie Scott — an all-city half back who was headed to the United States Military Academy the following autumn — to fullback, as Rose took over at the half back spot. When springtime came around, Rose turned his full attention to the baseball diamond. Pete’s baseball coach, Paul Nohr, used him mostly at catcher and second base; no matter the position he played, he would not let the West High Mustangs go down without a fight. “He was tough as nails and some competitor — even at ping-pong,” his younger brother David remembered. “Pete doesn’t like to lose at anything. You hear some parents and even kids say today, ‘Well, it’s just a game.’ I think that’s garbage, and Pete thinks that’s garbage and my dad thought that was garbage, too.... My brother’s worked at everything’s he’s done. He didn’t become a great ballplayer because of size, or because it was born into him. He worked.” While completing a solid but unspectacular high school career in baseball, Pete nearly accepted a football scholarship offer from Miami University, 40 miles up the road in Oxford, Ohio. But the baseball diamond remained his true passion, and as he had done in his sophomore year of football, he found himself pleading for an opportunity to continue his career at the end of his high school days— this time, on the bases. “I wanted to be a pro in sports,” Rose said. “Not a semi-pro like Dad. A real pro. And I just didn’t figure I’d get big enough [for pro football]. So I hung with a Cincinnati scout named Buzz Boyle — his real name was Ralph — and I damned near begged. ‘Just give me a chance in the Reds’ organization, Mr. Boyle. I’ll carry out the bats. I’ll water the outfield. A chance, Mr. Boyle. Just let me have a damn chance.’” Boyle, a Cincinnati native and Xavier University student who had a brief major league


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career with the Brooklyn Dodgers in the early 1930s, had seen much of himself in Rose — a gritty player whose natural ability everyone always seemed to doubt. In addition, Rose reminded Boyle of another recent Western Hills player, Eddie Brinkman, who was the same age as Pete but had committed to play at the University of Cincinnati before turning professional by signing for $75,000 with the Washington Senators. Thus, Boyle and Reds minor league director Phil Seghi ultimately felt inclined to give Rose an opportunity. After his last day of high school in June 1960, the young, small, smirky kid drove to Crosley Field and was offered a $7,000 bonus and $400 a month to meet up with the Reds’ rookie-league farm club in Geneva, New York. “They say [Brinkman] took his check to the bank in an armored car,” Rose joked years later. “I took my bonus check, and cashed it at the local store.” In his first game at Geneva, Rose went 2-for-5, which prompted a local sportswriter to pen that “Rose is an aggressive and eager ballplayer at second and gives promise that he could be a good hitter.” His roommate in Geneva was Art Shamsky, who after being traded by Howsam in late 1967 would go on to greater success in the New York Mets organization. Johnny Vander Meer, who was managing the Reds’ next level of the minors at Tampa and famous for being the only pitcher to throw consecutive no-hitters, wanted the organization to move Rose to third base or the outfield. But Seghi insisted that Rose remain a second baseman. Initially, Rose could not get comfortable at second, despite his considerable experience at the position from high school. Even with an early week-long visit from his mother with some home-cooked food from Cincinnati, it would take Rose considerable time to overcome his nervousness in pro ball, as he made 36 errors in only 85 games during his first year. Nonetheless, he showed enough promise at the position to prompt Reno Debenedetti, the manager of the Geneva team, to support Seghi’s suggestion and move the man considered to be a future regular second baseman over to third — a growing, muscular player named Tony Perez. Rose, who did not graduate on time with his classmates, wanted to attend high school classes in the summer to earn his diploma in an effort to make up for the time he had slacked off at Western Hills. His father, however, discouraged him from doing so, saying that nothing should get in the way of his concentration on the game. He followed the advice, and after he was promoted to Tampa for the 1961 season, Rose’s average soared to .350 before he ended the year at .331, which included an amazing league record of 30 triples. The next stop was Macon, Georgia, and the South Atlantic League in 1962, where Rose and his fellow Peaches brought the city its last league championship. It was here where a professional manager first impacted Rose deeply, as Dave Bristol directed the Macon club and shaped the young Cincinnatian into a quality second baseman. When Bristol later took a stint as the Reds’ manager in the middle of the 1966 season, Rose was thrilled to be playing for him once again. Nonetheless, Rose also admitted that while he respected Sparky Anderson

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deeply, enjoyed playing for him, and was moved when Sparky asked him to be the team captain, it was tough on Rose when Bristol was fired to make room for the new skipper. While in Macon, Rose continued to tear up the baseball at the plate and began tearing up the roads as well. After building up a savings account, he wired most of the money to his parents in Cincinnati and asked them to drive a mint green Corvette he had ordered down to Macon. Pete and teammate Tommy Helms planned to meet Pete’s parents in Nashville, where the two young men would pick up the new car. Rose and Helms had virtually grown up together in the organization, knowing each other since signing into pro ball in the Reds’ system until the big trade sent Helms to the Astros in 1971. When he first met Rose, Helms was immediately impressed with his approach to the game. “Pete Rose is a physical freak,” Helms told Earl Lawson of the Cincinnati Post. “I’ve never seen a guy with his energy. He never gets tired. He jumps out of bed in the morning, goes into his hitting stance, and takes batting practice in the hotel room with an imaginary bat. I’m just lying there, rubbing my eyes, wishing I could go back to sleep for a couple more hours.” Being up-and-coming baseball prospects in a hot new car had a perilous effect on both men’s judgment; for shortly after Harry relinquished the driver’s seat and waved good-bye, Rose was stopped for speeding in a small town in northern Georgia. Standing before the local judge, Rose proclaimed in a cocksure manner, “We’re professional ballplayers— we have to get to Macon for a game.” Not impressed, the judge asked the two to empty their pockets before him, which amounted to nearly $200. “Now I figure,” the judge said, “that you boys need about $8 worth of gas to get yourselves back to Macon. The court will keep the rest. That’s your fine for speeding. “Take $8, just $8, no more — and then you’re free to go. Have a safe trip to Macon and good luck in the ballgame tonight.” While that particular trip proved costly to his pocketbook, Rose mostly retained fond memories of his days in the bush leagues and the meager salaries that corresponded with the long bus trips. “The minors were good days ... making $400 a month,” Rose recalled of his first couple of years in the pro game. “I owned two pairs of pants and three pairs of socks. That’s what I had in this world. But we won. The owner (of the Tampa team in the Florida State League) decided to give us something to remember our championship. Every player got a Zippo cigarette lighter. That was the most wonderful moment in the world. Wonderful! And I didn’t smoke!” After further working his way through the Reds system, he finally got the call to become the parent club’s second baseman in 1963, earning the standard beginning player’s annual salary of $7,500, which was little more than his original signing bonus. In preparation for his first major league assignment, Rose and the Reds met the New York Yankees in an exhibition game. Upon drawing


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four balls at the plate, Rose sprinted down to first base, an act that caught the attention of legends Whitey Ford and Mickey Mantle while sitting in the Yankees’ dugout. “Hey Mick, look at Charlie Hustle there!” Ford chirped in bemusement (and mockery) about the then-unknown player. More so in days gone by, it was commonplace for a young player to over-exert himself in an effort to please the coaching staff, but nobody had ever seemed to take it to Rose’s level. And in watching Rose conduct himself in the major leagues for the first time, his teammates were not all that impressed with his skills. Moreover, many felt he was with the club only because he was a local kid from Cincinnati, designed to be a gate attraction; soon much of his “rah-rah” hooting and hollering from the bench became unappreciated by some of the veteran players. In one instance during his rookie season, Rose’s roommate during a road trip had gone so far as to lock him out of their hotel room. With nowhere else available to get some rest, Rose tried to sleep on one of the sofas in the hotel lobby. A more soft-hearted veteran, Vada Pinson, later walked in and saw the rookie curled up in the fetal position, snoring away. “Come with me,” Pinson said in shaking the rookie’s shoulder. “I have an extra bed in my room that you can have.” For occasions such as this, Rose took a special liking to Pinson in his maiden year, as well as long-time Reds star Frank Robinson. In addition to helpful veterans such as Pinson and Robinson, the sensitive impact of manager Fred Hutchinson would last with Rose throughout his career. For through all of the base hits, runs scored, and head-first catapults into third base during his legendary years, Rose’s first major league manager was always on his mind. When “Hutch” died of cancer after the 1964 season, it was extremely difficult on all the players, particularly Rose. Ultimately, a citizenship award for Reds players was named in the deceased manager’s honor. And much like Pinson and Robinson, Rose became known for being exceptionally kind to younger players in future years, harkening back on the experiences he had with the two men. Such was the case when Bench came to the team as a 19-year-old rookie in late August 1967. “When he was young, I treated him like a human being,” Rose proudly recalled about his early interactions with the raw catcher, six-and-a-half years his junior. “He came into a situation that was a lot like mine. When he came up, he had a lot of trouble with the older players because he was taking Johnny Edwards’ job, and Edwards [the Reds’ regular catcher since 1961] was close to all the older players. So I helped Bench, and I know he appreciated it.” Rose also noted a stark difference in personalities between himself and Bench, which was a factor that both players believed kept them from battling for the spotlight. “People keep trying to make it a competitive thing between him and me, and keep saying that no team can have two superstars, but that just isn’t true — not with us, because there just aren’t any similarities between us.” Despite the tremendous role models Rose found at work, he still had his biggest source of support at home — as well as his toughest critic. Even after

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Rose had established himself in the major leagues, his father was still looking over his shoulder. Harry often waited for the young player outside the locker room at Crosley Field, quick to make corrections about errors in Pete’s play in the game. Rose’s love of his father never wavered, however, and all of the pestering, advice, and perseverance would pay off. He finished the 1963 campaign as the National League Rookie of the Year after ranking in the top ten in atbats, runs scored, singles, triples, and sacrifice flies, and received the award four days after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. In the midst of that tumultuous rookie year, he met a young woman named Karolyn Engelhardt while at the River Downs Race Track, and the two discovered that they were fellow West-Siders. A courtship soon developed, and they were married before Pete started his second season in the major leagues. His numbers dipped a bit during that sophomore year, but Rose rebounded to secure his first appearance in the All-Star Game in 1965 and lead the league with 209 hits, surpassing the 200-hit mark for the first of ten times in his career. “Pete Rose is a once-in-a-lifetime performer,” admired Bob Hertzel, who had been covering the Reds for local newspapers, particularly the Cincinnati Enquirer, since 1969. “[He is] a throwback to days when baseball players were tobacco-chewing, hard-drinking, cussing illiterates who care about batting averages more than stock quotations.” But despite his growing reputation as a hitter and possessing adequate running speed, Rose seemed to be constantly reminded of his physical limitations, with much criticism leveled by those who felt he did not belong in the major leagues. From that point forward, he knew that his hallmark would have to be hustle if people did not respect his physical tools. He cemented that hallmark on July 14, 1970, at the major league All-Star Game, in front of nearly 52,000 fans in the month-old Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. With the game tied at four in the 12th inning, Rose rounded third and headed for home after Jim Hickman of the Chicago “Pete Rose may be the last ballplayer of Cubs singled, charging straight for his kind,” Sparky Anderson once said Cleveland Indians catcher Ray Fosse, of his hustling superstar who endured who was blocking the plate without the multiple position changes over several years to help the Big Red Machine pros- ball. Waving Rose around third base per (National Baseball Hall of Fame was Chicago Cubs manager Leo Durocher, the captain of the Gas House Gang Library, Cooperstown, New York).


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Cardinals who always looked forward to showdowns on the field. Rose crashed head-first into Fosse to score the winning run, and the catcher was sent sprawling in a disoriented heap. Fosse was taken to the hospital for treatment of a shoulder injury from the incident. Anderson, in perhaps the only game he ever spent as a spectator in Riverfront, took it all in from the lower stands. “I was sitting about twenty rows up behind the screen,” he recalled, “and it was so hot, I thought I was going to pass out.... Fosse was in the way of a freight train.... I think that set the tone for Pete’s reputation, and the ball club.” It would be one of the final games that Harry Francis Rose would see his son play, as on December 9, 1970, Pete’s father died at the age of 58 after collapsing at his front door with a blood clot upon returning home from work. The proud man had mentioned some chest pains to a co-worker at his bank office that day. The friend suggested that Rose take a cab home instead of his usual bus, since the latter mode, though cheaper, normally took an hour or more. Harry refused the idea, not wanting to worry his family with a sudden arrival. His son was in the midst of getting his hair cut when he received a phone call about the news. The rock of his life was gone in an instant. After the All-Star Game incident, stories were conjured of a supposed animosity between Rose and Fosse. Critics pointed out that the game was meaningless, an exhibition with no bearing on the league standings, and Rose should have shown more restraint. However, it was soon deduced that Rose was simply treating the game as he would any other baseball contest, with no friend lying in his path to a winning run being spared. It was also revealed shortly thereafter that Fosse and Indians pitcher and fellow All-Star Sam McDowell had spent the previous evening at Rose’s house until 1:30 in the morning, sharing laughs and exchanging stories between the rival leagues. Nonetheless, Fosse would later claim that the fractured shoulder altered his swing at the plate, shortened his career, and caused him pain throughout his life. Fosse was from the southern Illinois town of Marion, a place that would have significance decades later in Rose’s life. Nine months later, on Opening Day of the 1971 season, Rose was in a similar close play at the plate with catcher Duke Sims of the Dodgers; this time, it was Rose who was knocked nearly unconscious as the catcher held onto the ball. In any result, these situations left no doubt as to how Pete Rose would play any ballgame. After notching two National League batting titles in 1968 and 1969 — two seasons in which he played mostly in right field — Rose found himself in the midst of another position switch in 1972. Back in 1967, he had been asked to move from second base to left field in order to make room at the keystone sack for Helms. Now, after earning two Gold Glove awards in right (highlighted by a 1970 season in which he made one error in 159 games for a .997 fielding percentage), he was being asked to move to left field. This was done to make room in right for Geronimo, who possessed the stronger throwing arm. (Soon, how-

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ever, Geronimo would move to center, taking the place of Tolan.) In August that year, Rose recorded hit number 1,881 of his career, a single off Jon Matlack of the Mets, which elevated Pete as the all-time hits leader in Reds history at the age of 31. Rose then picked up the slack for Bench’s subpar season in 1973 by earning his own MVP award as well as his third batting crown, the products, in part, of 181 singles, a record in one season for a switch-hitter. Rose had always said that his first statistical goal in his career was to break Frankie Frisch’s record for the most hits ever by a switch-hitter, a mark that stood at 2,880. Rose had worked long and hard to make himself a textbook example in many baseball forms, but never more so than in how he didn’t swing the bat. He was indeed one the greatest models ever on how to take a pitch. In the instant that the ball arrived at the plate, Rose would habitually watch the ball all the way into the catcher’s glove if he decided not to swing at the offering from the pitcher, his head swiveling back and his eyes never leaving the sphere. “No hitter in the league can match Rose’s concentration when he’s at the plate,” said veteran major league umpire Bruce Froemming about the hitter’s incredible batting eye. When Rose first came to the major leagues, however, some umpires took this action as an insult, just as his teammates did not initially appreciate his all-out hustle on the field. In his first major league at-bat, in fact, Rose walked on four pitches. Calling the balls and strikes behind the plate was long-time ump Jocko Conlan, who after the third pitch admonished him while noting the strange way he stared at the ball in the catcher’s glove, telling Rose that he did not need any help with his job. As the manager, Anderson soon found that Rose essentially refused to be removed from the lineup, evidenced in 1974 when he set a major league record with 771 plate appearances. On Opening Day of that season, he was able to watch Henry Aaron’s 714th home run sail over his head at Riverfront Stadium, a blast that tied Aaron with Ruth for the most career round-trippers. Rose later admitted that he hoped the ball would ricochet sharply off the concrete wall that stood just beyond the outfield fence and carom back to him on the playing field so that he could try to keep the ball and give it to his four-year-old son, Pete Jr. As Rose turned around and peeked at Aaron’s historic wallop, the ball did indeed reach the concrete wall but fell out of his reach behind the outfield fence. There had been talk of Aaron being asked to sit out the 1974 opening series in Cincinnati by Braves owner Bill Bartholomay so that the home fans in Atlanta would have the chance to see him tie and break the record; Kuhn, however, “ordered” Aaron to play in at least two of the three games scheduled with the Reds, a rare directive from the commissioner’s office. (Kuhn stated that “two of three” would be consistent with Aaron’s use in games by the Braves over the 1973 season.) The record would be his four days later, as Aaron knocked a long one off Al Downing of the Dodgers in Atlanta to set the new mark. Sparky Anderson felt all along that Aaron should have been permitted to break the mark


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in Atlanta. “He belonged to Atlanta,” Sparky said. “He was the only thing they had going. My God, give them something.” In 1975, a position switch would come to Rose once again. And once again, for the good of the team, he agreed to it. ********** Rose began the 1975 season by staging a mild holdout in February, but ultimately signed his thirteenth consecutive one-year contract with the Cincinnati club, with the deal paying him roughly $158,000. With the agreement in place, he looked forward to another great season, content to spend the days before spring training playing with Pete Jr. Rose called him “Googie,” for a reason unknown even to Pete Sr. It was clear, however, that the father was molding the son in his image; when Rose was taking batting practice one day, Pete Jr. requested that he hit one into the bleachers. “Over the fence!” the little guy yelled. “I thought I taught you that we don’t like home runs,” the father replied sternly. “Anyone can hit homers.” Yet the father was impressed with his son’s enthusiasm for the game, which had rubbed off on the younger one just like Harry had done for him. “All he wants to do is hit,” Rose said of his boy. “He is what you’d call a chip off the old block. You can’t get him out on the field — but give him a bat, and he’s happy.” Things were not as happy for the team and by the end of April, the Reds were hovering near the .500 mark with a mediocre record of 12–11. “We couldn’t do anything,” Anderson later remembered about the lackluster 1975 start. “If we had to make an error, we made it. If we had to not get a run home from third with less than two out, we didn’t get it home. I asked myself, ‘Am I a liar? Are all the guys who write liars too? I think we’re the best club. They write that we’re the best. Are we lying?’” Perez, who along with Bench was now established as the main RBI men on the team, was part of the clutch-hitting problem that Anderson cited, with a .187 average. On May 2, the Reds lost to Atlanta, 5–2, to drop them to an even 12–12. It was at this point Anderson decided an adjustment to the batting order was necessary. Even though he had played 126 games at third base in 1974, it was becoming increasingly apparent that the young prospect Driessen needed to become a first baseman and outfielder only, as he was a liability at the hot corner despite his tremendous offensive potential. Additionally, the strong-fielding but weak-hitting rookie John Vukovich, who was essentially handed the third base job coming out of spring training in 1975, was also not envisioned as a long-term answer at the position. Vukovich had been a utility player with the Milwaukee Brewers and Philadelphia Phillies for five years before arriving in Cincinnati, and had never batted higher than .188 in the major leagues. (Anderson had once commented that when a pitched ball met with Vukovich’s bat, it sounded like it was hitting “balsa wood.”) By the end of the game on May 2, Anderson had seen enough

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from Vukovich’s offensive impotency. A few days earlier, Driessen had been inserted to pinch-hit for Vukovich in a crucial, late-inning situation, and he pouted about being removed, smashing the light bulbs that lined the corridor from the field to the locker room and cursing Sparky with every step. The following afternoon, Anderson confronted Vukovich in the manager’s office. “There’s one thing you’d better get straight, kid, and I mean get straight right away,” Anderson began. “I’ll pinch-hit for anyone any time I think it’ll help me win a ball game. According to my statistics sheet, you don’t happen to be a star in this league yet.” “You won’t give a guy a chance to prove anything,” Vukovich shot back. “You kill a guy’s confidence.” “I’m not here to build your confidence,” the manager said simply. “I’m here to win a baseball game, and if I think I can win by pinch-hitting in the first inning, then, by God, I’ll pinch-hit for you even in the first. So you just play your position and let me worry about running the club my way.” Vukovich and his .211 batting average would soon be shipped to the Reds’ Triple-A club at Indianapolis, never to resurface again in Cincinnati. (Anderson would call it “Indianapolis Fever” when a young player would play erratically on the field, fearing an imminent trip up Interstate 74 to old Bush Stadium in Indy.) Nonetheless, Vukovich would later return to the major leagues for five more seasons with the Phillies, ultimately earning a .166 career average in 559 at-bats. But amid the turmoil of the previous day’s problems with Vukovich and Driessen, Anderson had also seen Rose taking some ground balls around first base. Rose had been trying to break in a new glove he had bought for his daughter. “You look pretty good over there — how do you feel about the other corner?” the skipper asked. The outfielder thought Sparky was kidding, but when both became serious on the issue, Rose immediately agreed to start working in some practice at third base. “Don’t tell anybody,” Anderson told him a few moments later, “but you’re going to be my third baseman tomorrow.” In addition to third base, the rest of the infield had been slightly uncertain at the start of the 1975 season as well, with Concepcion and Morgan both having to prove that they had recuperated from 1974 injuries (Concepcion from a broken ankle, and Morgan from surgery to repair calcium deposits in his heel). But on May 3, just three days after the fall of Saigon, bringing an official end to the war in Vietnam, a new era had dawned for the Reds lineup. Against the Braves that evening, Rose found his name in the customary top spot in the batting order, but also with an unusual “5” next to it, indicating that he indeed had a new position. Part of the manager’s plan for Rose’s switch centered on taking advantage of the player’s ego and what Anderson called Rose’s “sociability needs.” Pete admitted to Sparky that he had often been “lonely” in the outfield, and as a third baseman, he could occasionally chat with the runner, the third base coach


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of the other team, the umpire, the pitcher, the shortstop, or even the nearby fans in between innings. Perhaps for this reason and others, Rose was truly excited about the change. “I’m like a kid with a new toy; it’s like being reborn,” he said. A 46-minute rain delay forestalled the start of the game, but when it finally commenced, Rose was put to the test immediately. Leading off for Atlanta was Ralph Garr, nicknamed “The Roadrunner” for being one of the fastest men in the game. He hit a slow chopper towards the new man down the third base line, but Rose played the ball aggressively and nipped the mercurial Garr just in time at first. Rose would later finish the game in his usual left field spot, but Anderson had the feeling that he was on to something. The Reds had won, 6–1, in the first victory in nearly three years for oft-injured starting pitcher Gary Nolan. Nolan had battled a variety of arm injuries after being a teen-age phenom in the organization in the late 1960s. Rose, meanwhile, took off with the new assignment, going nearly three weeks into his new job without making a miscue. Interestingly, Rose had been given a 16-game trial at third base nine years earlier (in 1966, his final year as an infielder before moving to the outer pasture), but the experiment went awry. He batted only .187 during that time and committed four errors before moving back to second base in advance of his first switch to the outfield. Hertzel suggested that with the position change, the Reds now had the highest-paid infield in baseball history, with the estimated salaries of Rose ($158,000 a year), Perez ($100,000), Morgan ($132,000), Concepcion ($65,000), and Bench ($170,000) all stretching the bank. The five men contrasted with what was, Hertzel wrote, “a bargain-basement outfield behind the million-dollar infield.” With the inspiration of Rose and his willingness to move, the Cincinnati ballclub would ascend from its early-season mediocrity to ultimately take over first place on June 7, and they would never look back. Their 41–9 record through the early summer of 1975 was highlighted by Rose’s 70 hits during that time, the awakening of Bench with his contribution of twelve home runs and 47 RBIs, and the team enjoying one defensive stretch of 15 consecutive errorless games. On August 17, a month after the impressive dash was finished, Rose would mark another personal milestone in passing the 2,500-hit plateau for his career. By the end of the 1975 season, Rose batted at least .300 for the tenth time in the previous eleven seasons, rebounding from a .284 mark in 1974, which had been his lowest figure in ten years. Perhaps even more impressively, however, he would navigate the new position of third base with 349 chances and make only 13 errors. Rose had provided a motivational burst with his willingness to sacrifice himself in 1975 for the benefit of the club. Just two weeks after Rose’s debut at third, another such burst would come from one of his veteran teammates. In a game on May 17, just as the Reds were on the verge of devastating the National

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League, Joe Morgan was badly spiked by Expos catcher Barry Foote while covering a play at second base. Morgan remained in the game, even though the incident rendered him nearly immobile. After the game, he took fourteen stitches in his shin. Anderson was ready to place Doug Flynn in the lineup at second the following day, but Morgan stormed into his office and told the manager that he wanted to play, insisting that the injury was not serious. As with Rose, Anderson recognized an opportunity in Morgan’s fire, and quickly used his spirit as a rallying point for the entire team. After the meeting with Morgan, Anderson proceeded into the locker room and conducted an impromptu tongue-lashing of the team for its lackluster effort to date on the season. He then looked in the direction of the little keystoner as an example-setter. “If Joe can play in his condition, we all can play!” he hollered, reminding the players that true championship clubs overcome the minor nicks and bruises of a 162game schedule. Interestingly (and to the bemusement of the team), Morgan relented a short time later and agreed to let Flynn take his place in the game. The Reds had nonetheless seen a measure of selflessness by Morgan on display, and it inspired everyone, including Bench, who decided to play despite suffering from a bad virus. They won the game over the Expos, 6–1, with Morgan cheering them on from the bench and encouraging Flynn, who went 2-for-3 with a pair of doubles on the day. During the team’s fabulous run through June and July of 1975, Morgan would bat .351, establishing himself as yet another Cincinnati candidate for an MVP award. Morgan had spent most of his young life in the Oakland area, attending the minor league games of the local Oaks of the Pacific Coast League with his father. After a brief minor league career, he became a well-established major league player in Houston before arriving in Cincinnati. Back in 1964, Nellie Fox was in the process of concluding a prolific career in the big leagues, spending the majority of it in the American League with the Chicago White Sox. He had been the league’s MVP in 1959 and a twelve-time All-Star when he joined the expansion Houston Colt .45s in 1964, where he planned on providing the fledgling third-year franchise with some stability until an heir at the second base position would present himself. Morgan had been the primary substitute, playing behind Fox in 1963 and 1964, known to all in the organization as a promising young player who still had seen action in only 18 contests for the Colt .45s in those two seasons combined. Fox wanted desperately to help the novice, and as part of his assistance, had noticed a problem with Morgan’s swing that had been limiting Joe to a .210 batting average during those first two years in Houston. Part of the problem had Morgan popping up quite often, the result of having his back elbow too high upon starting his swing. Thinking creatively, the sly Fox suggested that while in his batting stance, Morgan “flap” his back elbow in awaiting the pitch. Fox reasoned that this would help keep Joe’s elbow down and compact his movements, readying his upper body in a proper launching position for the swing. Morgan noticed immediate results once he tried it, and


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in 1965 had suddenly replaced his mentor as the starter at second base in Houston at age 21. This was the year the club became known as the Astros, coinciding with the move into their wondrous new indoor home, the Astrodome. By the time he had arrived in Cincinnati in the mega-trade of 1971, however, Morgan had brought with him a reputation from Houston of not being able to get along with the team’s leadership, and was even labeled by one Texas writer as a “motormouth.” Morgan had disagreed often with Houston manager Harry Walker, who pointed out that Morgan had never hit higher than .275 in his major league career and, in his opinion, was underachieving. Nonetheless, Sparky Anderson saw something more than a simple batting average statistic in Morgan’s overall offensive game. “Here’s a guy who gets on base an awful lot of the time,” Anderson was quoted as saying. “His on-base ratio is unbelievable.” Looking back further into Morgan’s early statistics in the major leagues, the astute Reds manager also noticed that since becoming a regular player in 1965 for the Astros, Morgan had finished in the top five in walks in the National League in every year but one. Anderson remembered getting to know Morgan when Sparky was the third base coach of the San Diego Padres, bending the little second baseman’s ear anytime they would cross paths on the field. To provide stability for Morgan when he came to the Reds, Anderson instructed the team’s equipment manager, Bernie Stowe, to place Morgan’s locker next to Rose’s. Sparky had wished for the immense self-confidence of Rose and Morgan to feed off one another, and ultimately it would. With Morgan posting improved offensive numbers as his seasons in a Reds uniform wore on, Rose felt that Joe could easily have been named the National League Most Valuable Player in the years that Bench (1972) and Rose (1973) won the award. The diminutive player had found a new home in Cincinnati; by the time the 1975 campaign concluded, he won the MVP trophy by the largest margin in history —more than doubling the voting points of second-place finisher Greg Luzinski of the Philadelphia Phillies (321 to 154), and claiming 21 of 23 first-place votes, with Rose holding the other two. (Fred Lynn nearly equaled Morgan’s feat by winning the award by a similar margin in the American League in the same year.) And as Anderson had always noticed, Morgan continued to have a keen batting eye, leading the National League in on-base percentage in 1972, 1974, and 1975. Joe batted a career-high .327 in his MVP year of 1975, and had not been below .290 since arriving from Houston, where the manager claimed he would never hit with consistency in the majors. When Howsam’s historic 1971 trade was made, it almost single-handedly changed the Reds’ offensive approach. Switching from an outfit of sluggers to one with more speed, the ultimate evolution of the Cincinnati running game, led by Morgan, would become most apparent in the 1975 National League Championship Series and the sweep of the Pirates. In what would become known as the “Rip-off at Riverfront,” the Reds stole eleven bases in eleven tries off Pittsburgh catcher Manny Sanguillen and his pitching staff, with Morgan

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(after stealing 67 bases in the regular season, part of the Reds’ league-leading team total of 168) accounting for four and his double-play partner, shortstop Dave Concepcion, stealing two. Heading into 1976, Concepcion had piled up more than 125 steals over the course of his career, having taken over as the Reds’ starting shortstop in 1970. Led by this impressive combination around the second base bag, the Cincinnati ballclub had successfully transformed itself from an all-slug, no-speed team into one that was dangerously balanced. “I have always loved base running,” Morgan admitted. “To be a good base runner you must concentrate. It is all concentration, thinking ahead. Instinct doesn’t play that big a part. Neither does speed, although speed helps. The big thing, though, is concentration.” Concepcion, while generally quiet with limited knowledge of the English language when he first joined the club, was soon viewed as a special equalizing force alongside his talented and sometimes outlandish associates. “It’s not a coincidence that Sparky named Concepcion the captain of those great squads,” long-time Reds radio announcer Marty Brennaman said many years later. Brennaman’s perspective is the broadest, as he has been the play-by-play voice of the Reds since 1974. “Davey was skipper Sparky Anderson’s alter ego— the leader who kept his gifted teammates in line.” Brennaman also pointed out that after the Reds’ triumph in the basestealing-happy 1975 NLCS, it was Concepcion’s key single, stolen base, and run scored in Game Two of the 1975 World Series that propelled the Reds to victory, which gave them momentum for the remainder of the fight against the Red Sox. The stark ballfields of Venezuela had spawned Concepcion’s natural skills, and he was signed by the Reds near the end of 1967 as a 19-year-old prospect. Originally, the club envisioned his future as a pitcher, but it was soon apparent that his graceful athleticism and batting potential was better suited to an infield position. Rising to the big leagues three years later, he earned his first appearance in the All-Star Game in 1973. However, just two days before that mid-summer classic on July 22, Concepcion suffered a broken ankle that nearly derailed Cincinnati’s drive to a third Western Division title in four years. At that time, some members of the local media called into question Concepcion’s durability, for up to that point he had yet to play an entire season in four years in the big leagues, and had not proven that he could muster the stamina necessary to be the everyday shortstop. Nonetheless, he responded to the suspicion in a bold manner, returning in 1974 to play in a career-high 160 games, appearing at the plate more than 600 times, and winning his initial Gold Glove Award while adding a .281 average and a (then) career-high 14 home runs. Unfortunately, an injury would befall Concepcion again in 1975 when he broke a bone in his wrist after being hit by a pitch from Montreal’s Dale Murray on August 8. The shortstop’s ailment occurred ten days before Don Gullett finally returned to the active roster from his broken thumb, which he had suffered on June 16 when Anderson was juggling his lineup and pitching rotation in an


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effort to maintain and lengthen his team’s lead on the Dodgers. Concepcion would return to help the Reds in their championship quest and after the season, he went back to Venezuela to play 50 more games of winter league ball. “I need the money,” the shortstop explained. “My salary and World Series money is not enough.” In the mid–1970s, Concepcion noticed that his throwing arm was starting to hurt, the origins of which he believed was traced to poor coaching as a young player in Venezuela. In order to compensate for the pain, Concepcion started providing Tony Perez and other Reds first basemen with gentle one-hop throws from his shortstop position, especially after fielding ground balls that were “in the hole” (moving to his right, away from first base). With the flat artificial surface at Riverfront Stadium providing no surprise divots for the men at first base, Concepcion found the new throwing technique to his liking. “I didn’t invent that [one-hop] throw. I saw another fellow do it. I saw Brooks Robinson do it to Lee May here in 1971. Then when my arm hurt, I decided, ‘Why not try it?’” Perez was the main handler of those throws at first base after the slugger had searched for a permanent defensive position since his days in the minor leagues. He was born Atanasio Pérez Rigal in Cuba, where he was one of the many young boys who idolized Minnie Minoso, the Cuban star of the Chicago White Sox. Perez was two months shy of his 18th birthday on March 12, 1960, when the Reds signed him to a minor league contract. Helping to feed his family was more important than playing ballgames, so at the time the Reds scouts discovered him, Perez was working at a sugar cane factory near Havana in addition to playing baseball whenever he could. He received no signing bonus money beyond the amount required for a plane ticket to the United States and the $2.50 he needed to leave Cuba on a visa. Perez was sent to the Reds’ farm team at Geneva, and four years later, he reached the major leagues. Even though the quick leap to stardom was most pleasant, it had its obstacles— not the least of which was a language barrier that was difficult for Perez and Concepcion to overcome. “To hear words like ‘cutoff man,’ ‘go to first,’ ‘go to third,’ simple things like that ... I had to learn how to play the game all over again — in English,” Perez was quoted in a 2003 interview for the newspaper Latino Legends in Sports. From 1964 to 1966, Perez played in 173 games for Reds, all at first base. And despite the fact he was splitting time with Deron Johnson at the position, it appeared that he gained the upper hand in becoming the full-time starter. Bristol, however, wanted both of their strong bats in the lineup. In 1967, Perez made the cumbersome switch across the diamond to third, and the experiment was a success— albeit temporary. He recorded only thirteen errors in 139 games at third that season, and took home MVP honors in the All-Star Game with his 15th-inning home run off a young pitcher named Jim “Catfish” Hunter. The blast had ended the longest All-Star Game in history, which proved to be the first of seven trips to the event for Perez.

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The positive debut by Perez at third base was followed by much poorer campaigns in subsequent years that included increasing error totals of 25, 32, and 35. Thus, after 1971 (when first baseman Lee May departed to the Astros in the blockbuster trade), Perez went back across the diamond to first base, which would finally prove to be a permanent home. But despite his consistent bat and newfound comfort at first, Perez was uncertain during the winter months if he would be back for a fifteenth year with the Reds organization for the 1975 season, which would be his eleventh in the major leagues. Howsam, in seeing Driessen as the club’s first baseman of the future, called Perez into his office and asked the player’s permission to seek a trade for his services. (Permission from Perez was needed for any deal since he was a charter member of the newly formed “10-and-5” category, a designation under the most recent collective bargaining agreement between the owners and the players’ union. A player in this category was one who had been in the major leagues for at least ten years and at least the last five with the same club. With such status, a player could veto a trade.) Driessen, initially noticed by Anderson back in 1971 during the Reds instructional league, had been impressive in his 1973 major league debut, batting .301 for Cincinnati after hitting a blistering .408 for the Indianapolis farm club until his promotion in June. Perez listened carefully to the different scenarios Howsam described at length as possible situations with various teams and their need for power hitters. After hearing the presentation, Perez responded with one request — the desire that if a trade needed to be made he be dealt only to a ballclub that had a realistic chance to contend for the pennant. When the meeting concluded, Perez spent the latter part of the winter in Puerto Rico pondering his fate. But when spring training in 1975 rolled around, Tony was still in a Reds uniform. Howsam decided not to pursue other clubs’ offers for his services, ultimately understanding Perez’s overall value to the organization. Coming into 1976, Perez had averaged 104 RBIs for the past nine seasons, and always conducted himself in a gentlemanly manner. “I’m the only one who’s ever seen him mad,” claimed Anderson, “because I’m the only one he ever gets mad at, including the umpires.” Filling a role that is available on every baseball team, Concepcion and Perez carefully cultivated their reputations as the pranksters on the Reds’ roster. Among Concepcion’s favorite ploys (with Bench often a willing accomplice) was to spring the “mongoose” on someone. Typically sitting near Concepcion’s locker was a mysterious cage with a furry tail wagging ever so slightly from side to side and protruding through the edges of the wire. Ominously, the cage was draped with a towel that said “BEWARE” in daunting letters on the front. Concepcion would invite curious strangers— particularly naïve rookies— to venture over and peek at the box. “Have you ever seen a mongoose?” he would ask with trepidation in his voice. When answering no, the visitor would be encouraged to take a closer look. Suddenly, the top of the box burst open, and out flew a spring-propelled fox tail (but no living crea-


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ture attached to it) at the startled victim. Even twelve-year-old Thom Brennaman, Marty’s son, was once used as prey for the practical joke. Despite the dramatic turning point of the Reds’ fortunes by late May 1975, Anderson was still concerned about an impending imbalance on his club. For while the infield may have been the highest paid and one of the more talented ever assembled once Rose took over at third base, the Reds’ outfield had been sputtering, a question mark in the minds of writers and fans stemming back over the previous few seasons. Center fielder Cesar Geronimo continued to be the focus of the majority of the questions; would he ever be productive offensively, Howsam and Anderson were constantly asked. The general manager was determined to find out — a conclusion, like with Morgan, that was never reached on the player while he was in Houston. “Well, we weren’t sure if he would hit, but we were sure of this— he had never been given a real chance to show if he could or he couldn’t.” Consequently, Geronimo finished the 1974 season with a solid .281 batting mark, but it was still uncertain whether he would become the above-average player that Howsam predicted. Howsam knew he had nearly lost the deal with the Astros in holding out for Geronimo, and he was counting on the young player to produce. Additionally, George Foster had not performed up to expectations since arriving from the Giants in May 1971, during auditions in the outfield before and after Tolan was traded to San Diego in late 1973. As the historic Tet Offensive was beginning in Vietnam in January of 1968, the San Francisco Giants had made Foster their third pick in the amateur baseball draft (at the time when the winter phase of the entry draft was still held, unlike in later years, when one draft per year was reserved for June). In the Giants outfield, he was stuck behind the likes of Willie Mays, Bobby Bonds, and Ken Henderson after making his way from his birthplace of Tuscaloosa, Alabama, to El Camino College in California for a chance to continue playing ball. In 104 games for Cincinnati during his first full taste of the big leagues in 1971, he batted only .234. Foster played in only 73 contests over the next two seasons, spending much of 1973 in the minor leagues at Indianapolis, which included a visit to a hypnotist in an attempt to discard the troubles in his swing. Ken Griffey, in much the same manner as Geronimo and Foster, had also been a relative disappointment — based on his most recent performance in 1974 — heading into the 1975 campaign. Griffey had followed a different path from the other two. A home-grown prospect drafted in the 29th round in 1969, Griffey and his physical talents had long been considered one of the organization’s most brilliant prospects in recent memory, having posted a fabulous .384 average in a 25-game trial with the Reds in late 1973. When he was drafted, however, he had been such a relative afterthought by the Reds that they did not even bother notifying him with a phone call. Instead, he received a brief letter in the mail. When the note arrived, he blurted out to his mother, “Hey Mom! I just got drafted!”

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His mother screamed, “You mean, you’re going into the Army?” “No, a baseball team.” Just as Perez had received his minimal monetary offer to get off the Cuban shores, Griffey later revealed that his signing bonus was nothing to celebrate. It consisted of four pairs of sanitary baseball socks and a red jacket — and it was not even a Reds team jacket. “It didn’t have an emblem on it. It was just red,” Griffey remembered. Dan Driessen recalled much the same experience with his signing prize as well. “A (Reds) yearbook and a plane ticket,” he laughed in counting his own rewards for inking a professional contract. “And I missed the plane. I had to take a bus to my first spring training.” Even with his simple beginnings, Griffey’s skills soon caught the eye of many veterans in Cincinnati. “That kid is the best young player in our system,” Bench once said, as Griffey proceeded to have a tremendous minor league career. But Anderson believed he made a mistake when he anointed Griffey the team’s starting right fielder before the 1974 season; the immediate job security seemed to cause the young player to loaf. He began to press more at the plate, and six weeks into the season, he was batting only .159. Anderson called Griffey into his office, and told him that he was getting the same remedy for his “ailment” as Foster had received — a bus ticket to Indianapolis. “But I’m not bringing you back,” the skipper told him about any possible return to Cincinnati. “Mr. Howsam can’t bring you back. Vern Rapp, your Indianapolis manager, can’t bring you back. Ken Griffey alone can bring himself back to Cincinnati. Now I want to find out how much of a man you are.” With that challenge upon him, Griffey said not a word, shook hands with Anderson, and left the city. He went to Indianapolis and hit .333 for the next month-and-a-half, earning him another trip to Cincy by early July. He emerged from his horrid early-season figure to finish his major league ledger at .251 for 1974. For Anderson, it was one of the proudest turnarounds he remembered jolting into a player. And as with Morgan, Concepcion, and others, Griffey by 1976 was starting to symbolize the transition that Howsam and Anderson had wanted, turning the Reds into more of a running team in the new downtown ballpark (with the fast-playing artificial surface), which coincided with a speedier, new-age National League. Griffey had already shown he was as quick as any of his teammates, legging out an impressive 39 infield hits in 1975 and stealing three bases in the second game of the NLCS against the Pirates. Yet even with his .310 career batting average heading in the 1976 season, the organization wished to see Griffey hit for more power; others, conversely, wished to see him bunt for more hits. But Griffey revealed he did not care for a lot of bunting with the many fast-playing Astroturf surfaces present in National League stadiums. A source no more intimate than the Reds media guide revealed that Griffey’s average in 1975 would have dropped to .218 without the benefit of those 39 infield hits. Naturally, Griffey’s speed served him well with his defensive duties in the


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outfield. Nonetheless, Howsam remained true to his feeling that Geronimo would become the supreme flychaser, and thus had been primed for a role in center field. As a teenager growing up in the Dominican Republic, Geronimo had dreamed not so much of becoming a ballplayer, but rather a Catholic priest (as did his counterpart Perez over on the island of Cuba, although Perez’s aspiration about the priesthood was much more fleeting). In time, Geronimo would find room for both of his devotions. While tucked away at night and supposedly sleeping along with the rest of the students at San Tomas de Aquino Seminary, he would hide a radio under his pillow and listen to the local winter league baseball games played on the island. These ballgames were comprised of many young American players who were sent to the warmer climate for the winter for more seasoning, and Geronimo envisioned himself one day batting and throwing among them. While playing softball as a boy and into seminarian life, Geronimo noticed that people were complimenting him about his speed and quickness as well as his uncanny ability to throw the ball accurately from great distances and with velocity. A scout for the New York Yankees, on a visit to the Dominican Republic to watch another player, offered him a tryout as a pitcher in early 1967. Geronimo decided to take advantage of the opportunity, and subsequently left religious life behind. He was picked up by the Astros two years later after making his transition from the pitching mound to the outfield. As Howsam pointed out, Geronimo never had a full chance to display his talents in Houston, making a total of only 138 plate appearances with the bigleague Astros from 1969 to 1971 in advance of the historic trade with the Reds before the 1972 season. And despite the Reds’ grand array of stars, by 1976 Geronimo was beginning to catch the attention of observers on the national scene, such as Bob Addie of the Washington Post. “Much of the Reds’ success last year must be credited to Geronimo,” he wrote. Even though they were being overshadowed by the stars in front of them on the infield, Anderson warned that the prospects in the outfield would not be playing second fiddle to the likes of Bench, Perez, Morgan, Concepcion, and Rose for very long. “They don’t get the recognition they should because they’re so young,” Sparky advised in early 1975. “But just wait two years— they won’t be overshadowed then.” From the time he joined the Reds organization, Anderson had never doubted his team’s ability to score runs. In many instances, however, he was finding that his team needed to outslug the opponent due to an inconsistent and inexperienced pitching staff. Even so, he knew that the young starting pitchers in the Reds’ stable in the early 1970s held great promise, and only needed a chance to develop. Back at old and cramped Crosley Field in Cincinnati, Anderson had to use the same shower facilities as the players (when the Reds moved to the more spacious Riverfront Stadium in mid–1970, Anderson would have his own shower). After one of the final games at Crosley in May of 1970, Anderson found him-

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self bathing next to the young Don Gullett, a reliever in his first major league season. “Can I ask you something, Sparky?” Gullett asked. “Sure, what is it?” Anderson replied. “Is there any way for me to have a day off next week? I’d like to go the graduation exercises in my hometown.” “Who’s graduation is it?” Anderson wondered. “My wife’s,” Gullett replied. “Is he that young?” Anderson wondered, as he realized that Gullett had only recently turned 19 years of age. Gullett had been an all-state selection in three sports at McKell High School near Lynn, Kentucky, along the banks of the Ohio River eastward from Cincinnati about 125 miles. While he excelled in basketball and his first love was baseball, Gullett’s most impressive feat occurred on the football field, where as a senior in the fall of 1968 he scored all the McKell points in a 72–6 throttling of Wurtland. He had run for eleven touchdowns in the game and kicked six extra points, as fans on both sides of the stadium stood in awe. After Gullett graduated the following spring, the Reds made him their first pick in the 1969 draft and gave him a signing bonus of $35,000. He promptly went to their farm team at Sioux Falls and posted a strong 7–2 record and a Northern League–best 1.95 ERA. It was what happened after the season, however, that concerned some in the Reds’ front office about the fortitude of the young man. The Reds wanted to send Gullett to their instructional league in Florida for some extra work. But when Gullett discovered another pitcher had gotten the same bonus money that he had received, he refused to report. Management backed off and did not make him attend the extra sessions, but the incident raised some initial eyebrows about the type of dependability — or lack of it — the young hurler might provide down the road. Gullett would never quite live up to his potential due to unfortunate injuries and illness, if not by attitude. By 1972, Anderson and the coaching staff decided to take Gullett out of the bullpen and make him a starter, but he was soon weakened by a bout with hepatitis and made only 16 starts on the year. After rebounding with 35 wins in 65 starts the following two seasons, Gullett was in the process of crafting a dominant 1975 campaign on June 16, and headed towards a complete-game victory over the Atlanta Braves that day by holding a 9–2 lead with one out in the ninth inning. The final Braves hitter he faced was shortstop Larvell Blanks, who lined a shot right back at the pitcher’s mound. Gullett felt the ball ricochet off his pitching hand, and saw it bound towards Darrel Chaney at second, who fielded it and threw out Blanks at first. Most of the Reds on the field and trainer Larry Starr in the dugout converged on the pitching mound to check on Gullett, and it was later discovered that he had broken his left thumb, with the joint on his pitching hand fractured all the way down to the wrist. He would not return for another two months, forcing


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Anderson to weave his famous magic from the bullpen with one of his starting aces out of action. With Gullett on the shelf, Sparky was now not only quicker in going to his bullpen, but was soon unprecedented in his regularity. The Reds set a major league record by not authoring a complete game for the next 45 straight games, a stretch that started with Gullett’s previous start, a June 11 win over St. Louis, and continued to the next full outing worked by Pat Darcy on July 30. How did the Reds fare under this strategy? They posted a record of 32–13. “I just wish they’d do away with the ‘complete game’ statistic,” Reds pitching coach Larry Shepard scoffed in reference to his team’s success and Anderson’s approach to the relief corps. “What does it mean? All that matters is if you won or you lost. We don’t look at a game as being something for the pitcher to win or lose. We look at each game as being a challenge for the entire staff.” During Gullett’s strong return to form from 1973 to mid–1975, the other Reds starting ace had been yearning to revitalize his career after once being a “can’t miss” prospect as well. The man was Gary Nolan from Oroville, California, the same community where Sparky Anderson spent a high school summer working on the rail lines. In all of the 1973 and 1974 seasons, Nolan had made a total of two starts while recovering from a devastating shoulder injury that required a complex surgery to fix. Like Gullett, Nolan had arrived in the major leagues at the age of 19, debuting for the Reds in 1967; however, Nolan assumed a much larger role in a short amount of time, leading the club in starts (32) and innings pitched (227) in his first year. This occurred after Nolan had accumulated only minimal professional experience, having pitched just twelve games in the minor leagues. In addition, Nolan possessed an unusual throwing motion, the cause (some had felt) of the increasing soreness in his shoulder about which he would often complain. The number of starts he made had dwindled from the team-high of 32 in 1967 to 22 in 1968, and then down to 15 in 1969. Attempting to compensate, Nolan began to develop one of the most effective changeups in the major leagues. This allowed him to regain his effectiveness in the early 1970s before a full blowout of his shoulder occurred as a result of the start he made on August 3, 1973, against the Astros at Riverfront Stadium, putting him on the shelf for nearly the next year and a half. While Gullett and Nolan were home-grown products of the Reds’ minor league system, the majority of the starting pitching staff was composed of castoffs from other organizations. While making another run to the playoffs in 1973, the Reds were helped greatly in Nolan’s absence by the addition of lefthanded pitcher Freddie Norman from San Diego, a 5' 7" fireplug who was only 1–7 for the Padres at the time of the trade, but had beaten the Reds, 2–1, for his only win on the year. It was an outing that impressed Anderson enough to convince Howsam to send outfield prospect Gene Locklear and cash to San Diego in return for the southpaw. Norman, who had already been dealt five times by other organizations once he arrived in Cincinnati, would go 12–6 for the Reds

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for the remainder of 1973 and finish sixth in the Cy Young Award voting. Norman had made his big league debut with the American League’s Kansas City A’s in late September 1962 at the age of 19, and got off to an auspicious start. “I got $45,000,” Norman said of his first professional contract a couple of years earlier. “I could’ve gotten more, but I didn’t think about money then. No one did. All I wanted to do was play baseball.” In making his first major league appearance as a reliever, Norman was told by A’s manager Hank Bauer to go warm up, and the excited rookie sprang to his feet asking, “Where’s my glove?” Bauer snickered and pointed back to the dugout bench. “You were sitting on it,” said the manager. “You really are a lefthander.” Returning to the minor leagues the following year to acquire more experience, Norman proceeded to strike out an Eastern League–record 258 batters in only 198 innings at Binghamton before being recalled to the major leagues with the A’s, this time to make his first start on September 9, 1963. Charlie Finley had spent a lot of money in publicizing the event, announcing that the A’s “pitcher of the future” was being unwrapped. Unfortunately, Norman would last only three innings on the evening, allowing five runs to the Yankees. He was traded to the Chicago Cubs in the off-season, and later landed in Los Angeles and St. Louis (in addition to San Diego) before coming to the Reds. Norman felt the turning point in his career occurred when he met legendary left-hander Warren Spahn in the Cardinals’ organization in 1970, where he threw a no-hitter for Spahn’s St. Louis minor league affiliate at Tulsa. Jack Billingham was yet another player whom Howsam felt had not had a chance to fully develop with the Houston Astros, and like Norman, found a solid niche in the Queen City. Billingham was a descendant of the immortal pitcher Christy Mathewson, a distant cousin from his father’s family. Mathewson, who also managed the Reds from 1916 to 1918, was the winner of 373 games. He was claimed to have been the inventor of a pitch called the “fadeaway,” an inversion of the curveball that would run away from left-handed batters off the arm of a right-handed pitcher, which Billingham would try to master himself. Later, the pitch became known as the screwball, and was a big reason for the success of the Reds’ chief nemesis in the Dodger reliever Marshall. Billingham’s role with the Cincinnati ball club would build over his time in the city, becoming a reliable starter by throwing over 200 innings in each season with the club and tying Nolan for the team lead in wins in 1975 with 15. However, it was Nolan and not Billingham whom Anderson had decided to start in that legendary sixth game of the 1975 World Series, wanting to save Gullett for Game Seven. Billingham was bitter about the move. “Maybe I expected too much,” he said. “I know I was lousy the second half of the season. But I felt they owed me something. I had done a good job for them since I came over from Houston.” With the injury-prone nature of Gullett and Nolan, even more assistance was required for the Reds’ championship run in 1975. Darcy provided a sub-


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stantial portion of this help with most a memorable rookie season, beginning on Opening Day, when he was the winning pitcher in an extra-inning affair with the Dodgers, throwing two final frames of scoreless ball in the 13th and 14th innings. That early moment proved to be the high point for the first half of his maiden big league voyage, as Darcy endured a 2–5 record through the end of June. “Not winning a game in May,” he recounted to Bob Hertzel, “you don’t know what that’s like. You’re a rookie, you know that you can be sent down at any time. It works on your mind.” Knowing that he needed to fill the gap left by Gullett’s injury, Darcy responded with a brilliant second half to the 1975 campaign, posting a perfect 9–0 mark through July, August, and September while the Reds pulled away from the pack. Darcy carried that personal regular-season winning streak over into the 1976 schedule, a stretch topped only by the season-ending twelve straight wins for Burt Hooton of Los Angeles. Nonetheless, just as magnificently as the 1975 term had begun for him, it ended as dismally in his last — his final pitch being the monumental home run by Fisk in Game Six of the World Series, leaving his team’s fate to Game Seven the following night. The Troy, Ohio, native had been another gift to the Reds from the Houston organization, the man for whom Denis Menke would be returned to the Astros before the start of spring training in 1974. The Astros were figuring to make a playoff run that season, and with a veteran starting rotation of Tom Griffin, Larry Dierker, Claude Osteen, Dave Roberts, and Don Wilson, were willing to part with the potential-laden Darcy in exchange for having Menke return as a valuable utility man in the infield. As a result, Menke would hit only .103 in 29 at-bats in his final big league season in 1974, and the trade was seen as yet another deft move by Howsam, who fooled the Astros’ executives once again. “They thought they had a shot at the pennant,” Darcy remembered about the transaction. “They felt Menke could help them in a backup role. That’s why they were willing to trade me. If they hadn’t, I’d still be in the big leagues, but with Houston.” Allowing Anderson to more easily shuffle the casualty-laden starting staff was a vibrant and precocious set of relief pitchers, led by McEnaney and Eastwick, each of whom enjoyed defining moments in their first full major league seasons in 1975. Together, the 23 year olds had become known as the “Kiddie Corps.” Both came up to the majors at the end of the 1974 season, but only McEnaney began 1975 with the big league club since the team needed another left-hander. McEnaney’s start to the season was so effective, in fact, that it prompted the Reds to trade Tom Hall, their other lefty out of the bullpen. Eastwick, whose given name was Rawlins Jackson Eastwick III, had also gotten off to a dazzling start in his big league career, pitching in eight games as a rookie in 1974. Included among these games was the season finale on October 2 against the Braves, in which he permitted the last National League home run off the bat of Henry Aaron. He finished five of those games for the Reds, saved two,

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and allowed only twelve hits and five walks in 18 innings of work. As with McEnaney, the effort seemed to assure Rawly of a roster spot in leaving spring training in 1975, but none was to be had. “It really hurt when I went to the minor leagues,” he said in reflection of not coming north to start the 1975 season in Cincinnati, “but I made up my mind that I’d think nothing but positive thoughts. I knew I’d be back.” Eastwick, an avid painter and collector of fine art, finally received his full-time chance in the major leagues when Vukovich vacated the third base position upon being sent down to the minors when Rose moved to the position. Eastwick, in turn, assumed Vukovich’s roster spot, making his 1975 debut on May 20. He picked up his third career save five days later on May 25, striking out the Phillies’ mighty Mike Schmidt on three pitches with the bases loaded to end the eighth inning, and then retiring Philadelphia in the ninth to preserve a 4–3 win for Clay Kirby. Eastwick credited much of his rapid success to regular meditation, a procedure he had employed since childhood but of which he was clinically unaware until adulthood. When his teachers talked to him as a child, he was in another state of mind. “I always sat in the back of the room ... it was like a day dream, only mine was deeper. I heard nothing. People would talk to me and I wouldn’t hear them. I guess every kid does it, but not to the extent that I did. You had to touch me to get me out of it.” The technique added to the mystique of the reliever, much like the actions of McEnaney, who did nothing to lessen the flighty reputation of left-handed pitchers. “Hey, I pride myself on being flaky,” McEnaney readily admitted. McEnaney called nearby Springfield, Ohio, home, and his 70 games pitched in 1975 ranked second in the National League. The Reds’ favorite story about McEnaney was how he met his wife. After knocking on her door for the first time, he said, “Hi, my name is Will McEnaney. How do you like me so far?” “I don’t,” the future Mrs. McEnaney said. Adding more experience to the bullpen — and certainly no less eccentricity — was the rubber-armed Pedro Borbon, who loved to pitch more than anything, and who claimed to have had only one sore arm in his life. “I was messing around in the outfield, throwing left-handed, and I hurt it.” He spent most of the early 1970s finishing right behind Marshall among the National League leaders in games pitched each year. Durability apparently ran in the family, as in 1974, Borbon asserted that his grandfather was 136 years old. “He is the oldest man in the Dominican,” he proudly announced in broken English. “His name is Bernardo. He lives on the same street that I do and is blind and walks with a cane, but he gets around. Bernardo is the father of my mother. My father’s father, he live only until 118. And his brother, he die at 102.” Borbon had been in professional baseball since originally signing with the St. Louis Cardinals in 1964, but would not reach the major leagues until five years later with the California Angels. Borbon’s arm strength was legendary. In the minors, he would challenge any takers to a bet that he could kneel in center field — with his feet


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touching the outfield wall — and throw a ball on the fly to second base “while genuflecting.” According to Rose, Borbon once stood at home plate in Fenway Park in Boston and threw a ball on the fly to the center field wall, 400 feet away. A few years later before a game in Houston, Larry Shepard came out to the field to find Borbon by second base in the Astrodome, trying to hit the roof with a throw; the pitching coach begged him to stop for fear of injury. The Reds reserve catcher, Bill Plummer, was once asked how Borbon passed the time in the bullpen. “If he isn’t losing his temper,” Plummer said, “he’s signing autographs or getting kids to buy him candy bars.” The Reds’ bullpen was the perfect microcosm of the team en masse — a small yet critical component, performing its function efficiently at the hands of a master administrator. Those parts formed a nearly unbeatable unit in 1975, and looked to be even stronger the following season. But while the Reds were fortifying their impregnable platoon, the greater financial structure of Major League Baseball was once again in peril, threatening the start of the 1976 season.

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Lockout There are no winners or losers in collective bargaining. By essence, collective bargaining is to compromise. — Marvin Miller, March 1976

Anderson and his wife, Carol, celebrated the Reds’ 1975 championship by taking a Caribbean cruise with Howsam and his wife, Janet, Mr. and Mrs. Pete Rose, Mr. and Mrs. Tony Perez, Mr. and Mrs. Marty Brennaman, and the newly formed team of Mr. and Mrs. Johnny Bench. Bench had wed Vickie Chesser in February 1975; unfortunately, they would dissolve the union shortly after the trip. “The 28-year-old all-star catcher has been the target of a national wordof-mouth smear campaign,” Tom Callahan noted. Callahan was berating the high standards of personal conduct — supposedly above those of the average person — that had been expected of public figures like Bench. “Frankly, he had been in a marrying mood, and it was a tragic mistake.” As for the manager, Anderson admitted he was tired during the first couple of months in 1976 even with the relaxing voyage, caused in part by the increased demand on him for public appearances in the off-season as a result of the World Series win. Nonetheless, he and the front office went on the warpath again, looking to strengthen the team in hopes of becoming the first National League club in more than fifty years to win back-to-back world championships. To accomplish this feat, the most pressing issue to be addressed was the thin nature of the Reds’ reserve players. Two trades had been orchestrated on December 12, 1975, by Howsam to strengthen the second-line group, with the shipment of Clay Kirby to Montreal for Bob Bailey, and Darrel Chaney to Atlanta for Mike Lum. In both cases, the men leaving Cincinnati were heading to starting jobs for the first times in their major league careers, while the players arriving in Cincinnati were former regulars who, despite going to a bench role with the Reds, would have a chance to be on a winner for the first time in their careers. The Reds thought that Chaney (who was nicknamed “Norton” by Rose, for his resemblance to 52

3. Lockout

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actor Art Carney’s portrayal of the character from The Honeymooners television show) would ultimately become a power prospect at an infield position. Chaney had established cause for this hope as the Southern League home run champ in 1968 with 23, but also had struck out 153 times with a .232 batting average. The power potential, however, would never materialize in the major leagues. After hitting several home runs in early spring training games in 1969, Chaney was given the starting shortstop job as a 21 year old; he would hit zero in 209 at-bats that season, resigning himself to a reserve role as Concepcion began to emerge at the shortstop position. “I thought I was a home run hitter, and what happened was, I was striking out quite a bit,” Chaney said of his early major league career. “I finally went to the bench.” Lum, conversely, was viewed by Anderson as a more versatile role player for the Reds, providing good defense in the outfield, serviceable skills at first base, and a left-handed bat. The 30-year-old, Hawaiian-born Lum had been with the struggling Atlanta ballclub since 1967, and embraced his reduced role in exchange for the possibility of a championship ring. Growing up in the warm weather of the islands, Lum relished the opportunity to play baseball and football every day, the latter for which he developed skills that earned him a scholarship offer from Brigham Young University. Lum had not felt respected in Atlanta ever since he walked into the office of general manager Paul Richards looking to discuss a possible raise. “What’s your name, son?” Richards asked, much to Lum’s bewilderment. Fifteen years earlier, Bailey had received the largest signing bonus in the history of professional baseball at the time, joining the Pirates for a sum of $775,000. The immense pressure initially had taken its toll, as he batted a mere .220 in his first year in the minor leagues at Asheville, North Carolina. He soon became a major league regular, however, and by spending the last seven years with the Expos, Bailey held the majority of the Montreal career hitting records. It was Expos manager Gene Mauch whom Bailey credited with polishing his technique. Now caught in the middle of a youth movement begun by the Montreal front office, Bailey was enthusiastic about arriving to a winning baseball town. “In Montreal, when you got a hit, it didn’t really matter because we were out of the race,” he said. “But here, every hit counts. This team will be in a pennant race.” The acquisitions of Bailey and Lum — two versatile men, capable of playing multiple positions— likely spelled the end for Merv Rettenmund and Terry Crowley, two other utility-type outfielders with whom Lum and Bailey would be competing for roster spots in spring training of 1976. In Anderson’s opinion, Rettenmund had been a relative disappointment since coming over from the Baltimore Orioles before the 1974 season, long after being named the Sporting News’ 1968 Minor League Player of the Year. When the Reds sent promising young pitcher Ross Grimsley to Baltimore for Rettenmund, it wound up being the only trade that Anderson regretted suggesting to Howsam during his tenure with the Reds. Rettenmund had excelled as a platoon player for the

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Orioles against left-handed pitchers, but failed in this role with Cincinnati. Conversely, Crowley had been a reasonably effective left-handed bat in pinchhitting situations, a role that Lum was expected to fill with better production. Bailey, furthermore, was deemed capable of filling Rettenmund’s job as a southpaw-basher quite ably. Also in the mix for a reserve outfield spot was Ed Armbrister, who while being a nondescript player in his short big league career, had just been involved in one of the most controversial plays in World Series history. In Game Three of the 1975 tilt against the Red Sox, Armbrister came to the plate in the tenth inning as a pinch-hitter for Eastwick with Geronimo on first and nobody out. With Geronimo representing the winning run and Armbrister being a skilled bunter, it was obvious to all that a sacrifice was in order. Armbrister did bunt, but in doing so collided with Fisk as he left the batter’s box. The collision caused Fisk to make a wild throw in an attempt to get Geronimo at second, with Geronimo ending up on third and Armbrister moving to second. Fisk and Boston manager Darrell Johnson protested vehemently that Armbrister should have been called out for interference, but home plate umpire Larry Barnett would not comply. Shortly thereafter, Morgan singled Geronimo home for the victory. Morgan would later call Armbrister “the best bunter I’ve ever seen,” and some other Reds referred to him as the “bunt specialist,” despite the fact it was a moniker that Armbrister did not appreciate. “I’m not here to sit around and bunt,” he chirped, hoping to get a spot as a starter after having been a sub for most of his three major league seasons. “I can play, too. I sit around and wonder when I am going to play. Maybe the day will come when I wind up with someone else and play, but sitting here, every day, is getting old. It is sickening.” Anderson recalled that on the same day as Game Three, President Gerald Ford’s car was broad-sided by another vehicle, yet a collision in a baseball game received more attention from the press. The game was one of the more famous sporting events covered on television to that time (just before the more notable Games Six and Seven would take place), and Tony Kubek, one of the broadcasters working the Series for NBC, felt that Armbrister was at fault on the play, and said as much in his commentary. As a result, Kubek received “roughly 1,500 letters. Most of them were anti–Kubek,” Hertzel wrote during spring training the following year. “Most of them were from Cincinnati. Three of them contained death threats, just as did a much-publicized letter to umpire Barnett.” Armbrister knew that the play was controversial, but was satisfied in his effort to make room for Fisk to make his throw. “I bunted the ball and, for a split second, I froze,” explained Armbrister. “All of a sudden I snapped out of it and started to run ... my feeling is that I stepped back to get out of his way.” The play gave Armbrister some notoriety that he had never enjoyed, and became famous as “that little outfielder” over the winter in Cincinnati for that one incident.

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A quality reserve was also sought in the infield for Rose, Concepcion, and Morgan. A perfect fit was found in young Doug Flynn, beginning with his sudden insertion for Morgan in Montreal in May 1975, helping to ignite the Reds’ torrid run throughout the summer. A couple of years earlier, Flynn in a matter of months had jumped from the pinnacle of the amateur world in one sport to the zenith of the professional world in another. The Lexington native had received a basketball scholarship to the University of Kentucky, but by the age of 21, he was released from the squad. Looking for another avenue for his athletic talents, he attended an open tryout camp for the Reds in August 1971. Flynn was signed to a minor league contract, and immediately flourished under the tutelage of Russ Nixon. Playing in the low levels of the minors against players (in some cases) four years younger than him, Flynn pondered his true prospects for moving up through the system. “I’d read about guys who spent five years in Class A,” Flynn worried. “Heck, I was earning $500 a month. I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t have much money and here were these kids driving around in big cars they bought with their bonuses ... am I wasting my time? Can I make a career out of baseball?” Nixon assured him that he could, and began to work with Flynn to tune his skills. Despite batting no higher than .258 in any season in the minor leagues, Flynn by 1975 had worked hard enough in all aspects of his game to earn a roster spot with the big league ballclub. And despite the fact he was stuck in a back-up role behind the team’s star infielders, he felt he had ably contributed to the Reds’ first title in 35 years. “Last year it took 25 guys to do what we did,” Flynn said of the 1975 campaign. “I like to feel with the things I did, I contributed. I remember Pittsburgh was in town and Concepcion got hurt. I filled in and got six hits in three games. And, the night I hit my first big league home run is the same night we started on a 41out-of-50 streak.” Hertzel asked him if he had any regrets about not being on the active roster for the 1975 World Series. “I had the best seat in the house,” he shot back philosophically. “And I got to go, all expenses paid. Not many people can say that.” Howsam’s moves reinforced the major leagues’ supreme outfit, and he was not afraid to confirm that sentiment publicly. “Our front line is the best eight men in either league,” he proclaimed, “and our bench is now as good as anybody has in baseball.” Anderson agreed, feeling that the reserves on the Reds were perfectly suited to the team’s situation. They were not whiners nor complainers about not getting a chance, as Sparky had seen on many dugout benches around baseball. “There are guys on the bench in this league who better hope nothing happens to the man in front of them,” he said, commenting on what he perceived to be the lack of depth in the baseball talent pool. “I think there are very few who could be regulars with some other team. “There’s been a lot of them I could name. Play ’em two days straight, and it’s ‘Bench me or trade me.’ If expansion comes, just wait and see what the new clubs get, because there isn’t that much talent around.... The man I marvel at

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is the one that’s in there day after day and night after night and still puts the figures on the board.... If you can play 162 games, you’re a man.” Still, some wondered why Anderson used his bench so much, considering the talented eight he was able to pencil in the lineup card every night. The evidence that his system worked, Anderson would say, is that a star player had never approached him and said he was tired. He knew that some, especially Rose, would play while fatigued and not tell him, something Anderson felt cost Rose as much as 15 points a year on his batting average. ********** Since the 1960s, the increasing television revenues in baseball (which would follow with football) had exacerbated a growing rift between the major league team owners and what had become known as the Major League Baseball Players Association, a union with former United Steelworkers and United Auto Workers chief negotiator Marvin Miller at its head. Miller had become available to lead the Players Association in 1966 when the Steelworkers’ president had been voted out of office, thus leaving Miller without his job as well. When he arrived on the baseball scene, Miller recounted, he found the Players Association to be “dominated by the owners. It had no staff of its own. It had no office of its own. It had no continuity from one month to the next. It had no accomplishments. It had no written agreements. Their so-called adviser was paid by the owners. It was illegal. Everybody involved could have gone to jail.” An ominous shadow of monetary influence was coming over baseball; the Reds’ victory in the 1975 World Series was the last in which the winners’ share would be below $20,000. In 1972 the first direct hit had been felt when a 14day player strike on April 1— the first-ever work stoppage in Major League Baseball —cut 86 total games out of the beginning of the schedule. The players had demanded that the owners improve their contributions to the players’ pension fund, and the owners agreed to do so by $500,000 more than had been previously submitted. In turn, the players agreed to forfeit their salary for the games that had been missed. However, the biggest prize of all in the contract was the achievement of salary arbitration for the players in negotiations with the owners, another item that Miller insisted be included in the final deal. With the owners angered by this detail that they felt was forced upon them, a strike loomed once again in 1973 when the players were locked out of the opening of spring training camps on February 8. Many had felt that the brief work stoppage in 1972 had been nothing more than under-handed gamesmanship on the part of the players, simply positioning themselves for what they knew would be a larger fight in 1973. Two weeks later, however, another deal was reached as the owners once again agreed to augment the pension fund as well as the minimum major league salary. The episode was viewed as a victory for the players, and the strength of their union appeared to grow with each passing

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month. Now, not long after the Reds had captured the championship, another labor problem threatened the major league season in 1976. The trigger for the new round of financial explosions in the game had occurred almost two years earlier in December 1974 when A’s owner Charlie Finley was mired in a contract dispute with one of his stars. Finley’s squabbles with his employees dated at least as far back as 1967, when he attempted to release several players who had been reported as being rowdy on a team flight. One of those players was outfielder Ken “Hawk” Harrelson, who sought to leave the A’s and become the baseball world’s first “free agent.” Harrelson was released by Finley on August 25, 1967, signed by the Boston Red Sox three days later, and assisted in their drive to the American League pennant that season in the place of injured outfielder Tony Conigliaro. Finley’s complete control of his employees was not exclusive to his players; on one occasion, he had fired the public address announcer at the Oakland Coliseum after the announcer refused to introduce Yankee player Joe Pepitone as “Josephine,” as instructed by the boss. Finley’s 1974 woes began when A’s second baseman Mike Andrews sued him for $2.5 million, immediately filed after the season’s schedule was completed, claiming that Finley had illegally moved Andrews to the disabled list after the infielder committed two crucial errors in Game Two of the 1973 World Series against the New York Mets. (Ultimately, Kuhn ordered Andrews reinstated, and when he appeared in Game Four as a pinch-hitter, the rival fans at Shea Stadium in New York gave him a standing ovation.) The day after Andrews filed his suit, Finley discovered that his premier pitcher, Jim “Catfish” Hunter, was charging him with manipulating his contract to the player’s detriment. Specifically, Hunter had claimed that Finley had failed to put a promised $50,000 towards the pitcher’s life insurance fund. On December 13, 1974, an arbitrator in New York ruled that Finley had indeed breached Hunter’s contract, thus making the pitcher a free agent, eligible to negotiate with any team seeking his services. (In late November, between the end of the regular season and the commencement of the legal proceedings, Hunter had won the American League Cy Young Award.) When he returned home to North Carolina just before Christmas to await new suitors, Hunter did not take long to make a decision. The New York Yankees would be his team, paying him a reported salary of $3.75 million for five years, more than three times what any other major league player had made in 1974. As the story goes, Hunter had received the nickname “Catfish” as a boy, when he went missing for several days in the North Carolina backwoods, only to be found by family and friends in fine condition near a creek with a string of freshly caught catfish. Now, as an adult, the simple country boy had truly — but perhaps unwittingly — unearthed a treasure chest for other major league ballplayers. The battle, however, would not culminate for nearly another year. On December 23, 1975, New York arbitrator Peter Seitz ruled that pitchers Andy

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Messersmith of the Dodgers and Dave McNally of the Expos (and formerly the Orioles) were also free agents. It was a status for which St. Louis Cardinals outfielder Curt Flood had fought several years earlier. (Flood refused to report to the Philadelphia Phillies in a trade after the 1969 season and appealed to Kuhn, who had just arrived on the commissioner’s job, for consideration.) McNally and Messersmith were two of nine players who had declined to sign their 1975 contracts; Messersmith’s claim of free agency was dismissed by the owners’ Player Relations committee back in October 1975, asserting that his claim was not under the purview of the arbitration panel. After having helped guide the Orioles to four pennants, McNally pitched the 1975 season without a signed deal with the Expos, retiring after a 3–6 season with the club and, like Flood, never seeing the riches that his confrontation brought forth for other players in the decades to come. Thus, McNally’s retirement left Messersmith as the one true free agent to test the waters entering 1976. As the winter wore on, fans and baseball people alike wondered if the issue would threaten the 1976 major league schedule. Seitz’s December ruling on McNally and Messersmith prepared to unleash its full effects just as spring training was about to begin in late February. Directly at stake was the “reserve clause,” a contractual tradition in baseball that essentially kept a player bound in his club’s services until the team decided to trade, sell, or release him, and had been standard language in every contract every major leaguer had signed for decades. By 1976, closer examination of the reserve clause had revealed a small codicil known as the “renewal clause,” another passage from the previous collective bargaining agreement struck between the players and the owners. The renewal clause further stipulated that any player who refused to sign his contract for the upcoming season would be employed only on a year-toyear basis thenceforth, and at the club’s discretion. Turning this protocol on its head, Seitz’s ruling decreed that such a player should be free to negotiate with any team once the player had played the first year without a contract, known in common language throughout the game as “playing out the option.” Again, the owners bitterly disputed this interpretation, maintaining that the renewal of contracts— particularly for players who had refused to sign their deals— should remain under their control, and furthermore, that all individual deals with players should be retroactive to the end of the last collective bargaining agreement, which expired on December 31, 1975. John Gaherin, the leading negotiator representing the owners, supplemented the argument by citing a 1944 United States Supreme Court ruling that decided a “collective bargaining agreement supercedes the individual.” Miller claimed, contrarily, that the decision did not apply to baseball, but rather to the “business world” of employer and employee, at which Gaherin and the owners were perplexed in seeing a difference between the two types. The owners contended they would not allow spring training camps to open as scheduled on March 1, 1976, without a new agreement with the play-

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ers. In early February, Seitz’s ruling was upheld by Federal Judge John Oliver in Kansas City, a couple of weeks after Jimmy Carter had won his first presidential caucus in Iowa, and just as the Winter Olympics were opening in Innsbruck, Austria. The owners then took their case to a three-judge panel on the U.S. District Court of Appeals, which, barring an unforeseen U.S. Constitutional issue to arise, represented their final card to play. While the owners were not labeling the current circumstances with any particular name, Miller chose to call the situation a “lockout” of the camps, suggesting that the players were ready to go while the owners lagged behind. “What we have is an owners’ strike,” he said, characterizing the proceedings being staged. A contrary view was held by Gaherin, who claimed that “what we have is a postponement of spring training, not a lockout.” Perhaps the loss of part (or all) of spring training meant less to the owners than it did to the players or fans; Chicago White Sox head man Bill Veeck pointed out that the exhibition season was a losing venture on his margin sheet. Veeck, who in 1976 was just starting his second ownership stint with the White Sox, surmised that his expenses from spring training approached $200,000, while total gate receipts from pre-season games only totaled around $30,000 “for a good March.” Known as a maverick in all aspects of running a ballclub, Veeck also threatened to defy his fellow owners and be the lone owner to open his training camp on time on March 1, although the camp would be only for 25 non-roster White Sox players. Employees of professional baseball in all capacities were concerned that the great leaps in popularity the game had made — with the exciting World Series that had just been played in the fall of 1975 — would now be erased, replaced by a fan bitterness that would be reminiscent of 1972 when the brief strike tore at the beginning of the season. Those concerned included front office executives, players, support service personnel at the various ballparks, and, of course, the fans. “The Red Rooters of Ruby Wright Rapp are scheduled to go on their annual trek to Florida March 14 to watch their beloved Cincinnati Reds,” Bob Hertzel wrote of a local fan club in the Queen City, which might be disappointed in their Sunshine State arrival this particular spring. “The Reds they will watch could be the likes of Junior Kennedy, Toby Franklin, and Greg Sinatro ... the major leaguers— Pete Rose, Dave Concepcion, Johnny Bench, et al.— they are persona non grata.” Sparky Anderson, for one, was tired of the bickering by both the players and owners, but appeared to be siding with management. “I can only speak for myself,” Sparky said. “I know what the game of baseball has done for me. I can’t see how I can have any complaints against it. I’m an $8,000-a-year person without baseball. How can I have any right to say the game has been unfair to me?” Howsam, meanwhile, insisted that the owners stand firm against the Players Association to protect the integrity of the game. He was concerned that any concessions on the part of the owners would weaken the fans’ confidence of a bona fide product appearing on the playing field. “Ownership has to go as

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far as necessary to get a fair and equitable agreement that will enable it to do a job.... Marvin Miller is saying the players are offering no proposal to change the reserve system, as if nothing happened. They don’t have to offer proposals— they got what they wanted. But as a result of arbitration, the entire reserve system has changed. We have virtually no control at all. This undermines the very foundation of the game.” While Howsam conceded that some changes to the reserve system were possible, he cautioned that “baseball, with a reserve clause, has been good for the players.... We must be careful we don’t kill the goose that laid the golden egg.” By the end of February, the owners (while the appeal of Seitz’s ruling was pending in the Federal Appeals court) had placed a compromise offer called the “Eight-and-One” plan on the table to the players union, one they deemed to be a generous allowance on their part. The plan offered free agency to a player at the beginning of his tenth major league season, after having played eight full seasons under contract and playing out his option in the ninth. The response from Miller, however, was that the offer was “a nothing proposal.” Among baseball’s executives, Miller was gaining a reputation as a man willing to do anything to win, even discredit individuals such as Howsam, who had built a reputation of fairness and integrity. “When Miller refers to Cincinnati Reds president Bob Howsam as ‘a liar,’ it obviously hurts Miller’s credibility with anyone who has dealt with Howsam over a period of time,” stated Callahan. Hertzel also noted that “owner Gabe Paul of the New York Yankees [part of George Steinbrenner’s group that purchased the club in 1973] compared Miller’s quest for victory over the owners to ‘the old story of the surgeon who said the operation was a success, but the patient died.’ In other words, a success for Miller could kill the game of baseball.” While the tabletop battle continued, a handful of major leaguers wished to be proactive with their physical readiness in the case of an abbreviated or hastily opened spring training schedule. As a result, Seaver set up private workouts at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Florida, with the college happy to host the activity. Seaver welcomed any major leaguers in the area who wanted to train, as the participants brought along their own personal equipment while scrounging up as many baseballs as possible for impromptu batting practice sessions. Some of the players figured that the large number of them without deals for 1976 was actually a ploy on the part of the owners, believing that the owners were not aggressively renewing contracts at the end of 1975 so as to imply that a majority of the players were seeking to play out their options. As an example, they pointed to owner Calvin Griffith of the Minnesota Twins, who apparently induced a large number of holdouts by offering small raises ($10,000 or less) to only two players: Rod Carew, who in 1975 had just won his fourth straight batting championship (along with Rogers Hornsby and Honus Wagner, only the third player in the history of baseball to do so), and pitcher Bert Blyleven, who at the age of 24 had already won 95 major league games. In the

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midst of the general turmoil surrounding the game, the Reds were experiencing their own business difficulties as well. While half of the 40-man roster was reported to be under contract by February 26, this represented a stark contrast from the same date in 1975, when only Dan Driessen went to spring training without an agreement. Most of the position starters, including two key components of the 1975 championship outfit in Rose and Morgan, were still without deals for 1976. Morgan, for example, was looking for at least a 25 percent increase on the $157,000 salary he made during his MVP season a year earlier. While Rose and Morgan would ultimately finalize one-year contracts on March 5 that would pay them each nearly $200,000, Perez, Foster, Geronimo, Griffey, and Concepcion were still without agreements by that date, the same date on which the 25th meeting between the owners and the players’ union failed to reach an agreement. Concepcion (wintering in his native Venezuela) by law was not permitted to return to the United States until a formal agreement was established between the Players Association and the owners. Rose, meanwhile, received an additional laurel on the day he signed his new contract, as a street that ran near Western Hills High School in Cincinnati was re-named for him. He would turn 35 years old in a couple of weeks, and reporters asked him if he would play until he was 40. Rose gave no predictions on such matters, saying simply, “I will play as long as I can.” Among the starting pitchers, Nolan and Billingham were already under contract, and Norman came to terms as well when he arrived in Florida on February 28. Nonetheless, the on-field effects of a possible work stoppage concerned Larry Shepard the most, for a shortened spring training schedule would most adversely affect the pitching coach’s two staff aces— Gullett and Nolan. “Gullett always has some arm trouble in the spring,” Shepard noted. In consideration of the tender-winged Nolan, “We want to bring him along slowly,” he cautioned. “We don’t want to rush him into the season.” Most of the players around baseball wanted the camps opened immediately, irrespective of any progress happening at the negotiating table. Shepard’s particular concern about the readiness of pitchers was shared by all teams, including premier Baltimore hurler Jim Palmer. Palmer warned of widespread injuries if spring training resulted in being less than four weeks long, which was the current projection. “You’d think that the owners would want us to be working out, to be getting in shape,” added Johnny Bench, perhaps as eager as anyone to get a sweat going in order to test his surgically repaired left shoulder from the off-season. “It would be to their benefit, too.” Bench, unwilling to take part in the crowded “training camp” that Seaver had launched (having grown to more than 50 players by early March), started his own camp for Reds players at the University of South Florida under the invitation of USF baseball coach Jack Butterfield. Norman, Nolan, Plummer, and a few minor leaguers joined them, as Bench and Plummer were seen bringing a pile of baseballs to the site in a large brown paper bag.

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Plummer had been the primary back-up for Bench the past four seasons after originally being signed by the St. Louis organization in 1965. In part of two seasons in the Cardinals’ minor league system, Plummer played for Anderson at Modesto in the California League, shortly before Plummer was dealt to the Chicago Cubs before arriving to Cincinnati in a 1969 trade for relief pitcher Ted Abernathy. While in Modesto, Plummer — just as he was now doing in Cincinnati — spent many game nights on the dugout bench while another man caught, and became increasingly frustrated with the manager. “I had quite a temper in those days,” Plummer admitted in looking back. After yet another evening without denting the box score, the catcher gave Sparky an evil glare as Plummer headed for the showers in the locker room. “A look like that can get you only one place — to Eugene,” Anderson snapped, in reference to a possible demotion. “If you’re not going to play me, send me somewhere else,” Plummer responded. When the two men reunited with the Reds, Anderson was happy to have him aboard. Nonetheless, he would never forget the terseness of their first encounter. “He was a mean son of a gun,” Anderson said of Plummer’s early days in pro ball, “the kind of guy you don’t want to get locked in a room with. He enjoys putting knots on other people’s heads, and a couple of times I’m sure he’s wanted to do it with me.” After one day of practice, however, the university received six phone calls of anonymous complaints about the nuisance of the workouts, which Bench and Plummer presumed were coming from non-union individuals. Even so, Bench wasn’t terribly disappointed. “There’s plenty to do here,” he beamed about the warm Florida sun. “Tennis, golf, dog races, fishing — heck, I haven’t even played golf yet.” Rose, however, insisted that he saw Bench carrying golf clubs every day — that is, when Rose wasn’t pulling his arm toward the horses at Florida Downs. Adding to Bench’s comfort was the fact that he already had a contract with the Reds. Within a week, it would be revealed that he had been given a multi-year deal, believed to be the first issued in the tenure of Bob Howsam, in addition to Bench becoming the third $200,000-a-year player in the history of the game. While he was taking some practice swings in a t-shirt and pair of gym shorts on the USF field, Bench revealed his theoretical solution for the bargaining mess— a proposal that he called the “8–5–1” plan. Similar in structure to the owners’ “Eight-and-One” proposal, Bench’s idea would allow a player to become a free agent after eight years in the major leagues or five years in the minor leagues. Such a deal would benefit those, Bench figured, who had been toiling in baseball’s lower levels for years, and who were perhaps stuck in organizations that included little chance for advancement (most often due to a star player at the prospect’s position with the parent club). The “1” component of the system would mean that a player could exercise his option only once during his entire career.

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The first tangible casualty of the stalemate came on March 3, when the California Angels announced that they had been forced to cancel the first three exhibition games for 1976. Playing the three games, which were to have taken place in Mexico on March 9, 10, and 11, were now an impossibility, as the stipulations of the expired labor agreement (and, at present, the only remaining guidelines to which both sides were deferring) required that teams have at least ten days of training before the first inter-squad game. That same afternoon, Miller forwarded a counterproposal to the owners that offered a compromise on the Eight-and-One Plan, in which the players’ union would instead consider a six-year tenure for free agency eligibility. “We’ve moved from one year to six,” Miller proudly announced, in reference to the union’s previous stance that Seitz’s ruling (essentially giving any player free agency after playing out his contract) should be the accepted standard. While Miller’s offer appeared on the surface to be a significant concession, many of the players— growing ever-antsy from inactivity — were also growing increasingly impatient with Miller. This impatience stemmed not only from the lack of progress in negotiations with the owners, but more with the lack of communication that seemed to be widening from the bargaining table to the union members at large. “I don’t know what’s happening, and I don’t understand it,” a frustrated Jack Billingham chirped, as he joined Bench’s entourage in the ad hoc workouts. “There has to be 90 percent of the players who don’t know what’s going on.” Billingham also maintained that a majority of the players actually did not want to see anything happen to the reserve clause, believing that free agency would only benefit a handful of superstars. Plummer agreed. “What happens if I don’t sign, and I can’t find anyone who wants me?” the man who backed up Bench wondered. “I have a family. I just bought a house ... Cincinnati has treated me pretty well. I don’t want to make them mad at me.” Bob Hertzel saw the wisdom in Plummer’s words. “Freedom was available to Bill Plummer, and he rejected it,” he wrote of the catcher’s unwillingness to pursue employment with other teams when his last contract ran out with the Reds. “It is, in a way, a lesson for both management and players.” Bob Bailey, one of the newest Reds, added some further sensibility to the scenario. “There are only two reasons a player would want to become free,” he concluded. “One reason is because he is in an untenable situation, unhappy with his club. The only other reason could be money, and a superstar already has that.” Like Bailey, fellow new Red outfielder Mike Lum was not a superstar, nor did he have much money, as per Bailey’s logic. While the players wanted to remain close to their respective training sites in case of a sudden announcement of the camps opening, Lum estimated on March 6 that he could remain in Florida only two more weeks on his dwindling bank account. This aspect deepened the anger of the players—for while the camps remained closed, all players had to use their own funds to stay in Florida or Arizona while the clandestine negotiations were taking place in Miami, New York, and other places.

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In fact, as Billingham alluded, few players even knew of the whereabouts of Miller and his sessions with the owners. Bench said plainly, “This is a game we helped create. Can we be responsible for its destruction?” Added Rose, “I’m ready to play ball, and all this isn’t doing any good ... I’d be the first to say that Miller has done a tremendous job for players in the past. But I don’t like the way he goes about it. We must remember that it is give and take. It can’t be all take for the players.” While the players were getting agitated with their union by early March, certain corners of the press began to turn on the owners, especially after Miller’s offer of the six-year free agent plan was rejected, which Dave Nightingale of the Chicago Daily News deemed as generous. “Miller had made a major concession by offering to place his troops in servitude for six major league years instead of the court-ordered one year — a concession the owners still have not deigned to sanctify by publicly admitting its existence.” Nonetheless, many of baseball’s executives felt that Miller had already achieved a triumph in the fight, and should now back off. “The players have won a substantial philosophical victory in that the owners are willing to alter the reserve clause,” said Gabe Paul. Some had further pointed out that Fidel Castro’s island nation of Cuba had earlier that week hammered out a new constitution for its government. Why couldn’t baseball in America, in the land of the free and the home of the brave, come to some sort of agreement? However, yet another large obstacle in creating a new deal between the owners and the union was Miller’s fear of retribution by individual players already entitled to be free agents in the future. Under individual cases that they pursued in the courts, certain players had gained eligibility for free agency in 1976, 1977, and even 1978. Miller was afraid that a new unilateral agreement brought forth now by the union would retroactively wipe out the free agency of this handful of players (with a collective bargaining agreement thought to supercede individually negotiated deals), and thus open up the union to potential lawsuits from these players. Some of these individuals, in fact, had already served noticed of their intention to pursue a lawsuit if such a scenario played out, including Marshall of the Dodgers. Miller also expressed specific displeasure with Rose and Bench, pointing them out as examples of “misinformed” players when the two went public with their desire to have the Players Association retreat from the negotiating table and urge the immediate opening of the camps. The media sensed that this growing dissension was a definite boost to the owners’ side. “The introduction of Marshall in the labor dispute is the best break the owners have had in weeks,” Tom Callahan claimed. Callahan continued by noting that “the New York Daily News, commenting on the selfishness of the players, ended up pointing at Marshall, saying ‘It’s about time the whole society stopped being intimidated by wild threats to blow up buildings.’” Marshall was simultaneously embroiled in another bizarre legal circumstance. He had been arrested on the Michigan State University campus on Feb-

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ruary 14, 1976, having served as a part-time instructor in the Physical Education department at MSU for the previous four years. Marshall, who was also pursuing a Ph.D. in Exercise Physiology at the university, was having a friend throw batting practice to him on a campus lot for some off-season work. The grounds were adjacent to the campus tennis courts, and tennis players were concerned that Marshall’s batted balls would land on them. When ordered by the police to stop his batting practice, Marshall not only refused to comply, but served notice of his intention to sue the university, citing that, as a faculty member (albeit part-time), he was entitled to use the property as he saw fit. Facing a possible 90-day jail sentence and $400 fine for that count, Marshall nonetheless would be arrested for the same infraction the following week when he then took his practice inside — still unapproved — into the Men’s Intramural Building, and reportedly interrupted the practice of the university’s tennis team once again. Adding to the bizarre nature of the story was that, on his second attempt, Marshall was joined by Minnesota Vikings quarterback Fran Tarkenton and a full television crew. By the end of the summer, MSU had filed another charge against Marshall for cutting off a lock that had secured the practice area. Marshall, conversely, was suing the school for “discrimination” against him, arguing that the university’s policy of requiring doctoral students to complete their degrees within eight years of matriculating was unfair to him as a professional baseball player. Gale Mikles, the chair of the Physical Education Department at Michigan State, responded by saying that “we are requiring of Mike Marshall the same thing we require of anyone else — that degrees be finished in the length of time required throughout the university.” Marshall, along with fellow pitcher/scholar Tom House, was launching his quest for pursuing the most scientific view on pitching that the game had ever seen. “I don’t think any pitching coach can call himself a pitching coach if he can’t name the 31 primary pitching muscles, tell me their origin and insertion and their action during the pitching motion,” Marshall once claimed. “And they should be able to explain how they account for Newton’s three laws of motion in the pitching motion, and most of them can’t even spell Issac [sic] Newton. Or they don’t know Issac [sic] Newton from Fig Newton.” Into the twenty-first century, Marshall would continue to be on the cutting edge of pitching biomechanics, emphasizing a revolutionary throwing motion that he claimed relieves stress on the player’s elbow. Most of his pleas would fall on the deaf ears of the traditional baseball scouting establishment, however, as his method was too unorthodox for any organization to adopt wholesale. But in the mid–1970s, at least Callahan recognized Marshall’s unprecedented approach to the craft. “He honestly believes that he knows more about pitching than anyone else does,” to which Dodger manager Walter Alston responds, “You think he don’t?” Marshall was already famous for the mastery and maintenance of his own throwing arm; he placed so much faith in his own regimen and abilities, in fact, that he typically did not warm up before entering a game as a relief

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pitcher, a tactic he utilized even in the 1974 World Series against the A’s. After starting in the big leagues with the Detroit Tigers in 1967, he had been traded to the Dodgers from Montreal in 1973 when the Expos had grown tired of Marshall’s complaints about the inadequacies of the club’s infielders. As the agitation on the players’ side of the bargaining dispute grew ever worse, some were threatening to play anyway — with or without the sanction of the major leagues, one point that Miller and the owners agreed was a mistake. With the ongoing impasse, Miller was expecting Commissioner Kuhn to soon intervene in some manner, either as a benefit or detriment to his cause. Finally, in a morose statement, Miller announced on March 6 that April 25 would be the ultimate doomsday deadline. “The players are willing and able and want to play baseball,” he proclaimed. “And they are under contracts to the clubs to play. If that’s impossible solely because the owners won’t permit it, each player has the right to demand to be paid on April 15. Unless they are paid within ten days, they are free. Either they will be paid, or the franchises will have no players.” On March 9, the Federal Appeals court in St. Louis upheld Seitz’s ruling from December, which had been previously upheld by Judge Oliver. The owners had only one legal maneuver left to use — taking their case to the United States Supreme Court — but this was possible only if the owners could find an aspect of the bargaining agreement that related to the United States Constitution. Upon learning of the results of the appeal, and after little progress in talks over the next five days, Miller returned with what he called a “unanimous” resolution on the part of the team representatives of the Players Association, a role Rettenmund was serving for the Reds (Rettenmund had agreed to step in as a substitute when the regular representative, Darrel Chaney, was traded to Atlanta in December 1975). It was deemed as an effort to show a restored unity for the cause, a unity that many had speculated was now crumbling among the players. It read as follows: The players fully support their association, its leadership and the positions taken by it in the present negotiations. We consider the owners’ lockout of spring training camps to be not only destructive to good faith negotiations but also destructive to the image of baseball. It is an attempt to intimidate players rather than negotiating and it will not succeed. We urge that the camps be opened and the owners, instead of concentrating their efforts to undermine the players’ organization through massive pressure and public relations campaigns, enter into good faith negotiations to produce equitable and appropriate solutions to the problems between us.

Most observers took this language as tantamount to an impending players’ strike. Rose held the opinion that somebody “ought to lock ’em in a room and not let ’em out until they have an agreement. They ought to have been meeting every day since December. Both sides are just trying to use time as a wedge.” Meanwhile, Seaver’s informal training camp at Eckerd College had disbanded

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by March 12. The players figured that exercising was not good for the bargaining table, and they came to the conclusion that if they got in shape, there would be little imperative for owners to open the regular camps. The hour-and-a-half practices that Seaver and the others were conducting were apparently not producing any sort of fitness anyway, as coaches were laughing at the intensity of the exercise that had been occurring. One of those was Larry Shepard. “When Sparky Anderson held drills the players were pooped when they left the field,” he scoffed. “Here, they are jogging off. They can’t push themselves enough ... this is like taking deep-breathing exercises.” While the owners were wrangling with the players over the contractual disagreements, they also were simultaneously grappling with Kuhn over expansion of the major leagues. Each league needed a unanimous vote from its clubs if it was to expand, and Philadelphia and Cincinnati cast the only votes against such a move on the National League side. Seizing the opportunity, the American League owners on March 26 approved the application for a Toronto franchise into their circuit, a move which went against the earlier wishes of Kuhn, who instead was seeking to admit Toronto as a National League entry. The Labatt’s corporation, the largest brewery in Canada, would foot the entry fee at $7 million after nearly a two-year quest by the company to land a team. Labatt’s was paying slightly more than the $6.3 million that had been recently paid for the Seattle franchise, which would become the other new American League team for the 1977 schedule. Despite the resolution sailing through the ownership’s approval, contingencies were placed on the finalization of the deal by a reluctant Kuhn. In an attempt to look after the interests of Washington, D.C., after the Senators franchise had moved to become the Texas Rangers in 1972, Kuhn insisted that the league make an effort to play a certain number of games in the nation’s capital — as many as 40, he had desired — if Toronto was to be added. It was assumed that the nearby Baltimore Orioles would be the likely choice to bring some baseball back to the capital, but American League president Lee MacPhail was none too happy about Kuhn’s interference. He called the commissioner’s attempt to manipulate the Toronto decision “neither just nor fair ... the American League intends to go forward with its plans for Toronto. If the National League desires to expand to Washington, it may do so. There are other fine cities available for a fourteenth franchise.” Before the American League acted, the National League — if it could get the Cincinnati and Philadelphia ownership on board — had been wanting to place a team in Toronto as well, which included talk of a new ownership group taking over the San Francisco Giants and moving them north of the border (a plan that was quickly dismissed by the other owners). As part of the National League strategy, the clubs in favor of expansion had asked Kuhn to order the American League owners to wait on taking a vote on expansion, in order to see if a higher bid came in from a National League investor. The American League owners went forward anyway in their efforts to increase their outfit to two

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seven-team divisions, pending Kuhn’s ruling. Steinbrenner, for one, had been most impressed with the Toronto group’s proposal, and approved its application without any reservations. “It’s an outstanding group of men with an excellent presentation and appearance. These types of people will enhance the league.” It had been reported that the Phillies would shift their vote in the National League if the Reds would do the same, but that event appeared unlikely. “We are opposed to expansion,” Howsam announced categorically on March 26, in light of the fact that no labor deal yet existed with the players’ union. “We don’t think this is the proper time to expand with the player situation and no set of rules on how we will operate in the future.... I don’t think expansion is prudent at this time without a players’ agreement.” In addition to an absent deal with the union, Howsam also cited two other factors that swayed him against expansion at the current time. One, insufficient talent abounded to avail such a move, and two, the financial instability of several current organizations (ones which Howsam would not name) made expanding imprudent. A few days later, the larger body of the National League owners— unable to convince Howsam and Phillies chairman Ruby Carpenter to change their minds— petitioned Kuhn a second time to block expansion in the American League, but now, Kuhn was not completely unwilling to do so. In only a month’s time, Howsam would convince the executives of the Cubs, Cardinals, and Giants to join him in dissention, putting the vote at 7–5 in favor of expansion — even further away from the unanimity needed for the measure to pass. Much more uncertainty remained at the bargaining table with the Players Association, and with individual players as well. Messersmith — along with McNally, the eye of the free agent storm — made it clear that he would not return to the Dodgers under any circumstances. Peter O’Malley, the Dodgers president, expressed a response that showed little regret. “I don’t think it’s good common sense to pay any man two or three times what he’s worth,” O’Malley said simply about the widening gulf that existed between the club’s offer and Messersmith’s demand. Writer Phil Pepe pointed out that, ironically, Messersmith also had wanted a “no-trade” clause in his new contract with the Dodgers— thus, in one respect, suggesting that he was not actually after free agency at all. By the third week of March, the bidding for his services was narrowed to three teams in the White Sox, the Cardinals, and the Braves. Messersmith had indicated a desire to play for the Reds, but the Cincinnati brass, just as they had passed on Catfish Hunter when he became available the prior year, was not interested in the $1.5 million package that he and his agent, Herb Osmond, had been seeking (to be comprised, according to Osmond, of a fouryear, no-cut contract and a signing bonus as well). “We have admiration for Messersmith’s pitching ability. He has been a 20-game winner in both the National and American leagues,” granted Howsam. “Andy is a good athlete and would make a desirable addition to our pitching staff, but we have to operate

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on a sound basis. To sign him under these terms is poor business. No club in our industry can truly afford this and survive. “In addition, we cannot allow the acquisition of one player to undermine the relationship we have with our other players and the soundness of our approach to them.” It can be inferred from Howsam’s statement that the issue went well beyond monetary aspects; it was his concern that signing a player for an outrageous amount of money would have a detrimental impact on the very integrity of the Reds team, an integrity that was at the height of its strength and something he was most unwilling to compromise. It was a position that was not unique among front office personnel, as many of his fellow executives around the game were cringing at the idea of an impending free agent flood. “[The situation of Catfish] Hunter was a once-in-a-lifetime thing,” suggested General Manager Peter Bavasi of the San Diego Padres. “But Messersmith appears to be the first in a long line of future free agents.” Messersmith had been a Dodger since the beginning of the 1973 season after five years with the California Angels. Naturally coinciding with the advent of the free agent in baseball was that of the free agent’s “agent”— a negotiator who bartered on behalf of the player, an entity almost completely new to the game before the late 1960s. As the larger discussions between the union and the owners continued to simmer past the Ides of March, four key Cincinnati players remained unsigned in Perez, Concepcion, Gullett, and McEnaney. Eastwick and Foster had recently come to terms with the Reds on their 1976 contracts, but it came to no one’s surprise inside the game that Concepcion, Gullett, and McEnaney were represented by the newly-notorious counselor Jerry Kapstein, who at the age of 32 was already known as the true living nightmare for owners and general managers. “He can decide who wins pennants,” Calvin Griffith flatly said. “Sure, I’m afraid of him — he can regulate the structure of baseball.” This fearful sentiment about Kapstein had quickly become widespread throughout both major leagues. “He controls half our pitching staff,” added Dick Wagner, the Reds vice president who handled many of the contract negotiations for Howsam, and who worked in similar capacities for Howsam in St. Louis. “Frankly, he gives us real concern ... there’s no question he could influence a pennant race. He could make a deal with one club and deliver a pennant.” Kapstein, who had started his agency in 1973 with Fisk and Baltimore star second baseman Bobby Grich as clients, denied that he held such power. He assured fans and owners alike that he would not exercise such power even if he had it, and that his roster of customers numbered far fewer than the total of 61 that one executive claimed belonged to him. In 1974, however, he successfully procured six-figure salaries for four more clients, including three cases he won against Finley, the stubborn leader of the A’s. Jerome Holtzman of the Chicago Sun-Times asserted that the owners “fear him more than Marvin Miller.” For the time being, Kapstein’s most well-known client was Fred Lynn, the star Boston outfielder who was

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seeking unprecedented sums from Red Sox management after the output of his outstanding rookie year in 1975. Other such problems were seeping over into other sports— even the more fiscally-traditional National Hockey League. In June 1976, it would be announced that Boston Bruins legendary defenseman Bobby Orr would sign with the Chicago Blackhawks for $5 million over three years, even though the Blackhawks were fully aware that Orr — though only 28 — was about to undergo the sixth operation on his battered left knee, and might not ever take the ice again. Blackhawks president William Wirtz knew of the risk. “We have gambled. We have placed our bet down, but at least we have gambled on a thoroughbred.” Personally welcoming Orr to Chicago in June would be Mayor Richard J. Daley. “With your help, Chicago will again be number one in hockey.” Daley passed away the following December, ending his 21-year run as Chicago’s chief executive. When news reports of Orr’s salary hit the papers, major league baseball players used it as leverage in their own fights. “They don’t even know if he’ll ever play another game,” an incredulous Bench (also 28, like Orr) marveled at the salary figure. He also wondered why people felt that baseball players were overpaid. “People berate me for making my money for catching 140 games a year ... twelve-and-a-half years catching is like playing 20 years anywhere else.” A break in the talks finally came on March 15, when the owners agreed to allow free agency for previously contracted players after one year of service in the major leagues (defined as players who had already signed 1975 or 1976 contracts), regardless of how long such a player had been in the major leagues. For players who had not yet signed 1976 contracts, such individuals could play out their options one time after seven full years of big league service, provided they sign their contracts before the proposed ratification of the bargaining agreement on April 1. Furthermore, the owners’ proposal held that players eligible for free agency would go into a post-season draft, in which a free agent could be selected (and thus negotiate) with as many as eight teams, including his current team if it was interested in retaining him. If no club selected the player, that player would then be free to pursue a contract with any team. In the end, it was a deal that the ownership side would regret making, created in haste “because we tried to come up with something the players will accept,” according to Howsam. “We’re trying to salvage this game of baseball. Some people may not think that is true, but they had better look at it that way.” Howsam added that the flawed offer (in his opinion) would upset league rosters at the most crucial of junctures, and that his own organization might be the most injured of all. “Look at us [the Reds]. Look how long it took us to win a World Series. Letting a player go after eight years in the big leagues is letting him go at a critical time.” Shockingly, however, even these concessions— offered as a final “take it or leave it” deal from the ownership — were rejected by the union the following

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day, at the recommendation by Miller and his influence over the MLBPA’s executive board. Miller had claimed to find many troubling loopholes in the contract offer, the most disturbing to him being the limitation of free agent drafting to eight teams, which in his mind defeated the purpose of the definition of the term. “A free agent is a free agent,” Miller said plainly. “He can deal with all 24 teams.... [U]nder the terms of ‘take it or leave it,’ I will recommend they leave it.’” Rettenmund knew that the other Reds players, anxious to get going with spring exercises, would pressure him to endorse the deal; however, he refused to do so. “They will accept anything now,” he said of his teammates. “They just want to play ball. But we can’t vote for this.” And Dick Young, in his column on March 17, now called Miller “the most powerful man in the game,” and painted this hypothetical scenario: Suppose some enterprising agent were to package Tom Seaver, Fred Lynn, Thurman Munson, Bert Blyleven, Dave Cash — all unsigned right now — and make the rounds next October, saying to the San Francisco Giants or the Chicago White Sox, “I can sell you the pennant for the next two years, guaranteed. All you have to do is take my five clients, pay them a half-million apiece, and they’re yours.” Marvin Miller says he doesn’t think anything like that will happen. How could you stop it, he was asked? He said he didn’t have the answer to that..

It was at this point that Kuhn — who had kept out of the negotiations, but hinted by mid–March that he might involve himself shortly — ordered on March 17 that, for the welfare of the game, all clubs must open their spring camps “as soon as possible.” He had implied for several weeks that he might execute such an order, but made no statement as such until after another compromising move by the players, thus ending the 17-day lockout. “If at some point I feel that sufficient progress is not being made [in the collective bargaining negotiations],” Kuhn was quoted as saying on February 27, “it would be the obligation of the commissioner to step in and move things along.” Miller had contended that Kuhn was overstepping his bounds as commissioner by involving himself in the labor dispute, stating that “Kuhn’s authority extends only to matters involving the integrity or honesty of the game,” and pointed out that the commissioner had appeared as a witness for the owners during Seitz’s arbitration deliberations back in December. Nonetheless, Kuhn, who was re-elected to another seven-year term as commissioner the previous July, made his statement after the union had agreed to defer to the owners on the “one-and-one” rule, the passage in the agreement that basically pointed to Messersmith’s circumstance. Even though the majority of the union’s executive board agreed to the terms, unanimity was not present; while not revealing individual votes, it was believed that Marshall, as the Dodgers’ representative, cast a dissenting tally. Marshall had long proclaimed his intent to bring suit if his personal gains from previous negotiations were erased through a new general collective bargaining agreement. At various points throughout the lockout, Miller nor any other person in the game could give Marshall (or any other player) an author-

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itative answer on the following question: Would the collective bargaining agreement supercede previously-struck, individually-negotiated contracts by players? All sides waited to see the outcome of the dilemma. As a result of the common agreement, Miller knew that someone, somewhere was going to get the short end of the stick. “There are no winners or losers in collective bargaining,” he noted. “By essence, collective bargaining is to compromise.” Yet, while there was now a basic agreement, the agreement was a handshake in order to open the camps; no formal deal existed on paper. Many viewed this reality as not of critical importance, however, as they pointed to the fact that the players in the National Football League had played the previous two seasons without a collective bargaining agreement while that league was in the midst of its own labor dilemma. Nonetheless, the owners knew that if no written compromise was reached by October, more than 150 major leaguers who then would have played the 1976 schedule without a contract would automatically become free agents— a contingency that they wished to see headed off. Years later, Miller would reflect on what he perceived as the source of the stalemate. “Their [the owners’] lawyers had assured the owners that the courts were going to throw out the Messersmith arbitration decision and therefore the owners should not negotiate and change the reserve clause on the basis of that decision,” he explained about the tense early months of 1976. “That’s what led to the lockout.” Rose, meanwhile, wondered what would be the ultimate impact on the game from the players’ actions. “I can remember when I wanted to be the first $100,000 player,” Rose said as full spring practices were finally getting underway for 1976. (The figure became a reality for Rose in 1970.) “It took me five great years and two batting titles to make it. Now teams have six or seven guys at that figure. And it only takes one great year to expect it.” Morgan put Rose’s words another way. “The players realized it long ago. That’s why the players get called ‘greedy.’ The fans don’t know what we know. It’s a business.” “If we ever look at it as a total business,” warned Sparky Anderson, “we’re through.” ********** All teams in Major League Baseball would be in compliance with Kuhn’s directive by March 19, and most were grateful for his help in expediting a solution. Anderson, however, had never been terribly impressed with the commissioner’s stance on anything. “If I hear Bowie Kuhn say just once more he’s doing something for the betterment of baseball, I’m going to throw-up,” Sparky said plainly. Anderson, as a member of the Players Association, had also been locked out of camp. He had spent his free time in Florida by visiting the Reds’ minor league complex, and announced that the defending champions would be ahead of the game with their first practice at 11:00 A.M. on Thursday, March 18, with the possibility of as many as 14 spring training games being completed in the

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remaining days in Tampa. Unlike other major league managers, Anderson was not worried about his club’s pitching staff being ready to go under the shortened preparation period. “The pitching isn’t that much of a problem,” he assured the fans back in Cincinnati. “If we have to, we’ll use three pitchers in a game early. We do that anyway. Clubs that depend on starters going all the way will be in trouble.” The only new member of Anderson’s coaching staff for 1976 would be Russ Nixon, joining the standing committee of Ted Kluszewski, Larry Shepard, and George Scherger. Nixon, who would be replacing Alex Grammas, had been working in the minor leagues since 1968 and was grateful for the chance to join a big league staff once again (the success that the Reds enjoyed in 1975 had led to Grammas being pursued by Milwaukee as the next manager of the Brewers). Grammas, a popular coach in Cincinnati, would be missed; he had captured the interest of Rose, as Pete insisted that he always saw Grammas chewing tobacco but he amazingly never seemed to spit anywhere. It did not take long for Sparky to round himself into spring training form, as “The Exorcist” had appeared once again, pushing the players into shape. After a particularly tough round of wind sprints, Bench suggested that the team take a strike vote — to which his mates, already with hands on their knees from being out of breath, doubled over further with laughter. Of the greatest concern for Bench (and that of his manager) was to make sure that he had fully recuperated from the broken rib and left shoulder injury he had suffered in a collision with San Francisco’s Gary Matthews in early 1975. The injury had hampered Bench for the entire season as he waited until November to have surgery on the shoulder, which was still causing him strange spasms of pain. Additionally, a bouncing pitch from Freddie Norman in September caused a painful contusion on Bench’s ankle. X-rays of the injury were negative, but the same x-rays revealed three other fractures in the ankle and foot from previous years that had never fully healed. As Bench was getting his work in behind the plate, Rose complained about the lack of care given to the Tampa playing grounds during the lockout. As if the target of a howitzer, the rocket-shot ground balls off the fungo bat of Kluszewski were ricocheting off the hardened dirt and thumping off Rose’s chest. Even with the hard work that was required in a short amount of time, the most grateful of the attendees was Bailey, the newcomer from north of the border, a refugee from Quebec. “In Montreal, we’d still be working on trick plays,” Bailey recollected of Gene Mauch’s approach to pre-season practice that included an array of elaborate pick-off throws and bunt defenses, to which Anderson replied, “The only trick we have here is to give a bat to Pete Rose, Joe Morgan, Johnny Bench, Ken Griffey, Tony Perez, and Dave Concepcion and tell them to swing it.” Morgan, for one, thought that he could improve on his magnificent season in 1975. “It all goes back to something Billy Goodman told me when I played for him in the minor leagues,” the reigning National League MVP explained. “He said that every year you go to spring training, you are a

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rookie. You have to prove yourself again. It’s something I’ve always remembered ... the difference between the Joe Morgan who came to Cincinnati in 1972 and the Joe Morgan of ’76 is confidence.” It was not immediately a full squad, however; eight Reds (including Geronimo, Borbon, and Concepcion) were making their way to Florida from foreign countries and could not promptly get their visas in order. Also absent were Foster, Perez, and Gullett, the latter two still without contracts. Nonetheless, all were expected to be in camp by March 20, a day after the workouts had begun. McEnaney and Concepcion were also yet unsigned, who along with Gullett were clients of the infamous Kapstein. Perez finally inked his deal on March 26, and by that date, the entire roster was practicing (with or without completed deals). The contract for Perez was believed to be worth approximately $125,000 for 1976, and it also happened to be signed on a day that young first baseman Dave Revering recorded a game-winning hit in a 5–4 exhibition win over the Yankees. Coincidence? Revering did not think so, and he wanted respect — even though he knew he was stuck behind Perez in the Reds’ food chain. “It’s looks pretty crowded [at first base], doesn’t it? I want to be traded; I want to play in the big leagues right now. I don’t want to waste my life in Triple-A.” Revering was referring to the fact that Driessen, Lum, and Crowley were also fighting for playing time, and that a move of some sort should be made. As a side note, Hertzel noted the great cultural diversity the Reds held at first base, with Perez (a Cuban), Driessen (an African-American), Crowley (an Irish-American), and Lum (a Chinese-Hawaiian). A poor spring and the acquisition of Lum was beginning to spell doom for Crowley. He had been the club’s best pinch-hitter in the past two seasons, but was considered to be the most limited of the potential reserves in his defensive capabilities. Rettenmund (although more skilled on defense) was in a similar situation, and it soon became apparent that the two roommates and Armbrister would be battling for one final roster spot when the team broke camp. Driessen, meanwhile, was still envisioned as the true long-term replacement for Perez at first base. He hailed from Hilton Head, South Carolina, and his high school didn’t even have a baseball team. When Driessen asked the school principal if he could get a team going, the principal said, “Sure, meet me in the auditorium, and we’ll talk about it.” The principal never showed, but it did not deter the young player from chasing his dream. By 1976, he had become a quality major league player, and Anderson, in fact, was making it a point to get Driessen in the lineup more often, allowing Perez to have a more frequent rest. “I’ll have Tony angry at times and Danny at times,” he said, “but Tony will drive in his 100 runs whether he plays 130 games or 150.” Even though considering himself still in the mix for a second-string job with the Reds, Revering found that he had not yet acquired bargaining capital in the major leagues when Anderson sent him to the organization’s minor league

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camp just three days later. Anderson soon did the same with Tommy Hume, a pitcher who was Cincinnati’s number-one draft pick in 1972. The reliance of Anderson on his bullpen appeared all the more important as the 1976 regular season loomed. Not only would the starters have less time to get into shape for the opener (as Sparky had noted), the mere availability of the starters was a question into the last week of March. Everyone was aware that it would take time for Gullett to get into shape, but when Billingham pulled a leg muscle on March 29, concern mounted as to who would fill the increasing voids in the starting staff. Anderson had previously tabbed Billingham as the man to take Gullett’s place on Opening Day, April 8 in Cincinnati, when the Reds would get things started against the Houston Astros. Furthermore, Tom Carroll, who had filled in so effectively for the injured Gullett in 1975 with four wins in seven starts, had been bombarded by enemy bats in the early spring training games, and was sent to the minor league camp after not inspiring any further confidence in the manager. On the positive side, two surprising rookies— Pat Zachry and Santo Acala — had distinguished themselves as possible solutions. “Both are kids who can throw the ball hard,” Anderson informed the press. “Acala just might have the best arm on the staff.” Equally impressed with Acala’s potential was Shepard. “You can’t pick the ball up on him,” he added about the pitcher’s deceptive motion in his wind-up. “He flaps around like a rag doll.” Each pitcher was out of options on his contract, and if the Reds did not keep them on their big-league roster for the entire season, there was the distinct possibility they would be lost to other major league organizations through the waiver process. Zachry had been in camp with the Reds for the past two years after six seasons in the minors, but failed to impress enough to stay with the major league roster. “He never showed me anything,” Anderson said bluntly. The young pitcher had nearly given up sports in high school while growing up in Waco, Texas, after he had both of his ankles shattered in separate football games in his eighth grade and senior years. “I was known as a klutz then,” Zachry admitted about his thin, gangly frame. “I’d go down the stairs head-first. I couldn’t chew gum and walk at the same time.” By 1976, Zachry and Acala were strapping young men, each standing six-foot-five and blazing the ball into the catchers’ mitts in camp. Like other rookies in spring training that year, they were concerned that a shortened pre-season schedule would dim their chances to wind up in the big leagues that year. By April 4 their roster spots had been assured with the delivery of another pitcher to the Indianapolis farm team in Rich Hinton, player who joined the organization the previous December 12. With all the uncertainty within the starting staff, more responsibility of leadership was now heaped on the shoulders of Gary Nolan. Nolan finally appeared to have convalesced from his arm troubles by making 32 starts in 1975, the highest number of appearances he had logged in four years. “Last year, I wanted Nolan to be the ‘Comeback Pitcher of the Year,’” admitted Shep-

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ard. “This year, my goal for him is the Cy Young Award.” When he recorded three scoreless innings against the Phillies on March 31, Nolan revealed that he was going “about 75 percent” of what he could do; even so, the confident young man told Cincinnati fans not to worry. “I’ve always believed that when Gary Nolan is just 85 percent of full speed, he’s as good as any pitcher in the league,” he said in self-assessment. He later retreated into a more humble tone. “I’ve been dead for a year and a half, and they haven’t given me a funeral.” The following day it was Gullett’s turn to show what he could do, and he displayed much of the supreme self-confidence of Nolan. As newspapers the morning of April 1 announced the formation of a new computer company by Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs named Apple, Gullett took the mound for his first game work in spring training. As he was doing so, he remained the only unsigned player on the roster, with Concepcion having just finalized a deal that paid him $85,000 for one year. “The kids were looking for a lot more, and were swinging way early,” Gullett said of the young Los Angeles Dodger minor leaguers he faced on the afternoon. “They were looking for the Don Gullett fastball ... I could throw a lot harder, but I don’t want to rush it to the point where it does more harm than good.” He was asked by the media if his contract troubles were a source of distraction. “All signing a contract is, is putting your name on it,” he assured them. “It won’t bother me mentally while I’m pitching if I’m not signed.” He went a bit further than the work that Nolan had endured the day before, hurling 51 pitches over four innings. Anderson was upset that Gullett had spent the lockout working on his new house instead of getting into shape, a decision Sparky felt had put the pitcher even further behind on his readiness calendar. He was now complaining about new physical problems, such as a stiff neck and muscle spasms in his throwing arm. Heading into the 1976 season, he had already won 80 major league games in his young life of 25 years, which was more than Warren Spahn, Whitey Ford, Sandy Koufax, and other notable lefthanders had achieved by that age. His brittle status, however, showed itself in his next spring outing on April 4, when Gullett endured what Hertzel termed as “the worst humiliation of his pitching career” in front of nearly 6,000 fans in Tampa, the largest crowd to see a Reds home spring game on the year. He was shelled for nine runs in four innings, and Anderson could not hide his disgust any longer. “If you know it takes you longer to get ready than most guys— and Don knows it takes him longer — then you’ve got to start early,” he grumbled, pointing to the fact that Gullett did not come to Florida until training camp opened after the lockouts, and then took an extra day to travel south at a leisurely pace. “If there was no delay and if the camp were opening on March 1, a pitcher who doesn’t think he can get ready in time should come to Florida on February 15 ... I know there’s no way to get Don ready on time now.” It was now Sparky’s plan to pitch Gullett in the sixth game of the regular season at the earliest. Gullett, strangely

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enough, was quick to add, “But this is only the second time I’ve been in a game situation. You can only do so much in a certain amount of time.” He still remained the only Reds player not under contract, and some were beginning to question if his heart was truly in his job. By 1976, Gullett had been expected to take his position among the elite pitchers in the National League, but the top of that group still belonged to the man he had faced that day in Tom Seaver. A whirlwind of individual intrigue had surrounded Seaver during the union’s negotiations with the owners concerning the possibility of his pitching somewhere other than New York in the coming months. The Mets had renewed Seaver’s contract for 1976 at his 1975 rate of $170,000; however, the Mets also knew they could exercise the renewal clause only once on a player, freeing such a player to become a free agent at the end of the renewal season. Thus, after the deal was made, the Mets quickly offered him another contract package that they claimed would make him the highest paid pitcher in the history of baseball. Seaver had refused the deal, instead seeking a contract in the neighborhood of $800,000 for three years. On March 29, it had been leaked to the press that an impending trade was about to occur, sending Seaver to the Dodgers. In return, the Mets would receive catcher Joe Ferguson and another front-line starting pitcher in Don Sutton, who had won 155 games in ten seasons in Los Angeles. With Sutton being a “10-and-5” player, he had the right to veto any trade but had shown no intention to do so in this case. And while not necessarily wanting to leave New York, Seaver was open to the possibility of returning home. “I grew up in California and the Dodgers have a good organization,” he said. “I don’t want to be traded, but if I am, I would go to the Dodgers.” When the leak reached New York, the Mets front office received such public pressure that they canceled the deal. It was then rumored that if Seaver was able to win his desired amount from New York, the Mets left-handed ace Jerry Koosman would be on his way to the Reds in a trade, as it was assumed that the Mets would not be able (or willing) to pay top dollar for both pitchers. Meanwhile, one of Seaver’s counterparts in the American League — Palmer of the Orioles— was said to have received a substantial (but unconfirmed) raise from his 1975 salary of $135,000. Even Seaver’s request paled in comparison to Lynn, however, who through Kapstein was demanding a comprehensive contract package from the Red Sox that would be valued at nearly $2 million, including “a $500,000 insurance policy, guarantee of $35,000 a year for life if he is injured, a six-figure bonus if Boston makes the World Series and a bonus of about $50,000 if he makes the All-Star team,” according to Associated Press reports. The Chicago Cubs were also rumored to be interested in Seaver as the 1976 season approached. E.R. “Salty” Saltwell had been named the new general manager of the Cubs, supplanting the 19-year tenure of John Holland. When asked if the Cubs would indeed be pursuing Seaver, Saltwell responded, “Oh, no, we’re only looking for left-handed pitching.”

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It would be Saltwell’s only year in the position. Seaver, at his core, simply wanted to pitch and be done with the business side of the game. “This has been a very emotional time for all involved,” he said a couple of weeks earlier, in reference to his own contract troubles and that of the players’ union negotiations during the lockout. He added that the correspondence coming from the fans was starting to lean towards the negative side. “My personal mail is about 50–50. It was much heavier against us in 1972 when we went out on strike.” Dick Young figured the backlash would be a lot stronger against the perceived greediness of both sides in the baseball stalemate, as the writer believed that the negative letters Seaver and other players were receiving did not even begin to scratch the surface of the sentiment against them. “The word ‘Boycott’ is being used more and more,” he warned, “and some [fans] go so far as to threaten they will picket the ballparks with signs to demonstrate disapproval of the players’ attitude, or the owners’ attitude, or both ... for every bitter letter written, how many have silently pledged within themselves not to go to the ballpark? For every angry letter writer, every disenchanted penpal, are there 10, 100, 1,000 who will stay away?” Other writers, such as Joseph Durso of the New York Times, were more optimistic. “For the public, the basic facts of life remain,” he pointed out, suggesting that ticket prices would not necessarily show a large increase in the wake of free agency. “You can still sit in the bleachers in Baltimore for 85 cents, and for 55 cents if you’re under twelve years old; and you can sit in the ‘deluxe loge’ in San Francisco if you have $7.10, regardless of your age.” As expected, time ran out for the expendable Rettenmund and Crowley on the Cincinnati major league roster. Crowley had been purposefully left behind from the team as the Reds headed north with the completion of spring training. With the Reds trying to trade him to another major league organization, Crowley was not cut from the active roster, nor was he assigned to the organization’s minor league camp. Rettenmund had been sold to the San Diego Padres, while shortly thereafter, Crowley would find a home in Atlanta in exchange for journeyman pitcher Mike Thompson. Moving both men freed a spot on the Reds’ roster for surprising rookie Joel Youngblood, an outfielder with more athletic ability than either of his predecessors. Youngblood had been a second-round draft pick of Cincinnati in 1970, and at age 24 had proven that he was ready for the major leagues. A former football and baseball star who had been offered college scholarships in both sports, Youngblood started briskly in the Reds’ system by reaching a .317 batting mark at Indianapolis in 1973. Since that high point, he had fallen to .285 and .263 in successive years, which suggested he needed more seasoning in the minor leagues. (In 1972, Youngblood had been struck in the head with a pitched ball, which in the opinion of some scouts had stunted his progress.) As with Zachry and Acala, however, Youngblood was out of options with his contract, which made him available for acquisition by another organization if Cincinnati did not keep him on the major

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league roster for the entire year. As a result, the three men would comprise the rookies on the Reds for the start of the 1976 schedule. While Kirby was a significant deletion as a relief pitcher and spot starter, also missing from the Reds bullpen for 1976 was one of their former mainstays in Clay Carroll. After coming over from the Braves in a mid–1968 trade, Carroll had become the Reds’ all-time leader in games pitched. Nonetheless, with the emergence of Eastwick, McEnaney, and other youngsters in the bullpen, Howsam decided to deal the veteran to the White Sox for another left-handed pitcher in Hinton. “I could see it,” Carroll mouthed out in his southern drawl about his impending departure, much in Dizzy Dean fashion. “The two kids came along and I was makin’ a lotta money. I wasn’t real happy last year. Didn’t get to pitch too much and that made me mad. You know, all I want is for them to give me the ball. I’ll be that way until they run me outta baseball.” Carroll’s nickname was “Hawk”; “One look at his face, and you’ll know why,” Rose once said of his prominent nose. Carroll’s personality was an infectious inspiration to those around him. “We are going to miss Hawk,” mourned McEnaney as he saw Carroll across the way during an exhibition game against the White Sox. McEnaney knew that one of the chief pranksters (as well as his personal mentor) was leaving the organization. “We’ll have to find someone to take his place as a conversation piece.” Carroll was quick to point out that with his trade to Chicago, the White Sox now had four former “Fireman of the Year” award winners— Terry Forster, Rich “Goose” Gossage, Wilbur Wood, and himself — given annually to the best relief pitcher in the game. Carroll liked to tell tales, and his backwoods anecdotes wound as long and far as the Chattahoochee River, from near which Carroll hailed in Alabama. He helped support his family while growing up by laboring in a steamy cotton mill alongside his six brothers and his father, the latter of whom had been an employee of the establishment for more than four decades. “Cotton Mill Hill” had propped up the entire economy in the little town of Clanton. “Without this [pitching] arm of mine, I’d still be working in that mill,” Carroll liked to joke. Dixie Walker, the former Brooklyn Dodgers star, had once been on a scouting trip through the South for the Milwaukee Braves. After visiting Clanton, he offered Carroll $1,000 to sign a contract, which Clay quickly accepted. As the story goes, Clay went straight to the Clanton bank to open a checking account and deposit the money — even though he withdrew $750 of it later that afternoon to buy a used car. “I got me a ’54 Ford,” he remembered proudly. “A real classic then.” Soon, however, he needed to make another withdrawal — enough money to get him a train ticket to Waycross, Georgia, for his first professional spring training in early 1961. After joining the Reds, the car-buying bug would bite him once again. Rose and Bench had invested in a Lincoln dealership, and Bench was trying to convince Carroll to purchase a new Continental. After Carroll told Bench that he had always wanted a new Cadillac when he could afford one, the catcher went into full-bore car sales mode. “The Lincoln Con-

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The 1976 Cincinnati Reds. Joe Morgan, seated second from the left in the first row, called the team “the best ever” (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York). Back row, left to right: Bob Bailey; Dave Concepcion; Gary Nolan; Bill Plummer; Pat Zachry; Sato Alcala; Jack Billingham; Rawly Eastwick; Cesar Geronimo; Pedro Borbon; Mike Lum. Middle row: Bernie Stowe, Equipment Manager; Paul Campbell, Traveling Secretary; Joel Youngblood; Don Gullet; Ed Armbrister; George Foster; Tony Perez; Johnny Bench; Ken Griffey; Will McEnaney; Dan Driessen; Mark Stowe, Bat Boy; Larry Starr, Trainer. Front row: Pete Rose; Joe Morgan; Russ Nixon, Coach; Ted Kluszewski, Coach; Larry Shepard, Coach; Sparky Anderson, Manager; George Scherger, Coach; Fred Norman; Doug Flynn; Manny Sarmiento.

tinental is the only luxury car on the market that comes equipped with an automatic vacuum cleaner,” Bench told the young pitcher with a gratuitous slap on the back. “Just think of the hours you’ll save ... you’ll never have to vacuum your car again!” The pitch convinced the pitcher, and he put a down payment on a Continental. He stormed back into the dealership two days later, however, angry as a kicked mule, wanting to know where the supposed vacuum cleaner was located. On March 31, it was announced that Messersmith had finally signed a deal with the New York Yankees, but it turned out to be short-lived and ill-conceived. Messersmith’s agent Osmond had apparently agreed to a salary figure with the Yankees without the pitcher’s consent, and the different parties tried to decide the enforceability of the contract amidst all the hearsay. “We intend to perform our obligations and expect Mr. Messersmith to do the same,” stated Gabe Paul. “I think I have been in this business long enough to know when we have a firm agreement. It appears to me that Andy Messersmith is being made an unfortunate pawn.” The Yankees held firm that Osmond was acting on the player’s behalf, and that the deal was legal. After issuing notice to the 23 other teams that Messersmith was challenging the validity of the contract, Kuhn ordered

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Steinbrenner to void the agreement a couple of days later. Messersmith threatened that if the commissioner did not rule in his favor, he would sit out the entire 1976 season. This would not be necessary, as on April 3 the Yankees backed off of their claim on the pitcher, with the New York front office tiring of Messersmith’s attitude. “The wearing of the Yankee uniform is not something which anyone will be allowed to take lightly,” read a statement from a club official, a position confirmed the same afternoon by Steinbrenner. Messersmith ultimately signed with the Atlanta Braves seven days later; even so, he was not finished complaining, as in early April he accused all 24 major league owners of being in a conspiracy to “make life uncomfortable” for potential free agents by not agreeing to contracts with them for 1976. Contract squabbles were not unique to the Messersmiths and the Seavers and the Lynns on the East Coast. Reggie Jackson, among the 150 or so players who had not finalized a 1976 deal, was facing a salary reduction from $140,000 to $112,000 from Finley in Oakland, which constituted the legal limit of 20 percent that an owner could impose on a player who refused to sign his contract. Instead of agreeing to those terms, Jackson was happy to be moved in a blockbuster trade with Baltimore just before the start of the season. (In April, it would be revealed that Jackson had declined a three-year contract from Finley worth $525,000, as Jackson had been seeking $750,000 for the same length of time.) He was sent with pitchers Ken Holtzman and Bill Van Bommell to the Orioles for outfielder Don Baylor and pitchers Paul Mitchell and Mike Torrez. Some saw the move (first the salary reductions, and then the ensuing trade) as a retaliatory strike by Finley against Jackson and Holtzman. Finley denied the accusation, stating that the move was made purely to strengthen his club. “This trade was made because I feel this deal will lead us to another world championship,” he announced. “I feel that Baylor is the equal of Reggie Jackson. I don’t mean this out of disrespect to Jackson. I think Baylor is outstanding and will be even more outstanding in the next few years.... I think under the circumstances it will turn out to be one of the best trades we have ever made.” Both Jackson and Holtzman lost their most recent arbitration battles with Finley a year earlier. Jackson was given $140,000 for 1975 instead of the $168,000 he wanted, and Holtzman had to settle for $93,000 in the same season, a figure significantly less than the $112,000 he had been demanding. (Finley had offered Holtzman a $2,000 raise for 1976 before sending him to Baltimore.) There was no guarantee, however, that Jackson would even report to the Orioles for service; with other local business interests, he did not wish to leave the California area and implied that it was not necessary for him to do so. “His disposition is that he feels strongly about the West Coast,” Jackson’s agent, Gary Walker, told the press. “He is of a mind to sit out this year and negotiate with a West Coast club next year when he becomes a free agent ... Reggie doesn’t have to go ... he can make his own deal anywhere.” Jackson initially did refuse to go to Baltimore, and would not appear in a game for the Orioles until May 2.

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The Reds finished their abbreviated 1976 spring training schedule with a mediocre 7–7 record, yet their lackluster performance was not a concern to Anderson. He was pleased that the two rookie pitchers, Zachry and Acala, had shined in the last game of the spring, a 10–1 romp over Detroit in which the two hurlers combined for eight innings of five-hit ball. “I don’t know if it is going to be as easy or tougher for us this year,” the skipper offered about his club’s prospects in ’76. “I know we are going to win 90 games ... I don’t think anybody will win 100. That looks totally impossible.” Bench, while recuperating from his injuries, wound up getting only two hits in the Reds’ 14 spring training games, a long way from the .436 he had batted in spring training of 1975. He attributed his struggles to the bad habits he acquired in the 1975 regular season in the process of protecting the shoulder while on the field. And despite the downturn, he was not discouraged, as he and his manager knew what was expected of him. At times during the ’75 season, however, Bench brought some of the problems with his shoulder upon himself, even in part due to his easygoing and friendly nature. A friend of Bench’s and a restaurateur in Cincinnati named Jeff Ruby ran the Holiday Inn Riverfront where Anderson and the coaches lived during the season. Ruby had quickly become a close friend of Sparky’s, and even shared his suite during the 1975 World Series in Boston. In the locker room before one of the games in Boston, Anderson, hearing a lot of commotion outside the door of the visiting manager’s office, dashed out to see what was the matter. Ruby (who had played football at Cornell) was on the floor in a spontaneous wrestling match with Bench. Sparky was concerned that his all-world catcher would hurt himself further, and he quickly knelt down between the two like a referee, pleading with them to stop. But before Sparky had even entered the room, newspaper photographers had snapped shots of the grappling. Anderson was sure there would be hell to pay when Howsam saw the pictures. All was well in the end, of course, as the Reds celebrated their championship and Bench went home to rest his shoulder. However, both he and his manager knew they would not be permitted to rest on their laurels. “The fans here [in Cincinnati] don’t want a winner,” Anderson said as the 1976 regular season loomed. “They demand a winner.”

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Opening Day and a Star-Spangled Monday Welcome to the baseball capital of the world. — Pete Rose to a newly hired towel boy at Riverfront Stadium

Opening Day was indeed a Cincinnati tradition, and the unwrapping of Riverfront Stadium in 1970 only augmented the gala spectacle that would be celebrated yet again each subsequent April. Heading into the 1976 season, the Reds had posted a record of 281–164 in their five-and-a-half seasons in Riverfront, including a particularly imposing 64–17 mark in 1975. Original ideas for a Reds stadium downtown near the Ohio River could be traced backed several decades, as a blueprint known as “The 1948 Plan” had called for development projects similar to the modern-day “Banks Project” taking place in the same location. The new stadium held a round, symmetrical design (which in part prompted Anderson to nickname it “The Pit”), a form which became emblematic of stadiums built in the preceding ten years; many of these stadiums were designed to house professional football teams in such cities as well (the Cincinnati Bengals of the National Football League joined the Reds at Riverfront in 1970, having played their first two seasons at Nippert Stadium on the campus of the University of Cincinnati). Near second base in the Riverfront Stadium sat the site of the former home of country music legend Roy Rogers. The new ballpark opened for business on June 30, 1970, with the Reds commencing a three-game series against the Atlanta Braves. Six days earlier, the Reds had played their final game at Crosley Field, the venerable establishment on the city’s near west side. In that final contest at the location on June 24, Reds pitcher Wayne Granger was able to induce Giants outfielder Bobby Bonds to tap lightly back to him at the mound to complete two scoreless innings of perfect relief in sealing a 5–4 Cincinnati win. It was the last kick-up of dust at the corner of Western and Findlay avenues, the intersection that had been the home of professional baseball in Cincinnati since 1884. The 83

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“old” structure with which the city was familiar had existed since 1912, thenceforth known as “Redland Field” until 1933 when the club was purchased by Powel Crosley. After Granger recorded the final out, the property became a vehicle impound lot for the Cincinnati Police Department, as the historic grounds were soon covered with a swarm of abandoned automobiles before the ballpark was razed two years later. After saying goodbye to their old home, the Reds made a three-game trip to Houston before returning to Cincinnati and christening the new ballpark, the magnificent edifice that now dominated the shoreline of the Ohio. Riverfront Stadium had been built at a cost of $48 million, and construction crews were still in the process of putting the finishing touches on the place — including the transplanting of home plate from Crosley Field via helicopter. As preparations were being made for the opening ceremonies on the afternoon of June 30, Rose happened to bump into Kuhn outside the ballpark. The two notable baseball men thus decided to go inside and take a self-guided tour of the cavernous facility. From a distance, one of the deadline-stressed workers saw the two “strangers,” and hollered at them to leave the premises, unaware that both visitors had special duties to perform that evening. “I didn’t expect to be recognized,” Kuhn would later say about the incident, “but I thought everyone recognized Pete Rose.” And while Rose would take his customary position in the Reds lineup, Kuhn was only one of the many luminaries who would help usher in a new era of baseball that night in southwest Ohio. Unlike its contemporary brother Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Riverfront Stadium had an artificial surface from that very first night, becoming the first ballpark (aside from the indoor Astrodome in Houston) to have the entire field covered with Astroturf. Yet another circular downtown structure — Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh — would open just two weeks later, and it would also possess artificial turf from its inception. The carpet in Riverfront Stadium would remain as the surface of choice until two years before the building’s demolition in 2002. Things began ominously at the new ballpark, as Henry Aaron smacked a home run in the first half-inning of baseball on the premises, leading to an 8–2 Braves win and a disappointment for the home crowd. Nonetheless, bigger events came to the new ballpark right away. The stadium hosted the 1970 AllStar Game just two weeks later on July 14, as well as the World Series in October, when the Reds bowed to the Orioles. As a result of getting half their 1970 home games in the new facility that held more than 50,000 fans, the Reds would be able to finish the season with a franchise record of more than 1.8 million attendees. Riverfront Stadium showcased Cincinnati as one of the best baseball municipalities in America in the mid–1970s, and by the start of the 1976 major league season, the city was accomplishing things that larger metropolitan areas in the major leagues could only dream, as explained by writer Norm Clarke.


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Riverfront Stadium, the recognizable structure that asserted itself along the shoreline of the Ohio River, between Cincinnati and Covington, Kentucky (photograph by Chris Mallory).

“The Reds, despite operating in the second smallest major league baseball market, have passed the million mark in advance ticket sales and could become only the second big league team to draw two million fans in four consecutive years.... Cincinnati fans have already purchased one-fourth of the season’s available tickets two weeks before the 1976 season is set to start.” The Reds were nearing the customer productivity of the Los Angeles Dodgers, who traditionally held the standard for big league attendance with their large metropolitan area and the so-called “Taj Mahal of Baseball” in Dodger Stadium. Yet, in 1975, the Los Angeles club barely edged little Cincinnati in total attendance, 2.5 million to 2.3 million (this, compared to the San Francisco Giants’ major-league low of just over 520,000 in attendance). And, in each of the three seasons since 1972, the Reds had easily broken their own home attendance records. Found within the new ballpark were state-of-the-art facilities, which included the television and radio broadcast booths. The 1976 season marked the third year on the Reds’ radio side for Brennaman, who had taken over for Al Michaels after Michaels’ three-year stint with the club had ended in 1973.

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Joining Brennaman was the man affectionately referred to as the “Old Lefthander,” Joe Nuxhall, who after retiring as a Reds pitcher had served as a Cincinnati announcer and batting practice pitcher since 1967. The pair could not have been more different, and they were a collective hit immediately. “Brennaman is a snappy dresser,” noticed David Fuselier of the Cincinnati Enquirer, “who likes nice clothes and tugs on his sleeves sometimes to make sure they fall just right. Nuxhall munches cookies or sometimes gulps a third inning sandwich.” Nuxhall, however, was best known in the baseball world for being the youngest player in the modern era, summoned to start a game as a pitcher at the age of 15 for a war-torn Reds roster on June 10, 1944, four days after the Allies’ invasion to reclaim France in World War II. Allowing five runs in less than an inning of work, the overwhelmed teenager went back to Hamilton, Ohio, to finish high school, later received some more seasoning in the minor leagues, and then returned to the Reds from 1952 to 1966 to win 130 games (in addition to five victories he acquired in a one-year stint with the Kansas City A’s in 1961). Before Nuxhall’s career had commenced at the microphone, the primary voice with whom Reds fans had grown most accustomed was Waite Hoyt, another former big league pitcher who transmitted the games into Cincinnati homes from Crosley Field between 1942 and 1965. By the mid–1960s, Hoyt would be partnered with Claude Sullivan and Jim McIntyre, two men who briefly took over for Hoyt after his retirement. Hoyt had been the number-one pitcher on the famous “Murderers’ Row” Yankees team of 1927, and loved to regale the current Reds players about his stories of being in the majors. One such story included the legendary Ty Cobb, as Hoyt and his Yankee teammates were giving Cobb a hard time during batting practice before a game. When he had heard enough, according to Hoyt, Cobb proceeded to foul 18 straight line drives into the Yankees’ dugout off the batting practice pitcher. And, as the Reds opened the 1976 season against the Houston Astros, it would mark the first work by broadcaster Bob Prince for the Houston ballclub, who had been the recognizable voice of the Pittsburgh Pirates for the previous 28 seasons. Opening Day for the major leagues in 1976 occurred on Thursday, April 8, and as the first major league team still in operation, the Reds continued to have the honor of playing the first game on the schedule. It was a privilege that was something special in Cincinnati, including the annual Opening Day Parade that was organized by the local Findlay Market Association and was as much a tradition in the area as Skyline Chili and Graeter’s Ice Cream. With the labor troubles apparently subsiding, it was expected to be a grand year for the game, in the 200th year of the nation, the 100th year of the National League, and the 75th year of the American League. In the Super Bowl the previous January, the Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys had worn commemorative patches for the bicentennial on their sleeves; to acknowledge the National League’s one hundred years, players in that circuit would don an appropriate patch as well.


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A patriotic spirit was felt everywhere around baseball in 1976, particularly on Opening Day. In Chicago, Veeck made two of his most prominent non-playing White Sox employees—field manager Paul Richards and business manager Rudie Schaffer — join him on the field for a march in Revolutionary War outfits, marking the special year for the United States. (Adding to the authenticity of the reenactment was the fact that Veeck had a wooden leg, a prosthesis for wounds suffered in World War II.) And just two weeks later in Los Angeles, a visiting player executed perhaps the greatest act of patriotism ever seen on the field. With the advent of free agency on the horizon, many other personnel changes had become noticeable throughout baseball — and not only among the players. In addition to Grammas, there were eleven other new managers in the major leagues in 1976, including National Leaguers Bill Rigney in San Francisco, Bill Virdon in Houston, Joe Frazier in New York, and Karl Kuehl in Montreal. Grammas, in his first managerial job in the big leagues, had possessed one of the prized young shortstops in the game in Robin Yount. Yount had already become a regular for the Brewers in 1974 at the age of 18, shortly after he was the third overall pick in the 1973 draft, and became the youngest nonpitcher to become a major league starter in 25 years. “It doesn’t take a smart man to look at a kid like that and realize what he’s done in three years out of high school,” Grammas said. “There is no limit to what he can do ... Robin Yount can be the best. He can be baseball’s premier shortstop.” Additionally, after a four-year hiatus from major league managing, Bristol had landed in Atlanta as the new manager of the Braves. After being replaced by Anderson in Cincinnati, Bristol had moved on to Milwaukee in 1970 for a stint with the Brewers that lasted just over two years prior to being fired 30 games into the 1972 schedule. As play began, oddsmakers put the Reds at 2–1 favorites to repeat as the National League pennant winners, with the Pirates coming in second at 5–2 money to take the flag. Meanwhile, the Red Sox were a slightly surer choice in the American League with 8–5 numbers being offered. Meanwhile, Las Vegas bookmaker Jimmy “The Greek” Snyder placed the division-winning odds in the National League this way: Eastern Division Philadelphia Pittsburgh St. Louis New York Chicago Montreal

2–1 5–2 4–1 4–1 100–1 100–1

Western Division Cincinnati Los Angeles San Francisco Atlanta San Diego Houston

1–2 8–5 10–1 40–1 40–1 50–1

The overwhelming line for the Cincinnati ballclub was obviously due to its potent batting order — the first half of which was now set, as Anderson did not wish to alter it any further after several experiments in the previous few seasons. Rose would lead off, Griffey batted second, Morgan third, followed by

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Bench and Perez. Foster, Geronimo, and Concepcion would complete the regular list of hitters. Furthermore, Rose had the benefit of knowing his defensive fate at the start of the season. “I am now a third baseman,” Rose proclaimed. He was looking forward to a year in which he would not have to make a position switch in mid-season, thus being able to concentrate on one place. “I don’t anticipate any problems there. I’ll make some errors, but it won’t be because I’m only giving 70 percent.” With Rose settling in, the steadier rhythm for which Sparky had been searching was now on its way. “For the first time,” Anderson had noted back on March 24, “we have a solid, everyday starting eight.” Morgan was happy to secure the third slot, providing a sense of stability that he felt would help him in 1976; additionally, he felt that if Griffey could hit for some power, opposing outfields would have to play him deeper — allowing Rose to go third on singles when Pete was on base, as was regularly the case. “I’ll be hitting third all year,” Morgan said in a relieved tone. “I won’t be moving back and forth. I won’t have a spell where I have to adjust ... every year since I’ve come to the Reds, I’ve had a better year than the year before. I see no reason why that shouldn’t be true this year.” Hertzel cautioned, however, that both Bench and Rose had statistically slipped to the worst year of their careers in the seasons following their own MVP campaigns. To counter the effects of the abbreviated spring training, Anderson continued with his plan to use a five-man starting pitching rotation consisting of Nolan, Gullett, Billingham, Norman, and Darcy. Nolan received the ball from Anderson for the opener, the third time he had done so for the Reds (as Nolan had launched the 1969 and 1971 campaigns for Cincinnati). “It is an honor,” Nolan said of the assignment on the unofficial holiday in the Queen City. “It is a big, exciting day for the city and everyone is enthusiastic about it.” ********** Sunny skies but chilly 50-degree temperatures greeted an Opening Day record of 52,949 fans at Riverfront, as the Reds took the field at 2:30 in the afternoon. The attendance not only surpassed the old mark for an opener in the city (set only one year earlier with 52,526), but it was the largest contingent to ever see a regular-season game in Cincinnati. The Reds were looking to avoid its sub-par start to the 1975 season, in which they posted an 18–19 mark through the first six weeks and found themselves staring up at the Dodgers in the standings. The visiting Houston Astros had been the owners of a 64–97 record the previous year, the worst in the National League in 1975 as they finished 431 ⁄2 games behind the Reds in the Western Division standings. Nonetheless, the season had produced an unveiling of their prized pitching prospect, flamethrowing right-hander J.R. Richard. As a 25 year old in his first full major league season in 1975, Richard had been asked to assume the spot in the starting rotation of the late Don Wilson. The club had experienced a profound emotional blow in the off-season when it was discovered that Wilson had committed


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suicide on January 5, 1975, in Houston. Wilson had been found inside his garage with his car running, an act that had also caused the death of his son Alex and had placed his daughter Denice in a coma, as the fumes from the garage found their way into the family’s home. In becoming the new power pitcher on the Houston staff, Richard immediately displayed his live arm, featuring one of the best fastballs in the game as he finished fifth in the National League with 176 strikeouts; the Astros lamented, however, his league-leading 138 walks. With college basketball scholarship offers from coast to coast, Richard had been Houston’s first-round pick (and the second player taken overall) in the June 1969 amateur draft, and at 6' 8" and 230 pounds, was the most menacing pitcher to enter the game since Bob Gibson. He began his major league career with a bang, a complete-game victory with 15 strikeouts against the Giants in 1971, the most strikeouts ever in a big league debut to that time. As he and the other Astros took the field, they had donned a black circular patch on their left sleeves with Wilson’s former number “40” found inside it. With the exception of Gullett, the Reds were generally healthy heading into the season opener; this included Bench, who maintained no complaints about his surgically repaired shoulder. The only lingering ailment he harbored was the foul tip that nicked his throwing hand near the end of spring training, but the injury proved to be nothing more than a bone bruise. Even so, it readily affected his swing, as he struck out twice later in game, even after the dominating Richard had left the contest for the Astros. Ultimately, a stroke suffered in the middle of the 1980 season would abruptly end Richard’s career, shortening the script on one of the greatest unfinished stories in baseball history. Nolan nervously took the mound to get things started, and everyone in the ballpark — including himself — was anxious to see how his arm would react. He passed his first test, inducing the first three Astro hitters of Wilbur Howard, Enos Cabell, and Cesar Cedeno to go down in order. The Reds offense immediately went to work, with Rose commencing the bottom half of the first with a sharp single to center field. He then relinquished the bag to Griffey, who had forced Rose at second base. Greeting him was the new first base coach, Russ Nixon, as Scherger (who had moved over to the third base coaching box, taking the place of Grammas) was about to launch the continuation of the speed show the team had established in 1975. Though left stranded, Griffey would steal second as Morgan would do in the third; in each case, both men were able to get up and go to third as the throws of maligned Houston catcher Cliff Johnson sailed into the outfield. Griffey and Morgan would wind up stealing two bases apiece on Opening Day, nabbing “everything but Cliff Johnson’s shin guards,” according to Hertzel. Morgan’s stolen base in the third inning was part of an early 3–0 lead built by the home club. Later in the afternoon, it was the team’s most unpredictable man who provided the greatest surprise of the day. In the sixth inning, Borbon was called

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upon to lay down a sacrifice bunt. Pedro appeared to be doing just as he was told, as he readied himself to put the ball down. At the instant the pitch arrived at the plate, however, Borbon “shoved” at the ball to bunt it hard, and the result was a bloop single past the hard-charging Astro infielders and into center field, which led to a five-run inning and an insurmountable 11–4 lead for the home team. Simultaneously perplexed, angry, amazed, and overjoyed at the result, Anderson just shook his head afterwards. “There is no defensing Borbon,” halfsmiling as he threw his hands up in surrender mode. “When I give him a sign, I don’t know what he’s going to do.” As the reporters made their way over to Borbon’s locker after the game, he claimed that he had pulled the trick seven times while playing in his native Dominican Republic — and it worked all seven times. “You’ve got to know him,” Geronimo said of his roommate, chuckling as he removed his cleats on the other side of the room. “And no one knows him.” Two batters later, a former Cincinnati farmhand made his major league debut against his original organization. While teammates in the Reds’ minor league stops for five years, Zachry and Acala were competing for promotions through the system with a third pitching prospect named Joaquin Andujar. “The three of us spent a lot of time talking about getting to the major leagues,” Zachry recalled about those days. Andujar had been drafted by the Reds in 1969, and as the Reds were beating Boston for the World Series title in October of 1975, Andujar was viewed as a potential member of the starting rotation for 1976. Just two days after the series ended, however, Andujar was dealt to the Astros in a much quieter trade than the monumental Morgan deal of 1971. He was considered to have the best “stuff ” among the three pitchers; unfortunately, Andujar’s volatile personality worked to his detriment and caused Howsam to make the move. While Andujar would enjoy some success in the major leagues, his hair-trigger anger would cause problems for himself and his teammates throughout his career. “He had a very bad temper, just like a little kid,” confirmed Concepcion. “If he wanted something, he got mad if you took it away from him.” Added Cesar Geronimo, “If he was supposed to pitch and didn’t, he would get mad; if he wasn’t supposed to pitch and he did, he would get mad.” Tony Perez felt no differently. “I pulled him over and told him that sometimes, when you’re a minor leaguer, a rookie, you have to listen — even if you’re right, and someone else is wrong. But it did no good telling Joaquin. He just said he couldn’t get along with certain people.” For the time being, Andujar found a home on a big-league roster with Houston, and made his debut in the middle of the sixth inning as he permitted a walk to Perez and a single to Foster while Borbon gleefully trotted across the plate with another run. Nolan had provided five solid-yet-unspectacular innings in achieving the 11–5 win, with a save from Borbon that went beyond three innings of work “After all that has happened to me in the past, this was an honor,” said Nolan,


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nearly in tears from gratitude for the positive launch to the season. “I don’t care that I gave up four runs and the score was 11–5, as long as it said the Cincinnati Reds won.” With zesty new uniforms, caps, and managers for many teams, the 100th season of the National League appeared to craft itself as a memorable one from its very first games, as all other clubs would have their inaugurals the following day on April 9. Seaver would out-last the Expos in New York by a 3–2 score, while Lynn McGlothen shut out the Cubs and Ray Burris in St. Louis, 5–0. The American League held compelling contests on Opening Day as well. Boston, of course, was among them, and confidence was high at Fenway. “Barring any injuries, there’s no reason we shouldn’t do it again,” said Carl Yastrzemski about Boston’s hopes for repeating as the pennant winners in the American League. Yastrzemski was entering his sixteenth season as one of the chief sluggers for the Red Sox. “We became a good solid ballclub last year, and we’re even better this year,” added his skipper, Darrell Johnson. “If I were a fan, I probably would have to think that we’d win again. Everybody will be gunning for us, but it’s kind of nice to be chased instead of doing the chasing.” The Red Sox had further bolstered an experienced pitching staff by adding Ferguson Jenkins in a trade. Winner of 191 big league games, including seven 20-win seasons, posting his first in the American League in 1974 with the Texas Rangers and winning the 1971 National League Cy Young Award, Jenkins earned the Opening Day start from Johnson; and in facing the Reggie Jackson–less Orioles, opposed fellow future Hall-of-Famer Palmer, two men who would ultimately combine for 552 big league wins by the time their careers were completed. Palmer won the duel, 1–0, and was not shy with his comments about Jackson’s absence. The pitcher believed the team would not keep winning with the star outfielder continuing his isolation. “The fact that Reggie is not here has hurt the attitude of the club,” Palmer said bluntly, adding that Jackson had a “moral, if not legal” obligation to be playing for the Orioles. The slugger was waiting to get a five-year, $2 million offer from the Baltimore club, which was not arriving. “And, it has hurt our performance on the field ...why should he help destroy that vehicle that could get him that $2 million, which is baseball? It’s just depressing.” Meanwhile, Opening Day assumed a much different meaning in the Bronx, as the Yankees— after playing in Queens at the Mets’ home of Shea Stadium for the past two seasons— returned to their ballpark the following week on April 15 to see its $100 million renovation. Four years earlier, Yankee Stadium had become the property of the city, as the new ownership (led by Steinbrenner and Paul) agreed to a 30-year lease on the ten-acre property and structure. The decay of the Bronx neighborhood had led the Yankees to consider leaving the area for New Jersey (as the NFL Giants and professional soccer Cosmos had recently done), but the potential move was headed off by the city’s decision to fund the restoration project. Renovations included a replacement of the tradi-

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tional façade that adorned the top of the upper deck, as well as the removal of beams in favor of more viewer-friendly, unobstructed sight line supports. It was the first major overhaul of baseball’s most famous park in forty years, and its first improvements of any kind since 1966. In addition to the Yankees, football Giants, and other team sports, the stadium had hosted 29 title bouts in boxing and numerous rallies and concerts. As the doors opened for the Yanks’ 1976 opener against the Minnesota Twins, the highest-priced box seats sold for $5.50 apiece. Several New York writers, especially Dick Young, were quick to warn the Bronx residents of how fortunate they were to keep the Yankees in the neighborhood. “This is a gorgeous thing they [the city and the Yankees] have given you people in the Bronx ... don’t louse it up. Don’t make it an instant slum, a concrete easel for your graffiti art, a parking lot of slashed tires.” Young was referring to the vandalism that had stained the freshly painted outside walls of the stadium, appearing only hours after the work crews had completed their final touches. “The Yankees wanted to move out of here, remember? The old ballpark was running down, and so was the neighborhood. A man couldn’t park his car and a woman couldn’t even hold onto her pocketbook.” The stadium still loomed over the Harlem River, just across the banks from where the Polo Grounds once stood, the baseball Giants’ home before their departure — as well as that of the crosstown Brooklyn Dodgers— to the West Coast in 1958. A full house greeted the Bombers back to their home, as the 1923 team — the outfit that opened the stadium — was honored. Bob Sharkey, who won the opener that first season, threw out the first pitch in advance of the Yankees’ 11–4 triumph over the Twins. The Reds flew out of the gate in 1976 just as they had finished 1975, sweeping the Astros in the last two games of the series by scores of 13–7 and 9–3. The final contest sported a Riverfront Stadium record crowd of 53,390, which broke the mark from Opening Day just 48 hours earlier. The fervor in Cincinnati for Reds baseball was so high, in fact, that stadium officials ran out of souvenirs that afternoon on Jacket Day, with many fans having to accept claim checks to pick up their jackets on a later date. Morgan stood out among all the stars, failing to reach base only four times in the three contests while amassing seven hits and four walks. Bench, who had been booed by many of the fans in Riverfront Stadium after an 0-for-4 Opening Day and his two-hit exhibition season, returned in the second contest to belt a three-run homer in the second inning. He also stole a base, successful in his 15th consecutive try, as he had not been thrown out since July 1974, including a perfect 11-for-11 in the Reds’ title run of 1975. “They already wrote me off in one paper,” Bench said of his reception in the home city. “I was looking for my spring training stats to be flashed on the scoreboard.” It was evidence of the continued demolition of the Houston catcher Johnson, who even saw Rose — not normally a base-stealer — swipe a bag on him. (Rose, in fact, had not stolen a base during Bench’s amazing stretch, having last performed the feat in August of ’74.) In the three games,


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the Reds had been a perfect 12-for-12 in their stolen base attempts. In defense of Johnson, however, Virdon warned that “Cincinnati will embarrass a lot of catchers before the season is over.” Pat Darcy was victorious in the third contest — his tenth regular-season win in a row, dating to 1975 — and permitted the Astros the same number of hits (two) to that he swatted for the Reds on the day. Before the 1975 season started, Rose bet Darcy that the pitcher would not hit .150 on the year; Darcy was now confident he was on his way towards winning the wager. “This year I gave him double or nothing,” Rose revealed, “and told him his sacrifice bunts would count as hits.” Rose also was doing well, with his nine hits in the series making him the active leader in baseball, inching ever closer to 3,000 for his career. Darcy would follow suit with the rest of the starting staff by being removed before his game’s outcome was decided. After the team’s record-setting stretch in 1975 of 45 contests without a complete game by a starting pitcher, the Reds had gone another 33 such games, dating to the end of 1975. For the opening series of ’76, Anderson continued this trend as Nolan (five innings), Billingham (six), and Darcy (five) went only long enough to be credited with a victory. The third game of the series (April 11) was also the day that Morgan received his 1975 National League Most Valuable Player award from league president Warren Giles, and the second baseman made a brief pre-game acceptance speech. “This is quite an honor, and I would be remiss if I didn’t thank my teammates, who made it possible,” Morgan said into the microphone set up behind home plate. “And a special thanks to Ted Kluszewski, our batting instructor, who took that Houston swing of mine and made it into a Cincinnati swing,” a comment that aroused even a few laughs from the Astros players who were making their way into the visitors’ dugout. Morgan held one considerable regret from the day’s festivities. Earlier, he failed to remember to leave gate passes for his wife and his father, and they unfortunately missed the presentation. After the Reds enjoyed their sweep of the Astros to start the season, they hit the road to see an old friend, facing Bristol as they headed down to Dixie for their first away games of the year. He was a man admired by so many in the Reds organization, from Anderson (to whom Bristol had relinquished the managerial job) to Rose (whom Bristol had carved into a professional second baseman) and many others in between. Change had run rampant in Atlanta in the off-season, as a new owner had taken root as well. Thirty-eight-year-old media mogul Ted Turner had purchased all shares in the club on January 14, primarily with the intention of providing his new small television station in the city, WTBS, with some sports programming. Four years later, Turner would launch another channel called the Cable News Network, designed to give his viewership constant access to events of the day. Turner sought to improve every aspect of the baseball experience in Atlanta, including public safety at the ballpark.

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“If it’s unsafe,” he told the local media, “I’ll get a shuttle bus to take the guys stealing hub caps to another part of town. Let ’em steal there. I’ll sell peanuts and popcorn myself if that’s what it takes.” He was also providing extra financial incentives for his players— including a $500 bonus per man for every win over 81 on the season by the club. “If we win 101, it will cost me $300,000,” Turner figured. “If they win 101,” countered a doubtful Gary Nolan, “the baseball season will have to go all the way until the next June.” In addition, the owner was planning on giving bonuses to all players in the Braves’ minor league system whose teams finished above .500. He also moved many of the seats at Fulton County Stadium 40 feet closer to the field. “The fans will be right down on top of the action,” Turner was proud to announce. He was not a free-spender in all matters, however; as an example, he was requested repeatedly by the league offices to stop charging members of the Atlanta media for meals they were eating in the press room at the stadium. In any event, Turner would ultimately rely heavily on the defending champions for his baseball income; the nine games the Reds played in Atlanta in 1976 accounted for more than 25 percent of the Braves’ home attendance for the season. Outshining the entrance of a flashy owner and the hiring of a new manager was the player acquisition Atlanta secured on April 10, just three days before the Reds’ arrival. Signing a multi-year, million-dollar contract to pitch for the Braves was Andy Messersmith, the focal point of the bargaining implosion from the past several months. Turner sought to take full advantage of the attention the signing had gained, calling the deal a “lifetime contract” to keep the pitcher in Atlanta, and going so far as to make sure that Messersmith wore the uniform number 17 to coincide with the channel on which television viewers found WTBS. Furthermore, Turner attempted to put the word “Channel” in the place above the number on Messersmith’s jersey, in the spot normally reserved for the player’s last name; he was denied permission by National League president Chub Feeney. While Messersmith would not make a start until Sunday April 18 against the Dodgers in Atlanta (an event purposefully crafted and promoted again by Turner), it was rumored that he would see action in relief against the Reds in the series. His arrival was injecting yet more life into a franchise that had become moribund in the early 1970s. Additionally, the club had acquiring power-hitting outfielder Jimmy Wynn from the Dodgers along with talented youngsters Tom Paciorek, Jerry Royster, and Lee Lacy, in an attempt to improve upon their .244 team batting average, which had tied San Diego and Montreal for the worst in the National League in 1975. To acquire those players, the Braves had to part with their starting right fielder Johnnie “Dusty” Baker, an emerging star at the age of 27. Even with the exciting overhaul, however, the Braves appeared intimidated by the arrival of the champions from Cincinnati. When Atlanta newspaper reporter Wayne Minshew polled all of the


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Atlanta players and asked for whom they would pay money to see play, they invariably responded by saying Pete Rose, Johnny Bench, or Joe Morgan. (Messersmith would not appear in the series against the Reds, but rather made his scheduled start against the Dodgers on the 18th, going four innings of three-hit, one-run ball and posting a no-decision in a 7–6 Atlanta win.) As to the windfall that Messersmith had received from Turner, the opinion of New York Mets veteran Ed Kranepool summed up the feeling of many. “Anytime I get a hit off him, I’ll ask for a raise. At that kind of money, they’re supposed to be unhittable.” It was soon discovered that Messersmith’s near-contract with the Yankees would have been illegal, due to a side deal the pitcher formed with Steinbrenner, according to Murray Chass of the New York Times. “It covered two points, one dealing with the pitcher’s dress and grooming, the other with an agreement under which the Yankees, at George Steinbrenner’s suggestion, would have received 40 percent of all fees Messersmith would have earned for advertising and commercial endorsements.” These components of the deal were revealed by the Yankees to Kuhn, who then intervened to nullify it. With the growth of the Astros’ franchise in the Houston-area market, the rise of Turner and his purchase of the Braves, and the budding success of some minor league teams in the region, professional baseball in the South had apparently seen the dawn of a new era. To some, the next logical step was a big league team in the city of New Orleans. With the opening of the grand Louisiana Superdome in 1975, certain local officials in New Orleans renewed their interest in seeking an expansion team from one of the two major leagues. The late completion of its construction and unforeseen early maintenance costs in recent months had put the budget in negative territory, and it was pointed out to those same officials that baseball would be a losing financial venture. Among the skeptics was the city’s mayor, Maurice “Moon” Landrieu. “There’s not a doubt in my mind a baseball franchise will not be a profit-making venture for this building,” he frankly stated. “How much of a loss it will be, nobody’s smart enough to say. We argued this point six to eight years ago when this building was designed. I don’t know the total cost, but it was no less than $15 million to $20 million to build baseball into this facility.” Instead of baseball during the summer months, city and state leaders felt it would be more profitable to host high-rent conventions in the Superdome rather than the low day-to-day rent of a baseball team. With Gullett still not ready to go, Anderson handed the ball to Nolan and Billingham for the two games in Atlanta. Rumors were flying around the clubhouse that Gullett had no interest in signing a contract at all, was grossly out of shape, and his dependability for any of 1976 was still highly questionable. The result was another promising performance in Nolan’s return, as he posted six dominant innings before giving way to Norman and Eastwick in a 6–1 triumph, keeping the Cincinnati mark perfect at 4–0. Trailing 1–0 heading into the seventh, the Reds tied the game on an unexpected blow from Concepcion,

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a long home run off Atlanta starter Carl Morton. A flood of hits followed in the eighth, and Norman gathered the victory. The Reds were happy to see Phil Niekro start the second game for the Braves the following night. The Cincinnati club had beaten the knuckleballer six times in as many tries in 1975, although Niekro had beaten the Reds six times back in 1969. With brother Joe’s loss to the Reds in the third game of the series with the Astros, it left the Niekro family a combined 1–10 in the last calendar year against the reigning world champions. Ted Turner showed up to his box for the second game in a veritable body cast, with both his hands and legs bound with bandages. He explained that he had ventured down to the locker room after the opener to wish the team well, and became incensed when he saw the poor quality of the post-game food spread that had been put out for the players. Promising them better fare in the future, he proceeded to punch and kick a locked door the impeded his exit from the locker room. Turner claimed that “a few beers” had caused him to fall into the rage. Johnny Bench’s home run against the Astros did nothing to shake him from his spring slump, as an 0-for-4 effort against a steady diet of Niekro flutterballs had the Reds catcher sporting an .095 average after the second night in town, part of the first loss of the year in a 10–5 decision for the Braves. Billingham lasted only two innings in the effort, perhaps because he, Bench, and the rest of the team was fatigued from travel — on foot. On the way to Fulton County Stadium that evening, the Reds’ team bus broke down approximately a mile from the ballpark, and the team was forced to walk the remaining distance. Once there, Bob Bailey was grazed by a Bill Plummer line drive in batting practice while Bailey was offering up throws to his mates, and blood gushed from his head. Bailey would be fine, but vowed not to pitch any more BP for a while. The quick road trip south ended in two days, and the Reds returned home to face San Francisco and San Diego. A week earlier, when the Giants opened their season at home against the Dodgers on April 9, it was uncertain if the game would even be played. Municipal workers in San Francisco were threatening to strike, which would effectively shut down services at Candlestick Park. That would be well enough, according to Pete Rose. “Candlestick Park is a sad excuse for a ballpark,” Rose once wrote in a journal he was keeping for the 1974 season. “It just might be the coldest spot on earth.” Upon hearing this, the Giants’ followers booed Rose lustily upon his next appearance on the Bay — a reaction that he could not understand. “A couple of days ago, they were cheering for Cesar Cedeno, the Houston outfielder,” he noted. “And he was involved in a lot messier thing than I was— a shooting last winter.” In May 1976, a similar scene developed in Pittsburgh when approximately 400 food vendors walked off the job in Three Rivers Stadium. As a show of support, National League umpires Ed Montague, Nick Colosi, Paul Runge, and Lee Weyer would not cross their picket line, and the games between the Pirates and the Cubs on May


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21 and 22 would instead be judged by so-called “sandlot umpires” named Al Cohen, Joe Schratz, Elmer Guckert, and Ralph Betcher ( Joe Puskaric and Clarence Adams would also work the second game). When the Teamsters Local 250 approved a new contract for the vendors at 1 A.M. on May 23, the regular umpires went back to work that afternoon for a Pirates-Cubs doubleheader. Like the Braves, the Giants also received new ownership in 1976, ending the 40-year leadership of Horace Stoneham (who had moved the team west from New York) with a sale approved by Feeney for $8 million to Robert Lurie and Bud Herseth. Herseth, a Phoenix meatpacking executive, had replaced Bob Short at the last minute in March 1976 as Lurie’s partner, and the National League owners approved the deal. The new ownership pre-empted another group’s bid that included the short-lived attempt to move the franchise to Toronto, another reason for the owners’ hasty approval of Lurie and Herseth. After Darcy suffered the Reds’ first home loss of the year to San Francisco, 14–7, (and in doing so, ended his ten-game personal winning streak), cameras were set up for NBC’s national Game of the Week telecast on Saturday afternoon, April 17. As the teams were getting ready to take the field, the attendance in the ballpark had, in mere moments, grown by a third to more than 30,000 — the result of a swarm of an estimated 10,000 honeybees that descended down inside the camera well by the third-base dugout. A 35-minute delay of the start of the game ensued. Dick Wagner made his way down from his office (from where he was about to be promoted to executive vice president in the coming days), as he attempted to subdue the insects by dousing them with foam from a fire extinguisher. Why did the administrator tackle the job, with 400 or so other employees in the park? It was actually just a typical day at work for Wagner, whose job in essence was to see that everything always ran smoothly for Howsam, whether chasing away a swarm of bees or chasing away a television network when a game was supposed to be blacked out. “It was just a case of something having to be done or the game wouldn’t have started on time,” Wagner explained about his foray into pest control. “There was a reluctance on the part of some others to go out there with the bees, so I did it myself.” When the bees returned after a brief repose and commenced an attack on the television cameras, on-site amateur and professional beekeepers offered their assistance. One was Tony Kubek, the announcer and former player who maintained hives on his property and tried to calm the fears of starting pitcher Freddie Norman. “Kubek told me they wouldn’t bother me if I stood still,” Norman said. “I asked him if he’d guarantee that.” Anderson, Kluszewki (who was allergic to bee stings), and others retreated down the runway to the safety of the clubhouse. In the end, it was a pair of real beekeepers in attendance that day who came to the rescue. The two were able to coax the bees to enter a cardboard box, and the swarm was then carried safely away to allow play to begin. Giants starter Ed Halicki was attacked nearly as quickly, as the Reds chased him from the mound after only a third of an inning, riding home runs by Morgan, Foster,

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and Griffey towards an 11–0 destruction. It was the sixth straight loss against the Reds for the normally effective right-hander. More remarkable than the bug invasion, however, was the fact that Norman produced the Reds’ first completegame effort in 36 regular season contests, permitting four hits and a lone walk in going the distance. To Norman — who survived the horror-movie scene unscathed — the appearance of the bees was actually a good omen. “The last time I was stung by a bee, I pitched a one-hitter,” he said in comparison to his shutout performance on this day. “Of course, that was 20,000 years ago. That was in the Pony League.” And while Concepcion (in the first inning) became the first Red to be thrown out in 15 stolen base attempts on the year, the sneaky Bench snatched his third bag of the campaign after walking in the third. The catcher also arose from his batting doldrums with an RBI double in the eighth off Mike Caldwell, his first hit in 20 trips to the plate. Strangely enough, it would not be the last invasion of a Reds game by a swarm of bees that season. On June 10 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh, a colony twice the size of the collection in Cincinnati gathered in the visitors’ bullpen. This time, a professional beekeeper was quickly summoned, who doused the swarm with a mixture of water and sugar. “Bees are like people,” apiculturist Steve Demko said after he subdued the bees and gathered them with his bare hands into a box. “When they’re hungry, they get irritable.” Pirates public relations director Bill Guilfoyle was not about to take matters into his own hands the way Wagner did; instead, he turned to the Yellow Pages, where he found Demko’s advertisement. “I had one foot out the door and I was ready to go,” the nervous Guilfoyle described about the scene as Demko took over, “especially when he started kicking the fence to loosen the clumps [of bees].” As with the game in Cincinnati, the contest ensued without incident except for the one sting suffered by home plate umpire Bob Engel, who whipped off his mask suddenly in the third inning as his hand shot to his neck. There had been a few straggler bees who had evaded Demko’s roundup — and who were perhaps agitated by Borbon, who had been seen flailing a towel at them as the Reds relievers attempted to re-take their territory in the bullpen. “The bees like us [umpires] because we’re so sweet,” reasoned Engel’s crew mate, Bruce Froemming. Those present at the close to the series with the Giants had witnessed a visit from one of most flamboyant pitchers to arrive on the scene in several years, even in an age of many colorful stars. In 1972, John Montefusco had been pitching for a semi-pro team and answering the line as a customer service representative for the telephone company when the Giants gave him a chance with a tryout. He stuck with the organization, and by the end of 1974, had gotten his feet wet in the majors with five starts. His legend grew by leaps and bounds in 1975, when he began predicting shutouts for himself. He made good on his brash promises, blanking the Braves, Phillies, and Dodgers as he said he would. Emboldened by his forecasting, he announced later in the 1975 season


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that he would shut out the mighty Reds on July 31 in Cincinnati, as well as strike out the great Johnny Bench four times. Quite the opposite occurred, as Bench nailed a three-run homer off him and the Reds won, 11–6, by scoring seven runs on him in just over an inning of work. “I was booed by 50,000 people,” Montefusco remembered about that night at Riverfront Stadium (although records show the attendance that day as being only 31,600). “That was the first time I’d been booed like that. I kind of enjoyed it. There were some things I wanted to say to them, but I couldn’t. So I just tipped my hat.” Among the Reds players, Montefusco was mildly popular. As a case in point, he had once invited Bench and Rose to appear on Montefusco’s television program that aired in San Francisco while the Reds were playing in the Bay Area. Montefusco treated the two enemies like royalty, going so far as to pick them up at their hotel in a stretch limousine. And so on April 18, 1976, Montefusco returned to Cincinnati, and was understandably greeted with a cold reception from the Reds fans. As for the Giants’ pitcher, he was unwilling to forecast any great feats on this day. “All I was shooting for was to get past the second inning,” Montefusco revealed after the game was over. “In two starts in this park, I never got past the second inning. I’d never gotten to bat here.” On the day that the Reds’ 1975 world championship flag was unfurled at Riverfront Stadium, Montefusco dominated the home team by permitting a lone run over six innings, when Foster was plated by a Geronimo triple in the second. Over the course of his work, the quirky pitcher continuously lobbed unwanted baseballs towards one dugout or the other, claiming that a majority of them were lopsided and not to his liking. The Giants scored three times off Nolan and twice off his successor, McEnaney, in winning 5–1, allowing the Giants to take two of three and becoming the first visiting team to win a series at Riverfront since the previous June. It was also the first time in 1976 the Reds were held to fewer than ten hits in a game. Bench, who was still struggling to re-acquire a firm grip with his injured right hand, received his first day off in favor of Plummer, who in turn suffered an injury in his debut — a cut face and a pair of broken glasses as a result of a collision at home plate with Giants outfielder Bobby Murcer. Plummer felt the incident included a “cheap shot” on the part of Murcer, whom Plummer alleged raised an elbow to the face of the catcher at the last moment. Concepcion, meanwhile, continued his own struggles by lugging an .094 average at the end of the day’s play, 200 points lower than the April mark he had posted in 1975, and partly the result of his being zero for his last 17 trips to the plate. “Look,” he said to the reporters, pinching his uniform jersey to hold it up for viewing. “Not even a hole in it. I no have to slide. I no get on base. I not even get the uniform dirty in a week.” Borbon, in his inimitable style, attempted to rig a small voodoo trapeze over the top of Concepcion’s locker to break the dry spell. Rose, on the contrary, was off to the greatest start of his storied career. He collected 19 hits in the first eight games, the most he had ever struck during the

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initial week of a season. Through those first eight contests, he also maintained a 22-game hitting streak that carried over from the 1975 season (batting .416 during that time), three short of his personal record from nearly ten years earlier and eight shy of the Reds’ team record held by his former mentor Pinson. Rose — also with hits in all three games of the 1975 National League Championship Series against the Pirates, and in six of seven games against the Red Sox in the World Series— had actually batted safely in 31 of his last 32 contests. Could he make a run at the major league record of 56 straight, held by Yankee legend Joe DiMaggio? Rose was noncommittal in his answer. “[DiMaggio’s record] is the most meaningful in baseball history because of the consistency involved,” is how he responded. His quick dash out of the starting blocks prompted a congratulatory telegram from President Gerald Ford, which Rose was elated to receive prior to the final contest with the Giants. Ironically, Rose may not have been the hottest hitter in baseball at the time, nor perhaps even the National League. At Wrigley Field in Chicago over the past two days, Philadelphia third baseman Mike Schmidt had pounded five home runs. Schmidt had led the major leagues in home runs in both 1974 and 1975, and the assault on the Cubs included a modern league record of four in a row on April 17 as part of an 18–16 Phillies win, a game in which his club had trailed 13–2 at one point. The next afternoon, Schmidt tied the major league mark with his sixth homer in three days, a feat held by five other men and last accomplished by Lee May with the Reds in 1969. A few days later, Schmidt socked his ninth long ball, part of the Phillies’ battering of Messersmith’s second start with the Braves (in between the two starts, Messersmith had picked up a twoinning save against the Giants on April 21). Even with the performance, Schmidt was not sure he had taken the lead position to be the National League’s starting third baseman in the All-Star Game in July — notwithstanding the fact that the game would be hosted in Philadelphia. “It is pretty much a losing battle,” Schmidt said of the task of beating out the third baseman in Cincinnati for the honor. “Rose would be voted to the team if he got hurt and didn’t play another game.” Schmidt had long proven himself as a Cub killer, and the series was his coup de grace in that regard. Just one week later, however, a Chicago player would become the hero of the entire nation for an incident that happened in between innings of a game in Los Angeles. The youthfulness of the Reds bullpen had blossomed into a positive force in 1975, but the ensuing two-game series with the Padres showed that consistency was still needed. McEnaney and Eastwick each contributed to the loss in the opener, 7–5 (a game that ended Rose’s hitting streak at 22). Eastwick walked in the tying run and permitted a base hit to follow that posted the loss for McEnaney. The right-hander bounced back the next day to save Freddie Norman’s third win, a 5–4 decision that also included the first appearance of Gullett on the year, relieving Norman in the seventh inning to face the tough left-handed hitters of Willie McCovey and Johnny Grubb. He escaped the seventh but per-


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mitted a leadoff walk to the newly-acquired Rettenmund and a single to slugger Dave Winfield before he was pulled for Eastwick, who posted two scoreless innings. “He’s got to be my big cat, and I know it,” Anderson said of Eastwick, looking for reliability from someone out of the bullpen. “If I have to pitch him every day in the seventh or eighth inning, we’ve got problems. I can’t take that boy and milk him dry ... I have to find someone to hold that lead until the ninth, and I haven’t found him yet.” Griffey — surprisingly leading the team with 15 runs batted in — powered the way on the offensive side with a runscoring double and his fifth stolen base. “I didn’t have this many [RBIs] until July last year,” he joked. After the game, Anderson was upset with misgivings that Gullett was continuing to have about his arm. Pending the pitcher’s performance against the Padres in relief, Anderson had planned on starting Gullett four days later during a road trip to Montreal. Gullett was implying that he still was not quite ready, and Sparky had finally heard enough; come hell or high water, Gullett was going to make the upcoming start. “That’s April 25,” Anderson muttered about the proposed date of Gullett’s start, still four days off in the distance. “It will be his first start. We opened on April 8 — that’s 17 days. It’s a matter now that you’ve got to get him in there — period.” To be certain, his outing against the Padres, while effective, was not cause for celebration by the media. “He wasn’t impressive,” Hertzel wrote of Gullett’s effort. “The fast ball he threw was slow.... He gave up two singles and a walk, and was bailed out by [Rawly] Eastwick.” Gullett was still without a contract, and was still the greatest enigma walking around Cincinnati, with no one — not even those within the organization — any more certain about his reliability than they were in spring training. “The time has come to say it aloud, without animosity, but flat out: Don Gullett is not one of the best pitchers in the National League,” Tom Callahan wrote. “The Sandy Koufax comparison has been customary for six seasons.... Warren Spahn is mentioned frequently too. It is a mean joke.” Callahan went on to remind readers that, as with his most recent game, Gullett had to be rescued the time before as well, and by a more nondescript hurler. “Jack Billingham is a less-respected pitcher here, yet in the crunch of the last two World Series, lazy-looking old Billingham came through. In the seventh game that the Reds won for their first World Championship in 35 years, Gullett left the game three runs behind and in trouble. Billingham came in and handled the emergency.” Even so, it was Billingham — not Gullett — who was demoted to the bullpen by Anderson after having been bombed for six runs in two innings of work in Atlanta. In addition, Darcy had been moved back in the rotation as well while fighting a bout of wildness, as exemplified by his five walks in his last start against the Giants on April 16. Billingham was told by Larry Shepard to report to the relief pitchers’ area as the team took the field in chilly Montreal on April 23. By 1976, National League players and coaches had bemoaned the necessity of traveling north of the border in early April for seven years, where the NHL’s

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Canadiens were still in full hockey swing, and remained the greater interest of the citizens long beyond the final trip of the Stanley Cup around the Montreal Forum ice in mid–May. Rose, his hitting streak now gone, was fighting to maintain his other badge of persistence in the midst of battling a fever, not having missed a game in nearly three years. Making matters worse for the players was the fact that games were played in the second-rate Jarry Park, a modified public access area that was hurriedly made ready for baseball when the Expos were granted admission to the league in 1969. Long-time Montreal mayor Jean Drapeau approved the use of the park only because the city rendered its intention to build a ballpark more suitable for major league play in the downtown area in the near future; the outgrowth of this thinking led to Olympic Stadium, slated to be ready for use by the Expos by 1977 after the Summer Olympics were held in the city later in 1976. The facility was to be the first to have a retractable roof for inclement weather (although the roof was never fully completed for this function). The Expos had never experienced a winning season in their seven National League years, and Kuehl had become only the second manager in their young history after Mauch. Their .244 team batting average in 1975 tied Atlanta and San Diego for the lowest in baseball, but offering a glimmer of hope was talented young outfielder Ellis Valentine, a so-called “five-tool” player who physically excelled at every aspect of the game. Valentine batted .364 in a brief September call-up by the Expos at the end of the 1975 schedule after hitting over .300 the entire season at the top Montreal farm club in the International League. Combating his sickness, Rose still scored two runs out of his leadoff spot in the first game in Quebec. It was not enough, as Billingham was battered hard once again, this time coming to the aid of Nolan in a 5–4 loss and permitting three Expos runs in the bottom of the eighth. The following morning, Anderson glanced at a headline in the sports section of a Montreal newspaper while eating his breakfast at the Sheraton–Mount Royal Hotel. The headline, though seemingly positive, troubled him. “There seems to be only one question pertinent to the National League West: By how many games will the Reds win?” It was penned by local scribe Dink Carroll, and Sparky finished his coffee as he grabbed the paper and hustled out the door. He brought the paper into the locker room, and held it up to embolden his point — that the Reds were giving too many games away for a club of its caliber, and were not going to repeat as champions through simply through putting on the uniform and taking the field. The manager then informed young Pat Zachry that he was going to make his first major league start that day. Zachry and his teammates responded to Anderson’s challenge in a riveting 6–4 win in eleven innings, powered in part by a home run by Mike Lum, who was making only his second start of the year. And when Gullett was placed on the mound the following afternoon, on Sunday, April 25 (as Anderson had directed), he did not disappoint. The Kentuckian,


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still pitching without a contract after having turned down the Reds’ latest offer of a two-year deal worth around $100,000, toyed with the Montreal men in a wind-chill factor that reached a mere six degrees, permitting no runs through six innings (as Darcy followed suit in three perfect innings of relief ) and shutting out the Expos, 7–0 for the 81st win of his career. Bench and Concepcion launched the second home run of the year for each man, while Griffey possessed the top new hitting streak at eleven while extending his team-leading RBI total to 17. The only calamity on the cold day occurred in batting practice, when Armbrister was struck in the head by a line drive off the bat of Lum (Armbrister arose immediately from the impact and was fine). In another oddity on the afternoon, an unlikely character was forced into a role as an emergency catcher in the ninth inning. After gaining the large lead, Anderson had sent Plummer into the game to relieve Bench. While batting, however, Plummer got into a balls-and-strikes argument with Froemming, the home plate umpire, and became the first Red to be ejected from a game in 1976. With no one to handle his pitcher for the final three outs, Anderson looked around the dugout for volunteers; up sprang Joel Youngblood, who readily admitted to the manager that he had never caught in a professional game but was willing to give it a try. Youngblood made it through the ninth without a mishap, as Darcy retired Valentine, Foote, and a young second baseman named Pete Mackanin to secure the victory. After batting .476 (10-for-21) in spring training, Youngblood had been waiting for a chance in the starting lineup; he would get one the following day in Philadelphia, and took full advantage of it. With Anderson deciding to put left-handed batters Morgan, Griffey, and Geronimo on the bench against the Phillies tough southpaw Jim Kaat, the right-handed-batting Youngblood responded. Not fazed by Kaat’s notorious quick-pitching delivery from the left side, Youngblood posted four hits; nonetheless, it was not enough to offset the tenth and eleventh homers off the bat of Schmidt, tying the National League record for the most ever in the month of April by one player (a record set by Tony Perez in 1970 with ten, and later broken by Willie Stargell of the Pirates with 11). It had been quite a reversal from the two-homer, .125 average April that Schmidt had endured in 1975. It was Schmidt’s strikeout in the eighth inning, however, which ironically proved the difference in the 10–9 Philadelphia win. Eastwick thought he had safely retired the slugger, but the third strike slipped away from Bench for a rare passed ball. Second baseman Dave Cash subsequently trotted home with the difference-making tally on an error by Morgan (who, also ironically, had entered the contest for defensive purposes), marking perhaps the only time in which Bench and Morgan — two of the greatest performers with the glove in the history of the game —contributed to a Reds’ loss with miscues in the same inning. Adding to the peculiar evening was the home run launched by old friend Bobby Tolan in the seventh off Eastwick, which had tied the game at nine.

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While the performance of Gullett was welcome news to Reds fans, the interest across the country mostly turned to the baseball game occurring at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles on that same day. With the Dodgers batting against the Cubs in the bottom of the fourth inning, two fans leaped over the low-lying wall along the left field foul line. With such acts growing more common during the 1970s, the crowd watched in pitying laughter at the two attention-seekers, but the foolishness did not immediately strike many observers as an unordinary circumstance. Instead of running towards a particular player or away from security personnel, the two trespassers— one a man in his mid–30s, and the other a young boy of 11 or 12, and both of whom were together carrying an American flag — appeared to be heading in the direction of the open patch of ground between the second base bag and center field. Watching the scene move closer and closer to him was Cubs’ center fielder Rick Monday. “There’s nobody on a field who’s not in a baseball uniform that I don’t notice fast,” Monday said afterwards. “I didn’t know what the hell they were doing there, and suddenly they’re laying out the flag like a picnic basket. My first thought was to run them over.” With the two perpetrators kneeling and looking downward, Monday saw the older man douse the flag with some sort of fluid, and then reach into his pocket for a match. It was at this point that Monday darted into a full sprint towards the pair. Before the flag could be ignited, he dashed onto the scene and grabbed the flag on the run, carrying it away to safety as the two were apprehended. “There’s nobody going to burn a flag while I’m on the field.” Monday asserted. “I’ve visited too many V.A. Hospitals and have seen too many kids who were mangled trying to protect what it stands for.” The older man was so infuriated with Monday for ruining his plans that he heaved the can of lighter fluid in his direction. The Dodger crowd responded immediately by giving Monday a standing ovation. “They weren’t clapping for me,” Monday added, humbly trying to deflect any praise, “but for what the flag means to them.” In unison with the applause, the large scoreboard at Dodger Stadium quickly read: RICK MONDAY ... YOU MADE A GREAT PLAY

Monday did ask the Dodgers if he could keep the flag. He was informed that the police needed it temporarily as evidence, but later, it would gladly be released to him. Fellow Cub outfielder Jose Cardenal, who witnessed the scene nearby and later (along with Dodgers third base coach Tommy Lasorda) helped subdue the older man before security could arrive, marveled at his teammate. “Now we’ve got three patriots,” Cardenal proclaimed. “Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and Monday.” Monday (batting in the Cubs’ leadoff spot) also posted three hits on the day, despite the fact that the Dodgers won the game in ten innings, 5–4. Chicago starting pitcher Steve Stone was injured in the second and would miss not only


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the theatrics that occurred two innings later on the field, but the next two months as well with the first signs of what would be a devastating rotator cuff injury. As the Cubs moved down the road to San Diego, the congratulatory phone calls kept coming to Monday’s hotel room, including sentiments from Chicago’s Mayor Daley, who invited Monday to be the city’s grand marshal of its annual Flag Day parade in June. “I wasn’t trying to be a hero or anything,” the outfielder said after a day of reflection on the episode. “I just happen to respect our flag and what it stands for, and I don’t like to see anybody treat it like that.” Soon, the Illinois Legislature unanimously voted to make May 4, 1976, “Rick Monday Day” in Illinois, as the Cubs were finally back home after their ten-day West Coast trip — to face the Dodgers at Wrigley Field. During the onfield ceremonies, the same flag he saved was presented to him by Mary Lyn Valkenburg, the recently crowned Miss Teen Illinois of 1976. Ironically, Monday would be traded to Los Angeles in the winter before the 1977 season, with the Cubs securing Bill Buckner, Ivan DeJesus, and Jeff Albert in return. And naturally, Monday received another rousing cheer from the Dodger fans the first time he was introduced in Chavez Ravine. His heroics became the early feel-good story of 1976, baseball’s rallying call for the celebration of the nation’s 200th birthday. The Reds dropped the next two out of three on the trip to Philadelphia, which included a bench-clearing brawl in the midst of their victory in the middle contest. The fracas was caused by Rose being given a close shave by pitcher Tug McGraw’s fastball in the ninth inning, after which Rose went over to the Phillies dugout looking for the left-hander. When meeting up with the Phillies the next day during batting practice, Rose was asked by the large, imposing Greg Luzinski, “What were you going to do when you got over to us?” To which Rose reportedly responded, “I wasn’t worried. See this face? You can’t make it look any worse.” McGraw was enjoying his role as the rambunctious leader of the Philadelphia bullpen. He had been a hero of the New York Mets’ postseason runs in 1969 and 1973, but was nonetheless happy to be out of the Big Apple. “My shoulder’s okay,” McGraw would say after the brief tussle with Rose, “but I’ve still got the scar where the Mets stuck a knife in my back.” In most instances, the good-natured McGraw was among the friendliest in the game. “He laughs so much, I think he goes home and cries,” former New York teammate Bud Harrelson said. To that point in his life, Rose had never been fond of Philadelphia, a place he would later call home. He had once labeled the city as “the place where they booed the kids when they couldn’t find the eggs in an Easter egg hunt.” In the same series, rowdy Phillies shortstop Larry Bowa would be fined $350 and suspended three games for shoving rookie umpire Jim Quick on a disputed call. Upon returning home, Cincinnati won two straight at Riverfront against the Expos to close out the month of April. Finally fully awakening was the bat of Bench, who slammed two home runs in the opener to raise his average above

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the .200 mark for the first time on the year. The blasts also lifted his RBI total to 14, which Hertzel pointed out was nine more than he had in the Aprils of 1972 and 1974 — two seasons in which he won the league RBI titles. In the second contest, Sparky was booed by the home crowd when he removed Gullett with a 6–1 lead in the ninth after Don had reached the maximum number of pitches that Anderson would allow. Gullett had permitted Mackanin to knock a home run in the fifth inning, one of the few mistakes he had made on the afternoon. Gullett’s effort kept the Reds atop the National League Western Division by May 1, as Rose was batting a blistering .466 through the first month of the season. Cincinnati Los Angeles Houston San Diego San Francisco Atlanta

W

L

Pct.

GB

11 11 11 9 8 8

7 9 10 11 10 11

.611 .550 .524 .450 .444 .421

— 1 1.5 3 3 3.5

Proving once again that Cincinnati is a classic baseball town, the Reds had drawn more than a quarter of a million fans (260,029) at home in the month of April for the first time in their history. Particularly pleasing to Anderson was the fact that the rookies had integrated themselves well into the ballclub for the first month, as exemplified by the easygoing Santo Acala. While roaming in the outfield of Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium before a game, Darcy pointed to the Liberty Bell design that stood above the stands in center field and told Acala that Luzinski had once pounded a prodigious home run all the way up there. “He must really have hit that bell hard,” Acala was reported to respond. “He cracked the bell.” The personable Acala claimed to speak three languages— Spanish, English, and French. “And he no speak any of them very good,” added Concepcion.

5

Battling the Boys in Blue The first three dimensions are material, coaching, and schedule; the fourth is selfless teamwork and collective pride, which accumulate until they have made positive thinking and victory habitual. — Vince Lombardi

While the Reds were enjoying their customary position in first place, all was far from well. Two of the biggest run-producing bats in the lineup — Bench and Perez — had been in dire straits during April. Perez had failed to hit a home run during the month while batting .206. Bench’s April woes had been so profound, in fact, that even after having been named the National League Player of the Week (batting .525 with three home runs and nine RBIs in the last week of April), he was only now above the .200 mark overall. Driessen, batting only .182 in fifteen plate appearances on the young season, was given a start in place of Perez and provided a lift in Gullett’s win over Montreal with a long home run. Concepcion, meanwhile, was in an even bigger hole, hitting at a meek .163 clip by the end of the Expos series— the final game of which saw the shortstop go 0-for-8, part of a 16-inning, 8–4 loss. It was off to New York to face the vaunted Mets pitching staff, which over the years had befuddled Joe Morgan the most. Since he joined the Reds, Morgan had managed to bat just .224 against New York, and had not hit a home run against them in three years. “Throw a Mets uniform over a sore-armed has-been,” claimed Hertzel, “and Morgan would have trouble hitting him.” Of particular difficulty to Morgan was the left-hander Koosman. Anderson would later recall a practical joke that Perez once pulled on Morgan while attempting to prove, once and for all, that the second baseman would invariably claim to be ill when the Reds were scheduled to face Koosman. “We were playing New York, and Jerry Koosman was due to pitch, and he was really good in those days— tough on lefthanders. Morgan was said to be sick with a temperature of 102 degrees, and I had him scratched from the lineup. Suddenly, I hear all this laughter from the locker room, and they come and get me. In front of Mor107

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gan’s locker they’ve stretched out a sleeping bag, a pillow, a glass of water, and some aspirin. Maybe there was even a wheelchair, I don’t know. But there was a big sign: TAKE THESE PILLS AND GET PLENTY OF BED REST — TOMORROW YOU’LL BE OVER YOUR ATTACK OF KOOSMANITIS

“I went back in my office, and soon I hear screaming. Morgan comes tearing into my office. “‘What the hell is all this??? I’m playing!!!’ “‘No, you’re not,’ I told him. ‘You’ve got a fever and you’re out of the lineup.’ “‘The hell I am! I’m not going to let that Cuban son-of-a-bitch get me this time. I’m playing if I have to tear this place apart!’ So I had to put Joe back in the lineup.” After some prodding from his mates, Perez ultimately admitted to the offense. Unfortunately for Morgan, Anderson, and the Reds, the second baseman went 0-for-4 in the game. On May 4, Morgan was fortunate that Koosman was not on the hill, but unfortunately, it was the best right-hander in the game instead. Seaver was off to a 3–0 start, and had not allowed a run in his last 17 innings as the Reds arrived in town. He was also leading the league with 35 strikeouts. It was Seaver whom the Reds had beaten back on May 21, 1975, to launch their 41–9 streak — nearly the same closing record to which Seaver had led the Miracle Mets in their world championship run in 1969. A visit to New York was always an adventure for Rose as well, albeit in a more militaristic tone. For three years, Rose had been the solitary target of Met fan hatred, resulting from an incident on the basepaths in the 1973 playoffs in Shea Stadium. On a double-play groundball, Rose barreled into Mets shortstop Bud Harrelson at second base and came up swinging as the benches quickly cleared (naturally, Borbon was in the middle of the fray, going so far as to bite a hole in the cap of Mets pitcher Buzz Capra as the fight ensued). When Rose returned to his left field position the following inning, he was hit with a beer can; soon after, an empty whiskey bottled flew by him as well. It was at this point that Anderson removed his team from the field for its own safety. Anderson would say to the press, “Pete Rose has contributed too much to baseball to be allowed to die in left field in Shea Stadium.” The following day, Rose would homer in the twelfth inning off Harry Parker to give the Reds a 2–1 victory, keeping them alive in the must-win contest before winning the five-game series. Naturally, Rose’s home run raised the ire of New York fans even further, especially when Rose stood at home plate for a moment after blasting the shot, which Pete claims is the only time in his career that he showed up a pitcher. The Mets had recently dealt with a fair amount of bickering from within its own club. Cleon Jones, a defensive mainstay and .340 hitter for the 1969


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championship team, accused the Mets in spring training 1976 of being a racist organization. Jones had played in only 21 games for New York in 1975 before being released on July 27. He succeeded in making the roster of the Chicago White Sox for the start of the 1976 season, but would be released by the end of April. While working out with the White Sox at their Sarasota, Florida, training camp in March, he was asked by a writer if the Mets were anti-black. “I never thought so until last year,” Jones responded, “but when you think of it, they have an all-white scouting staff. You sit in the clubhouse and look around, and there are no black players. It’s lily white.” Jones’ claims were refuted by most who heard them, particularly by Dick Young. “When you speak from hurt, from anger, from pique, you exaggerate,” wrote Young, who felt that Jones was simply bitter about the depreciation of his skills and the Mets’ recognition of it in his subsequent release. “If Cleon looked one way, he saw John Milner. If he looked another way, he saw Tom Hall [two other black players on the Mets’ roster].” Milner was currently the leading hitter in the National League while the Reds were in town, but had missed the last week of the schedule with injuries to both legs. While Jimmy Carter was making his first campaign stop in Cincinnati in his bid for the United States presidency, Seaver was knocking the Reds out of first place in New York with his fourth win in as many tries on the year. Tagged with the loss was Norman, his first setback on the season as he struggled with control, walking five New York batters before Anderson removed him in the second. First to come to Norman’s aid was Borbon and his newly-shaved head. Borbon had received what he felt was a less-than-desirable haircut, and with the help of Concepcion, Armbrister and a pair of powered clippers, was able to scrape off the remaining hairs. “I can’t blame him,” Anderson snickered, “not after looking at what that barber did to him.” The surging Dodgers, meanwhile, had won ten straight to take the top spot in the West. The tenth victory came on “Rick Monday Day” at Wrigley Field in Chicago, as only 4,500 fans attended to see the ceremonies honoring the Cubs outfielder. Their eleventh in a row occurred the following afternoon, as they battered Chicago pitching for a Dodger-record seven home runs— behind 50 mile-per-hour winds on the Chicago lakeshore — in a 14–12 triumph. A split of the final two games in New York left Cincinnati with a record of 12–10, which hardly placed them better than the lackluster early pace they had set a year earlier (the final game of the Mets series began, interestingly, with Harrelson gleefully snagging a Rose line drive that appeared destined for a base hit in center field). The Dodgers, on the other hand, were determined to not let another 1975 replay occur, as they soon ran their streak to twelve straight. They had swept the Pirates, Cardinals, and Cubs in the process, and after a 3–9 start, now led the Reds by a game-and-a-half as the Cincinnati men arrived in Chicago to face the Cubs on May 7. Nonetheless, the Reds were not concerned — at least Morgan was not. “I don’t think we have to worry about the Dodgers as

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much as you all think,” the second baseman said in speaking to the Insiders’ Club the following week, a local booster organization for the Reds. The club members were asking Morgan about the superior Los Angeles pitching. “You’re better off putting the eight best players on the field and scoring a lot of runs. You can always pick up pitching somewhere along the way.” The biggest news out of the American League, meanwhile, continued to concern a player who had yet to swing a bat during the season. It appeared that Reggie Jackson was inching a bit closer to actually playing for the Baltimore Orioles, but by early May he had yet to sign a contract. Even so, rumors had swirled around the Orioles’ clubhouse that Jackson was receiving a raise, even without a signed deal. Many of the players who took pay cuts— including Jackson’s teammate in Oakland, Ken Holtzman — took offense to the possibility. “This issue will determine my future with the club,” Holtzman staunchly announced, warning the club to promote fair treatment with all of its players. “If it is not resolved, I will cease to be associated with this team at the end of the year. They will never sign me. I swear it, no matter what they offer me.” Rules stated that all unsigned Baltimore players could endure as much as a 20 percent pay cut. The rule apparently did not apply to Jackson, as the outfielder was reported by his teammates to be receiving $200,000 while playing out his contract, a $60,000 increase over what he had received in his last agreement, the figure that was supposed to stand until a new contract was finalized. “Why not have 25 policies for 25 players?” Holtzman smirked about the fiasco. Holtzman and ten other Baltimore players (including established stars Grich, Ross Grimsley, and others) had been led to believe that the 20 percent cut was necessary to maintain strength and uniformity across the Players Association before the new collective bargaining agreement was finalized; the move to pay Jackson a raise without a contract was considered a blatant disregard for this solidarity. Jackson, who had once threatened to sit out the season, now was showing a desire to play. “I never really decided to stay out of baseball,” he said. “I’m fortunate. I have other opportunities, but I love baseball. It’s what I do best.” First appearing in a game for the Orioles on May 2, he went one for his first nine and did not homer until May 12, in his 26th at-bat, for Baltimore. In June, he challenged all of the Baltimore pitchers to a fight, claiming they were “cowards” for not throwing at Kansas City players after Royals pitcher Marty Pattin had beaned Lee May, now playing for the Orioles and hitting fifth behind Jackson in the Baltimore batting order. The Cubs’ 4.49 team earned run average in 1975 was the worst in the National League, as was the monstrous 5.21 mark they had posted to this point in 1976. So desperate were the Cubs for pitching help, they sent their long-time All-Star shortstop Don Kessinger to the St. Louis Cardinals for reliever Mike Garman after the completion of the 1975 season. Nonetheless, manager Jim Marshall was willing to bank on a young starting staff of Rick Reuschel, Bill Bonham, and Burris, each of whom was under the age of 28 heading into 1976 —


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as was perhaps the most promising of the group in Stone, who would be lost for most of the season (and who would sign with the crosstown White Sox in the offseason as a free agent). And as for the Reuschels, there was not one, but two; Rick’s brother Paul did some relief work for the Cubs, and on August 21, 1975, against the Dodgers, they became the first siblings to ever combine for a shutout as they beat Messersmith. Bonham, Burris, Reuschel, and Stone combined to make an impressive 140 starts in 1975, suggesting that the organization retained confidence in their abilities despite also combining for an ERA of 4.13. Another promising young starter, Burt Hooton, had been sent to the Dodgers in May 1975 after being hit hard in a Cub uniform (despite firing a no-hitter as a rookie in 1972), and subsequently flourished in succeeding years in the spacious stadium in Los Angeles. “A pitcher here with a 4.00 earned average is a good pitcher,” Anderson said of the cozy ballpark on the north side of town that seemed to cater to hitters. “You have to marvel at the record that Ferguson Jenkins [six 20-win seasons in Chicago] put together here.” The Cubs knew they could put up runs themselves. Monday was an offensive force, as was upand-coming first baseman Andre Thornton. Truly leading the batsmen, however, was underrated third baseman Bill Madlock, the defending National League batting champion who had burned the Reds for a lofty .538 clip in 1975. Concepcion, still mired in his slump and batting .157, had been trying all sorts of superstitious ceremonies in an effort to reverse his plight (he also had committed half of the team’s 18 errors on the defensive side). In doing so, he never lost his sense of humor. The Cubs series began with Davey in another hitless stretch, the current one reaching 15 at-bats and extending to 18 after the Reds’ 3–1 win in the opener (in which Billingham glared at Anderson for removing him in the eighth inning, although the game still ended up being Billingham’s 100th career victory). More voodoo from Borbon had not worked in New York, so Concepcion attempted the next morning to scrub himself clean of all slumping impurities by taking a shower before the game as well as afterwards. “Maybe I wash away the bad luck.” When the pre-game bathing did not provide for a good round of batting practice, he tried a more drastic measure as game time approached on May 8. Saying that he felt “cold at the plate,” Concepcion crawled inside a large industrial clothes dryer in the laundry room at Wrigley Field, intent on “warming up.” He was not inside a matter of seconds when Pat Zachry walked by. Interested in playing along, he slammed the door shut as Davey pressed his nose against the glass in mock horror. The horror was not feigned when Zachry turned on the power, intent on releasing Concepcion a second later. Zachry was not able to turn the machine off, however, and for a few panicked moments, the shortstop whirled around in tumble-dry mode. Shortly, Concepcion was freed with casualties amounting to nothing more than some singed leg hair, and got ready to take the field. The result? Concepcion logged three hits (including two doubles) as the Reds beat up on the Cubs for a second straight day, 14–4.

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The struggles of Perez continued to mirror that of the shortstop, as Tony was also dragging an 0-for-18 spell at the plate, posting a .188 average and still without a home run when the team arrived in Chicago. Arriving in Chicago, however, was the key to jump-starting the slugger’s bat, as the friendly confines of Wrigley was one of his favorite places in which to swing it. Virtually on Concepcion’s cue, Perez broke out with three hits of his own in the second-game win. The power problems for the first baseman would quickly end as well, and the Reds completed the sweep the next day behind two Perez home runs, destroying the Cubs again, 14–2. It was the 22nd and 23rd home runs hit by Perez in Wrigley Field, the most for him in any ballpark outside of Cincinnati (the same was true for Morgan and Rose as well, who had hit 12 and 10, respectively, in Chicago). The final contest saw the Cincinnati team pound out 21 hits, for in addition to Perez, Concepcion stayed “hot” with two more safeties, Rose with three (upping his league-leading average to .421), and Foster with four (including his third homer). Perez was now up to .239 on the season after a 7-for-13 series. Plummer had three hits in the finale and a 6-for-12 series, making his third straight start after Bench had suffered yet another injury, slightly straining a knee ligament while throwing out Philadelphia’s Dave Cash trying to steal in the previous week. Bench, despite appearing in the series as a pinch-hitter and left fielder, returned home to Cincinnati ahead of his teammates to have the knee examined more closely. The beneficiaries of the two blowouts were the rookie starting pitchers, Acala and Zachry, who now cemented themselves as contenders for regular spots in the rotation. Acala was nearly pulled by Anderson after a three-run first inning, but the manager was convinced by Shepard to let him go; he proceeded to allow two hits over seven innings. The only mistake Zachry made in the finale was a two-run homer off the bat of Madlock, which ended the pitcher’s personal string of 15 straight scoreless innings. The success of the youngsters (perhaps not surprisingly) seemed to hasten the healing of Gullett, who had thrown effectively in a complete-game loss in the final contest in New York. It would be one of only ten complete games the Reds staff would throw in the first 50 outings of 1976, a commendable feat by contemporary standards but still well below average in the mid–1970s. Captain Hook was evidently still on the prowl. By the time the ninth inning of the final game of the Cubs series had rolled around, the Chicago outfit was a physically- and mentally-beaten team, as were their remaining fans in the Wrigley Field grandstand, after being outscored 31–7 in the three games. Thus, even fewer still took much notice when, obscured in the carnage, was the major league debut of a talented relief pitcher for the Cubs. Bruce Sutter entered the game to mop things up in the ninth, and the impressed Cincinnati batters noticed that the nervous rookie pitcher’s ball seemed to possess an extraordinary “drop” at the last moment it crossed the plate.


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Buried in fifth place in the National League East, the Cubs attempted to shake things up just a week later in a blockbuster trade. On May 17, they sent Thornton to the Expos for outfielder Larry Biittner and pitcher Steve Renko. While Thornton appeared to be one of the league’s more impressive young sluggers, Renko gave the Cubs an established starting pitcher — something they desperately needed, especially in light of Stone’s injury — and Biittner had shown ability in batting .315 in semi-regular duty for Montreal in 1975. Just three days later on May 20, Thornton homered against his old Cub mates in Montreal, powering the Expos to a 3–0 win. After Billingham had beaten 1968 World Series MVP Mickey Lolich in a home game against the Mets on May 14, a large test loomed for Acala the next evening. Seaver was on the mound for New York, looking to defeat the defending champions again, as he had done in Shea Stadium eleven days earlier. He was surprised by Driessen, however, when the utility player stole home in the second inning, which was followed by a Concepcion triple to score Perez for a 2–0 lead. The Mets batters could not assist their ace hurler on the day, being shut down chance after chance by Acala over the course of the sunny afternoon at Riverfront. The 2–0 lead stood up all the way, as Acala would permit only four hits and one walk while striking out nine. Even in out-dueling the great Seaver, more amazing to some witnesses was that it was the third complete game in four days for the Reds’ pitching staff. “Who’s Captain Hook?” asked Hertzel, who also pointed out that Acala’s major-league minimum salary of $16,500 would likely be passed easily by Seaver’s incentive bonuses alone by the end of the year. “I no afraid of Seaver,” Acala announced defiantly afterwards. “You the man. You have to believe in self. You can’t be ‘fraid.” The Reds beat the Mets’ stopper without any help from Rose, which was a first for the year. For the first time since the season began, Pete failed to reach base in a game via a hit, walk, or hit-by-pitch. Nonetheless, Rose’s simple daily presence in the lineup was an inspiration in itself, for the iron man had not missed a game since September 26, 1973. During his post-game comments, Mets manager Joe Frazier became incensed about an umpire’s call at second base that contributed to the Reds’ runs, a play in which Perez appeared to have been easily tagged out by Felix Millan when Driessen stole home, but instead was called safe. “They get every decision,” Frazier opined of the Cincinnati club’s favoritism by the men in blue. “There’s nothing you can do about it. It has to be obvious for an umpire to call them out.” The victory had capped a run in which the Reds had won six of seven, and after Acala’s gem on May 15, the standings displayed the Reds deadlocked with the Dodgers atop the standings, although with a slight percentage lead.

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Cincinnati Los Angeles San Diego Houston San Francisco Atlanta

W

L

Pct.

GB

18 19 15 15 11 10

11 12 14 17 20 20

.621 .613 .517 .469 .355 .333

— — 3 4.5 8 8.5

Over in the Eastern Division, the Philadelphia Phillies had jumped out in front with an 18–8 mark, in the midst of what would ultimately be a 13-game road winning streak — a run that would stretch from their 18–16 thriller over the Cubs on April 17 until finally losing in St. Louis on June 3. The Atlanta Braves, conversely, had endured a 13-game losing streak that plunged them to the bottom of the Western Division, as the million-dollar Messersmith would not win until May 17. Even worse troubles had befallen the pennant-winning Red Sox over in the American League. On May 12, they had finally snapped a ten-game losing streak — their longest in 16 years— which had remarkably sent them to last place in their division, the American League East, with the worst record in baseball (6–15) to that date. A couple of slots above them were Grammas’ Milwaukee Brewers, who had shot out of the gate with an 8–2 record but had fallen back to earth with a seven-game losing streak by May 15. “You just don’t worry about it,” Grammas suggested, remembering fondly but not mourning over the lost good-ol’-days in Cincinnati on Anderson’s staff from the past six years. “If worrying helped win ballgames, then worry is what I would do. In a time like this, we just have to work on the simple things.” Winning eight of its next nine, Boston would suddenly climb near the .500 mark and into third place behind New York and Baltimore. During the turn-around, on May 18, Yastrzemski passed Ted Williams for the most games played for the Red Sox and then slugged three home runs off three different Tiger pitchers the following day. As the team moved on to New York the following night, however, trouble befell them once again. During a bench-clearing brawl with the Yankees, Red Sox pitcher Bill Lee hit the ground and tore cartilage in his pitching shoulder while being pinned on the turf by New York third baseman Graig Nettles. The injury to Lee, a 17-game winner during the Boston pennant drive of 1975, would become a serious blow in the club’s attempt to repeat. Lee also sported a black eye from the fight. “He picked me up and threw me down like a body slam,” Lee said of Nettles’ actions, as the third baseman claimed he was only pinning the pitcher on the field to keep him away from further harm. “Is that what you call breaking up a fight? And besides, I wasn’t fighting.” After Gullett displayed another strong performance over five innings in the Mets series finale (gaining his third win — and Darcy a four-inning save, his second), the team packed its bags and headed for the West Coast once again to face the Dodgers. Much like Newcombe and Erskine in the 1950s and Koufax


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and Drysdale in the ’60s, pitching remained the Dodgers’ forte in the 1970s and had once again blazed their path to victory. The Dodgers led the National League in earned run average for the fourth straight season in 1975, posting a mark of 2.92. Even with the departure of Messersmith, Los Angeles was able to turn to the likes of Sutton, Hooton, Doug Rau, and a resurgent Tommy John, who sat out the entire 1975 campaign while recovering from an experimental operation performed on his pitching elbow by Dr. Frank Jobe. The innovative surgery had, in effect, transplanted tendons within John’s elbow to tighten the joint. On the offensive side, the only significant change in the Dodgers’ batting order for 1976 was the center fielder Baker, for whom the club had shipped several quality players to Atlanta. Like the Reds, the Dodgers relied on a combination of speed and power at the plate. In 1975, only one player in the National League had more stolen bases than Morgan — and that man was his counterpart in Los Angeles in second baseman Davey Lopes. Lopes led all of baseball with 77 steals, including a major league record 32 in a row at one point. Dodger stolen base legend Maury Wills called Lopes “the most exciting player to come into the National League since Pete Rose,” and was the ultimate table-setter for sluggers Steve Garvey and Ron Cey. In battling their arch-rivals, the Reds picked an inopportune moment to suffer their first casualty of the season. Morgan suffered muscle spasms in his back, occurring when he stole second base in Acala’s victory over the Mets. Hertzel reported that a sellout crowd — rare for a Monday — on May 17 had formed in Chavez Ravine, cheering their team against the vilified Cincinnati squad as the Dodgers came in winning 17 of their last 20 games. Anderson used a pre-game opportunity to bolster his team after Dodgers outfielder Bill Buckner said the Reds had “second-division pitching.” For nearly a half-hour before the first game of the series, Sparky worked himself up into an expletive-filled tirade before his charges, according to Hertzel “using no fewer than 27 bleepbleeps in a three-minute span.” The Cincinnati ballclub had actually posted an ERA of 2.00 in the past twelve games. Perhaps Buckner was upset he had been shut down in the previous meeting with Darcy, whom Buckner felt had lessthan-average “stuff.” One of those “mediocre” hurlers downed the Dodgers again in the first game, when Zachry went to 2–0 on the year with a 5–3 win, issuing a strong seven-inning performance with bullpen help from Eastwick. Griffey’s two hits upped his average to .345, and added three RBIs to his stunning team-leading total of 27. On the flip side, the struggles of Bench were unrelenting. The ailing catcher was now two for his last 18 at the plate while still recovering from his assortment of aches and pains. Rose had typically floundered on his visits to Hollywood, exemplified by his 1974 campaign when by mid–August he had posted only two hits at Dodger Stadium all year. It was an unknown member of the Los Angeles staff who derailed the Reds in the second of the two-game series, however, as young Rick Rhoden — a scratch golfer, and quickly becoming one of the better-hitting pitchers in the

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major leagues as well — shut Cincinnati out 5–0 on May 18. It was the first time the Reds had been blanked on the year. The 23-year-old Rhoden, meanwhile, was proving himself able to take a place alongside the other stalwarts in the Dodger rotation. Rhoden had spent most of 1975 (his first year in the majors) in the bullpen, during which time he collected three victories, including one against the Reds. Ultimately, Rhoden would finish 1976 with the best winning percentage among starters in the National League with his 12–3 record (.800), and gain his first All-Star appearance as well. Armbrister made his first start of the year on May 21 in San Francisco, part of a two-game set the Reds split with the Giants. In the first contest, Rose passed the 2,600-hit mark for his career, and had his eyes set on the record book. His initial goal was to go beyond Frisch’s record of 2,880 hits for a switch-hitter. “The National League record is only a thousand away,” he noted, pointing to the 3,630 hits Stan Musial had posted. “It could be within reach,” Hertzel admitted, “to keep Pete Rose playing every day, even though he is making more money than he ever could have imagined existed back in those days on the vacant lots in Western Hills.” From San Francisco, Rose and his teammates went down to San Diego and took two of three from the Padres to end the western swing. Rose told the rookies on the team the story of Herman Levy, the young, impressionable visitors’ clubhouse boy in San Diego. Levy was a very hard worker — the hardest at his job that Rose had ever seen — but always seemed to have one player or another playing a practical joke on him. As one example, Rose cited the time Levy spent more than an hour looking for the key to the batter’s box after one player suggested he do so. On another occasion, Billingham said within earshot of Levy, “I could sure go for a ham sandwich about the fifth inning.” On cue, Levy had one of the visitors’ batboys take a sandwich out to Billingham in the middle of the game. To get to the bullpen, however, the batboy had to pass through the Reds’ dugout. After asking about the sandwich’s destination, Anderson seized the meal and smashed it into a messy lump of meat and bread. The manager then said, “Here, son, take this out to Billingham — and tell him that’s an awfully ugly sandwich for fifty bucks” (the fine Anderson assessed for players eating during a game). Billingham would have his revenge on all, however, besting the home club 11–0 in the series finale for his first shutout since 1974. “Sparky is learning that starters can get out of jams,” the pitcher said sarcastically afterwards, pointing to the Reds’ seventh complete game of the season and second in a row. Before the game, Morgan took the lineup card out to the umpires. Morgan was resting his ailing back that evening, as was Anderson. Sparky had been the latest victim of batting practice, taking a line drive in the back off the bat of Bob Bailey. Assuming Morgan’s customary number-three spot on the lineup card was Concepcion, and the resurgent shortstop responded with a 4-for-4 night, boosting his climbing average even further to .247. Nolan lost the opening match to San Diego ace Randy Jones, who disposed of the champions with 87 pitches in only an hour and 39


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minutes. Nolan had failed to beat the Padres in nearly four years. Gullett went back on the disabled list once again, this time with a pinched nerve in his neck. It was wondered if the Reds really needed Gullett at all. After all, they had produced their torrid stretch in mid–1975 without him, and rookies Acala (3–0 record to date, and a 3.91 ERA) and Zachry (3–0, 1.40) were filling the bill quite ably in 1976. The Reds came back home on May 25 to Riverfront for a visit from Messersmith and the Braves. Morgan remained in the dugout, his back still in disrepair. Bench, meanwhile, requested to Anderson that he be dropped in the batting order, down to sixth, because his surgically repaired left shoulder continued to hamper his swing. Bench’s average had hit a high point on May 2, when he enjoyed a three-hit night against Montreal to raise his mark to .286; as the Braves came to down, it had plummeted again to .222, with only two home runs in the month of May. Picking up the slack had been Foster, whose batting average had risen to .336 after his two-homer performance in the opener, which was Acala’s fourth win in as many decisions. Rose, meanwhile, moved into a tie with Rabbit Maranville for 43rd on the all-time hit list. The next afternoon brought Messersmith’s first start of the year against the Reds, producing a solid Wednesday afternoon crowd of nearly 26,000 on the banks of the Ohio. He was matched against Cincinnati ace Nolan, and the fans were treated to their expected low-scoring duel. The Reds dented the scoreboard first in the bottom of the sixth, when Concepcion reached on an error by rookie third baseman Jerry Royster, who the previous summer had led the Pacific Coast League in batting while in the Dodgers’ organization. The hothitting Foster brought Concepcion home on a sacrifice fly, his fifteenth RBI in the past five games and part of his league-leading total of 36 on the year. And even though Nolan had pitched seven innings of scoreless ball with two hits and no walks, Anderson chose to summon Eastwick from the bullpen to start the eighth, and Atlanta responded with a cascade of hits that built Messersmith a 3–1 lead. When the Atlanta hurler walked Rose to start the Cincinnati eighth, Bristol went out to retrieve him. Messersmith, however, refused to acknowledge him, turning his back and walking towards the outfield when the manager reached the pitcher’s mound. Finally, a disgusted Messersmith tossed the ball wildly towards his successor, relief pitcher Roger Moret, and took his pouting into the dugout. Looking for a comment afterwards, reporters could not locate Messersmith anywhere; it was discovered that he had been in the shower for 45 minutes until the wave of media men had left the locker room. (The pitcher would be in a happier mood two starts later, on June 4 in Montreal, when he took a no-hitter into the ninth inning against the Expos; four days later, he would spin a three-hit shutout in Chicago against the Cubs.) Atlanta’s bullpen allowed the Reds back in the game as well, but a double from the bat of old teammate Darrel Chaney in the ninth sealed the loss for Eastwick, 4–3, who was booed voraciously by the angry home crowd. “I don’t understand these

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people,” a confused Eastwick muttered after his implosion. “They can’t understand that on some days you’re not going to have it.” Anderson was booed as well — this time, for a change, for leaving a pitcher in rather than taking him out. “A lot of managers never want to go out in front of 40,000 people and be the goat,” Anderson would say in later years. “They don’t do the radical things, then they can’t be blamed. They can say, ‘I played it by the book.’ Well, I don’t manage that way. You have to accept criticism, and the criticism will be there when you go against the book and fail.” Nolan’s record remained at 3–3, but Hertzel noted that it should be 7–3. In Nolan’s four no-decisions, he permitted just three earned runs in 28 innings of work. Grumblings were starting to be heard about a possible players’ boycott of the July 13 All-Star Game in Philadelphia, as no official deal between the owners and the Players Association had been signed. The Chicago Sun-Times reported that Marvin Miller was offering the option to the union since the basic agreement under which the players were currently performing (even though it had expired on March 31) referred only to “exhibition, championship (regular season) and post-season games,” which could exclude the Mid-Summer Classic. Miller only would say that the players “are beginning to talk about the pros and cons of participating in the All-Star Game,” and that he would meet with all 24 teams before handing down a decision. While uncertainty seemed to rule the baseball world, the boxing domain still belonged to Muhammad Ali. On May 24, Ali defended his world heavyweight title with a fifth-round technical knockout of Englishman Richard Dunn in Munich, Germany. Ali pounded Dunn with a series of right hands when German referee Herbert Thomaser stepped in to end the proceedings, above the objections of the challenger. It was the third time Ali had defended his title in 1976, and the seventh successful defense since he reclaimed the belt by beating George Foreman on October 30, 1974. (Ali had been stripped of the title in 1967 for refusing induction into the United States Army.) The two fighters endured a brief scare the day before at the weigh-in, when the makeshift wooden platform on which they were standing gave way and collapsed in a heap of rubble. Despite the panicked screams of onlookers, Ali and Dunn emerged from the wreckage with smiles and waves. “Not a scratch or a bruise on him. Everything is fine,” reported Ali’s physician, Ferdinand Pacheco, about the mishap. Before the surprise occurred, Dunn had weighed in at 206.5 pounds and Ali 220 for the bout, the lightest the champion had been in any of his title defenses to date; ironically, the local police later claimed the cause of the platform’s collapse was that it had been bearing too much weight. This may have been precipitated by the typical, lavish crowd that Ali always seemed to have behind him, described by the bemused Dick Young as “his entourage, having just signed his name to their tabs for caviar and venison in the best hotel in Munich ... [it is] sad what money, and the promise of more, does to people.” In the United States, the baseball following — as it had been for the past


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Pat Zachry (pictured) and fellow rookie Santo Acala provided a much-needed boost to the Reds’ starting rotation in 1976 (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York).

year — was focused in Cincinnati, but especially so in the waning days of May, as another cataclysmic four-game series commenced with the Dodgers. Tickets were hard to come by and few seats remained by the first pitch for the first game on Friday, May 28, as well as Saturday, while standing-room-only tickets were the lone admissions available for the big Sunday doubleheader, sold

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to the public at 9:00 that morning. The boys in blue were led by manager Walter Alston and his 1,977 wins coming into the series. His team arrived in town as the hottest in the game, having gone 17–7 over the month of May (in addition to a 12-game streak from the end of April) to claim a two-game lead in the division. Anderson started things off by sending Zachry, one of his prized rookies, to the mound, facing the seasoned Sutton, an 11-year veteran. The youngster was not intimidated and continued his dominant start to the season by defeating the Los Angeles men, 9–0, in yet another complete game, lowering his ERA to a miniscule 1.17. Home runs by the resurfacing Morgan (his sixth) and Bench (seventh) in the first inning put Sutton in a hole from the start, while Zachry cruised by scattering five hits over the duration. The main target of the Reds players and fans continued to be Mike Marshall. The scholarly hurler had once compared going against the Reds to “pitching to a bunch of high school kids.” Marshall found himself in a familiar situation the following day, pitching before a national television audience on NBC’s “Game of the Week” and attempting to hold a 5–3 lead for starter Rhoden in the ninth inning. Anderson had been wired with a microphone attached to his jersey for the game, as he struggled — particularly in this last-chance atbat for the Reds— to keep profanities from entering the millions of homes that were tuning in to the broadcast. “Klu [coach Ted Kluszewski] was standing next to me and was afraid to say anything,” the skipper said after the game, vowing not to allow the networks to amplify him again in the future. “George Scherger stayed down at the other end of the dugout like I had the plague.” The Dodgers had gotten to Billingham early on the day, scoring their five runs in the first four innings. When Concepcion singled to start the ninth, Marshall took the mound to relieve Rhoden. He welcomed the ensuing jeers that rained down from the upper deck, waving playfully to one such section. On Marshall’s first pitch, Geronimo greeted him with a sharp single to center. Armbrister laid down a perfect sacrifice when he was sent in to pinch-hit for Eastwick, who had pitched two scoreless innings. Rose then hit a ground ball that scored a run, but also produced the second out of the inning. Rising to their feet, the 40,000-plus fans roared for Griffey, the next batter. He swung mightily at a Marshall offering, and rocketed a ball over the head of Joe Ferguson in right field. Geronimo scooted all the way around the bases to tie the game before Morgan followed with a single to center as Griffey leapt into his teammates’ arms. The Reds had won another thriller, 6–5, and also had hoisted themselves atop the division standings once again. Saturday’s excitement may have made the Sunday doubleheader on May 30 nearly anti-climatic. Just a couple hours to the west on Interstate 74, rain had reduced the Indianapolis 500 that day to its shortest duration ever. The drivers had toiled a mere 102 laps or 255 miles, which nonetheless did not slow the track for Johnny Rutherford, who zoomed past A.J. Foyt at the finish line to emerge as the victor. Nor did the elements slow down the track back at River-


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front. In game one of the twin-bill, the Reds stole nine bases on a beleaguered Ferguson, who was attempting to keep order for the Dodgers while summoned from the outfield to work behind the plate. Griffey nabbed four of the thefts, and the Los Angeles club turned to knuckleballing relief pitcher Charlie Hough in the fourth inning after starter Tommy John had been chased from the mound. (Perhaps far away in Houston, Cliff Johnson was passing the mantle of poor luck on to Ferguson. On that day, the Astros catcher, upon whom the Reds had run rampant in the opening series of the year, had four hits, breaking his personal 0-for-33 slump at the plate.) Hough totaled seven walks in going the rest of the way, and the Reds blazed their way to the most stolen bases in a National League game since 1916. Even so, it was not enough to stave off another blown game by the Cincinnati bullpen, as both Borbon and Eastwick permitted a run in the last two innings to send the Dodgers to a 6–5 triumph. The more defensive-minded catcher Steve Yeager managed things in the second game, with Acala winning 7–2 for the Reds as Anderson went late to McEnaney, who responded with his first save of the year in a three-inning effort. With a split of the games on May 30, the Reds were back in first place, once again by mere percentage points. Cincinnati Los Angeles San Diego Houston San Francisco Atlanta

W

L

Pct.

GB

27 28 23 21 17 16

17 18 21 26 30 29

.614 .609 .523 .447 .362 .356

— — 4 7.5 11.5 11.5

Foster — part of the young, promising outfield crew of which Anderson warned everyone in spring training — was named the National League’s Player of the Month. In doing so, he batted .360 with seven home runs and 31 RBIs in 26 games. His overall RBI production had risen to the top of league at 43. Memorial Day brought the Reds’ first visit to the Astrodome in Houston, the indoor baseball/football complex which for its ten-year existence had been hailed as “the Eighth Wonder of the World.” Getting to Houston, however, was a wonder in itself for the Cincinnati club. Instead of flying the usual chartered plane, the Reds were forced to fly a commercial craft from Cincinnati to Atlanta, and a commercial flight once again from Atlanta to Houston. From there, they had to ride a rickety bus for 45 minutes from the Houston airport to their hotel, which tested the patience of the pampered major leaguers. “The world champions are supposed to go first class!” someone grumbled from the rear of the bus. Scherger shot his head around, and reminded the anonymous complainer that their title of “champions” was in peril, as the team was once again in a fight for their lives with the men from Los Angeles. Within

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days after being humiliated by the Reds’ baserunners, the Dodgers turned the full-time catching duties over to Yeager while trading Ferguson and two minor leaguers to the St. Louis Cardinals for hard-hitting outfielder Reggie Smith, thereby making Walter Alston’s men even more dangerous than before.

6

The Bird Takes Flight, and the Machine Rolls On Cesar Geronimo don’t get no credit — no ink. — Sparky Anderson There’s only so much ink to go around. — Joe Morgan

The Reds finally made it to their hotel and cooler heads prevailed — even though there were not many cool heads. With no air conditioning inside the bus, the lower temperatures of their hotel rooms served as a welcome relief — as was the climate-controlled Astrodome, with its glowing roof and multi-million dollar scoreboard. For players who could remember the old Colt Stadium that stood next door, the synthetic world was a pleasant change from the heatladen, mosquito-infested ballyard that once stood in what was currently the north parking lot of the dome. Workers at the Astrodome had been accused of manipulating that very same air conditioning system during the games, turning the blowers on to restrict the flight of the baseball when the visiting team was batting, while leaving them silent to still the air for the Astros’ bats (if such hindrances and helpfulness could be scientifically proven). With the astounding success of rookie pitchers Zachry and Acala (now dubbed as the “Gold Dust Twins” by the Cincinnati media), the forgotten man on the staff was Pat Darcy. He had appeared in only seven games in the first two months of the season, but was given his first start in five weeks on Memorial Day against Houston, the team from whom the Reds had acquired his services in 1974. The result was a solid five-inning effort towards a 4–2 Cincinnati win, part of a split of the four games the Reds played inside the dome. And despite Zachry suffering his first loss at the hands of his former minor-league teammate in Andujar the following night (the first big-league win for Andujar), it was yet another strong performance by the Cincinnati rookie, who struck out seven batters in as many innings and had permitted just one home run on 123

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the season, coming at Chicago on May 9, in more than 60 innings of work. (Zachry, in fact, would not allow another home run for another five weeks.) “You may think I’m loony,” Anderson said of Zachry, “but that kid can win 20 games. He can pitch. He fields his position and he hits. We haven’t had anyone like him come along in quite a while. He’s a different sort, too, in the dugout. He’s cheering the guys along like he has nothing to think about.” The Reds’ running game remained in high gear as well. Following the completion of the four-game set in Houston, the Reds were now a perfect 17for-17 in stolen base tries against the Astros in 1976. With Gullett — although still unsigned — getting closer to being physically ready, Anderson had Darcy pegged for a long-relief role. Gullett was proving himself to be more prepared every day, exemplified by the complete-game victory he tossed shortly thereafter in St. Louis. The only hope for Darcy to return to the starting rotation, it seemed, was if Gullett was dealt to another team before the June 15 trading deadline. This was a distinct possibility, as Howsam was growing concerned that the Reds would lose Gullett at the end of the season as a free agent, at which point they might receive nothing in return for him. Little did Darcy know, however, that his career in the major leagues would end just days later. The Reds made their first visit of the year to St. Louis on June 4, and discovered a Cardinals team that was going through the final stages of a metamorphosis from its championship clubs of the 1960s. The Cardinals had an entirely new set of infielders in 1976, with Keith Hernandez at first base, Mike Tyson at second, and Hector Cruz at third. The new collection was completed and anchored by veteran shortstop Don Kessinger, who had just arrived from the Cubs after twelve seasons in Chicago. The previous October, the Cardinals had sent relief pitcher Mike Garman to the Cubs for Kessinger, a six-time All-Star. While an unknown factor at the big league level, Cruz certainly provided hope for St. Louis fans as he was named the minor league player of the year at Tulsa in 1975 after batting .306 with 29 home runs. Through August, Cruz would lead National League rookies in home runs and runs batted in. Also new to the Cardinals in 1976 was left-handed pitcher Pete Falcone, a one-time bonus baby of the San Francisco organization, which had made him the fourth overall pick in the secondary phase of the 1973 draft after previously being selected by Minnesota and Atlanta. Falcone had been acquired by the Cardinals in exchange for their third baseman, San Francisco native Ken Reitz. (Reitz, however, would spend just one season in a Giants uniform, and returned to St. Louis the following year.) In giving up a Gold Glove winner in Reitz, the Redbirds knew that they were taking a gamble by inserting the untested Cruz at third; even so, as with the Cubs dealing for Garman, they felt it was a risk they had to assume in order to improve their pitching staff. “We didn’t even have a top-notch lefthander in the minor leagues,” Cardinals manager Red Schoendienst claimed after the deal was made. “If we’re going to be able to compete, we’re going to have to nullify some of these other clubs’ hitting.”


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Shooting quickly through the Giants’ system, Falcone rose to the big leagues in 1975 as a 21 year old and won 12 games. Now, Falcone looked to join Bob Forsch, John Denny, and Lynn McGlothen as the components of a gifted young starting staff in St. Louis that was being rebuilt with the retirement of the legendary Bob Gibson after the 1975 season. But while the St. Louis pitching had improved, eight other players with gloves were still needed to catch the batted balls. “What we’re concerned about is defense,” Schoendienst added, referring to the 171 errors his team committed in 1975. “Either that has to improve over last year, or we’re in for a long summer.” Clutch hitting was also a priority for improvement for Schoendienst in 1976. The previous year, his club led the National League in batting with a .273 team average, yet finished only in the middle of the pack in runs scored. The result of the stay was an overwhelming sweep of the St. Louis club, with the Reds victorious by scores of 11–2, 5–1, and 13–2. While the convalescing Gullett upped his career mark against the Cardinals to 14–3 with his win in the middle contest (already the tenth complete game of the year for Anderson’s staff ), the cascade of offense was achieved without the assistance of Bench, who contrarily appeared to be heading in the opposite direction with his own health. Bench was nursing muscle spasms in his back as well as a shoulder injury that continued to hamper his swing, causing him to miss nearly a third of his starts by mid–June. The beneficiary of his absence was Plummer, who on the series’ final day, June 6, collected a career-high seven RBIs with a homer and a three-run triple, the only three-base hit he would post in his ten-year major league career and his first at any level in five campaigns. “That’s a season for me,” Plummer laughed afterwards about the seven-ribbie total, with his average now up to .307. “As I ran around the bases, I had chills.” The raging Concepcion notched a five-hit day in the opener to further boost the attack. The losses continued to mire the Redbirds near last place in the Eastern Division, as those glory years of the 1960s (in which the team had won three National League pennants and two world championships) had long vanished. The only remaining link to Schoendienst’s great Cardinal teams was outfielder Lou Brock, who in 1976 at the age of 37 would enjoy his last dominating year on the basepaths. In the opening game against the Reds, Brock stole the 821st base of his career, leaving him just 71 shy of Ty Cobb’s all-time major league record. Brock would proceed to post 56 steals by the end of 1976, finishing the year with a lifetime total of 865. (He would break the record the following summer, and retire in 1979 with 938 career thefts.) Nonetheless, a new generation was looking to lead St. Louis in the outfield positions as well. Along with the rebuilt infield, the club possessed the 1974 Rookie of the Year in Arnold McBride (better known as “Bake”), off to a .365 start to 1976 as the Reds arrived in town, as well as one of the best offensive catchers in the game. In May, the Cardinals re-signed backstop Ted Simmons to a multi-year contract, which was reported to remunerate him $600,000 over three years. The deal made Simmons the

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highest-paid player in the franchise’s colorful history. (Previously, the highest salaries in St. Louis had been the $150,000 that Gibson had made in 1974, and then the $175,000 that was given to Brock in 1975, while Simmons had made $125,000 that season.) In addition, Simmons was believed to be only the second Cardinal ever — after Stan Musial — to receive a three-year contract from the club. Simmons had finished second in the National League in 1975 with a .332 average, and his switch-hitting capabilities allowed him to rival Bench as one of the most feared batting catchers in baseball. While the Reds and the rest of the major league teams were selecting their new players in the upcoming June amateur draft, the nation was on the verge of choosing its new president. Gerald Ford, who had taken over the office after the resignation of Richard Nixon in 1974, was considered the front-runner to regain the Republican ticket in the primaries. Nonetheless, Ford was facing a formidable challenge from former California governor Ronald Reagan in the key early–June primaries in Ohio and New Jersey, as well as in Reagan’s home state. “Republican regulars tended at first to view Reagan as little more than a sparring partner to pace President Ford in organizing, raising funds, and campaigning,” noticed political analyst Warren Wheat. “But here three days before Republicans in California, New Jersey, and Ohio choose 331 delegates to their national convention, the best President Ford apparently can hope for is to break even with Reagan, meaning that neither candidate will arrive in Kansas City July 12 [the place and date of the 1976 Republican National Convention] with the 1,130 votes necessary for nomination.” The editorial section of the Cincinnati Enquirer endorsed the incumbent Ford as the GOP choice, citing the forward-moving economy, the nation being at peace, and public trust having been restored in the office of the president. While Ford would take Ohio, Reagan would continue to gain momentum in the coming weeks, winning the California primary. “Heading from his California sweep, Ronald Reagan has assured a knock-down, drag-out affair to be fought across the nation,” wrote Robert Webb of the Enquirer. An old nemesis loomed next in the Pittsburgh Pirates as the Reds made their way east to the Steel City. Heading into 1976, the Pirates had won the National League’s Eastern Division in five of the previous six years. That did not scare Philadelphia manager Danny Ozark, however, who had boldly announced in spring training that his Phillies club was “the team to beat” in the division for 1976. Ozark had the numbers to back up his claim, as his club had posted an amazing 22–5 record in May, the best month in franchise history, as the Phils opened up a six-and-a-half game lead by the beginning of June. The Pirates had made a large, risky move in the off-season, trading pitchers Dock Ellis, Ken Brett, and young infielder Willie Randolph to the Yankees for one pitcher, George Medich. The Pirates could match almost any team in offensive firepower, with long-ball experts Stargell, Dave Parker, and Richie Zisk, as well as “doubles” hitters Manny Sanguillen and Al Oliver. Normally modest bat-


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ting threat Rennie Stennett had also produced great things in 1975 as well. On September 16 against the Cubs at Wrigley Field, the second baseman went a perfect 7-for-7 at the plate — the only player to do so in a nine-inning game in the twentieth century — as the Pittsburgh team manhandled Chicago, 22–0. Nonetheless, even the club’s manager seemed uncertain if the move for Medich was a good one. “Sure, we’ve got bats, but pitching is the main reason we’ve won,” skipper Danny Murtaugh pointed out. “The staff was second in the majors in earned runs [allowed in 1975], and we finished second in the league in [fewest] hits allowed.” It was the batting power that carried the Bucs in the first rematch of the 1975 National League Championship Series, as Stargell, Zisk, and Bill Robinson belted three straight homers of Billingham, after which McEnaney surrendered yet another big fly to Parker in the ninth to send Pittsburgh to a 5–4 win. Stargell, the main deep threat in the lineup, hit 22 home runs and drove in 90 in 1975 despite missing 18 games with cracked ribs. As the 1976 schedule approached, some had wondered if the 36-year-old slugger was losing his edge, but he dismissed those notions. “When you’re a competitor and start getting the weeds of doubt because of age or anything else, look out,” he warned. “It’s confidence that counts. I never think in terms of age.” In the opener, Pirate hurler Bruce Kison no-hit the Reds into the sixth inning, when Rose tried to break up the dominance with a bunt hit. After fouling off the first bunt attempt, Kison took a couple of steps towards Rose at the plate. “Swing the bat like a man,” Kison challenged him. After losing the contest, the Reds would rebound to take the next three from the Pirates as Gullett and Nolan each posted 6–1 victories to close out the series. For Gullett, it was his second straight complete-game victory since recovering from his most recent injury, and it was also only the second time in his career that he had beaten Pittsburgh. Foster increased his league-leading RBI total to 52, a product of being inserted regularly into the fifth slot in the order. “Last year, I batted eighth,” he explained, “and usually came up with one man on or no men on. I always hit a lot of solo home runs. And in crucial situations, they walked me to get to the pitcher.” Meanwhile, the sizzling Morgan had slugged four homers in the span of two games, his average soaring to .342 by the end of the stay in Pittsburgh. Yet, at the time when Morgan’s play was finally starting to rival that of his 1975 production, an apparent disaster struck when he pulled up lame after rounding first base on a single. The second baseman had strained his left hamstring and would be out of action for an undetermined amount of time. Super-sub Flynn would be asked to plug the hole. While not believed to be serious, Anderson and Morgan both knew that such an injury could linger or re-appear over the course of the season. The manager had full confidence in Flynn as well as the other so-called “never-wills” whom other clubs had passed over, or on whom they had given up. “Guys come here and become good players that no one dreamed would be good players,” Sparky commented. “Ed Armbrister? Hous-

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ton gave him away. And who would’ve thought Cesar Geronimo would become what he became.... I’ve watched all these guys in other organizations that are supposed to be so great. Dusty Baker, four years ago, was supposed to be the greatest thing since Alka Seltzer.” Early June brought a tradition back to professional baseball each year when teams re-stocked their minor league systems with the amateur draft. In an enviable position to build for the future with no immediate needs, the Reds went almost exclusively with younger high school talent in the first 15 rounds instead of college prospects. Their first selection was right-handed pitcher Mark King of Owensboro, Kentucky. King had just led Owensboro High to the state baseball championship, striking out 183 batters in 91 innings while posting a 12–2 record on the year. Included among his victories was a 3–2 win over Laurel County in the semi-finals before finishing out the championship with two innings of perfect relief in a 1–0 victory over Newport Central Catholic for the title. With their second pick, the Reds took athletic outfielder Paul Householder from North Haven High School in Connecticut. Householder was regarded as a true power and speed threat, and had reportedly turned down more than 50 college scholarship offers for baseball or football to sign with Cincinnati. He signed his contract immediately, while King pondered a scholarship offer to Texas A&M University before inking his deal with the Reds a day later. Both men were then sent to the Reds’ rookie-league team in Billings to begin their professional careers. The first overall pick in the draft belonged to the Astros, and they selected Floyd Bannister, the dominant left-handed pitcher from Arizona State University. Bannister, earlier named the Sporting News’ college player of the year, was an engineering major who had crafted an 18–1 record with a nation-leading 195 strikeouts for the top-ranked Sun Devils. He was envisioned as possibly joining the Astros’ major league staff later in the season; his college coach, Jim Brock, agreed it was possible. “He should be brought up immediately,” Brock asserted. “Not as the top man, but as number-six or number-seven on a tenman staff.” Despite having twelve players from its 1976 roster eventually make the major leagues, Arizona State finished only third at the College World Series as the draft was taking place. Rick Monday launched the modern era of the draft, becoming the first player selected in the newly constituted system in 1965 as another product of Arizona State. In the 1976 selection process, the Reds decided to pass on some local high school talent as outfielder Pat Tabler (McNicholas High School) went to the Yankees, shortstop Jeff Kraus (Colerain High School) was picked by the Phillies, and outfielder Leon Durham (Woodward High School) was drafted by the Cardinals. Durham had been double-trouble for opponents in his days at Woodward, possessing an 11–3 record on the mound while swatting 16 home runs in his senior season. In the fourth round of the draft, the A’s chose a speedy hometown player named Rickey Henley out of Oakland Technical High School who, like Householder, had passed on multi-


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ple college football scholarship offers. Henley moved to California from Chicago at the age of seven, after which his mother adopted the surname of Henderson, which belonged to her second husband. When St. Louis arrived in Cincinnati in mid–June for its first return visit in 1976, the overhaul of the Cardinals’ pitching staff had already become apparent. Despite the dearth of southpaw starters, Schoendienst felt he had unearthed a gem out of the bullpen from the left side in a tiny reliever who had caught the fascination of baseball followers everywhere. The press had dubbed little Al Hrabosky “The Mad Hungarian” for the demeanor he possessed while on the hill. “This is my mound,” he described his attitude when coming into a game to pitch. “That’s the philosophy I take. Nothing can happen until I decide to throw.” Upon entering the major leagues, he immediately became a favorite of the sportswriters. “He is colorful and unorthodox in his style,” admired Bill Nack of Newsday, “and in action a man of almost bizarre intensity, an eccentric who walks off the back of the mound between pitches, talks out loud to himself, glowers like Dracula at the batters over his Fu Manchu, and throws the ball not in a picturesque, fluid motion, but rather as if exploding from his chest.” It had truly been an amazing journey for Hrabosky, who as a youngster was cut from his Little League team three times, from his high school team twice, and did not throw a pitch until his senior year of high school. The Cardinals drafted him in February 1969, and his development continued until he led the National League with 22 saves in 1975 (tying Eastwick for the honor) while finishing third in the Cy Young voting. Hrabosky insisted that his glove-pumping and staring was simply done as a reminder to concentrate on every pitch, putting himself into what he called a “controlled hate mood” towards the batter. Eastwick agreed with the philosophy. “A negative thought cannot be allowed into your mind,” the Reds closer said of the men of his particular craft. “You can turn an idea into reality — there is power in your thoughts.” Despite the intimidating presence of the lefthander, Tony Perez had turned Hrabosky into a victim during the first Cardinals-Reds meeting on June 11 in Ohio. Hrabosky entered the contest looking for his sixth save, holding a 7–5 lead in the ninth for starter John Denny. He quickly permitted a single to Griffey and a walk to Morgan, bringing Perez to the plate to represent the potential winning run. The little southpaw whizzed a low fastball towards the plate, and Perez shot the ball long over the center field wall for his eighth homer, bringing the Reds an unexpected 8–7 win and dropping Hrabosky’s record on the year to a disappointing 3–5. Although Cincinnati lost the following evening, it was the second of two consecutive 3-for-4 days for Flynn. He had spent the first game spelling Concepcion at shortstop and the next day filling in for Morgan at second base as Morgan rested his tweaked hamstring. “Doug Flynn is the best utility player in baseball,” Anderson marveled. “He is a major leaguer at both short and second and there isn’t anyone who can say that.” It

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would become Flynn’s best stretch of play in 1976 for the Reds, as he would bat .347 (25-for-72) in the month of June. In the second game, Brock —forever a regular in the Cardinals lineup — perhaps tried to become too much of a utility player. With the Cardinals holding a 5–2 lead late in the game against Will McEnaney, and with Brock never having enjoyed much success against the lefthander, he took his swings from the right side of the plate for the first time in his storied 16-year major league career. Striking out swinging on three pitches, Brock later admitted that he pulled the stunt mostly to see if it would get him on the all-time hits list for switch-hitters; baseball statisticians did not accommodate this wish. Earlier in that game on June 12, Darcy had preceded McEnaney to the mound in relief of starter Billingham, who had permitted five runs in the first three innings. Darcy would stymie the Cardinals with two scoreless frames, although the five runs would stand in a 5–4 St. Louis win. The following day, Darcy was once again the first pitcher retrieved from the bullpen by Anderson, as Acala was equally ineffective as Billingham had been against the Redbird bats. Darcy would be hit hard as well on this day, however, as his ERA soared to 6.23 in an ugly performance. It would be Darcy’s last appearance in a Reds uniform. On June 17 he was sent to the Indianapolis farm club in exchange for Hinton, and would never again return to Cincinnati. Darcy remained quietly disappointed about the move, but pointed out that he was removed from the starting rotation by Anderson after only two starts, which in Darcy’s opinion was not enough evidence to warrant such a decision. (Billingham meanwhile, perhaps satisfied with simply keeping a major league contract, gladly accepted his temporary assignment to the Cincinnati bullpen after his latest poor start.) In March 1977, Darcy would be traded to the Cardinals for Mike Caldwell, but would never re-surface in the major leagues. With the Cubs being victims again on June 14 and 15 (the sixth wins on the year for both Gullett and Nolan, and the 15th time in the last 16 meetings with the Cubs in which the Reds emerged victorious), the Reds had opened a four-game lead over the Dodgers. The Cincinnati team batting average swelled over the .300 mark, having battered the ball to a .322 tune in the first half of the June. The Reds were two games off their pace of a year ago, but their home attendance was 160,000 higher at this point compared to 1975. Cincinnati Los Angeles San Diego Houston Atlanta San Francisco

W

L

Pct.

GB

39 35 32 29 24 23

22 26 27 33 34 39

.639 .574 .542 .468 .414 .371

— 4 6 10.5 13.5 16.5

It was announced on June 15 that four Reds including Morgan, Bench, Rose, and Concepcion (with the first three, respectively, leading the overall vot-


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ing as well), were leading their positions as the top vote recipients for the AllStar Game in Philadelphia on July 13. Foster was second to Philadelphia’s Luzinski among National League outfielders, while Griffey was fourth. Also making sports news that week was the merger of the struggling, nine-year-old American Basketball Association with the 30-year-old National Basketball Association. The NBA agreed to assimilate the New York Nets, Denver Nuggets, San Antonio Spurs, and the Indiana Pacers into their league. The ownership of the other two other ABA teams— the Kentucky Colonels and the Utah Rockies— were cut a check by the NBA for consolation purposes related to being left out of the deal. The players from the Utah and Kentucky rosters were placed into a draft pool, and the Chicago Bulls took Kentucky’s seven-foot, two-inch center, Artis Gilmore, with the first selection. June 15 also marked the trading deadline around the major leagues, as a mass sell-off was feared with many teams experiencing the “Gullett situation” on their own rosters. With the number of stars playing the 1976 schedule without a signed contract, several owners were predicted to conduct fire sales, reacting in fear of losing such players with no return at the end of the year. And as expected, Finley, who ironically to some had made his vast fortunes in the medical malpractice business, led the charge. Just before the stroke of midnight on June 15, he instantly altered the balance of power in the American League by selling Rollie Fingers and outfielder Joe Rudi to the Red Sox and star pitcher Vida Blue to the Yankees, in transactions that were described as “strictly for cash.” The “cash” amounted to more than $3 million for Finley, who was heard to say that “the night’s not over” in between the Boston and New York deals, which had a half-hour of separation. Rudi and Fingers held salaries in the $80,000–$90,000 range, with each having to take the 20 percent cut to play without finished contracts. The moves were much to the dismay of the other teams’ administrations, such as the small-market owner of the Minnesota Twins, Calvin Griffith, who blasted the sale as “a dark day for baseball. It’s a terrible thing when the Yankees and Red Sox start bidding to see who can buy a championship team.... It just shows a reserve system is necessary if we are to have fair competition.” These latest moves by Finley — not long after he had opened the door to free agency with his missteps in dealing with Catfish Hunter’s contract — had the rest of the ownership world fiercely enraged with him. Nevertheless, most of the players around baseball, including Pete Rose, were fine with Finley’s ways. “If a man owns a ball club, he ought to have the right to sell the players, the uniforms, or the bats if he wants to,” Rose opined. “He put up the investment to buy the ball club, didn’t he? Players get sold at the winter meetings all the time; nobody said anything when we sold Roger Freed to the Mexican League.” Kuhn initially posited a stance that he would approve the sales, but three days later on June 18, while Henry Aaron was hitting his 750th homer in Milwaukee, he suddenly voided the transactions. The infuriated Finley, Red Sox,

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and Yankees separately threatened to sue the commissioner, as the A’s owner directed field manager Chuck Tanner not to play any of the three men in Oakland’s upcoming ballgames. In an effort to “uphold the integrity of the game,” Kuhn felt compelled to act. “The commissioner is left with the lonely job of deciding integrity and confidence,” he announced to the writers. “I have to weigh public opinion. I’ve been commissioner for eight years, and I have to use my own judgment. That’s what I do. That’s my job.” Kuhn added that Finley’s actions were “most unusual” and “unprecedented in the history of the game.” When it was noted to Kuhn that, in addition to other similar situations in history, Babe Ruth was sold from the Red Sox to the Yankees to pay the business debts of Boston owner Harry Frazee, the commissioner asserted a difference in the contemporary case. “Shorn of much of its finest talent,” he proclaimed, “the Oakland club, which had been a divisional champion for the last five years, has little chance to effectively compete in its division.” Official notice of Finley’s lawsuit would come on June 23, served in a United States District Court in Los Angeles by Finley’s attorney Neil Papiano. “This is not a vindictive move,” Papiano assured the media about the complaint, which charged Kuhn with violating anti-trust laws and the civil rights of Finley, as well as launching a conspiracy to keep Finley from obtaining his rightful money from the sale. “It’s made from legal and practical considerations. These are somebody else’s property. What if they get hurt?” When Kuhn and American League president Lee MacPhail ordered Finley to play Rudi and Fingers, the A’s owner casually shrugged them off. “Kuhn ordered me to ‘remove any restraints,’” Finley said in a telephone interview, attempting to mince words. “He did not order me to play anybody, and he better not attempt it, either. Kuhn just had to jump up on his soap box again.” Marvin Miller sat with keen interest among the discussions that Finley and Kuhn held; the commissioner felt it was important to have the players’ interests represented at the meetings. In the end, Miller supported the sale of the players, saying that an owner had the right to sell his property, to which a befuddled Finley reportedly responded, “Where have you been all my life?” The remaining A’s players (led by representative Jim Todd) threatened on June 25 to strike unless Finley allowed the three in question to play, a plan that was strongly discouraged by Miller. “A strike at this time would have enabled Finley to say that he was unable to comply with the directive Kuhn had given him,” Miller said. Defiant once again, Finley responded abruptly. “If they go on strike, I’ll call up 25 players from the minor leagues to play for me,” he answered. “I’ll suspend any striking players for the rest of the year.” On June 27, the owner relented and permitted the three back on the active Oakland roster. A potential walkout by the A’s would have been only the second “team strike” in major league history, following the 1912 protest of Ty Cobb’s suspension for fighting with a fan, as his Detroit Tigers teammates refused to take the field the following day against the Connie Mack–led A’s. The Tigers ownership had to round up local high school boys to play the A’s, who beat the rag-tag


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crew, 23–2, before the regular Detroit men returned to action the following day. Rudi, for one, was not troubled with the hiatus in his schedule whatsoever. “I’m not letting this bother me,” he smirked. “I stayed in shape and worked out so I’d be ready when they finally made the decision.” All three men in question would finish the year in an A’s uniform; while Vida Blue would play one more season in Oakland, Rudi and Fingers would part ways with Finley. The unpredictable owner would continue to cause shaking heads throughout the season, and later announced that he had secretly hired a “team astrologist” in spring training to assist in foretelling the club’s fortunes in 1976. And while the drama of the sale of the three players was continuing, an audit of Finley’s assets— included those related to his interests in major league baseball — had been ordered by a circuit court judge as part of divorce proceedings that had been launched by Finley’s wife nearly two years earlier. As part of the earlier ruling, Finley had provided his wife $5,000 a month of support, in addition to use of their estate in LaPorte, Indiana. Custody of the couple’s three children also was given to Mrs. Finley. Additionally, Finley would be challenged in court by three A’s players at the end of the season, including Bert Campaneris, Don Baylor, and Gene Tenace. The individuals were also playing 1976 without a contract and taking the legal 20 percent pay cut, and would seek greater dollars out of Finley for 1977. Despite nullifying the sales, Kuhn knew that his decision would have little impact on the direction that Major League Baseball would take in the coming decades, noting that such inevitable moves in the future would irrevocably alter the “competitive balance” among teams with differences in the depths of their pockets. “The spectacle of the Yankees and Red Sox buying contracts of star players in the prime of their careers for cash sums totaling $3.5 million is anything but devastating to baseball’s reputation for integrity and to public confidence in the game, even though I can well understand that their motive is a good faith effort to strengthen their clubs.” The Reds, on the other hand, saw a need to hold onto their entire wealth of talent. On the same day the Kuhn was making his remarks, Cincinnati began a brutal seven-game stretch that included five with the Phillies (currently holding the best record in baseball at 41–17 atop the National League East) and two home games in between with the Dodgers. The Philadelphia club was obviously getting little resistance from its foes in its division. “For Philadelphia to get caught, the Western Division teams will have to help,” Sparky Anderson decided. “We’ll have to beat the Phils, and Pittsburgh will have to beat them face-to-face.” They emerged from the week of slings-and-arrows faring worse than they had hoped, logging a 3–4 mark by sweeping both games from the Dodgers in Riverfront (which included a four-hit shutout by Norman, raising his record to 5–1), but were manhandled by the Phillies in four of the other contests. The day after the Dodgers series had ended, Mike Marshall, who did

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not appear in either game for Los Angeles, was traded to the Atlanta Braves, joining Messersmith in a dumping ground of disenchanted pitchers. In addition to his legal and contractual troubles in recent months, Marshall’s difficulty in the locker room among his teammates was cited by Dodgers management as a chief cause of the exchange, in which the Dodgers received even more outfield depth in Lee Lacy as well as relief pitcher Elias Sosa. The Phillies were looking to place themselves on top of the mountain in the senior circuit, claiming the National League as their new-found kingdom. Schmidt, the native of Dayton (only 45 miles to the north of Cincinnati), continued as a personal wrecking crew with three more homers, upping his career average against the Reds to .340. Also among the Phillie stars was feisty shortstop Larry Bowa, who was quickly emerging as a local favorite himself under the Liberty Bell. Bowa knew that he always had to prove himself to others, for like Hrabosky, he had been cut from his high school baseball team; for Bowa it had happened for three straight years. “You know, it wasn’t long ago that I got my 1,000th major league hit,” the slight 5'10", 155-pounder would point out later in 1976. “When I came up, people didn’t think I’d ever get 1,000 atbats.” When the Phillies acquired second baseman Dave Cash from the Pirates after the 1973 season, a formidable combination around the middle bag was established (although Cash was yet another of the many players around both leagues conducting the 1976 schedule without a signed contract). As the two clubs were exchanging places on the field for batting practice, Bowa did not hesitate to take verbal jabs at his counterpart in Concepcion. Not coincidentally, it was one day after Bowa pulled off one of the best plays by a shortstop in recent memory in Philadelphia, diving to his right on a smash by Perez and throwing him out by two steps from well into left field. “Hey, is your name Elmer?” Bowa asked Concepcion as they crossed paths the next evening. “No, it’s David,” the Reds’ shortstop replied. “Oh, I thought it had to be Elmer,” Bowa said. “Every time I look at the box score in the paper, it says ‘E — Concepcion.’” Bowa, however, had empathy for Concepcion in one respect, as the two commiserated about the poor playing surface at Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium. “What do you want me to say?” was his response when asked by a group of reporters about the Vet that included local scribes. “This place is for the birds.” Perhaps more troubling than the losses or Bowa’s needling was the demise of Gullett once again. While a 6–3 record (after a June 20 loss to Jim Kaat) was not a reason for disappointment, the yet-unsigned Gullett again complained of having a tired arm. In the opinion of Hertzel, he carefully avoided using the term sore arm so as to not dissuade potential suitors from a fat free-agent contract at the end of the summer. Surprisingly, the stalwarts of the everyday lineup were also hurting; Morgan was injured once again, pulling a rib cage muscle


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during batting practice before an exhibition game the Reds had played in Indianapolis on a recent off day. Rose, meanwhile, was battling a rare slump. His average, in the .400s through May 14, had “plummeted” down to .326 by the end of the second Philadelphia series on June 24. It was that evening at Riverfront that Anderson had decided to finally give him a day off, starting Bailey in his place at third base. (Sparky, however, sent Pete up as a pinch-hitter in the ninth inning to keep his consecutive games-played streak alive at 397.) Rose was in a self-admitted mental funk, culminating in his commission of a throwing error the night before in the ninth inning — so long ago from May of ’75, when he threw out Ralph Garr on a similar play up the line, making his new position at the time look so easy. His miscue permitted the Phillies to score the winning runs, and Rose was ashamed. He needed a break, and for the first time he could remember, he nodded in agreement when he saw that Anderson had left his name off the lineup card. Having Rose in the dugout helped Anderson, for if nothing else, it kept Borbon from pestering him for a chance to play a position off the bench. When Anderson would be on the telephone to the Reds bullpen, Borbon would often grab the other end of the line and holler, “Hello, mister — you call on me if you ever need a pinch hitter.” Recovering from their derailment in Philadelphia, the Reds continued their march through the rest of the National League, concluding June by taking two of three from both the Astros and the Padres on the road. In addition to his more notable All-Star teammates, Geronimo was making a strong case for his first appearance in the mid-summer classic as well, having seen his batting average soar to .319 after gaining two of the Reds’ six hits against Randy Jones, one evening after posting a five-hit performance against Dave Freisleben. That night, Geronimo took part in the Reds’ seven-run outburst in the 14th inning after they had knocked 20 hits and left 18 men on base throughout the night. The massive assault in the 14th — one short of the National League record for an extra inning — started with a lead-off homer by Mike Lum, his second for Cincinnati. Driessen had received his own opportunity off the bench in Houston, where his five RBIs on a day of rest for Perez (and his “tired bat,” as Anderson called it, with Perez’s average down to .270 heading into the game) helped defeat the Astros, 8–6, on June 25. Borbon earned his first win of the year in a five-inning relief effort. Among all their success in the last twelve months, the Reds had nonetheless failed to conquer the entire National League in the mid–1970s. There remained a pitcher who each time he took the mound befuddled them as well as any club that crossed the path of Randy Jones. Jones, who was reared fewer than ten miles from San Diego in the California town of Poway, had led the National League in ERA in 1975 with a 2.27 mark while winning 20 games, and on June 30, had beaten the Reds for the second time in 1976. Two weeks earlier, he became the only pitcher to date in 1976 to shut out Schmidt and the powerful Phillies. “If he showed up at a tryout camp, they’d tell him to go

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home,” Bench said of the soft-throwing lefthander, who relied on his outstanding change-up and slider to fool the batters. “Tom Seaver is overpowering — so is Randy Jones in the opposite sense,” added Morgan. “Seaver, because of his speed, makes you change your hitting style at the plate. Jones does the same thing.” Some of the Reds’ power hitters thought they would compensate by moving up in the batter’s box and trying to drive the ball to the opposite field. “Wrong,” Morgan countered the idea. “By doing that, guys like Bench, Perez, Bailey, and Foster are doing things they don’t normally do. Jones is making them change their way of hitting.” Jones had recently been named the National League Pitcher of the Month for May, winning six of seven starts (with all six victories being complete games) and posting an ERA of 1.48 during the stretch. Despite having average “stuff,” as Bench pointed out, Jones’ statistics continued to amaze. One week after blanking the Phillies for his second straight shutout, he tied a National League record of 68 consecutive innings without issuing a walk during a game against the Giants, a mark last set by Christy Mathewson in 1913. (Jones would fail to break the record, however, as he walked San Francisco catcher Marc Hill in the eighth inning.) While Jones was the emerging star on the mound for the improved San Diego squad, the future of the Padres’ offense belonged to big six-foot-six Dave Winfield, a star in baseball and basketball at the University of Minnesota (as well as a professional football draftee because of his athleticism). He had been the fourth overall pick of the 1973 draft, and was already beginning to instill fear in major league pitchers. The standings after the day’s play on June 30: Cincinnati Los Angeles San Diego Houston Atlanta San Francisco

W

L

Pct.

GB

46 42 39 34 34 31

29 34 36 41 41 47

.613 .553 .520 .453 .453 .397

— 4.5 7 12 12 16.5

Even during his stellar accomplishments in 1975 and 1976, Jones was still not receiving much attention from most American League writers. The majority of their thoughts were obsessed with a rookie pitcher in their own circuit named Mark Fidrych, who at the start of the 1976 season was envisioned as nothing more than a spot starter and occasional long reliever out of the Detroit Tigers’ bullpen. Infatuation had reached a fever pitch with the young man known as “The Bird” (for his likeness to the character Big Bird on the Sesame Street television show) as the fluffy-haired young hurler worked through a litany of gyrations while performing his craft. The nickname had been given to the 21 year old by his minor league pitching coach in Bristol, Tennessee, where his strange antics first appeared. In addition to carefully cultivating the dirt on the pitcher’s mound with his hands and bounding off the field after an inning was


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over, he was best known for whispering into his glove before entering his windup — presumably, most had figured, to tell the ball where to go. His playful, child-like actions were seen by many fans as a source of refreshment from the growing corporate scene in baseball. “Every time I used him that spring, he got people out,” said Tigers manager Ralph Houk about meeting Fidrych in March 1976. “He had unbelievable control with a fastball that moved. [His] breaking stuff wasn’t really that great, but the ball always moved. We finally decided, “Let’s take him north.” Fidrych appeared in only two games in relief by the middle of May, as Houk was hesitant to expose the youngster to too much adversity in his first big-league stint. When Fidrych’s roommate, Joe Coleman, went down with an illness on May 15, the Bird joined the starting rotation with a two-hit victory over the Cleveland Indians; he never relinquished the spot for the rest of the summer. People wondered about his many idiosyncrasies, but to Fidrych, it was all normal. “My dad told me about filling the holes on the mound, so if the ball was hit back to me I wouldn’t get a bad hop,” he said of the landscaping motions. As for the talking? Simply self-reminders of good habits. “[It’s] the same as you see some hitters talk to themselves about keeping their head down, keeping their shoulder in, or keeping their eye on the ball.” On June 28, Bird-Mania in Detroit reached its zenith. Fidrych and the Tigers took on the Yankees on Monday Night Baseball, a staple national television broadcast which every baseball fan used to anxiously await, long before the days of ESPN and satellite subscription packages brought daily coverage of coast-to-coast games. With his sideshow antics at full force, Fidrych shut down the Bronx Bombers in stellar fashion, 5–1. “Fidrych was brilliant. Just brilliant,” recalled teammate Rusty Staub, who homered that night. “He just had games when he didn’t make a mistake.... Every time he pitched in Detroit, there were 50,000 people there.” In his next start on July 3, he shut out the Orioles for his eighth victory in a row. Houk, in fact, complained that general managers from other clubs kept calling him, insisting that Fidrych pitch in their parks so as to maximize their attendance. Employed by the Tigers at the league minimum salary of $16,500, Fidrych was soon the target of a campaign by Detroit radio hosts, businessmen, and even politicians to generate funds to give him a raise. “This is the most I’ve ever made in my life,” an appreciative but content Fidrych said about his current rate. “What happens if [Tigers general manager Jim] Campbell did give me a raise? It might go to my head and I’d start losing.” Campbell confirmed that the club had never given mid-season raises, and saw no reason to alter the practice now. Down I-75 from Detroit in Cincinnati, a veteran player was still the top man. Despite hitting 35 years of age, Pete Rose continued to scrap like a rookie trying to make an initial impression, just as when he earned his nickname “Charlie Hustle” in his first spring training camp. Even though he had already endured five cortisone shots in an aching shoulder, Rose vowed not to leave

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the lineup. “I want to play as long as I can do the job,” he said in forecasting his future summers in the game. “I don’t want to embarrass anyone; I don’t want to stumble around the bases. “I’ll be in baseball in some capacity all my life. I’d love to be a manager,” Rose offered.

7

A Nation Celebrates, and a World Competes Pete Rose was the greatest two-strike hitter I ever saw. If I got two strikes on him, I knew he was going to hit it up the middle on me.... And there was nothing I could do about it. — Boston pitcher Bill Lee

The on-again, off-again 1976 saga of Don Gullett took another turn on the first of July. After announcing to the press that the pitcher had a tired arm, Anderson mentioned to the media that Gullett would likely not make a start for another two weeks at the earliest, although he might be available for some slight relief work. Gullett still did not have a signed contract with the club, and the likelihood of having any such completed deal was nearly extinct at this point. Other “reds” elsewhere seemed more willing to negotiate; for even North Vietnam and South Vietnam, oddly enough, were able to strike a deal the following day, even if Gullett and the Cincinnati ballclub could not. On July 2, the countries came together to form a communist regime under the title of “The Socialist Republic of Vietnam.” In spite of the Reds’ widening gap in the National League West, the importance of Gullett returning to the starting rotation was becoming ever-more apparent. Anderson had lost confidence in Billingham, had kept the recently struggling Acala away from teams that were loaded with left-handed bats, and had dismissed Darcy from the club. Only Nolan, Norman, and Zachry remained reliable starters in Sparky’s mind, and concern mounted about the team’s ability to defend the pennant against the Phillies and the Dodgers, despite the tremendous offensive production it was enjoying. The starting pitching deficit was most glaring on July 2, when the lowly Astros bombarded Riverfront Stadium with 25 hits over 14 innings. It was more than enough to top Hinton in his seventh appearance on the season in the first game of a doubleheader, while Andujar beat his old club for the second time 139

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in a week in the nightcap. Rose posted five hits for the Reds in the opener, but reinforced the worry that runs-scored alone would not win all the games necessary for Cincinnati while a large portion of the starting staff remained unreliable. Anderson was amazed that his team had plated an aggregate 180 runs more than the opposition so far on the year, but had “only” posted a .608 winning percentage — a figure Sparky thought should have been higher at this point. Things had become so desperate for the skipper, in fact, that he would summon Borbon from the bullpen to start a game against Montreal on July 6, marking the first start for Borbon in four years, which was one of only three starts in more than 350 appearances in his major league career. Still, it was Rose’s passion that continued to drive the team, and it electrified the Riverfront crowd one night later, on July 3. Leading off the third inning against Mike Cosgrove of the Astros, Rose stroked a ball towards the gap and hopped into his gallop, racing around second before flopping head-first into third for a triple, soon scoring on a Griffey sacrifice fly. Rose, who was about to pass Ted Williams for 42nd place on the all-time hit list, was often seen by Riverfront fans steaming around the basepaths in such a manner. His head bobbing and arms pumping all the way, the build-up led to a crescendo that everyone eagerly anticipated — his famous head-long dive into third base. “There has been no more exciting play in the last quarter-century of baseball,” Roger Kahn would write about him in 1989, “than one of Rose’s 135 major league three-base hits.” Rose had always claimed that a triple is made between home plate and first base, not in the sprint between second and third, as is commonly thought. It was yet another chance for Charlie Hustle to torch the Astros, whom he would rock for a .438 average in 1976. For any Cincinnatian, Rose’s spectacle was the perfect launch to the country’s bicentennial celebration on July 4, as President Ford urged Americans to “break out the flags, strike up the band, and light up the sky in the greatest Fourth of July any of us will ever see.” In Cincinnati, Enquirer reporter Walt Schaefer estimated that “45,000 decked the walls of Yeatman’s Cove Park and another 75,000, some six deep, lined the streets and milled on Fountain Square.” Rose’s energy propelled the club into a seven-game winning streak through July 9, on which date Cincinnati topped Pittsburgh in two extra-inning thrillers during a rare Friday twi-night doubleheader in front of 53,328 fans, the second-largest regular season crowd ever at Riverfront. Borbon would indeed start on July 6, going three poor innings. Ironically, Gullett saved the win for Eastwick in relief, Gullett’s first work since June 20. The Reds had taken advantage of two large absences on the Pittsburgh roster during the series. Stargell was battling a pulled groin muscle, and their top option out of the bullpen, Dave Giusti, was suffering from a torn muscle in his lower back. A Dodgers’ loss in St. Louis had pushed the Reds’ advantage in the West to seven games, while the Phillies continued to be baseball’s best team with a 53–25 record, good for nearly a ten-game lead on the Pirates in the East. The Reds’ series with the


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Pirates ended with two Cincinnati losses, including a combative affair on July 10 in which Bench was ejected from the game by jawing at home plate umpire John Kibler from the dugout, moments after Kibler had called him out on strikes. Anderson rushed to his catcher’s aid, and was nearly tossed as well. Sparky was already well known for his classic nose-to-nose spats with the men in blue. In an autobiography written in 1978, he would forecast the possible future use of instant replay in baseball — something which, despite his run-ins with the arbiters, he did not wish to see. “There are managers who say that instant replay should be used to decide close or disputed calls. I disagree. Let’s leave as much of the human element in the game as possible. You lose some, you win some.” The subject of umpire quality around the major leagues had been debated for as long as the game existed, but it now seemed to be coming to a head in the mid–1970s. Leading the informal probe was Maury Wills, who had just released a controversial new book entitled How to Steal a Pennant, in which the former stolen-base artist of the Dodgers had issued a scathing account of the quality of the National League workers. “Give or take a few, one-third of all the umpires in the National League are incompetent,” Wills claimed. Modeling a strong overall unit, each member of the Reds’ squad seemed to be struggling in some aspect of the game, but overall excelled in most. Morgan, for example, stole only three bases between June 7 and July 15, yet his average fell only to .326 during the same stretch. Bench, meanwhile, was still hovering around the .240 batting mark, but nonetheless had picked up eight critical RBIs in as many games since the start of the month after posting seven in all of June. The most consistent performer at the plate had been Foster, threatening to take another player-of-the-month award for June with his .330 clip, seven homers, and 20 RBIs during the month, which he had finished with a 16-game hitting streak. Griffey (.336), Foster (.333) and Rose (.331) were still outdistancing Morgan in the batting race after the sweep of the Pirates, while the unexpected force, Geronimo (.320), who had batted .356 in June, was not far behind. And Perez, while struggling to improve his power numbers and batting average, had contributed 43 RBIs in the past two months. But perhaps the most amazing component of the Big Red Machine in June 1976 was the bullpen. Eastwick, Borbon, and McEnaney combined for a miniscule 0.91 ERA and seven saves in a total of 40 appearances by the three men during the month. The starting staff had enjoyed its finest month in June as well, as Nolan (4–1, 2.91), Norman (3–0, 2.05), and even Gullett (3–1, 2.48) had dominated, while Zachry added three wins. Norman had been especially tough at home, now owning a 29–7 career record at Riverfront Stadium. Gullett was back on the positive side of the mind of Anderson, with his strong outing on July 11 against the Pirates being his first start in three weeks. The disappointments had been the bullpen-banished Billingham (0–3, 6.66) and Acala, who after his brilliant 5–0 start through May had seen his ERA jump to 5.46 in the following three weeks.

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The 1976 Cincinnati Reds **********

Although Kuhn had broken the spring training lockout in March and the season had begun successfully in April, there was still no formal agreement between the Players Association and the owners. The discussions of American League expansion in the interim had complicated matters further by potentially altering the number of teams with which a free agent could be permitted to negotiate (a stipulation brought by the owners from the earlier agreement); thus, the Reserve Clause remained at the root of the differences. In mid–June, the Reds had become the 16th team to reject the owners’ latest proposal from April 13 (under the suggestions of Marvin Miller), and a strike loomed once again. Progress had been made in one regard — the establishment of a new minimum major league salary, with both sides near an agreeable rate. The owners had offered a new minimum of $18,000, while the players were seeking $19,000. Additionally, the owners had offered to increase that figure by $1,000 per year through 1979; the players also sought the annual thousand-dollar increase, but wished to see that policy left indefinite. Seeing that unbridled free agency would be bad for the game, the players were open to a compromise. It was struck on July 12, 1976, the day before the All-Star Game, which added a special cause for celebration — as well as a huge sigh of relief — in the baseball world. The MLBPA’s executive board voted to approve a four-year agreement with the owners, thus (pending membership approval) ending the bitter negotiations that had dragged on for more than a year. The details of the agreement included that, after five years of service, a player could ask to be traded (and veto a trade to up to six teams). If such a player was not traded, he would become a free agent. In the player’s sixth year, he would automatically become a free agent and could openly negotiate with as many as half the clubs in the major leagues. A codicil was added that, if a player signed with another club via free agency, that player would be forbidden from changing teams a second time until five years had passed; teams who lost star players to free agency would be compensated with amateur draft choices. As a final kick, the owners agreed to increase their contributions to the players’ pension fund by approximately 15 percent each year through 1978, as well as augmenting the minimum major league salary to $21,000 by 1977. Marvin Miller pointed out to the press that the deal still had to be ratified by the union’s membership at large, but was confident it would pass. Specific details of the agreement would not be made public for another month. In being named the starting pitcher for the American League in the 1976 All-Star Game, Fidrych was on the biggest stage yet in the whirlwind that had engulfed his 21-year-old life. The awestruck yet calm rookie still did not feel like he belonged among his celebrated peers. “I didn’t really expect to be here, but then I never really expected to be in baseball either,” he said. “If I wasn’t playing baseball, I guess I’d be pumping gasoline for two-fifty an hour, maybe


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two dollars.” Before losing to the Kansas City Royals on July 9, Fidrych’s only setback before the All-Star break had been a 2–0 shutout by Tiant and the Red Sox back on May 25, in just the second start of his career. Even in the recent loss to the Royals, however, his league-best ERA had dropped even further, to 1.78, and with his 9–2 record, Fidrych was poised to become the first rookie to win 20 games in 22 years. Tiger Stadium in Detroit had been sold out for his last four starts at home, and Bird-Mania continued to sweep Motown with fury in a matter of weeks. With Fidrych taking over for the names of McLain and Lolich on the pitching side, the Tigers were also rebuilding offensively from their plodding, powerhitting teams of the late 1960s and early 1970s to one of youth and speed. While Kansas City third baseman George Brett (leading the American League in hitting at .365) was perhaps the brightest star on the AL roster, no story was more intriguing than the path taken to the All-Star Game by Detroit’s base-stealing center fielder Ron LeFlore, the leading vote-getter on the American side. LeFlore moved over to left field for the All-Star Game in deference to reigning MVP Fred Lynn, but the switch was embraced by the young player who had survived much more in recent years. LeFlore had been sent to prison in Michigan in 1971 for his participation in an armed robbery of a Detroit bar. While at the Jackson State Penitentiary, he was able to show off his athletic skills against local college and semi-pro clubs, which would visit to play the prison teams. Word ultimately reached the Tigers of the tremendous ability of LeFlore — who had never played organized baseball to that point — and arrangements were made by Campbell for his early release and a tryout at Tiger Stadium. LeFlore impressed club officials enough to be offered a contract; three years later in 1974, he was the MVP of the Florida State League, and the Tigers’ starting center fielder the following season. Nonetheless, life in 1976 had once again been a tragic up-and-down ride for LeFlore. His younger brother, Gerald, had been shot and killed on April 23 in the same rough neighborhood on Detroit’s east side from which Ron had escaped. LeFlore pressed on, however, to set a Detroitrecord 30-game hitting streak through May. LeFlore recalled that while he was in prison, the guards had allowed the inmates to watch on television the legendary 1971 All-Star Game, played in nearby Detroit and which featured six home runs from future Hall of Famers (Bench, Aaron, Jackson, Frank Robinson, Harmon Killebrew, and Roberto Clemente). The game occurred after LeFlore had gotten word of his upcoming tryout with the Tigers, and he proclaimed to his unbelieving cellmates that they would soon see him playing in an All-Star Game as well. Now, in 1976, he was one of seven players in the American League lineup who were first-time starters in the contest, as only Thurman Munson of the Yankees and Rod Carew of the Twins were “veterans” in this regard. The starting lineups:

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The 1976 Cincinnati Reds American League

National League

LeFlore, LF — DET Carew, 1B — MIN Brett, 3B — KC Munson, C — NYY Lynn, CF — BOS Harrah, SS — TEX Staub, RF — DET Grich, 2B — BAL Fidrych, P — DET

Rose, 3B — CIN Garvey, 1B — LA Morgan, 2B — CIN Foster, CF — CIN Luzinski, LF — PHI Bench, C — CIN Kingman, RF — NYM Concepcion, SS — CIN Jones, P — SD

Despite missing 15 starts to date on the year, Morgan won the Commissioner’s Trophy as the game’s leading vote-getter. He was already accustomed to Perez’s needling, who now because of the award would say, “Hey Morgan, when you were with the Houston Astros, nobody ever heard of you. We brought you to Cincinnati and made you a star.” In turn, Morgan thanked his teammates for their assistance in attaining the honor. Bench, meanwhile, was making his eighth straight start at catcher for the National League in the All-Star Game, outdistancing the Phillies’ Bob Boone by more than a million votes. The Phillies (five representatives) and the Reds (seven) comprised nearly half of the National League roster, underscoring the general dominance they had exerted over the league since the start of the season. Other reserve selections made by Anderson included Pirates outfielder Al Oliver, who was leading the league in hitting at the break at .363, as well as St. Louis’ McBride, who stood at .342. A controversial choice was Steve Swisher of the Cubs, who made the roster because Anderson wished to have three catchers (and, the fact that each team was required to have at least one representative). That being the case, many had felt that the honor should have gone to Chicago third baseman Madlock, the defending National League batting champion. Dave Kingman of the Mets, in right field, brought 30 home runs and 90 strikeouts into the game, figures that led baseball at the time. Some had chided Anderson for choosing Perez and Griffey to the team in addition to the five Cincinnati starters voted in by the fans, but Rose felt it was appropriate. “If I was hitting .220, I’d feel funny being the lineup,” he said. “But look at the way our guys are hitting. We belong in the lineup.” All seven Reds players were loudly booed by the Phillie fans upon their introductions. The same thing happened with American League coach Gene Mauch, who had piloted the Philadelphia club in their infamous fall from the pennant chase in 1964. Randy Jones, at 16–3 after beating the Cubs on July 8, was the first National League pitcher in history to enter the All-Star break with 16 wins. He was one shy of the major league record of 17, set by Vida Blue in 1971. Jones had an opportunity to make one more start before the break, on Sunday, July 11, but San Diego manager John McNamara instead wished to give him a rest. “I think 16 wins is enough work for half a season,” McNamara reasoned. When it was clear that McNamara would not use Jones in any capacity (starter or reliever)


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over the weekend, Sparky Anderson named him the starting pitcher for the National side. Anderson had twice managed the National League in the AllStar Game previously, losing 6–4 in the famous 1971 affair in Detroit before emerging victorious in the 1973 contest at Royals Stadium in Kansas City, 7–1. As the All-Star events were unfolding in Philadelphia, the Democratic National Convention was in the process of getting underway up the road in New York City, where Ohio Senator John Glenn addressed the throng. “Americans are strong,” he told the attendees. “The strength of our system [of government] is a magnificent tribute to the good sense and stability of the American people.” Nearly 64,000 Americans instead decided to gather in Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium that evening for the annual viewing of baseball’s best. It was the third-largest crowd even to witness an All-Star Game, trailing only the 1935 and 1954 versions played in Cleveland’s cavernous Municipal Stadium; it was also the largest collection to ever see a ballgame in Philadelphia to that time. After President Ford fired out the first ball, the National League took the field, winners of 12 of the previous 13 meetings between the circuits. The American Broadcasting Company (ABC) was handling the television broadcast of the AllStar Game for the first time, while the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) was conducting its first radio venture at the event as well after new deals were signed by the networks in the previous off-season. Ford had visited both locker rooms before the game, and Anderson was asked to introduce the president to the players. The National League fans in Philadelphia saw the excitement that LeFlore had been causing all season in the junior circuit when he laced a single to left field to start the game. A double play induced by a Jones sinker to Carew would end the threat, however, and the National bats went straight to work. Rose singled to center to start the bottom half, and he scored immediately on a Steve Garvey triple, wasting no time in jumping on the young Fidrych. The batted ball had actually been playable for LeFlore’s teammate, Staub, in right field, The 1976 season showed the continued but was misplayed as it skidded past development of outfielder George Foster, the first of three straight seasons in which him to the wall in right-center. Fos- he would lead the National League in ter’s RBI groundout later scored Gar- runs batted in (National Baseball Hall of vey for a 2–0 National League lead. Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York).

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Jones introduced his baffling “soft stuff ” to the Americans, as Staub would record the only other hit through three innings. Part of the Cincinnati contingent would add to the lead in the bottom of the third, when Foster socked two more RBIs with a long home run to center off Catfish Hunter while Morgan, who had singled, scored in front of him. More insurance was added in the eighth. Griffey joined the act with a run-scoring single and later crossed the plate on a long ball off the bat of Houston’s Cesar Cedeno. Montefusco, Rhoden, and Ken Forsch continued to silence the American League hitters, with Lynn providing the sole AL scoring with his bases-empty homer in the fourth off Seaver (who followed Jones to the mound) in what ended as a 7–1 National League romp. Foster took home the MVP award, which Anderson privately confided to Scherger had taken much of the pressure off Sparky. The skipper had been the recipient of some abuse by the fans in Philadelphia that felt hometown slugger Greg Luzinski should have been batting in the cleanup spot instead of Foster. It was the fifth straight victory and 13 of the last 14 for the National side, unbeaten since the famed battle in Detroit in 1971. Why the continued success for the National League? “Quality and depth,” answered Sparky. “For several years, our league has had better players than theirs. Not that they don’t have quality players. It’s just that we have more.” Added Rose more forcefully, “Our second-line players are better.” The box score: AL 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 — 1 5 0 NL 2 0 2 0 0 0 0 3 x — 7 10 0

American League

AB

R

H

RBI

LeFlore lf Yastrzemski lf Carew 1b Brett 3b Money 3b Munson c Fisk c Chambliss ph Lynn cf Otis ph Harrah ss Belanger ss Patek ss Staub rf Tiant p Wynegar ph Tanana p Grich 2b Garner 2b Fidrych p McRae ph

2 2 3 2 1 2 1 1 3 1 2 1 0 2 0 0 0 2 1 0 1

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

7. A Nation Celebrates, and a World Competes American League

AB

R

H

RBI

Hunter p Rivers ph, rf Totals

0 2 29

0 0 1

0 1 5

0 0 1

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DP: 1. Money-Garner-Carew PB: Munson (1) HR: Lynn (1, 4th inning off Seaver 0 on 2 out) Team LOB: 4 SB: Carew (1, 2nd base off Montefusco/Boone)

National League

AB

R

H

RBI

Rose 3b Oliver rf, lf Garvey 1b Cash 2b Morgan 2b Perez 1b Foster cf, rf Montefusco p Russell ss Luzinski lf Griffey rf Bench c Cedeno cf Kingman rf Boone c Concepcion ss Bowa ss Rhoden p Cey 3b Jones p Seaver p Schmidt 3b Forsch p Totals

3 1 3 1 3 0 3 0 1 3 1 2 2 2 2 2 1 0 0 1 1 1 0 33

1 0 1 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7

2 0 1 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 10

0 0 1 0 0 0 3 0 0 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 7

DP: 3. Morgan-Concepcion-Garvey, Morgan-Bowa-Garvey, CashRussell-Perez 3B: Garvey (1, off Fidrych); Rose (1, off Tiant) HR: Foster (1, 3rd inning off Hunter 1 on 1 out); Cedeno (1, 8th inning off Tanana 1 on 2 out) Team LOB: 3

American League

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Fidrych L (0–1) Hunter Tiant Tanana Totals

2 2 2 2 8

4 2 1 3 10

2 2 0 3 7

2 2 0 3 7

0 0 0 1 1

1 3 1 0 5

0 1 0 1 2

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The 1976 Cincinnati Reds National League

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Jones W (1–0) Seaver Montefusco Rhoden Forsch Totals

3 2 2 1 1 9

2 2 0 1 0 5

0 1 0 0 0 1

0 1 0 0 0 1

1 0 2 0 0 3

1 1 2 0 1 5

0 1 0 0 0 1

Umpires: HP — Harry Wendelstedt; 1B — Jerry Neudecker; 2B — Andy Olsen; 3B — Don Denkinger; LF — Satch Davidson; RF — Jim Evans Time of Game: 2:12 Attendance: 63,974

In yet another episode of a hard-luck 1976 for Johnny Bench, the catcher had to give way to Boone during the All-Star Game when Bench took a foul tip on his right shoulder, causing a large bruise. Making matters worse, Bench was hit in the finger on a pitch by Don Stanhouse of the Expos in his first game back after the break. While x-rays at Christ Hospital in Cincinnati were negative, the compilation of minor, annoying injuries was undoubtedly taking its toll on the normally indefatigable strong man of the Reds. It was thus apparent that Plummer, batting .305 at the time, would be asked to assume an even larger share of the duties behind the plate in the second half of the season. The Reds had entered the All-Star break 20 games over the .500 mark at 53–33, six games ahead of the Dodgers. The record was slightly off their pace of 1975, when they were 61–29 and leading by twelve-and-a-half at the time of the midsummer classic. As Jimmy Carter emerged from the Democratic Convention as the party’s nominee for president on July 15, the perhaps All-Star hungover Reds dropped their first game after the break, 4–3, to Montreal, as the National League West looked this way: Cincinnati Los Angeles San Diego Houston Atlanta San Francisco

W

L

Pct.

GB

53 48 43 42 40 35

34 39 45 45 46 53

.609 .552 .489 .483 .465 .398

— 5 10.5 11 12.5 18.5

In the American League West, Brett’s surprising Royals had opened an eight-game lead over the Texas Rangers while posting a better record (52–32) than the vaunted Reds. Meanwhile, things had gone from bad to worse for the defending American League champion Red Sox in the other division. They emerged from the break on July 15 struggling to maintain a .500 record (41–41) at the half way point of the season, trailing the Yankees by ten-and-a-half games in the East. Moreover, they had lost their beloved owner, Tom Yawkey, who was felled by leukemia at the age of 73 on July 9. Yawkey had owned the Red Sox for the past 43 years, purchasing the club from Bob Quinn in 1933. The organization had repeatedly denied rumors for months that Yawkey was ill,


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despite the fact he was seen spending most of 1976 in a hospital bed. Initial reports had listed former Red Sox center fielder Dom DiMaggio— brother of Joe DiMaggio— as heading an investment group with four other Boston-area businessmen to buy the team. Even with the troubles of the Red Sox on the field, the popularity of baseball in Boston was at an all-time high; a week earlier, on July 8, the franchise passed the one-million mark in attendance at the earliest point in the season in its history. Ten days after Yawkey’s death on July 19, Darrell Johnson was fired as the Boston manager, just nine months removed from a World Series appearance, with third-base coach Don Zimmer taking over as the interim leader. “The way the team has been going,” Johnson conceded, “I don’t blame [general manager] Dick O’Connell one bit. In my opinion, it was time for a change — but I wouldn’t change anything I did one bit.” The 45-year-old Zimmer had previously managed the Padres in 1972 and 1973. O’Connell admitted that “we cannot blame everything on Darrell Johnson [who had been named the 1975 Manager of the Year], but it’s easier to change managers than the team.” Zimmer knew he needed to re-establish order on the team. “The players have got to know that I’m going to be the boss,” he announced. “Rules have to be abided by. You can’t win without rules. If I say the bar in the club hotel is off-limits, it’s off-limits. If I say everybody has to be in uniform by 4:30 every night, that’s it.” Although ten years his elder, Zimmer had been an old friend of Pete Rose back in Cincinnati, as their two fathers would often bring the sons along on their trips to the horse racing tracks around town (joining another future majorleaguer in Eddie Brinkman and his father as well). The attention of sports fans had been divided between the All-Star Game and the upcoming Summer Olympic Games, set to begin July 17 in Montreal. (The Reds were just in the process of leaving Montreal on the 17th, finishing up a three-game series against the Expos to start the post-break round of ballgames. Taking two of three, it would be their last meeting with Montreal on the year.) However, the games would commence under a shroud of anxiety, coming in the wake of the murder of eleven athletes from Israel by Palestinian terrorists at the 1972 games in Munich. As the XXI Olympiad approached, no one knew for sure if safety would accompany the attendees this time. “There is the scent of fear at the Olympic Village, pervasive as the nasty smell of fresh paint,” writer Stan Hochman noticed as the preparations culminated a few days before tens of thousands would start arriving in Montreal from all over the world. “You cannot chase the smell by opening windows. You open the window and look out, and there is that Canadian soldier walking with his automatic rifle.” Even in light of the enormous task facing them, local officials were nonetheless confident. “Nothing is going to happen this time,” assured Montreal police officer Bob Ranson from the security headquarters. “We’ve got 300 police in this building alone. Twelve hours on, twelve hours off. Seven days a week. No days off from now until it’s over.” Security, however, was not the only

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issue needing to be resolved. The International Olympic Committee had threatened to cancel the games altogether because of Canada’s reluctance to admit Taiwanese athletes into the country. The U.S. Olympic Committee charged that the games would be “just another track meet” without the IOC’s support, and suggested the American athletes stay at home if the IOC did not resolve the issue, a position specifically articulated by USOC president Phillip Krumm. “We are seriously considering withdrawing from the Montreal Olympic Games,” Krumm speculated on July 14. “Mexico has already told us that it would follow suit, and there are other countries of the same mind. It may be six or it may be 70, but it would turn the games into nothing.” The disagreement stemmed from Canada’s recognition of the sovereignty of the Communist Peoples’ Republic of China, and its consequent lack of recognition of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Canadian prime minister Pierre Trudeau, in fact, threatened to forbid the Taiwanese athletes visas into his country unless they agreed to march in the opening ceremonies of the games under a different banner than their proposed one, which was to read “Republic of China,” a stance the Taiwanese were unwilling to amend. Use of the Games for political statements had already been conducted by other nations; on July 9, Tanzania announced that it would not be sending its athletes to Montreal in protest against New Zealand, which had intimate athletic ties with South Africa. Nigeria, Somalia, and Mauritius soon followed suit with Tanzania’s lead, and before long, all black nations in Africa threatened to withdraw as well. As for the United States’ prospects for success at the games, most hopes rested with the usual areas of competition. “United States medal chances in the 1976 Olympic Games seem best in the sports where Uncle Sam has traditionally been the strongest,” the Associated Press reported. “Those are the glamour sports of the Games— basketball, swimming, track and field, and boxing.” Much of the attention would be focused on the basketball court, where University of North Carolina coach Dean Smith would be leading a host of college all-stars against the world. Smith’s outfit would be led by Scott May and Quinn Buckner, fresh off their national championship season at Indiana University, where Bob Knight’s team posted the last undefeated season in major-college history. The 1972 Games marked the first-ever loss for the United States in Olympic basketball competition when the Soviet Union won a controversial gold-medal game in which the final three seconds was replayed twice due to an official’s suspicious reversal of calls. In the boxing ring, coach Pat Nappi believed that his team was the strongest American contingent since the collection that dominated the 1960 Games behind Cassius Clay. Trying to heighten the spirits of the American athletes was President Ford, who visited the team at its staging area (en route to Montreal) on the campus of the State University of New York at Plattsburgh, and assured the nation that America would indeed participate in the games. “I think it’s tragic that international politics and foreign policy get involved in international sport competition,” said Ford,


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a former football star at the University of Michigan. “Competition between athletes from all countries ought to be stimulated rather than curtailed.” Ford was continuing his hotly-contested battle with Reagan for the Republican presidential nomination to be announced the following month, with the incumbent recently sweeping all 35 state delegate commitments from Connecticut, while Reagan had grabbed all 20 delegates in Utah. “We’re told that we’re having a solid economic recovery; I don’t believe that,” Reagan, the California governor from 1967 to 1975, said of his rival’s leadership. “We’ve been given the illusion of prosperity in an election year.” While most analysts were predicting that Ford would ultimately outdistance Reagan for the nomination, they were also describing Reagan as a rising star and difference-maker in American politics. The opening ceremonies of the Olympics went off in grand style, with Cincinnati resident Gary Hall carrying the American flag as the United States team entered the stadium in front of Queen Elizabeth II of England and thousands of other spectators. Hall, making his third and final appearance as a swimmer at the Games, was accompanied by his two-year-old son, Gary Jr., who would also become an aspiring swimmer himself. As soon as the Games were completed, Hall returned to Cincinnati to become a full-time medical student at the University of Cincinnati. He would ultimately take home a bronze medal in the 100-meter butterfly, following up his silver medals from the previous two Olympics, and he took a victory lap around the pool with Gary, Jr., in his arms. While never achieving gold, Hall took pride in what he and his teammates had accomplished. “Tonight gave me my greatest thrill,” he said of posing on the medal stand for one final time on July 21. “Actually, my greatest thrill was to just get on the team. The medal was probably beyond my greatest dream. Going in, I said I’d be happy no matter what happened, and just try to do my best.... This [American swim] team is the greatest of all time.” Hall’s teammates quickly asserted their dominance in the sport when Americans Mike Brunner, Steve Greg, and Billy Forrester placed 1-2-3 in the 200-meter butterfly, one of the first medal events to take place. Increasing the medal count in the water for the United States was a 16-year-old diver from El Cajon, California, named Greg Louganis, who earned silver in the platform competition. In addition to Hall, among the other Ohio athletes represented in Montreal was hurdler Edwin Moses from Dayton, a junior at Morehouse College who was taking time out from his studies to set the world record in the 400-meter hurdles at 47.64 seconds, the first time an American had claimed gold in the event in twelve years. The most stirring moment in the opening ceremonies, however, occurred when Israeli athletes marched into the parade area. They were met with cheers from the crowd as they wore black ribbons around their chests in memory of their comrades who had fallen victim to the terrorist attacks at the 1972 Games. No one, however, would shine brighter at the Games than 14-year-old Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci. The Olympic Games had never seen a perfect

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ten-point score in the sport, but by the third day of the Montreal gathering, Comaneci had posted three— on the uneven bars, the balance beam, and an optional turn she had performed on the uneven bars as well. By the end of the Montreal Games, Comaneci would record a total of seven perfect scores, dominating the competition as no one ever had in gymnastics. What writers covering the events noticed most, however, was the cold, stoic, Iron Curtain glare she seemed to give when asked about her performances. “I will try to perfect my present routine and try to add new things,” she responded quickly, when asked about the feeling of winning the gold medal. While Nadia stole many hearts, the imagination of fans was also captured by American decathlete Bruce Jenner, who stormed to the gold medal with a world-record 8,634 points among the ten events. The most impressive performance in the team events belonged to the U.S. basketball contingent, the youngest squad ever to take the floor for the Americans. They subdued Yugoslavia, 95–74, in the gold medal game after the Yugoslavs had upset the Soviet Union in a semi-final match. Adrian Dantley of the University of Notre Dame scored 30 points in the championship game, which was played in front of 16,000 fans in the historic Montreal Forum. Unlike at the Olympics, the bitter politics and policy at last appeared headed for a dissolution in baseball. Bob Bailey, the new player representative for the Reds, reported that his teammates looked ready to ratify the new agreement, as did the 600 or so union members from the other clubs, a process Miller figured would take two weeks or more. (While an effective communicator, Bailey was perhaps getting too comfortable in his limited playing role among his talented teammates. When the Reds played in Montreal, Bailey had to be retrieved from the visitors’ clubhouse where he was found shaving, and was reminded that he had to play defense in the bottom of the ninth inning after pinch-hitting in the top half.) As the owners signed the deal on July 19, Kuhn celebrated the fact that among the 24 team leaders, “there were 17 votes for approval, including a majority in both leagues.” Only 13 votes (a simple majority) was needed for the measure to pass, but at least five votes had to come from within each league. The omens remained positive; while Bob Watson had scored the one millionth run a year earlier, the one-billionth spectator was expected to enter the turnstiles in Major League Baseball sometime during the last few days of July. By Monday, July 26, the Associated Press cited the all-time count at 999,286,101. To be certain, the game needed all of the good karma it could acquire. The Reds were collectively in high spirits as well, rocketing out of the AllStar break by winning four of the first five games after the three-day layoff (although hardly considered a “layoff ” to the numerous Cincinnati players working over the All-Star stretch). The next setback the following week was Nolan’s defeat by Koosman and the Mets on July 20, the third straight start in which Nolan had been foiled in attempting to become the 13th Reds pitcher to


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win 100 games. Earlier in the evening, Wapakoneta, Ohio, native Neil Armstrong had thrown out the first pitch at Riverfront Stadium, marking the seventh anniversary of his setting foot on the moon. Armstrong had settled in southwestern Ohio long after spending much of his childhood growing up in various other parts of the state, and for the past five years had taught in the Aerospace Engineering department across campus from where Gary Hall was studying at the University of Cincinnati. It was truly a celebrated date for the United States space program, for earlier that same day, the Viking 1 explorer had descended upon the surface of Mars, originally scheduled to make its landing on the bicentennial more than two weeks earlier but was forced to delay in an effort by technicians to find a safe landing spot for the probe. While Armstrong was offering the first pitch and the Viking 1 was doing its duty, Henry Aaron was in the process of sending up his final lunar shot as a Milwaukee Brewer. In the seventh inning of a game against the California Angels in Milwaukee, Aaron took hold of a Dick Drago pitch with his patented short, quick swing, and deposited the ball over the left field wall in County Stadium for his 755th, and last, home run. Just three days later, Sadaharu Oh would become the only player in Japanese baseball history to hit 700 home runs. The landmark 100th win for Nolan came five days later in Atlanta, on July 25. With the help of Eastwick’s 11th save, the Reds held on to down the Braves, 7–6, while Rose socked a lead-off homer for his 692nd extra-base hit, tying him with Frank Robinson — like Vada Pinson, the veteran who was so kind to Rose in his rookie year —for the all-time Reds lead. Rose would break the record the following day with yet another lead-off homer, this time against the Giants; additionally, Rose was on pace to break Robinson’s club mark for runs scored in a season of 134. While some — not the least of which was Anderson — still bemoaned the inconsistency of the pitching staff, positive aspects were indeed present. When Norman (8–2) shut out the Mets on July 21, it was the 22nd complete game for the Reds’ starting staff on the year, which matched their entire total from the glorious 1975 season. Acala (9–2) made it 23 complete games for the staff the following night with his own triumph in Atlanta, resurrecting his season with a second straight win after being removed from the rotation by Anderson for much of July. When Norman posted yet another complete-game victory five days later, he had lowered his National League–best ERA to 2.36. The resurgence of the starting staff in July was most impressive, considering the fact that it had relied so heavily on the fantastic bullpen in June. Just as the manager had been searching for answers within the rotation, he was now scratching his head for solutions to the relief corps. Hinton, the left-handed pick-up from the White Sox, had been a disappointment with his 1–2 record and 7.50 ERA. He was sent to Indianapolis on July 29, and replaced by rookie right-hander Manny Sarmiento, a 22 year old from Venezuela with a rocket arm who had notched 11 wins in relief for the Indy farm club. Anderson was

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no longer looking for balance in the bullpen between lefthanders and righthanders, which was the reason for promoting Hinton in favor of Darcy back in June; now, he only wished for simple reliability. “We have great reports on him,” Sparky said of the new pitching addition. “And, Dave Concepcion [a fellow Venezuelan] has been trying for two years to get me to bring him up to the big leagues.” It would still take a while for Anderson to get familiar with the new pitcher, as for weeks afterwards, he would sometimes pronounce his name as “Sarmenteeno.” Upon saying goodbye, Sarmiento’s Indianapolis teammates wondered why he was leaving his beloved guitar behind, which was a favorite hit on the team’s road trips. “Here I got to think baseball,” the newest Red said of being in Cincinnati. He picked up a win in his first major league appearance, on July 30, coming to the aid of Gullett in San Diego and firing three effective innings. The “mutual assistance” of the starters and the relievers was further proof of the cohesive unit that the entire outfit had truly become. The defensive play had been stellar all along. Through the first 111 games of the 1976 season, the Reds would commit a mere 69 errors while orchestrating all their moves together as an efficient unit. The concept of “team,” in fact, was instilled in every aspect of the Reds players’ conduct on the field. One time Wagner called Rose in Atlanta and told him to remove his number “14” from the back of his helmet in order to be the same as everyone else. Anderson was looking to give some of the starting position players a rest, and he wanted to begin with Perez and at least one of the outfielders. Many had questioned his decision to put Perez on the National League All-Star roster with the first baseman hitting only .259 heading into the break and batting only .186 in the past six weeks. Driessen, his main substitute, had posted a fine .313 mark in spot duty at first and in the outfield, and a platoon of Driessen against right-handed pitching and Perez against lefties appeared to some as a reasonable possibility. Anderson, however, was not interested in such a move because he did not want Perez to get rusty on the dugout bench for any extended length of time. In a few days it would finally be Armbrister’s turn, getting a chance in the place of Griffey. Would Armbrister, making only his fifth start of the year, use his noted bunting skills against the Padres? He answered the question quickly by homering in his first two at-bats— half the total home runs he would post in his major league career — and adding two more hits later in the day while Norman tossed another complete-game win, 12–1. Coming with the spoils of victory for Armbrister, however, were also the perils. After the second home run, embarrassed pitcher Brent Strom of the Padres sent a fastball high-and-tight to Armbrister in his next plate appearance. The pitch nipped his batting helmet, and home plate umpire John McSherry removed his mask to issue Strom a warning. “I’m glad he didn’t throw it any lower,” Armbrister said, citing the vulnerable area near the temple just under the helmet. “Any lower and he would have got me. I didn’t think he’d throw at me — I mean, I


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only get out there once every month, month-and-a-half.” The minor incident came in the wake of a more serious “beanball” war in Baltimore between the Yankees and Orioles on July 27, in which New York pitcher Dock Ellis nailed Reggie Jackson in the face with a fastball, to ignite a bench-clearing fracas. “The beaning of Jackson, sidelined the next three days, was either an accident or a crime of passion,” suggested Thomas Boswell, who was opposed to the age-old baseball tradition of each team’s pitcher protecting his own players by reciprocating the act. “Either would be comprehensible. But the next stage — retaliation — turns a game into a potential tragedy.” As for Armbrister’s perspective, he shrugged off his experience as a part of the game, and his batting performance on the incredible day raised his average to .415 in his limited duty. Also showing the quality of the Reds’ depth recently had been Driessen, who had batted .404 (21-for-52) with 14 RBIs in July while playing in relief of Griffey and Perez; Griffey, meanwhile, had hit .376 in July. And with his latest victory, Norman’s ERA, still tops in the National League, dipped down further to 2.27. With the march towards the pennant in full swing once again, Bench’s health was the only ongoing concern. He seemed to be stricken with a new misfortune each day; in the third week of July, the back spasms had returned to haunt him, which had first plagued the catcher in Houston early in the season. The Reds completed July with their strongest month of the season to date, posting a 20–9 mark (including an 8–1 record on the road) and nearly a double-digit lead on the Dodgers while Marty Brennaman celebrated his 34th birthday in the last week. Cincinnati Los Angeles Houston San Diego Atlanta San Francisco

W

L

Pct.

GB

66 55 54 49 46 46

38 46 52 56 56 58

.635 .545 .509 .467 .451 .442

— 9.5 13 17.5 19 20

Even though all the teams feared the Reds, it appeared to be the summer of the Phillies, who continued to own baseball’s best record at 67–32. The Philadelphia ballclub had opened a ten-and-a-half game lead over Pittsburgh in the East, an advantage that had been as large as 13 games near the end of the month. People had expected grand events in 1976, the nation’s 200th year, and baseball had provided many of them. On July 28 at Oakland, two pitchers— a washed-up has-been and an untested rookie —combined on the unlikeliest of no-hit games. John “Blue Moon” Odom, yet another castoff of Charlie Finley’s championship teams in Oakland and in what would be the final season of his career, had been looking to salvage one last flicker of glory on the South Side of Chicago with the White Sox. In his old ballpark, Odom held his former teammates hitless and to one unearned run for five innings; unfortunately,

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Odom had also issued nine walks, and had fatigued. To his relief came young Francisco Barrios, who was in his first full season in the big leagues. Barrios finished the final four frames in the same manner Odom had begun, adding only two walks to the total of eleven. The likes of Campeneris, Rudi, Bando, and Tenace were held without a safe hit as Barrios capped a 2–1 win, notching not only a piece of a no-hitter but a save as well. A’s manager Chuck Tanner described the scene as “the most tainted no-hitter I’ve ever seen — or maybe I should call it the funniest.” It was the first time in major league history that two pitchers had combined for a winning no-hitter in a nine-inning contest. Nonetheless, outlandish White Sox owner Bill Veeck would host an even more bizarre event for his fans just two weeks later when the team took the field at Comiskey Park for a doubleheader against the Royals while wearing short pants. Shattering the summer of serenity and patriotism, however, was the news that broke out of New York City on July 30, although the magnitude of the occurrence would grow worse in passing time. Earlier that morning, an unknown assailant pulled a gun out of a paper bag and killed a pedestrian in the Bronx, while wounding another. The identity of the gunman, David Richard Berkowitz, would not be revealed for another year, during which time the entire city would remain gripped in fear as similar incidents would repeatedly surface.

8

An Historic Finish You give us the pitching some of these clubs have and no one could touch us. But God has a way of not arranging that, because it’s not as much fun. — Sparky Anderson

While there were many such candidates wearing a Cincinnati uniform, George Foster was certainly making a strong bid for the 1976 National League Most Valuable Player Award. The evidence was empirical as it was theoretical, as Foster was named the NL Player of the Month for the second consecutive time at the end of July after batting .315 with six home runs and 28 RBIs. Rose, for one, was most certain to whom the ultimate individual honor should go for 1976. “Let me put it this way. I’m having a good year. Joe’s [Morgan] having a good year. But George Foster is having an MVP year.” In addition to the surge in the standings for the Cincinnati team, unprecedented numbers were coming to watch them do it. The Reds had drawn more than 657,000 fans to Riverfront in July alone, the first time the team had lured 600,000 home attendees in any month. The Reds completed their four-game sweep of San Diego on the banks of the Ohio on August 1, finishing things with their first victory over Randy Jones in fourteen months. (Much of the most recent San Diego news coverage had shifted away from Jones and onto a fellow hurler, rookie Butch Metzger, who would set a record by winning his first thirteen decisions in the major leagues before finally losing on August 28.) The team appeared to have a lone hurdle in its path as it rounded the turn towards its second straight pennant — an immediate, brutal 13-game road trip, its longest of the year, which would stretch from coast to coast. From August 2 until the 15th, the Reds would travel to San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York in succession, looking to solidify their position by accumulating some key victories in opponents’ home parks. Among the slate, all eyes were especially focused on the series with the Hollywood men, whose last chance to catch Cincinnati rested in their hopes of taking all the games in Dodger Stadium. While such a vast 157

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expedition would be taxing with even a comfortable ride, the Reds had to endure an extra scare during their flight to the Bay Area. A coffee-maker in the plane’s galley caught fire after mishandling by a stewardess, causing a pilot to rush into the cabin with an extinguisher to calm the small blaze before it spread. When the excitement was over, Brennaman turned to Anderson and said, “Well, at least you’re going down nine [games] in front,” to which all within earshot laughed. While Walter Alston’s team had comfortably settled into its stylish new home of Dodger Stadium in the past 15 years after moving west from Brooklyn, things could not have been more uncertain for their former neighbors in Gotham, the Giants, whose owner Horace Stoneham had sought more profitability in northern California. Now, with the cold winds blowing into Candlestick Park, there was some question as to whether the Giants’ franchise would even stay in San Francisco for the long-haul, even with the new ownership of Robert Lurie. “To be brutally honest, they have double-crossed a town that was passionately eager to take them back,” wrote Wells Twombly in the San Francisco Examiner about the players who, in his opinion, had not given their best efforts. “Lately some of them have reacted like spoiled children. They gripe, carp, and complain. They roll over on the rug and kick and scream. They threaten to turn blue if the newspapers don’t lie like Nazi house organs and call them the most splendid athletes on the face of the earth.” Attendance had fallen off steadily at Candlestick by 1976, with the least number of fans coming through the turnstiles in the National League for the past two seasons (the Giants would finish 1976 in last place in home attendance once again, although they would surpass their 1975 total). Hertzel chimed in on the dire situation in San Francisco, borrowing a line from the salty Leo Durocher in pointing out that “you can’t back up the truck and take out the garbage,” which Durocher made famous when he attempted to clean up the Cubs roster in the mid–1960s. “There should be change,” Hertzel continued. “The ballpark must go. That being an impossibility, then the franchise must go. “Remember two important facts. San Francisco doesn’t want baseball. And baseball doesn’t want San Francisco. Do not keep the marriage going just to save the children.” Even with the champion Reds in town, only one contest in the three-game set would draw more than 7,000 onlookers. It was considered quite troubling that one of the proud franchises in baseball appeared to be dying, just as the business side of the game appeared to be stabilizing. The Players Association had overwhelmingly ratified the new collective bargaining agreement on August 3, and early reports from Miller had the union membership approving the measure at higher than a 95 percent rate. “Once there was pride in being a Giant,” Hertzel had also written the last time the San Francisco club had visited Cincinnati. “There was a tradition of excellence, built through the years.... This is no more.” The up-again, down-again situation of the Reds’ starting rotation sur-


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The talented Don Gullett frustrated opposing batters — as well as the Reds executives — in 1976 (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York).

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faced yet again in San Francisco, with the main characters taking center stage once more. Gullett — at which no one was surprised — again complained of a “tired” arm. Most disappointing was that after posting his best month of the season in June (a 2.48 ERA), Gullett had gone on to have his worst in July (5.59). Not wishing to take any chances in the season’s final weeks, Anderson planned to rest Gullett all the way through the West Coast part of the trip, in addition to having him examined by Dr. Jobe (who had performed the surgery on Nolan’s arm, in addition to the ground-breaking operation of Tommy John) while the team stayed in Los Angeles. Bob Howsam was now starting to air his frustration publicly about Gullett. “He’s got to improve the rest of the season before he’ll even be a steady pitcher for us,” he assessed the situation frankly. In Gullett’s place to start the first game in San Francisco, Anderson retrieved Billingham from the bullpen. Anderson had given him one last chance to start on July 27 against the Giants at home, but Billingham was shelled another time, and a final banishment now seemed imminent. However, left with little choice with Gullett down, old Jack got the ball. He responded in heroic fashion, recording perhaps his greatest effort of the year in a three-hit shutout, giving the Reds 16 wins in their last 20 games. Magically revitalized as well was Bench, who was riding a nine-game hitting streak in the course of which he was batting .452. It was, ironically, one final ailment that seemed to cause his others to heal. His biggest problem had been the back spasms he had been suffering since early in the season, although recently he was feeling dehydrated from catching in the hot months of late summer. Consequently, trainer Larry Starr gave him salt tablets to guard against losing too much fluid. After taking the tablets for a few days, Bench noticed that the spasms in his back were gradually going away. By the middle of August, he reported feeling as healthy as he had been all year, and it showed with his steady RBI production, now up to 59 on the year; it showed even further in his continued stolen-base efficiency, as through August 8, he had swiped 24 bags in a row without being thrown out. Even with his struggles at the plate over the summer (having posted only ten home runs), Bench felt that if he could reach 100 RBIs by the end of the season, he would have contributed on the offensive side. It was also time for salt tablets in Wilmington, Ohio, where the Cincinnati Bengals of the National Football League were sweating their way through pre-season training camp. The Bengals had landed prized running back Archie Griffin of Ohio State University, the two-time winner of the Heisman Trophy, and most of the media and fan interest centered on him as the team conducted its practices. “They pour into Wilmington,” described Ray Buck, “and stand in the blistering sun for hours. Some are there just to catch a glimpse of Archie touching his toes. Fathers stare, small children squirm with delight. Forget the buckeye tree —Archie Griffin has become the state symbol.” Griffin had been impressive in early auditions for the Bengals, leading them in rushing in their first two pre-season games against the Green Bay Packers (12 carries for 49


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yards) and Buffalo Bills (five for 64). Overall prospects were bright for the team in ’76, too, with the return of veteran quarterback Ken Anderson from tiny Augustana College in Illinois. Fans and record-watchers were waiting for Anderson to throw his first 34 passes in the regular season, which was when Anderson would become the NFL’s all-time leading passer. He had attempted 1,466 passes coming into 1976, and needed 1,500 to qualify. His career rating was 85.5, better than Sonny Jurgenson’s 82.6. Anderson entered 1976 with 10,959 yards, 69 touchdown passes, 44 interceptions, and a 59 percent completion rate. Taking two of three from San Francisco, the Reds moved their invasion down the coast to Los Angeles; despite their desperate status, the Dodgers proved to be no match for Anderson’s rampaging men. Years later, Sparky would reveal his belief that in the four critical games against the Dodgers during August 5–8, his team “played the best ball I had seen in seven years with the club.” They swept all four contests, holding Alston’s dangerous offense to a total of nine runs. Norman had suddenly risen in recent weeks to be the true stopper among the starters, posting his sixth complete game in his last seven starts in the opener while crafting a 3–2 gem. His ERA during these starts was a tiny 1.37. “He is, right now, the best pitcher in the National League,” his manager affirmed. Reggie Smith, the Dodgers’ recently-acquired outfielder from the Cardinals, went as far as to say that Norman was “the toughest pitcher I’ve ever faced.” During the evening, Rose inched ahead of Griffey in the National League batting race by a single point (.335 to .334), while Perez’s 12th homer in the sixth inning proved to be the difference in beating Don Sutton. All-Star Rick Rhoden, who had not lost in nine decisions in 1976, was the victim the next night, bowing to Acala and Eastwick, 7–4. Rookie Pat Zachry, who to date had permitted two earned runs in just 25 innings against the Dodgers, topped Tommy John, 4–1. And finally there was Billingham, who finished things by authoring his second straight win in his resurgence, besting former Cub phenom Hooton on Sunday afternoon, August 8, by a 3–2 score. The four-game sweep left Los Angeles a staggering 13 games behind the front-running Reds, and the rigor mortis was finally starting to take hold on Dodger Nation. REDS END PENNANT CHASE

This was the headline of the sports page of the Los Angeles Herald-Examiner. In fact, all had appeared resigned to this fate in the San Fernando Valley even with seven weeks remaining in the regular season. Therefore, by the time the Reds arrived in Chicago on August 10, no one expected the listless Cubs to offer much resistance. The expected shortcomings of the Cubs’ pitching staff at the season’s beginning had come to fruition, and the only remaining drama for the North Siders was to see if Bill Madlock could successfully defend his National League batting crown in the final six weeks against Rose, Griffey, and other challengers from around the circuit. By mid–July, it had appeared that Madlock was falling off the radar screen, in dan-

162


ger of dropping below the .300 mark at the mid-point of the schedule. In the Cubs’ last series in Montreal, however, Madlock had knocked eight hits in three games, and was on Rose’s tail for the league lead at .327, only six points behind as play began at Wrigley. Madlock posted two more hits in the opener, raising his average against the Reds on the year to .520 (after hitting .538 against Cincinnati the previous season), as Nolan was beaten by Ray Burris. Madlock raised his mark further in game two, swatting three more hits off various Reds hurlers before Zachry was able to secure a win in relief. Acala and Sarmiento cooled Madlock in the finale, as Foster passed the 100-RBI mark for the season with his two home runs off Cubs bullpen mainstays Sutter and Garman, allowing the Reds to take two of three in the Windy City. Coming along even further was Bench, who had five hits (including two homers) and five RBIs in the series. “Reports of Johnny Bench’s baseball demise have been greatly exaggerated,” announced Randy Harvey, covering the scene for the Chicago Sun-Times. “There isn’t a rocking chair in front of his locker. He hasn’t taken up needlepoint. He had no need for Geritol.” As always, Wrigley provided the cure for any disease a Reds (or any visiting National League) hitter might be suffering. Freddie Norman just shook his head when looking around the so-called “friendly confines” of Wrigley Field. “If I were ever going to ask the Reds to trade me,” he laughed, “one of the six teams I’d say I wouldn’t report to is the Cubs. There’s no way I’d come to this club.” Perez, from the batter’s standpoint, wasn’t so sure. “Next year, I play here for the Cubs,” he dreamed, looking up into the gusty, warm August winds that blew over the left field wall at Wrigley. Part of what allowed Madlock back into the batting race was the slump in which Rose found himself, which may have been partly due to the reduced duty in which Anderson had employed him in the previous two weeks. While missing only one start since the beginning of August, Rose had been lifted early in several of the contests prior to going hitless in Chicago in 15 at-bats. He also had gone zero for his last five in Los Angeles, marking the first time in a long while that the batting machine could recall being hitless in 20 trips to the plate. Even so, Rose (as always) was able to put a positive spin on the topic. “Who could go 20 at-bats without a hit and still lead the league in hits and runs scored, and still have a shot at the batting title?” Thus, he was in an edgy mood as the team came to New York, a place in which he was already unpopular. To add to his unwelcomeness, he made known his long-standing feelings to the local press that Shea Stadium had the worst lights in the National League, saying that he could not see the stitches on the baseball. (More than one NL umpire agreed with Rose’s sentiment about the poor lighting.) Added a scoffing Anderson in agreement about the stadium’s maintenance difficulties, “It takes a cannon to get a ball through that high infield grass.” The welcome mat had certainly not been laid for Anderson’s troops; during the Reds’ stay at the New York Sheraton, four of their rooms were burglarized while the team was playing at Shea. To make matters worse, the Mets’ formidable pitching staff had given the


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Cincinnati batters trouble all year, limiting sluggers Bench and Perez to .105 and .125 averages, respectively, against New York on the season (Concepcion, interestingly, was able to hit .366 versus the Mets’ hurlers in ’76). Fortunately for the Reds, missing them during the series was not only Seaver and Matlack (out of turn in their regular starts), but also the imposing Dave Kingman from the batting order. Kingman was nearing a return to the lineup from torn tendons in his thumb, an injury he had suffered on July 19 after his appearance in the All-Star Game. In fact, it would be during the final game of the series with the Reds in which Kingman would be at a local hospital, having a pin removed from the surgically repaired area. At the time of the injury, Kingman was on pace to threaten Roger Maris’ single-season home run record of 61 (or at least Hack Wilson’s National League record of 56), having slugged 32 prior to getting hurt, a figure that was nearly half of the Mets’ team total. Since then, he had been a lame-duck leader in the National League home run chase, and Schmidt was closing in with 31 by the time Kingman starting swinging a bat in practice once again on August 14. Kingman injured the thumb while diving for a sinking liner off the bat of Braves pitcher Phil Niekro in Shea Stadium. Kingman’s mere physical presence (like his contemporary, Winfield, and Frank Howard before them) altered the approach of the pitcher; he was the newest power phenomenon in the game. “He is a clanking six-foot-six,” Tom Callahan wrote of the imposing slammer, “and hits baseballs not just out of stadiums, but across the street, and up the block, until they land on porch roofs and bring the residents out howling.... He has plunked three different houses in Chicago this season.” Kingman, Winfield, Stargell, and a handful of other similar-style power hitters in the 1970s were, in a sense, arriving before their time. Long before the flood of long-ball swatters appeared in the 1990s (in both quantity and distance), batters like Stargell and Kingman were becoming individual spectacles within the game, players whose home run hitting exploits were the sole reason that certain fans would cite for coming to the ballpark. And, long before the conspiracy theories of “juiced” baseballs began appearing in the ’90s, such a change in the ball was noted in the middle portion of the 1970s as well. Because of a temporary short supply of horses for use, professional baseball had switched from horsehide-covered balls to cowhide in 1974. Rose started calling the new cowhide balls “Haiti Balls,” because “Sewn in Haiti” was printed on them. He pointed out that it was a “Haiti Ball” that Stargell hit out of Dodger Stadium in 1973, becoming the first player ever to transcend the park’s boundaries from home plate. (Interestingly, in the early ’60s, Rose and Stargell were almost traded straight-up for each other when they were in the minors. A Pirates’ scout, however, nixed the deal. “All Rose can do is hustle,” the scout insisted in his report.) Zachry started the first game in Shea on August 14, and while he could not overcome the Mets in a tough 2–1 loss, he survived a greater scare in the first inning. Plummer was catching in place of Bench, and had struck Zachry in the

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cheekbone with the normal return throw after a pitch. Zachry had bemoaned the fact that the pitch had been called a ball, and momentarily took his eye off the sphere. It caused a deep bruise but no significant fracture, and the rookie was able to stay in the rotation. The Reds’ mark for the long road venture would be a powerful 9–4, and was only so “blemished” because of their dropping the final two games in New York. They had won an amazing two out of every three away games so far in 1976, leaving their top place in the standings as strong as ever on August 15. After the Reds lost to the Mets, 1–0, that day in which Bud Harrelson scored the only run, they quickly boarded the plane to return to their happy home at Riverfront, not wishing to stick around a couple of hours afterwards to bear witness to Harrelson’s wedding at the New York ballpark. (Rose was confident that he would not be missing any duties as the best man.) Cincinnati Los Angeles San Diego Houston Atlanta San Francisco

W

L

Pct.

GB

76 63 59 58 54 51

42 54 62 63 64 69

.644 .538 .488 .479 .458 .425

— 12.5 18.5 19.5 22 26

In dropping the 1–0 game to the Mets, Nolan continued his hard-luck, no-support pattern against the tough New York pitching staff. In 1976, he had three losses in as many decisions against the Mets despite posting a strong ERA of 2.67 versus the team. The standings had backed up Anderson’s recent claim about his team’s superior play in Los Angeles. It was the most impressive stretch the Reds had demonstrated to date on the year — even better than their tear through July — as they had won 14 of their 16 games since July 28. Some were wishing to see a playoff rematch of the Reds and Pirates, carrying over from their epic battles of past years. With the relentless onslaught of the Phillies in the East, the only chance for such an occurrence would be (in the future) the adoption of a wildcard system of postseason play, in which teams beyond the divisional winners would qualify. It was a plan advocated by Charles Maher of the Los Angeles Times, for one. “If you inspected the major league baseball standings this morning,” he offered in a light-hearted manner in his column on August 12, “you perhaps observed that four teams are still very much in contention —one in each division.... The only serious drawback we can see is that a wild-card system would rob us of something the present baseball season offers in abundance: boredom.” The only recent upside for the Pirates had been the pitching of sixfoot-seven lefty John Candelaria, who on August 9 carved the first no-hitter ever by a Pirate pitcher in Pittsburgh, downing the Dodgers and Doug Rau. It was also the first no-hitter by anyone in Three Rivers Stadium since Gibson of the Cardinals authored the only no-hitter of his career in 1971.


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Rose’s 2,700th career hit against Atlanta on August 16 — a bunt single — could not help stem a four-game losing streak, all of which were games lost by a lone run. It also constituted the Reds’ longest losing streak of the season, carrying over from the end of their impressive road trip. Rose would also steal three bases in the following week, his most prolific stretch of the season. Not known as a base-stealer between first and second, Rose preferred to be known as one who tore up the basepaths between first and home. “I don’t take a very big lead when I’m on first base,” he once pointed out, “but I don’t have to. I’m not planning on stealing the base — all I want is to get a jump so that I can make third. I want to make third even if the ball is hit to left field.” The legs and the bats had grown tired, some felt, and Anderson agreed. “We’re just not hitting, and that happens,” Sparky said of the team slump. They rebounded to beat the Braves in the final two contests at home, which included Billingham’s fourth win in a row (and a 2.09 ERA for August), giving him a total of 11 victories on the year and tying him with Nolan for the team lead. With little mystery apparently left in the standings, much of the attention on the Reds turned to the individual duels that were developing within the club. Best known was the batting title chase between Rose and Griffey. Morgan, while falling further behind Foster each day, was attempting to pursue the National League home run and RBI titles, a double feat not accomplished by an NL second baseman since Rogers Hornsby in 1925. (Hornsby also had won the Triple Crown that season, winning his sixth straight batting title with a .403 average, the third time he had topped the .400 mark in his career.) The situation looked promising for Morgan since the Cubs were next in Cincinnati, on August 20. It was the Cubs and Cardinals whom Morgan especially enjoyed pummeling in 1976, as he posted averages of .455 and .452, respectively, against the teams during the season. His main batting counterpart on the opposite side, Madlock, would not have a chance to wreak his typical terror on the Reds nor further his own pursuit of the batting crown. In coming to the plate in the first inning of the first game, he pulled a muscle in his back while grounding out to Concepcion at short, and would miss the rest of the series in which Cincinnati took another two of three from the Cubbies. The only Reds loss came in the middle contest, as they were stymied by Sutter, the outstanding rookie reliever. The man of the split-fingered fastball shut them down for two perfect innings for his seventh save in protecting the 3–2 win for starter Rick Reuschel. Norman (11–4) reached double figures in strikeouts for the second game in a row, but had dropped both decisions. Slightly more drama was taking place in national politics than in the National League standings. At the Republican National Convention that wrapped up in Kansas City on August 19, Ford won the nomination over Reagan, even though the former did not have enough delegate votes to clinch the position. Also nominated by the convention was Kansas Senator Bob Dole as Ford’s new running mate, who was to replace incumbent vice president Nel-

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son Rockefeller on the ticket. In Ford’s acceptance speech, he pointed to the rebounding American economy as a convincing point for the voters towards his re-election drive. As the warm summer months pressed on, the business of baseball appeared to be thriving as well. “The average baseball crowd has been 18,666 this year,” reported the Associated Press on August 18, “compared to 16,652 in 1975.” And by mid–August, the Reds, despite playing in one of the smallest markets in the major leagues, were on pace to make a run at the alltime attendance record for one season by any club. In 1976, the title was held by the Dodgers and the 2,755,184 they drew in 1962, the opening year for Dodger Stadium. The Reds would fall approximately 125,000 short; the Dodgers, however, would break their own record in 1977 with 2,955,087 and again in 1978 with over 3.3 million, a mark that would stand for another twelve years. Adding to the enjoyment of the large throngs at Riverfront Stadium since early July was the enhanced electronic scoreboard, complete with newly-devised pictures of the players shown as they came to bat. “That scoreboard hasn’t drawn one person into this ballpark,” board operator Bob Rathgeber modestly admitted. “The reason the fans are here is for the ballgame. We try to keep the fans informed and entertain ’em.” And while the Reds were poised at this juncture to enter the top ten all-time for single-season attendance in baseball history, business had indeed been at its best throughout the game. On September 24, more than 30.11 million fans had visited major league parks in 1976, breaking the overall single-season record that had been set in 1973. By late August, the Reds’ bullpen had returned to its stellar self, finding its June form by posting an ERA of under 1.00 since the first of the month, lead by Eastwick at an 0.86 clip during a 14-game run in August. The staff, in fact, was venturing into new territory for collective excellence; no team in baseball had ever won a pennant without one pitcher winning at least 15 games, and the 1976 Reds were on course to achieve the mark. Only three teams, in fact, had ever won a National League pennant without a 16-game winner — and the 1975 Reds had been one of them, with Nolan, Billingham, and Gullett each having won 15. It did not bother Anderson in the least that he did not have a starting pitcher with big stats. “It’s not my job to make a big winner,” he said. “I use what I have. We have ten pitchers— I’m using them.” He also pointed out the unseen side of starting pitchers’ complaints of being removed early from games. “A lot of pitchers believe they don’t get a chance to stay in long enough,” Sparky continued. “Well, I have a belief too— I believe a lot of earned run averages would be higher if I left those pitchers in to pitch out of those jams.” Shepard, his pitching coach, agreed. “When Atlanta was here, Andy Messersmith was taken out of a close game,” he recalled from early 1976. “He went crazy. He believes he should finish what he starts. On clubs like that, the pitcher sets the rule, rather than the manager.” The enigma among the Reds’ relievers was McEnaney, who after his great June would have an ERA over 6.00 in every month during the last half of the season (July, August, and September).


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In spite of the big lead in the division, the position players in the starting lineup were not looking for days off; rather, it seemed that they wanted to turn up the heat on their opponents, particularly Morgan. “I want to start stealing a lot of bases now,” he said plainly, thinking that he and the rest of the offense had become too lethargic. “We’d gotten away from it, and that’s not good. When you’re stealing, things start happening. The pitcher starts thinking. The catcher changes his game plan.” Fully healthy for the first time all year, Morgan made good on his promise. He swiped seven in a five-day span, from August 22 through the 27th, including three against the Phillies and Bob Boone, the talented defensive catcher, on the final date. Waite Hoyt, the former Yankee pitcher who had recently retired from the Reds’ radio booth, could not hide his admiration of Number 8. “I have pitched against the greatest baserunners of all time — Ty Cobb, Bob Breschler, Max Carey — and I can honestly say I have never seen anyone run the bases better than Joe Morgan.” In the process of advancing his stolen base totals, Morgan had caught Rose, Griffey, Madlock, and others around the league for the top of the charts in batting average. (Those three Reds were the leading run-scorers in the National League as well through late August.) Morgan would wind up batting .394 and steal 15 bases in August, his best month of the season in each category. Yet, as Morgan was enjoying his tremendous night in the series opener on August 27 against the Phillies, some of the other big bats were being silenced. Both Bench and Foster needed hits that evening to break 0-for-17 slumps, as Eastwick suffered the loss in a 13-inning affair, 5–4. It was the eighth defeat in the past 12 games for Cincinnati, and the Reds’ lead over the Dodgers had suddenly decreased to eight. It was at this most ironic point, however, that Anderson exuded the most confidence in his club. “We’re gonna win it,” he boasted to the newsmen about his forecasted outcome of the National League West. “You can print it. I don’t care if they print it in Los Angeles. I don’t care if they hang it in the locker room in Los Angeles. We’re gonna win this thing. It’s a promise.” Sparky’s words sparked magic, for immediately afterwards, they proceeded to rip off three straight wins against the Phillies through August 30, which included Rose’s 134th home run of his career. While one would not normally associate home run records with Rose, the round-tripper left him only one shy of the National League record for switch-hitters, held by Rip Collins. (Pete, in not homering again for the remainder of the season, would break the record on May 25, 1977, against Charlie Williams of the Giants; he was still light-years away, however, from Mickey Mantle’s major league record of 536.) Also in the game on August 28, Morgan drove in his 96th run, breaking his own team mark for RBIs in a season for a second baseman. It was the largest Saturday afternoon crowd in Cincinnati history, with more than 51,000 watching the fun. Morgan gave the appropriate answer when asked how the team rebounded so easily from its recent fall. “Character,” he said in a word. Among his other

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achievements, Morgan was also leading the league with a .646 slugging percentage. “From the manager and the leaders, that’s where it comes from. If they panic, everyone panics. But on this team, no one panics.” In the series against the Phillies, yet another attendance record had been set at Riverfront, as over 190,000 had come to watch — the most ever at the park for a four-game set. ********** The beating that the Phillies took in the last three games of their series with the Reds appeared to affect them mentally. Before winning the first game of the set, the Phillies had dropped a game to the Braves on August 25, which also happened to be the beginning date of their infamous 11-game collapse to the St. Louis Cardinals in 1964, as some writers were quick to point out. Now in 1976, from that date to September 4, their lead in the National League East had shrunk from 15 games to 61 ⁄2, as the Pirates had won nine straight during the same timeframe. “There is something that haunts the Phils,” Tom Fitzpatrick of the Chicago Sun-Times had written two weeks earlier, before the downfall had even begun. “It is like the Ghost of Christmas Past hovering around the edge of the banquet table. They are still remembered as the team that blew the 1964 pennant ... of course, that can’t happen again. This Phils team is too strong in all departments, right? But you never know. Not really.” Shrugging off the pressure while sounding like Yogi Berra, Danny Ozark said, “I don’t think there is such a word as ‘tenseness’ on our ballclub. I guess it’s anxiety, if it’s anything.” Philadelphia was not unique in its struggle to keep its hands off its neck, as Tom Callahan pointed out. “A choking epidemic is upon the National League,” he wrote. “The Cincinnati Reds have been breathing with difficulty, and so far their wheezing and gasping represented mere accompaniment for the strangling sounds of the Philadelphia Phillies.” Even the mighty Reds, with their seemingly indomitable club, had let the Los Angeles Dodgers back into the race. The Reds’ bats were weakening like at no other time during the season, and yet another scare hit the starting pitching staff as well. Gullett’s roommate, Nolan, left a game against the Cardinals on August 31 with a sore back. The injury was later described as the back having “popped out.” But the next day, Nolan reported that he could hardly get out of bed. It made the pressure on the bullpen — and especially on Eastwick — all the more acute for the season’s final month. “There can be no doubt that we are tired in the bullpen,” Anderson admitted, as McEnaney had proven unreliable in recent weeks while the team had saved a valuable roster spot all year for the on-again, off-again Gullett. “For all intents and purposes,” added Hertzel in his column on September 1, “Anderson has had to ask a nine-man staff to do the job of a ten-man staff.” At this point, the first few specific details of the contract negotiations between Gullett and the club were leaked to the press. The sticking point was Gullett’s desire for an unprecedented five-year contract to stay in Cincinnati,


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something the Reds were unwilling to offer. “We have offered two years,” Dick Wagner said. “We get a very solid ‘no’ [from Gullett’s agent Jerry Kapstein] on any offer under five years. We don’t feel we can build successful teams on fiveyear contracts.” Then, in a telling statement, Wagner summed up management’s frustration with the pitcher. “Maybe he doesn’t want to play here, but I hope not. Maybe he shouldn’t play here. I believe you must have some amount of loyalty to the people you work for. We’d like to sign him. I like Don Gullett, but he has befuddled every one of us.” With the ability to expand the roster to 40 players beginning September 1, the Reds dipped into Indianapolis to bolster the reliever situation. Joe Henderson, a 30-year-old veteran of 11 seasons in the minor leagues, was recalled to the majors, making his first appearance in the big leagues since 1974 with the Chicago White Sox. Henderson had constructed an impressive season at Indy, winning the American Association ERA title with a 2.31 mark while winning seven games and saving eleven more. The Indianapolis season had been over for more than a week when Henderson received the call while relaxing at his home near Fresno, California, when he was ordered to arrive in Cincinnati. “I didn’t see a baseball until I was ten,” Henderson recalled of his childhood days in the South. “We didn’t have baseballs in Mississippi — we just threw rocks.” He was signed by the California Angels in 1965 as an outfielder, but after an accident in which he was shot in his left (non-throwing) arm, he made the switch to pitching. In 1981, Henderson’s nephew David would become a major league outfielder. It took help from Borbon and Eastwick to pick up the victory against St. Louis the evening of Nolan’s injury. The Cardinals had another young player cracking its lineup by the end of the summer. Kessinger, for the most part, had given way at shortstop to a 20-year-old prized prospect named Garry Templeton, recalled from the Cardinals’ top farm team at Tulsa on August 9 after hitting .318. Templeton, the first draft pick of St. Louis in 1974, had batted .325 in 19 games in the big leagues for the Cardinals while Kessinger started playing some at second base (for the first time since entering the major leagues in 1964) to make room for him. “He’s got something that very few have — maybe a Musial, a Banks, or an Aaron,” Cardinals long-time general manager Bing Devine said, speaking of the baseball instincts that the speedy switch-hitting Templeton brought to the table. Another of the Cards’ promising rookies in the infield, first baseman Keith Hernandez, had batted .500 against the Reds for 1976, including a homer off Nolan that helped drive the Reds’ starter from the mound. The offensive roster for the Reds had become a tale of two teams. On one side, the once-meteoric Foster was coming back down to earth in a rapid descent (and who was removed from the clean-up spot by Anderson for the first time since June 28); Bench, who still waffled in inconsistency, was batting .245 on

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September 1 and would hit his final homer of the regular season on September 8, victimizing Astros rookie Bo McLaughlin of Amelia, Ohio; and Perez, still at below-normal numbers for himself as well, was struggling to advance his unparalleled achievement of nine straight 90-RBI seasons. On the other side of the story was Rose, who enjoyed six straight multi-hit games to end August; Griffey, who was still among the league leaders in hitting; Geronimo, who was threatening to crack the .300 mark by the end of the year for his first time; Concepcion, who had not fallen below the .280 mark since mid–August and led the team with 14 game-winning hits; and Morgan, who despite missing 18 games (to date) over the course of the season was in the process of posting one of the greatest batting years for a second baseman in the game’s history. On September 5 in Atlanta (with 25 games still remaining in the regular season), he joined Frisch, Hornsby, and Jackie Robinson as the only National League keystoners to collect 100 RBIs in a season. “I’m very proud of the accomplishment,” Morgan said. “It makes me have a lot of respect for guys like Tony Perez and Johnny Bench who have done it so many times. It isn’t easy to do.” The following night, Morgan extended his hitting streak to 17 — one shy of Foster’s team-high for the year — as he upped his average to .341 while drawing his 100th walk of the season. (Morgan would eventually reach 19 games with his batting streak.) Hertzel discovered that it was the first time a player had scored 100 runs, driven in 100 runs, walked 100 times, hit 25 home runs, and stole 50 bases in the same season. It was Morgan’s increased base-stealing in recent weeks, in fact, that Anderson felt had distracted Foster at the plate. The only thing plaguing Morgan was a relative inability to hit lefthanders, as his .349 mark against righties was tempered slightly by his .260 average versus southpaws. Even so, he had the constant admiration of even his most notable teammates. While being roasted at a dinner in his honor back in May, Morgan had been given a chauffeur’s cap by Rose. “I want you to stay here in Cincinnati this winter,” Rose explained as he turned and gave the cap to Morgan. “I need a chauffeur to drive me around in my Rolls Royce.” When Morgan got a chance at the microphone, he laughed. “Pete Rose driving a Rolls Royce? That’s like putting earrings on a hog.” The Phillies’ abscess of misplay, meanwhile, had festered even further. After breaking their eight-game losing streak with a win at New York on September 5, they had the misfortune of having to travel to Pittsburgh, where they were dismantled by the on-rushing Pirates in three straight to make it eleven losses in their last twelve. By the end of the series on September 8, the Pirates (who, conversely, had triumphed in 13 of their last 14) stood only four-and-ahalf games back of Philadelphia as the Phils appeared on the verge of yet another historic demise. Just over two weeks prior, the advantage for Danny Ozark’s men had been an indomitable fifteen-and-a-half games. “We just have to keep it up and let the Phillies take care of themselves,” Ozark’s counterpart, Danny Murtaugh, had said. Dick Young suggested that the Phillies’ problem did not


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stem from even baseball itself, but from them playing a game called “scoreboard.” “Scoreboard is a game that requires broad peripheral vision,” he explained. “As you stand at your position in the field, you must keep one eye on the baseball in front of you and the other on the scoreboard in back of you, where the progress of the Pirates’ game is being promulgated.” In the other divisional race, with no immediate threat looming from the Dodgers or any other team in the West, Anderson was enjoying an opportunity to rest his starting players by playing his reserves more often. “I really don’t have extra men,” he explained. “I use them more than most people do.” In support, Hertzel pointed to several such examples. There was Doug Flynn, who was batting .290 and had played every position in the infield except first base, and Bill Plummer, who stepped in for Bench on numerous occasions and actually had a higher batting average (.273 on September 11) than the starter. Anderson also had Mike Lum, who had four game-winning hits, the same number on the year as Rose, as well as Bob Bailey, with three game-winning hits himself among his six homers and 22 RBIs in just 105 at-bats by mid–September. Other “extra” men included Joel Youngblood, who despite being in the midst of an 0-for-15 slump as a pinch-hitter had played outstanding defensive baseball in the outfield as a rookie, and little Eddie Armbrister, batting a robust .284 while still laying down those perfect sacrifice bunts when needed. “Ten games,” Anderson paused to estimate. “The ‘extra’ men have won at least ten games this year.” The Dodgers were now measured for the grave, as Zachry and Gullett beat them on back-to-back nights in Cincinnati, on September 15 and 16, the twelfth time in 15 games the Reds had downed Los Angeles in 1976. While Morgan stole his 500th career base and Griffey collected six hits in the series (with the latter going on to bat .397 against the Dodgers for the year), Gullett shined off the mound in his strongest outing so far, retiring the last 18 Dodger batters in succession as Shepard stood amazed. “If he can throw any better, I’ve never seen it,” the pitching tutor marveled. As for Zachry, it was his fifth triumph over Walter Alston’s club on the year, conjuring images of Larry Jaster, who as a St. Louis Cardinals rookie ten years earlier in 1966 had done the same thing to the Los Angeles team. In an effort to shore up their own pitching staff, the Dodgers promoted rookie right-hander Rick Sutcliffe from their Eastern League team at Waterbury. Sutcliffe, however, would not make his major league debut for another two weeks, in which he would go five scoreless innings against the Astros. The magic number for the Reds now stood at four, as any such combination of Cincinnati wins and Dodger losses would spell the official end of the Western Division race. Craig Dissinger, the Riverfront Stadium ticket director, announced two days later that 18,000 mail-order seats for the National League Championship Series would soon go on sale for $4 apiece. While Dissinger was answering the inquiring phone calls at the Reds’ offices on September 16, so too were officials at NASA, who had just rolled out the brand new Space Shut-

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tle, a craft that would explore outer space (and then land) in airplane-like fashion after taking off like a rocket. The standings that evening: Cincinnati Los Angeles Houston San Francisco San Diego Atlanta

W

L

Pct.

GB

95 82 73 68 67 64

53 64 76 81 81 84

.642 .562 .490 .456 .453 .432

— 12 22.5 27.5 28 31

Things were made official on September 21 when the Reds pocketed their fifth division title in seven years after Zachry subdued the Padres in Cincinnati, sprinting to the locker room afterwards to douse himself with champagne. It would be the fourteenth and final victory of the year for Zachry, tying Wayne Simpson’s total from 1970 as the second-most wins by a rookie in Reds history. In the interim, Rose had reached the 200-hit plateau for the eighth time on September 18, dribbling an infield single off of San Francisco’s Jim Barr (only Ty Cobb had posted nine such seasons, and Pete would begin 1977 setting his sights on the “Georgia Peach”). The Reds had taken over first when they had beaten the Dodgers at Riverfront back on May 30, and had not relinquished the top spot since. It would have been perhaps most fitting that Cincinnati secure the honors by exorcising the one individual demon which had haunted them throughout the season; however, Padres stifling lefthander Randy Jones would not face the Reds in the brief two-game set. Jones had experienced a reversal of the luck which made him 16–3 at the All-Star break, for since then, he had lost seven games by a single run. The clinching was most satisfying for Bailey and Lum, who while playing limited roles off the bench (as had been expected) in 1976, had nonetheless escaped losing clubs in Montreal and Atlanta. Through late September, each man had contributed a team-high nine pinch-hits. “Every year I got tired of going home early,” said Lum. “Going from Atlanta to Cincinnati is like going from the gutter to a ritzy hotel. Last year was disastrous— I got tired of sitting there watching guys play who didn’t want to play. If I hadn’t been traded, I’d have asked for a trade. I had to get out of there.” The Dodgers would spend the final two weeks of the season offering little resistance, as a much better fight had taken place between Muhammad Ali and Ken Norton at their heavyweight championship bout in front of 42,000 spectators at Yankee Stadium on September 28. The fight, for which Ali was guaranteed $6 million, went the full fifteen rounds, and thus onto the judges’ scorecards. Most witnesses had given the upper hand to the challenger Norton, especially after he had given Ali a bloody nose in the fourteenth. Even so, the decision went to the defending champion, which Norton called a farce. “The judges made asses of themselves,” a vexed Norton fumed afterwards. “Obviously, you have to knock him out to beat him.... Unless I get a rematch with


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Ali, I’m quitting.” Callahan was covering the scene for the Enquirer, and he was nearly as astounded. “This is very unjust, and a little sad,” he wrote. Ali would announce his retirement a week later, a statement that was met with skepticism by most. “He has retired before,” James Farley, Jr., chairman of the New York State Athletic Commission, pointed out. “I don’t take it too seriously yet. We will have to wait and see.” As expected, the news turned out to be untrue. Ali would defend his title twice more in decisions over Alfredo Evangelista and Earnie Shavers before being defeated by Leon Spinks in February of 1978, ending a fourteen-year, on-again off-again hold on the belt. The remaining drama for the Reds, meanwhile, hinged largely on the pursuit of the National League batting title by three of their stars. Madlock, the defending champion, enjoyed a five-point advantage with ten days left in the season as the Cubs’ third baseman led the way with a .337 mark, followed next by Griffey at .332, Rose at .329, and Morgan at .327. (Philadelphia outfielder Garry Maddox was in the mix as well at .328.) Each of the Reds’ contenders marveled at Madlock’s approach at the plate. “Madlock is a pure hitter,” Morgan said. “He just gets his hits. He beats out a chopper, then he hits a bullet. He seldom hits a line drive at someone. He and Rose are the same type of hitter.” Griffey agreed. “I played against him in the minor leagues and the majors; he’s one of the best hitters I’ve ever seen. He hits the ball hard everywhere — and I do mean hard.” On September 25, however, misfortune would befall Madlock in a most unfair manner. While entering his hotel room in New York as the Cubs were in town for a series with the Mets, Madlock was assaulted by two muggers. One pistol-whipped the player in the back of the head, causing a deep contusion, as Madlock wrestled with the two in a melee that spilled into his room. According to Madlock, the attackers made off with around $60, after which he was examined by Mets team physician James Parkes at Shea Stadium. While his injuries were not thought to be serious, Madlock would not return to the lineup until the Cubs’ final series at home against Montreal, beginning on October 1, missing a chance to augment his lead over Maddox and the Reds’ challengers. Three days after the Reds had clinched the division title, they made their final road trip of the regular season, visiting the Dodgers and Padres just as the Phillies were wrapping up the Eastern Division and the New York Yankees the American League East. The National League Championship Series was now set, as the Reds and Phillies would begin play in Philadelphia on October 9. (The only remaining divisional race was in the American League West, where the Kansas City Royals were being mildly threatened by the Oakland A’s, with the Royals holding a four-game lead with a week to go.) The Pirates had gotten as close as three games to Philadelphia on September 17 before seeing the difference expand once again to nine by season’s end. And as the Phils had safely rebounded from their apparent 1964-like doom, Danny Ozark felt confident enough to issue a bold proclamation about his team. “I feel we’ve got the best

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club in baseball,” he was inclined to say. “I felt that way last year, too. The guys have worked hard all year and we’ve been working together for a good cause.” Unlike most episodes of the Los Angeles–Cincinnati series, this one presented no imminent drama; a relaxed attitude took over the games, and there was even one particular cause for celebration on the Dodger side. Returning to the lineup for the first time since September 6 was catcher Steve Yeager, who on that date had been injured in a freak accident during a game. While standing in the on-deck circle, Yeager was struck in the throat by a splinter from the broken bat swung by teammate Bill Russell at the plate, which essentially shattered Yeager’s esophagus. Doctors had to remove nine separate pieces of wood during an extensive surgery, during which his life hung in the balance. Yeager celebrated his return in his own special way by throwing out Morgan on an attempted steal of second base in re-asserting himself as one of the finestthrowing catchers in the game. In a short time, Yeager (who hailed from Dayton, Ohio) would begin donning one of the most famous inventions by a baseball player — a throat-protector that dangled from the mask, soon adopted by many catchers while gaining the name of the “Yeager Guard.” An even greater icon of the Dodgers— and yet another native of Ohio— made more news on Monday, September 27, the day after his club had taken two of three from the Reds. Walter Alston, the manager of the club for the past 23 years and owner of more than 2,000 victories since its days in Brooklyn, was stepping down, saying that “there comes a time when you get enough of everything.” In addition to his seven National League pennants and four World Series titles, Alston had been the victorious manager seven times in the All-Star Game, a record. Chosen to lead the Dodgers as a relative unknown from his minor league managerial job in Montreal in 1954, Alston had arrived in the big leagues from Hamilton, Ohio, just north of Cincinnati, to receive one at-bat with the Cardinals before commencing his coaching career. “It’s a shame that 30 guys didn’t win for him this year,” Yeager said. “I’ll miss him, because he’s a man who treats his players with concern.” Added first baseman Steve Garvey, “It’s a sad day. He set the standard for all managers.” Alston had been in the National League for so long that his competitor across the field from him — Sparky Anderson — had memories of him from a player’s perspective. In coming up through the Dodgers’ system, Anderson had been told by Alston in 1958 that he was being cut; it led to Sparky being picked up by the Phillies, and in turn producing the one season (like Alston, albeit a full one) he enjoyed as a player in the big leagues. “Never once did he embarrass the Dodgers,” Anderson recalled proudly of the man known to some as “Smokey.” Alston always wanted to work to prove that he belonged, as he signed 23 consecutive one-year contracts with the Dodgers, coming to spring training each season with the belief that he had to fight to keep his own job, just as a player would do. With the Dodgers’ collapse via the onslaught of the Reds in 1975 and 1976, Alston — in essence for the first time in his career — had came under intense media scrutiny


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and criticism in Los Angeles. In less than a week after Alston made his announcement, his presumed replacement was formally named. Third-base coach Tommy Lasorda, the man who assisted Rick Monday in the flag-saving incident back on April 25, would take the reins of the team. Alston suggested that he should step aside immediately so that Lasorda, who had been a teammate of Anderson’s in the minor leagues, could manage the final four games of the season and get a feel for the players. Was Lasorda planning on signing oneyear deals with the club? “You bet!” he answered sharply. “If it’s good enough for Walter Alston, it’s good enough for me.” Lasorda had been a pitcher for the Dodgers in Alston’s first two seasons at the helm in 1954 and 1955, but his playing career wound up being nearly as nondescript as his mentor. Nonetheless, he became a five-time league champion as a manager in Los Angeles’ minor league system before being promoted to the major league club as an assistant coach in 1973. His tenure as Dodgers manager would run nearly as long as Alston’s, piloting the club through the 1996 season and winning four pennants and two World Series titles. Anderson sent his respects to Alston regarding his imminent departure from the game, and then turned his attention to fine-tuning his own charges for another championship run. He strongly considered putting Freddie Norman in the bullpen for the playoffs despite Norman’s impressive numbers as a starter during the regular season. With the inconsistency of McEnaney in the second half of the year, Sparky wished to have another left-handed option from the relief corps. Additionally, despite his own struggles throughout most of 1976, Jack Billingham had permitted a lone earned run in 22 innings of work during six World Series games in his career, which gave the manager more confidence to restore his starting spot against the Phillies in the pennant round and versus an American League opponent in the World Series. (Anderson would create another stir by announcing that Zachry would start Game One, then abruptly switching to Gullett shortly Gary Nolan, the leader of the pitching before the game.) With Billingham’s staff who, like Gullett, would fight to overcome numerous injuries in an apparent return to a starting role, the abbreviated career (National Baseball odd-man-out appeared to be the man Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New once considered the ace of the staff — York).

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Gary Nolan. Nolan felt he deserved a chance to start in the playoffs, but it looked unlikely with a three-man rotation of Gullett, Zachry, and Billingham. Nolan also was bitter about the recent lack of attention for recording the 1,000th strikeout of his career (only the fifth Reds pitcher ever to do so), a feat he accomplished on the team’s final road trip in Los Angeles on September 25. “We pitchers are in the back of the bus,” Nolan complained, referring to the exclusive press coverage that the sluggers and speedsters on the team seemed to enjoy. “This team is all offensive-oriented. Pete Rose gets his 2,500th hit and they know it. Tony Perez drives in his 1,000th run and they make a big deal about it.” Through that outing, Nolan’s control had been outstanding; he had given up only 24 unintentional walks on the season, which was fewer than the number of home runs he had permitted (27). When the Reds finally faced Randy Jones again in San Diego later that week, the dominant southpaw of 1976 would pull a muscle in his left forearm while pitching to Billingham in the second inning, and would have to leave the game. Even though it wound up being Cincinnati’s 100th win of the year, Jones would set a National League record that night with his 112th consecutive errorless game in his brief appearance. Thus he would finish his season, still on top with a league-high 22 victories. “I’m really sorry about Randy,” Billingham said after the game. “I hope he wins the Cy Young Award, because he deserves it. He’d win 30 games with a club that scored him some runs.” Ending the regular season with a three-game series with the Braves at home, the Reds had the opportunity to further rest some starters, thank their supportive Riverfront fans, and put one of their own in the best possible position to win his first batting title. The Reds averaged approximately 32,000 for the final three contests against the Braves, shooting over the 2.6 million mark for the year as Cincinnati led baseball in attendance for only the second time ever. On September 15, with nine home games yet remaining, the club cracked the top ten for single-season all-time attendance marks in the major leagues. At the completion of the Atlanta series, the final total would stand at 2,629,708; it was the fourth-highest total all-time in the major leagues, trailing only the 1962 and 1974 Dodgers and the 1970 Mets (and their much larger markets). Attendance throughout the National League had swelled in 1976, totaling an aggregate increase of over 60,000 fans by season’s end, with only the Montreal Expos showing a deficit from their 1975 numbers. As Dissinger and his office workers announced the Reds would be taking preliminary mail orders for World Series tickets at $8 each, the players on the field finished the year in fine fashion, taking two out of three games from Atlanta, with Nolan (his 15th win) and Gullett (11th) claiming the victories. The lone blemish was the middle contest, in which Geronimo broke up the potential second career no-hitter by Braves ace Phil Niekro in the ninth inning. Nevertheless, the knuckleballer earned a 3–0 win — one of 20 career victories for Niekro against the Reds to date, the most by any active pitcher versus Cincinnati. (He had also been defeated 18


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times by the Reds.) The only other bad news from the season’s final series was a serious injury sustained in the closing act by Billingham, suffering muscle spasms in his right biceps after throwing one pitch in the second inning. With his outstanding record in post-season play, Anderson’s plan for Billingham’s extensive use in the playoffs was now up in the air. Sparky would turn to Gullett, he figured, in the second game of the NLCS against Philadelphia. Anderson feared that the Phillies lineup would be especially tough on left-handed pitchers, with mighty righty swingers Schmidt, Luzinski, Maddox, and others taking their cuts. However, the statistics from the regular season did not bear this out, showing that the Phils’ batters posted only a .276 average with 36 home runs versus southpaws, compared with a similar .271 mark and 74 homers against right-handers. Although each of the four divisional races in the major leagues had been decided, the 1976 season’s final few days brought about some of the most exciting, controversial, and historic events at the close of any baseball campaign. In addition to Alston’s retirement from the Dodgers, the National League would see the end of another legendary manager’s career. Danny Murtaugh had led the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1957 to 1964, part of the 1967 season, in 1970 and 1971, and once again from the end of the 1973 campaign until he announced he was quitting on October 1, 1976. Murtaugh, at age 59, had decided to step down after a similar move by general manager Joe Brown, his longtime friend in the organization. The native of Chester, Pennsylvania, had won World Series titles in 1960 and 1971 for the Bucs, and was heading back to Chester to enjoy retirement. “I think I’ve been around long enough,” he told the writers. “In my younger years, I don’t think I spent enough time with my children. I’m going to kind of make it up with my grandchildren.” Unfortunately, Murtaugh would pass away in December, having suffered two major heart attacks in recent years. And while Murtaugh had not commented publicly on its effect, the press speculated that his health was the main reason for his leaving the Pirates, as it was when he first left the team back in 1964. In just over a week after his announcement, the Pirates would also lose one of their pitchers when starter Bob Moose was killed in auto accident on October 9 in Martins Ferry, Ohio. The closing drama of the 1976 season was not reserved to the men in the leadership roles. After hitting his 755th and final home run on July 20, Hank Aaron would appear in 23 more games for the Brewers. He singled in his final at-bat on October 3, which drove in the 2,297th run of his career, finishing 80 beyond Babe Ruth for the most all-time (although Aaron would make over 3,000 more plate appearances than Ruth). In addition, Minnie Minoso on September 12 had become the oldest player to hit safely in a game, singling in the first inning of a doubleheader against the Angels at Comiskey Park at the age of 53. (The White Sox would sign Minoso once again in 1980, and while he would go hitless in two at-bats, it would permit him to have played in the majors in five different decades, only accomplished by one other player — Nick Altrock.)

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The most interest, however, occurred in the exciting races for the batting titles, which had continued to the season’s final day in both circuits. Griffey and Madlock waged their battle for the National League honors, while Kansas City teammates George Brett and Hal McRae were tied in the American League. Back in March, Anderson had been prophetic in expecting great things out of Griffey, who had not wavered from between .330 and .340 since the beginning of July. “With his speed, he can lead the league in hitting some year,” the manager had surmised. In addition, Griffey had proven himself an outstanding hitter in the clutch, having batted .409 with runners in scoring position over the course of the season. Anderson believed that Griffey deserved MVP consideration along with the traditional cast of Reds stars. “You don’t hear a word about him,” Sparky said of his mostly inconspicuous right fielder on September 27, “but he has to be in there [among the final MVP voting]. I expect we’ll have four players in the top ten.” Griffey went into the final three games with a .339 average, which led Madlock by four points. Madlock had recovered from the injuries suffered in his mugging in New York, playing on October 1 for the first time in eight days while the Cubs finished the year against Montreal at home. Griffey came into the season’s final day on Sunday, October 3, with a .338 average, five points better than Madlock. He had not missed a start since September 11, and Anderson — despite Griffey’s lead in the batting race — did not want his player to “back in” to the title by sitting out. According to Hertzel, Griffey had been sulking in the locker room before the game, wavering between wishing to play and not. Approximately a half-hour before game time, Anderson summoned whom he called the “Big Four”— Bench, Perez, Rose and Morgan — into his office for a private meeting to gather their opinions. Morgan, for one, was in favor of Griffey sitting on the bench and not actively defending the top spot. This was the decision ultimately made by the manager, and Griffey took a spot in the dugout as Lum took his place in right field. Word soon came across on the wires that Madlock had singled in the first inning off Woodie Fryman at Wrigley Field in the Cubs’ game against the Expos; later, word reached Cincinnati that Madlock was 2-for-2 on the day, having singled again in the third inning. Griffey grew uneasy on the bench, fearing that Madlock’s surge was now irresistible and his supremacy inevitable. The game in Chicago had moved along much more quickly than the contest at Riverfront Stadium, as the Cubs’ 8–2 triumph would be completed in just an hour and 57 minutes. In the process, Madlock singled twice more for a perfect 4-for-4 afternoon, charging past Griffey with a final batting mark of .339 for 1976. It was only the seventh inning in Cincinnati by the time of Madlock’s fourth hit, and the situation was clear — Griffey needed to play in order to have a chance. After Rose singled to start the bottom of the seventh for the Reds, Griffey was sent to the plate to pinch-hit for Driessen, who had started the game in left field in place of Foster. On the mound for the Braves was spot-starter Frank LaCorte, who promptly fanned Griffey on three pitches to sink him another


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point further behind the Chicago third baseman. Hoping for one last turn at bat for Griffey, Anderson placed him in right field defensively for the top of the eighth, and his teammates subsequently came through in the bottom half. Six straight Cincinnati batters— Lum, Morgan, Concepcion, Bailey, Flynn, and Rose — reached base to start the inning, bringing Griffey back to the plate as the crowd roared encouragement. Overanxious, he struck out once again, flailing at pitches out of the strike zone in desperation. Little did anyone know — including Anderson or Griffey — that Madlock’s second-straight batting title was already safe, and that this final atbat by Griffey was inconsequential. No Ken Griffey, Sr., would help give the Reds’ offense of the mid–1970s someone seemed to notice that the Reds thing they had lacked in recent years — scored seven times in the eighth, en speed (National Baseball Hall of Fame route to an 11–1 romp over Atlanta on Library, Cooperstown, New York). Fan Appreciation Day at the home ballpark. In his disturbed silence after the game, Morgan was angry for Griffey not being put in the lineup; Anderson covered for his player anyway, taking the blame for the situation as he had done with Tolan’s debacle and other occasions. Despite falling short in the batting race, it was another banner year individually for Griffey and his Reds teammates. Griffey had neared his impressive 1975 total of infield hits (39) with 36, while Morgan was the National League leader in on-base percentage (for the fourth time in five years) at .444, slugging percentage (.576), and sacrifice flies (12), and had stolen 60 bases despite missing 21 games. Foster paced the circuit in RBIs (121), although he cooled considerably in the final month-and-a-half of the season, batting just .229 while posting only two home runs and 15 RBIs in that time. Perez, the traditional RBI threat in the lineup, had only 69 coming into September, but finished strongly with 22 in the season’s final month. It pushed him over the 90-RBI total once again for the tenth straight season, something that no other player active in 1976 had ever accomplished. Topping the league lists the most times, however, was Rose, who led the NL in plate appearances (759), runs scored (130), hits (215), doubles (42), and times on base (307). On the pitching side, Nolan had permitted the fewest walks per nine innings (1.02, although also permitting the most home runs with 28), while Eastwick’s 26 saves once again led the National

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League’s relievers. Just as they had done in 1975, the Big Red Machine mastered the finer points of the game, and it showed in the minute team statistics that were examined as well. As examples, the Reds had been shut out only eight times in 1976, the fewest in the league; their pitching staff had thrown only 32 complete games, but their opponents threw only 21 against them. Amidst all of their accomplishments from the 1976 encore performance, the Reds (as a team) set one dubious National League record. They had wasted many table scraps from their offensive feast, having left 1,328 men on base during the season. They could afford to do so, however, as they also scored 857 runs— nearly a hundred more than anyone else in baseball. The slight internal conflict over “Griffey-Gate” in the Reds’ clubhouse was miniscule in comparison to the controversy that had been generated in the American League’s batting title chase. Brett and McRae were tied at .331 entering the Royals’ final game on October 3 against the Minnesota Twins in Kansas City, and the home fans looked forward to the final individual duel in advance of the Royals making their first playoff appearance in franchise history. With Brett batting third in the lineup and McRae fourth, both men failed to reach base in their first turns as Brett lined to short to end the first inning, while McRae led off the Kansas City second with a fly ball to center. Brett struck first with a fourth-inning double, but McRae followed suit with a single. Brett added his second double in the seventh while McRae posted his second single, leaving the men still tied with one potential at-bat left. After the Twins had extended their lead to 5–2 in the top of the eighth, it looked probable that the Royals would have two more chances at the plate; it would be needed to continue the chess match, as Freddie Patek, Jamie Quirk, and Tom Poquette went down in order in the Royals’ eighth. After Amos Otis flied out to start the ninth inning, the small crowd of 15,665 rose and cheered as Brett made his way to the batters’ box while McRae readied his stick in the on-deck circle. On the second pitch, Brett laced a liner towards Minnesota left fielder Steve Brye. Brye broke in on the ball but it fell in front of him, caromed over his head, and skipped to the wall on the smooth artificial surface at Royals Stadium. Brett circled the bases for an inside-the-park home run, as his teammates gleefully greeted him back at the dugout in instantly cutting the Twins’ lead to 5–3. The only one not cheering, however, was McRae, who glared out at Brye. He followed with a groundout to shortstop Luis Gomez, as did Jim Wohlford two batters later to end the game. In the clubhouse, sparks began to fly regarding the events surrounding the ninth inning. McRae accused Brye of letting Brett’s ball fall intentionally, thus improving Brett’s chances to win the title. McRae, who is black, suggested that racism was at play with Brye, a white man, appearing to have let it drop for Brett, another white man. “This is America. Not much has changed,” was all McRae mumbled to the reporters as he removed his cleats in front of his locker. Brye, however, was perplexed about McRae’s charges. “I just messed up,” he


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explained. “I played the ball too cautiously. I didn’t want it to get by me. If I had gone for a shoestring catch and missed, the same thing would have happened ... I can’t understand this whole thing. What can I say? I don’t see where I have to defend myself.” Brett was just as confused with McRae’s reasoning, feeling that Brye’s effort was legitimate. “The curious thing is why Brye would want me to win the batting title instead of his own teammates, [Rod] Carew and [Lyman] Bostock,” Brett wondered. Carew had begun the day at .329, and Bostock at .323. With Carew only two points in back of Brett and McRae, it was the closest three-way race for the American League batting title in 45 years. Often forgotten is that if McRae had managed to get a hit in his final atbat, he would have won the batting title. His final average would have stood at .3339 in such a scenario compared to Brett’s .3333. With the Royals taking the American League West and preparing to face the Yankees for the right to go to the World Series, the close of the 1976 regular season meant the absence of the Oakland A’s from post-season play for the first time since 1970, with Finley’s string of five consecutive division titles coming to an end. The A’s had played above .600 ball at home (51–30), but were decimated by a 36–44 record on the road, their worst since the franchise had moved to the West Coast. The most startling evidence of the A’s breakup was seen on the season’s final day, when none of their usual stars were in the lineup. A collection of second-stringers was asked to face the California Angels’ laser throwing right-hander, Nolan Ryan, who added 14 more strikeouts to his baseball-leading total of 327 on the year. Despite their tumult over the course of the season, the A’s still managed to finish with 341 stolen bases, the most ever in the American League and only six shy of the overall record. And what had happened to the pennant-defending Red Sox, who appeared to be on the verge of becoming the new American League dynasty at the start of the season? Zimmer, who was placed in charge of putting out fires for the second half of the summer, was convinced that complacency was at the root. “There is no doubt in my mind, there was no doubt in Darrell’s [Johnson] mind, that we came to Winter Haven in spring training with a better team than we had in 1975. I would say, however, that many of our players were overconfident. They didn’t train as they should have. They thought another division championship would be easy. They were wrong. Nothing in baseball is easy.” Thus, the Reds, a veteran-laden outfit seasoned with championship experience, would be the only team returning to the playoffs in 1976. “To win you must sacrifice,” Anderson pronounced. “To win, you must discipline yourself from April to October. That’s why a lot of players can’t play for a winning club; you have to win every day, and they just can’t handle it.” Even so, Anderson had been able to rest a majority of his regulars for the final week of the season due to the Reds’ early clinching of the Western Division. In fact, over the course of the 1976 season — because of injuries and other

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matters— the normal eight starters of Bench, Perez, Morgan, Rose, Concepcion, Foster, Geronimo, and Griffey had played together in only 57 games during the regular season. With each and every one now ready to go for the playoffs, woe seemed imminent for the Philadelphia Phillies in the National League Championship Series.

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“The Best There Is” You haven’t won anything until you’ve won the big one — the World Series. — Sparky Anderson, 1974

Even with their seasoned club, the Reds were fully aware of the Phillies’ being a worthy adversary. Danny Ozark’s team had gone 12–2 in the last two weeks of the season, appearing to shake off the near-disaster in late August and early September when they had lost 13 of 15 as the Pirates charged towards them. While coming close to relinquishing the lead to Pittsburgh at that point, the Phillies had in fact not given up the top spot in the Eastern Division since May 9, when Jim Lonborg beat the Dodgers 10–3. It appeared to be a year of destiny for the downtrodden Phils, who had made only two other post-season appearances in their 93-year history. “When I came here, all I knew was that the Phillies hadn’t won in 25 years,” second baseman Dave Cash noted about his trade to Philadelphia in the fall of 1973. “I had never been on a loser, even in high school. And I sure didn’t want to be part of that.” Cash had become an All-Star in each of his three seasons with the Phillies, while leading the National League in at-bats all three years in addition to posting the most triples in the league (12) in 1976. Maddox and Jay Johnstone provided a pair of .300 hitters to the lineup to supplement the home-run machines of Schmidt and their neighbor in left field, Greg Luzinski. Luzinski possessed as much raw strength as anyone in the game, as attested by one of the Phillies’ minor league coaches who watched him take batting practice as a rookie. “He hit the longest home run I ever saw — until he hit his next one,” read the report he had written for the organization. All of the regular players had become local favorites in the City of Brotherly Love; rounding out the starting lineup, however, was a true “prodigal son” at first base in Dick Allen. Allen was back for his second tour of duty in Philadelphia, coming to the Phillies in May 1975. Allen had logged a history of mysterious disappearances during his career, and the behavior surfaced again in July 1976 when he was a 183

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no-show for two straight games. In the midst of the team’s near free-fall out of the pennant chase in August, Allen received a tongue-lashing from Ozark when he showed up only 30 minutes before the start of another contest. At least in the eyes of his manager, Allen was at the center of the storm when the Phillies once again fell into complacency in the season’s final week, even though the club would finish the year by winning eight of its last nine. Allen had recently stated that unless long-time teammate and friend Tony Taylor was not placed on the playoff roster, he would boycott the postseason. Taylor was in his 19th major league season, and Allen felt that he deserved a chance to finally experience a playoff atmosphere. (Ironically, it was Taylor who, back in 1960, had taken Anderson’s job as the Phillies’ second baseman after Sparky’s lone year as a major league player.) Even with just the one loss the team suffered in the final week of the season, the manager ripped into the Phils for over a halfhour in the locker room, feeling that the players had lost their enthusiasm for playing since clinching the division title. “It’s hard to believe,” Ozark told the press. “I’ve been so excited about winning the division. I get up at seven in the morning just to feel good. But my players don’t seem excited.” Ozark pointed indirectly to the fact that Allen had been late on a road trip to St. Louis as well, staying behind in Philadelphia to spend more time with his family. It was a teammate that directly lashed out at Allen this time, as reliever Tug McGraw could not understand his actions. “He [Allen] makes $250,000 a year, and if he was so hot to celebrate with his family, he should have had them flown here [to St. Louis]. They say he’s been hitting an hour and a half every day at home — what the hell does he think his teammates are doing out here in St. Louis?” Having felt that Allen underachieved and was a general distraction since his first stint in Philadelphia from 1963 to 1969, the majority of the fans booed him loudly when he took the field in the season’s final weeks. Tom Callahan wrote that “Allen compares himself to ‘an ex-convict’ whom no one will give the chance to go straight. But he makes it hard when he does things like demanding his friend, Tony Taylor, be eligible for the playoffs.” Phillies general manager Paul Owens had already indicated to the local media that Allen would not be back in a Philadelphia uniform in 1977. Allen had at least one fan in attendance at the series— Rawly Eastwick. The Reds’ closer had grown up in nearby Camden, New Jersey, and recalled Allen as one of his favorite players when the slugger had his first go-round with the Phillies. “My brother and I would go to the games and imagine ourselves playing,” Eastwick remembered of visits during younger days to old Connie Mack Stadium, which housed the Phils until Veterans Memorial Stadium opened in April 1971, ten months after its twin brother, Riverfront Stadium, had its June 1970 inaugural in Cincinnati. “I was there the day he [Allen] hit one to center field over the batting cage. The next day, the papers said he was the second guy to hit one there, him and Jimmie Foxx. I couldn’t believe that anyone could hit a ball that far.” The awestruck Eastwick child, however, had grown into a man,


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ready to do his duty. “When he comes to the plate, he’s just another hitter,” he said of Allen. “I’m not going to think of his past accomplishments.” Eastwick noted that about 25 family and friends would be in attendance at the playoff games in Philadelphia, but was disappointed that the Phillies had placed the tickets— along with all the other player passes left by the Reds— in the upper deck of the outfield. Anderson relied heavily upon the work of Reds advance scout Ray Shore in preparing for Philadelphia, and Shore confirmed Sparky’s conclusion that Gullett should start Game One of the National League Championship Series. “He’s one of the better ones,” wrote Hertzel about Shore among his scouting peers, “the man whose scouting report helped bury Pittsburgh and Boston last year.” Shore had noted back in September that the Phillies would likely use their ace, Steve Carlton, in the opener of the series. In virtually every game he started in 1976, Carlton was permitted by Ozark to have his “personal” catcher in the lineup — the left-handed-hitting Tim McCarver — which Shore and Anderson agreed was a better match-up for the lefty Gullett than the righthanded-hitting Boone, the Phillies’ other catcher. McCarver had caught 19 of Carlton’s 20 victories in 1976, with their relationship dating back to the mid–1960s in the St. Louis Cardinals organization. (They knew each other so well, in fact, that McCarver once jokingly suggested that the two should be buried sixty feet, six inches from each other — the distance from the pitcher’s mound to home plate — after they die.) Carlton was the unquestioned leader of the Philadelphia starting staff which also included Lonborg, Kaat, Larry Christenson, and Tom Underwood. Back in early June, Ozark had promised $25 for each starting pitcher who would last at least six innings in a game and not issue a walk; the staff responded with three straight performances without a base on balls. “I hope I go broke,” the manager said after the third occasion. Now, in October, Ozark saw his starting pitchers as the key to beating Cincinnati. “I think the way you have to pitch to them,” he reasoned, “is to have your starter go as hard as he can for as long as he can, and then get him out of there.” Even so, Ozark was extremely confident in his bullpen, one member of whom, former pro basketball player Ron Reed, felt the Phillies had more depth than the Reds in that department. “When the game is really on the line, when it really gets down to the nitty-gritty, there’s only one guy that Sparky goes to,” Reed commented, obviously referring to Eastwick and describing the triumvirate of relievers on the Phillies, a system that would become familiar to Reds fans 14 years later. “Danny goes to three — Tug McGraw, Gene Garber, and me.” Sparky did not disagree with Reed’s assessment. “I have nowhere else to go,” Anderson said plainly of his bullpen options sans Eastwick. Eastwick had saved at least one game against every National League team except Montreal in 1976, and knew he would be a critical component of another Reds pennant chase. Among the backup infielders sitting on the bench for the Phillies was mal-

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content John Vukovich, the man whose spat with Sparky Anderson led to his banishment from Cincinnati and opened the third base position for Rose, and thus a main propeller in the 1975 championship. “Philadelphia is number one,” Vukovich said in admiration of his new surroundings, even though the Phillies only found eight at-bats for him in four games for all of 1976. “I don’t know where the Reds are. They’re not number two. They have a ____ legend at third base, and he isn’t happy with the organization. That tells you something.” Vukovich’s comment was in reference to a report in the newspapers about Rose supposedly wishing to be traded to Philadelphia, a claim made by Associated Press writer Norm Clarke that Rose categorically denied. As part of his report to Anderson, Shore also believed that the running game would be the difference in the series, with the Reds holding a distinct advantage in that department. Their 210 stolen bases on the year dwarfed the Phillies’ total of 127, and it was the first time in more than 60 years that a Cincinnati team had stolen over 200 bases in a season. Moreover, while Bench had nabbed four of the six Philadelphia runners who had tried to steal on him, the Reds were successful 14 of 18 tries versus the Phillie catchers. “There are two or three guys we’ve got to keep off base,” said McCarver, a veteran of postseason play who had been a World Series hero with the Cardinals in 1964. “[Morgan, Griffey, and Concepcion are] guys who, if they get on consistently, will steal off anybody.” Despite the Reds’ success in running on Ozark’s team in 1976, Boone was certainly on the list of the top backstops in the game behind Bench in throwing ability. In 1976, Boone had enjoyed one of his finest offensive seasons, posting a .271 average after a .246 performance the previous year. Rain hit the Veterans Stadium turf for much of the day before the start of Game One on the evening of October 9 in Philadelphia. The temperatures began to plummet quickly and strong winds blew cold gusts through the stands. Those stands were crammed to capacity, however, as over 62,000 huddled together, sipping hot coffee and anxiously awaiting the first playoff game in town in 26 years. Anderson, fearing that the grounds crew would purposefully not attend to the basepaths in order to slow down the Reds’ running game, kicked at each sliding pit in the middle of the artificial turf to make sure the dirt was wellpacked around each base. Eddie Sawyer, the man who had managed the Phillies to their last pennant in 1950, threw out a first pitch. (Sawyer had also managed Sparky Anderson in his only big league season in 1959.) Ozark and Sawyer were truly in unique company as the only men alive to lead the Phillies into postseason play. The only other National League pennant won by Philadelphia occurred back in 1915 under the guidance of Pat Moran, who passed away nine years after claiming his flag. Ozark was counting on playoff veterans Carlton, McCarver, and Lonborg — the latter of whom dominated the American League for Boston in 1967, only to lose to McCarver and Carlton in the World Series— to counter the confident, poised Reds team that hungered for a repeat, and who were 3–2 favorites over the Phillies on the Vegas betting boards. And


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Philadelphians were well aware of the mettle of their foe. “There is about them always an air, a palpable wisp of proficiency, prowess, mastery,” marveled Skip Myslenski of the Philadelphia Inquirer. “They seem forever capable of salvaging any circumstance, of capturing any game.” As play began, the Reds went right to work on Carlton, the Phillie stopper. Rose started the first inning with a double, measuring up to the marvelous .442 average (23-for-52) he had posted against Philadelphia in the regular season. The bases became loaded with one out after walks to Morgan and Perez, but Carlton recovered to get Foster to strike out and Bench to pop to Bowa at short to end the threat without a run scoring. Gullett, the first unsigned player ever to be the starting pitcher in the first game of a playoff series, took the mound in the bottom half. The Phillies drew first blood when a sacrifice fly by Schmidt scored Cash for an early 1–0 advantage. Schmidt, having batted nearly a hundred points higher in his career against the Reds than the rest of the major leagues (.338 to .252), had five homers and batted .348 versus Cincinnati in 1976. Once out of the initial jam, Gullett retired 20 of the next 21 Phillie batters, holding them at bay while his mates scored in the third via a Rose triple and Perez sacrifice fly to even the score. In the sixth, Foster showed some of his mid-season might by slugging a home run to left, giving the Reds a lead they would not relinquish. Though possessing a 6–1 advantage heading into the bottom of the ninth, Gullett was pulled by Anderson in favor of Eastwick. A series of hits and a wild pitch produced a couple of runs on the nervous native son, but he was able to retire Tolan and Tommy Hutton to end the game in a 6–3 Cincinnati win. Gullett was unquestionably the true all-around star of the contest, driving in three of the Reds’ runs while permitting only two hits over his eight innings of work. The Reds had indeed imposed their running will on Ozark’s club, stealing four bases off Carlton and McCarver (Morgan with two, and Bench and Griffey one each) to compliment Rose’s two doubles and triple to highlight the offense. In addition to his stolen base, Bench also posted two hits on the evening, with playoff action apparently bringing his latent talent in 1976 finally to consciousness. Bench had batted .188 (13-for-69) in September, the worst of all his poor months in 1976; nonetheless, the Phillies feared they had awoken a sleeping giant, with full knowledge that the catcher had five doubles, two homers, and nine RBIs against them in the twelve meetings between the two teams in the regular season. Furthermore, the Phillies had pitched around Bench for much of the season, walking him 13 times in the twelve contests. “If Bench gets hot in the post-season,” Bruce Keidan of the Philadelphia Inquirer had warned before the first game, “the Reds could be devastating.” Jim Russo, major league scout for the Baltimore Orioles, agreed. “Bad shoulder or not, Bench is still Bench,” he assessed. “A playoff or a World Series brings out the best in him.” In the American League series, no one was giving the Royals much of a

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chance against New York, especially Dick Young. “It’s the U.S. Marines against Cub Pack 89,” he characterized the match-up. “On paper, the Yankees are a cinch.” Catfish Hunter certainly made it look so in Game One, with the Yankees dismissing Kansas City on his five-hitter in winning 4–1. Being the Yanks’ first playoff appearance in twelve years, it appeared that much of the baseball world was surprisingly rooting for the Bronx Bombers— even in the other larger cities that held some of their fiercest rivals. “Throughout the South Side here in the ’50s and ’60s,” wrote Bill Gleason from his desk at the Chicago Sun-Times as one example, “Yankee-hating was an activity more beneficial than jogging, more therapeutic than drinking, more stimulating than a girlie magazine ... because the Yankees had been so abject during so many recent seasons, I feel certain that some White Sox fans, who know much about suffering, would take this Yankee team to its hearts.” Back in late September when Anderson, Shore, Scherger, and the rest of the staff had toyed with their options for the starting rotation for the playoffs, they had another crucial decision to make about the starter in Game Two in the wake of the injury to Billingham (who had won only three times at home all year), Acala’s inconsistency in the second half of the season, and Norman going to the bullpen as a result of his winless September with a 4.97 ERA. Anderson ultimately decided upon Zachry, not concerned about the rookie facing the seasoned October veteran in Lonborg because “we can get four or five runs off Lonborg,” he smirked. When this quotation reached the Phillies’ clubhouse, it was understandably met with scorn. “The Reds are working awfully hard to psych us,” former Cincinnati player Bob Tolan retorted. “If you think about it, all season long, Sparky has downgraded us. He’s never given us the credit we deserve. I think the psych job means that they’re worried.” When confronted with the Phillies’ rebuttal, Anderson laughed off their bickering over his words. “What are we, children? Who cares? We scored 5.82 runs a game off him [Lonborg] during the regular season. What are they all upset about?” Game Two was a Sunday afternoon affair and an LCS–record crowd of 62,651 enjoyed more temperate weather in the daytime hours. Griffey was able to walk and steal second in the first inning off Lonborg and the strong-armed Boone — the 16th consecutive stolen base by the Reds in playoff action — but was left stranded. Three straight singles in the Phillies’ second inning by Allen, Johnstone, and Boone gave them an early 1–0 lead, an advantage they would augment in the fifth when Luzinski walloped a monstrous home run to left field, landing in the upper deck. It was reported by local officials as only the 19th ball to reach that part of the ballpark since the facility opened; five had been launched by the hulking Luzinski. Despite the tremendous blast and deafening crowd roar that followed, Zachry kept his cool and was able to stem the tide at two total runs. The rookie had led the Reds’ staff during the regular season with an opponents’ batting aver-


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age of just .228, and he kept the Phillies from inflicting further damage heading into the Reds’ sixth turn. At that point, Zachry was lifted by Anderson in favor of Driessen as a pinch-hitter after Concepcion had walked. Moving on the first pitch, Davey was able to scoot into scoring position when Driessen grounded to Cash. Next up was Rose, and the steely money player laced a pitch into right field for a sharp hit, plating Concepcion and cutting the Philly lead in half. Another hit by Griffey, a walk to Morgan, and a critical error by Allen was parlayed into three more runs for the Reds, who had turned a deficit into a 4–2 lead on the dejected Philadelphia team. Taking the mound in Zachry’s place was Pedro Borbon, who had permitted only four runs since September 7 (in addition to assisting Eastwick with three more saves during the month) and, like most of the Reds players, was well-rested heading into the playoffs. His lead grew to 6–2 in the seventh on more hits by Rose and Griffey (as well as McGraw’s second wild pitch in as many days), while Pedro frustrated Ozark’s batters by scattering four hits over the final four frames. Attempting to widen the lead further in the eighth, Geronimo singled and then broke for second base on a Ron Reed pitch. Boone fired a laser to Bowa, however, nabbing the Reds’ center fielder and ending Cincinnati’s impressive streak of stolen base perfection in National League playoff action. By game’s end, Borbon had tossed four scoreless innings in preserving the 6–2 triumph for the rookie Zachry, and the Phils wasted several chances in allowing ten men to perish on base. In the process of helping the Reds attain the victory, Rose set a pair of league championship series records in Game Two with the most at-bats in LCS play (78)— bettering by three the mark set by Reggie Jackson — and the most runs, 11, in such contests, surpassing the standard of 10 set by Jackson’s teammate Bando and Mark Belanger of the Baltimore Orioles. An open travel date was scheduled for October 11, and the series continued at Riverfront on Tuesday the 12th. Greeting the Cincinnati crowd at the start of Game Three was the widow of former Reds pitcher Eppa Rixey, the team’s all-time leader in wins with 179, who fired out the ceremonial first pitch. The Cincinnati club seemed to be as indomitable as ever, now back on its home turf after topping the Phillies twice in their own park. Covering a Philadelphia team that contained many more free spirits, Myslenski was impressed with all aspects of the orderliness and efficiency of the Cincinnati outfit. “There is no long hair on the Reds,” he noticed, “nor beards or mustaches. Their uniforms are the traditional white, always crisp as a nurse’s; their shoes are black, their socks are cut low, and the outfit is worn in the same style by all.... Management also demands that players travel in coats (ties were excluded just this year), and that there be no drinking on planes, even on charter flights. ‘I’ve heard many stewardesses say we’re the nicest group they have,’ says Rose. ‘That’s good.’” It was Nolan’s turn to start, and once again the Phillies jumped out to a lead, courtesy of back-to-back doubles by Luzinski and Schmidt in the fourth inning. The lead increased to 3–0 in the seventh when two more doubles by

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Pete Rose shows the batting form that produced 4,256 hits, the most in baseball history (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York).

Maddox and Schmidt pushed across two runs off the rookie Sarmiento, who had replaced Nolan an inning earlier due to a pinch-hitter. But yet again, just as they were appearing to secure some traction in the series, the Phillies were thwarted in a vain effort to supersede the Cincinnati men. Nolan, hard pressed for run support all season from his normally prolific teammates, had seen only one hit and no runs on his behalf by the Reds’ batters by the time he exited the premises in the sixth. A massive Reds assault in the bottom of the seventh, however, gave them a 4–3 lead, culminated by a rousing Geronimo triple that plated the difference. When the Phillies recaptured the lead with three runs off the cooling Eastwick in the eighth and ninth, it looked as if a decision on the National League champion would stretch to a fourth game. Unfortunately for Ozark and Reed (his relief pitcher that inning), the Reds had the perfect countermeasures to bring to the plate. It started with two men looking to atone for weeks-long (and even season-long) slumps, as if waiting for the most dramatic moment to launch a deafening crescendo. Leading off was Foster, then man who had posted incredible numbers through two-thirds of the year, yet who had struggled in the final segment of the season. He caught hold of a Reed offering


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and drove a ball far into the Tri-State night, a 480-foot propulsion that cut the score to 6–5. Following Foster was Bench, who had come into the game batting .333 in the series in an attempt to reverse the statistical valley he had suffered in 1976. Jumping on a Reed fastball as quickly as Foster, Bench slammed another home run, circling the bases amidst a stadium shaking with a collective roar with the game tied. The Reds suddenly had the opportunity to claim a second straight pennant that very night, needing to send across a lone run with nobody out. The side-arming reliever Gene Garber, who joined Reed and McGraw as the third piece to the “deep” Phillies bullpen to which Reed had alluded prior to the series, entered the game and faced one batter, a five-pitch walk to Concepcion. Southpaw Tom Underwood was then summoned to face the left-handed Geronimo, but the same result occurred. Anderson sent Armbrister to the plate in place of Eastwick, and with first and second occupied, all knew the strategy; as one of the best bunters in the game, Armbrister would be asked to move the runners along. He did so with ease, placing Concepcion 90 feet away from the flag. A return to the top of the batting order saw Rose coming to the plate, a man whose pursuit of Joe DiMaggio’s consecutive-game hitting streak record just two years later would be thwarted by Garber. Serving no purpose to the Phillies’ strategy, Rose was given the open first base on an intentional walk. Next was Griffey, standing with a bountiful chance to provide the difference in any number of ways with contact. Swinging early, he tapped a dribbler to Tolan at first, who had seen Concepcion break for home out of the corner of his eye when the bat struck the ball. In his haste to fire the ball towards Phillies’ catcher Johnny Oates at the plate, Tolan never got a grip on it, the sphere laden with over-spin. It skidded away harmlessly from his glove as Griffey raced across first, Concepcion across the plate, and the Reds were back-to-back National League champions. The Reds had come from behind to win yet again, their ability of which John Wilson of the Houston Chronicle had marveled for several seasons. “The Reds must have been the toughest team to close out, year after year, of them all. That offensive potential is always there, and if they’re in striking distance in the late innings, it is a challenge indeed to hold onto a potential victory.” With the players laughing and singing in the Reds’ locker room, Tolan (along with Cash and Maddox), to the surprise of many of the Cincinnati men, dropped in to submit his congratulations; it was an effort to offer them (and Sparky Anderson, in particular) an olive branch for all of the turbulence of Tolan’s dealings with the organization over the past six years. Interestingly, the Reds had dismantled the strong Philadelphia squad without much help from Morgan, who went hitless in seven official at-bats in the series (despite the fact that he walked six times for a .462 on-base percentage and stole two bases). Additionally, the supposed “only option” for Anderson in the bullpen, Rawly Eastwick, posted a lofty NLCS earned run average of 12.00, as Borbon’s magnificent performance in Games Two and Three provided a

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much-needed boost from another entity. The sweep constituted six straight games the Reds had won in league championship play, including their threegame rout of Pittsburgh in 1975. As they expected, the Reds were marching on to another World Series, looking to become the first National League team in over fifty years to repeat as champions. They would meet the New York Yankees, who had been pushed unexpectedly to the brink by the upstart Royals in the American League Championship Series. The Yankees claimed the flag by virtue of first baseman Chris Chambliss’s startling ninth-inning home run in Game Five, perhaps the most dramatic homer in New York since Bobby Thomson’s “shot heard ’round the world” to take the National League pennant in 1951. Chambliss seemed to have a penchant for the game-winning homer in 1976; his bomb with two out in the ninth inning back on July 25 beat the Red Sox, sending the defending league champions to the bottom of the Eastern Division in Don Zimmer’s first week as Boston’s manager. Against the Royals, Chambliss was knocked to the ground by gleeful fans as he rounded the second base bag, but righted himself to finish the ceremony and hop on home plate to claim the Yankees’ 30th pennant. “I think I touched them all, but there might have been somebody lying on them at the time,” Chambliss said in reference to the bases, the path of which he tried to navigate despite being tugged at every turn. It was a satisfying personal culmination for Chambliss, who when acquired in a trade with Cleveland in 1974 was initially shunned by his new teammates, who felt that the organization had given up too much pitching in the trade. Now Chambliss, the rest of the team, and the Yankee executives in Steinbrenner and Paul felt as equally destined to greatness as the Reds, raising the onceproud franchise to their first World Series appearance in twelve years, befitting their 1976 return to their treasured and newly remodeled stadium. Still in their way stood a team, however, that reminded Associated Press writer Will Grimsley of great New York teams of past decades. “There is an aura of supreme confidence, without bombast or braggadocio, about the 1976 Cincinnati Reds. They apparently are building a baseball dynasty similar to that of the old New York Yankees.” And with the oncoming expansion of the American League from twelve to fourteen teams in 1977, it looked as if no team from the junior circuit was bound to stop them. ********** The Yankees’ first appearance in the Fall Classic since 1964 marked the culmination of the rebirth of the team from the Bronx, with their renovated ballpark and new spirit that hearkened to the great pinstriped teams of old. Even so, much of the road over the past few years had been rocky for the organization, and Steinbrenner had only recently been reinstated to baseball by Kuhn after a suspension. He was forced to serve a nine-month banishment from the game, starting in November 1974, after he had been indicted on 14 criminal counts tied to illegal contributions he had made to Richard Nixon’s 1972 pres-


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idential re-election campaign. (The transgressions would later be pardoned by President Ronald Reagan in 1989 days before Reagan left office.) Upon his return, Steinbrenner resumed his strict control of the club. When the Yankees arrived to spring training after the lockout in March 1976, they found a declaration affixed to the wall of the locker room: no beards or long hair would be permitted. In addition to thickly maned catcher Thurman Munson, Catfish Hunter, and Hunter’s fellow pitcher in ace reliever Sparky Lyle, a new member of the team would discover the new meaning of the term “Yankee Clipper.” Outfielder Oscar Gamble had been acquired from the Cleveland Indians in 1976, and Gamble was among the more famous Afro-wearers in the big leagues, his crop standing a full ten inches at its apex. When Gamble arrived at the Yankees’ pre-season headquarters at the Fort Lauderdale Inn at 6:00 P.M. on a Saturday in March, the barber shop had already closed for the day. Steinbrenner nonetheless ordered the facility opened so that Gamble could be shorn immediately. The price for having his locks cut was a full $30, and Gamble’s wife Juanita cried when the hair fell to the floor. “They carted the hair away in bushel baskets,” claimed witness Elston Howard, a former Yankee star and currently a coach. “There was so much of it I’m making myself a wig out of it.” Despite the laughs surrounding the scene, Steinbrenner made clear his intentions. “I’m trying to impose a certain sense of order and discipline in the ball club, because I think discipline is important to the athlete.” Former Detroit first baseman Norm Cash caught up with Munson after Thurman’s own not-so-careful trim and asked, “Where did you get that haircut — in a pet shop?” Word had circulated that Steinbrenner had seen how neatly groomed the Reds players were in spring training of 1976, and was so impressed that he wanted the same for his own employees. Even so, high-shine and polish alone would not win a championship; thus, Steinbrenner knew he must have a leader on the field who possessed the fire of the old Yankees. “When they hired pepperpot manager Billy Martin, the New York Yankees knew this season wouldn’t be dull. And it hasn’t been,” wrote Hal Bock of the Associated Press in late April 1976. Martin, a player on some of the great Yankee teams of the 1950s (as well as one year with the Reds in 1960), had received a three-year contract extension from Steinbrenner in mid–September after impressing the owner in his 13-month trial that began on August 2, 1975. “He is a man without peer as a manager,” Steinbrenner boasted about his skipper. Martin, of course, had also complied with the CEO’s directives in shaving off his mustache. “He has brought the great pride and tradition of the Yankee past into this new era, and we look forward to continued success under his leadership.” In reference to his famous boat-building boss, Martin confirmed that he had been allowed to make his own decisions on the field. “He lets me run my own ship, and I’ve let him run his own ship up there,” he said in pointing to the Yankees’ executive offices. Martin was with his fourth team and eighth season as a big-league manager, with his 97 wins in ’76 equaling the personal

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high he had set in his first (and only) season with the Minnesota Twins in 1969. He was asked to compare his current club to the great Yankee teams on which he played in the 1950s and ’60s. “We don’t have the one or two guys who can hit 40 or 50 home runs a year,” he admitted, noting the absence of a Mantle or a Maris or a Berra, “but we’ve got five or six who can give you 20 homers or more, and that’s just as good. That’s a lot of power.” When asked about his opponent in the World Series, Martin confessed that he had actually been more worried about the Phillies than the Reds. “I’ll take my pitching anytime,” he told the Cincinnati press after he arrived in town, comparing his staff against the Reds. “It’s going to boil down to pitching, and ours is better than it showed in the playoffs.... Our left-handed hitters will knock the living manure out of your right-handers.” A member of the Cincy media was quick to remind Martin that Gullett had pitched only 114 innings on the year, which in essence meant the Reds were without their number-one starter for more than half of the season. Like most other topics in Major League Baseball in 1976, the World Series was wrought with controversy from the beginning. And as with many previous events over the course of the year, Kuhn was once again in the middle of the issues, three of which would impact the series. First, the commissioner announced that the 1976 World Series would be played with the designated hitter in effect, a rule in place in the American League since 1973 that allowed another player to hit in the pitcher’s spot in the batting order without playing a position on defense. The edict immediately thrust such also-rans on the Reds’ roster as Driessen, Bailey, and Armbrister into possible prominent roles in the World Series (with Driessen likely serving as the DH against right-handed pitching, and the latter two versus lefties). While Anderson relished the chance to get these men into the lineup, he nonetheless despised the rule. “I think the designated hitter is the worst gimmick they’ve ever come up with,” Sparky quipped, wishing that the manager held more strategic power. “I would like to go into a World Series, thinking maybe one move here or there would make the difference. All the drama can come down to a decision on the pitcher. That’s what it’s all about.” As for Driessen, he had gained some experience as a DH while playing winter ball in Puerto Rico, but did not enjoy the sporadic adrenaline that it provided in the overall flow of a game. “When you haven’t been playing, it’s not easy to get your stroke back. You can’t do it running up and down the tunnel.” The disagreement in the rule’s usage between the American and National leagues was thus called by Dick Young as “a compromise, really, the worst one since Chamberlain gave the Sudetenland to Hitler.” Disdain for the idea even made atypical allies of Bob Howsam and Marvin Miller on the topic, as each man disagreed with its use for different reasons. Howsam was so much against the measure, in fact, that he had forbidden Reds minor league teams to use a DH, even though many leagues in which those teams were housed had installed the practice. “Howsam is against the rule


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because of its merits,” Miller explained. “We are not taking a position concerning the merits of the rule.” Instead, Miller was filing a grievance against Kuhn’s directive because of the dictatorial precedent it might set, leading to possible unilateral power within the commissioner’s office. “If he can do this,” Miller warned, “then he can go to 12-inning ball games, two strikes and a batter is out, or moving the mound to 80 feet or 40 feet.” Miller added that Kuhn did not have authority to alter the rules of the game without consulting the Players Association, as per the new basic bargaining agreement signed in August. Howsam, on the other hand, simply did not like the trampling of tradition within the sport. “We have a great game that doesn’t need gimmicks,” he scoffed. Before the series began, Miller spoke with Reds player representatives and asked if they would back his grievance; they answered in the affirmative, but admitted their stance was only because they felt they had a better chance of winning without the designated hitter in effect. “It changes strategy,” Bench pointed out. “We might get a pitcher out of there early that we want out, but not be able to get him out with the designated hitter. We feel we have the better eight [position players than the Yankees].” Out of jocular spite, Anderson considered letting his pitchers bat anyway, perhaps declining any and all use of the DH. “I’m not sure if I will or if I won’t,” he tantalized the press before Game One, “but I hate that rule. If you could win without using the rule, think of the embarrassment for the other league.” Joel Youngblood, the reserve player for the Reds who had seen only limited action all year, offered perhaps the most interesting perspective on the matter. “The designated hitters take away from the utility players too,” he asserted. “For me to get into a game [in the World Series] would probably be as a pinch runner.” Kuhn also issued a second order that, for the first time ever, a Sunday game in the World Series would be played at night as an assumed favor to the NBC television network, which would be telecasting its 30th consecutive World Series but its first in 11 years without veteran Curt Gowdy at the play-by-play microphone. On the radio side, the chores were being handled by CBS, which would be the last time that the participating teams’ broadcasters (Brennaman for the Reds and Phil Rizzuto for the Yankees) would be working for the network. The first game would be played on Saturday afternoon, October 16, whereas Game Two would begin at 8:00 P.M. on Sunday, October 17. As with the designated hitter decision, it was another decision from Kuhn that Bench, Anderson, and others strongly denounced. “Sunday afternoon, that’s what baseball is for,” the catcher shook his head in disbelief. “They’re just trying to get the baseball and the football audience.” Anderson was particularly concerned about the effects of colder temperatures at night. “You should always play under the best conditions for both teams,” he said. “You decide: Do you like it 60 degrees or 45?” Rose, on the other hand, was pleased that he now had time for his other interests. “It’s good; I get to see the football games,” he said of his

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now-free Sunday afternoon. But if it was added business for which Kuhn was looking, Joe Gergen of New York Newsday warned that the strategy might be counter-productive. “While more people may be able to tune in to baseball when the World Series is played at night,” he wrote, “there is the risk that more people also will be turned off.” Finally, a third matter of contention with which Kuhn had to navigate was what would become known as the “Walkie-Talkie” controversy. For several months, the Yankees had been placing coaches and scouts in the upper reaches of Yankee Stadium and other venues around the American League, originally intended to assist in the positioning of their outfielders on defense in response to hitter tendencies, weather conditions, and so forth. It was not an unusual practice; Sparky Anderson, in fact, initially did not mind that the Yankees planned to do it in the World Series since the Reds had employed the tactic themselves on occasion. Early in Game One in Riverfront Stadium, however, Kuhn abruptly and completely forbade the technique. He had given the Yankees permission to place one scout in the stands for the stated purpose. Nonetheless, before the end of the first inning, there was not one but an entire staff of scouts at work on the project; and the collection was not sitting in the stands, but rather had found its way into the CBS radio booth, which also contained television monitors for the assistance of the radio broadcasters in the transmission of the game action to the audience. It was presumed — or at least feared — by Reds personnel that the Yankee scouts were now using their walkie-talkies to relay the signs that Bench was flashing to the Cincinnati pitchers, as the television cameras displayed their typical pre-pitch vantage point from above the center field wall. When removed from the radio booth, the Yankee employees attempted to set up shop in the NBC television booth. They were quickly removed from that room as well when Reds publicity director Jim Ferguson instructed them to leave. When word of the expulsion reached Martin on the Yankees’ bench, the manager was incensed, lashing out at the Reds’ general manager (although Billy could not remember the gentleman’s name). “What’s his name —Howser?— told the commissioner he didn’t want us to use them [the walkie-talkies], and the commissioner said, ‘Yes sir, Mr. Howser.’” Martin was seen conversing with Steinbrenner and Gabe Paul near the Yankees’ dugout before the game started, and eavesdroppers heard reference to the walkie-talkie situation being discussed. The clandestine nature of the Yankees’ operations caused Anderson to stand in firm agreement with Kuhn’s decision on this matter. As the series was about to get underway, Anderson admitted that he felt more comfortable in a match-up with the Yankees than he would have been with the Royals. “We would be more prepared to contain them because they are so left-handed,” Sparky claimed, in reference to Chambliss, fleet center fielder Mickey Rivers, and power hitters Gamble and third baseman Graig Nettles as their primary offensive threats, all batting from the left side. And even


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Game night at Riverfront Stadium, where through 1976 the Reds won nearly twothirds of their contests since the building opened six years earlier (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York).

the rock-solid Munson, the team’s second-leading hitter (behind Rivers) at .302 overall during the season, dipped slightly to .287 when facing southpaws. Munson was looking forward to the series on a personal level, having a desire to prove that he was a better catcher than Bench. As for Bench, it was another chance to go toe-to-toe with one of the best backstops in the American League, as he had done in the 1975 World Series against Carlton Fisk of the Red Sox. Many in the Reds’ war room, however, did not see much of a threat in the Yankees’ catcher. “We’ll run all over Munson,” the superscout Shore predicted. Additionally, Shore felt that the Reds would face no pitcher on the Yankees’ staff that was near the equal of the Phillies’ Carlton. “The Yankees don’t have a Johnny Bench in Munson,” added Sparky Anderson. “He wants to see the best catcher in the world? Okay, he will — but he’ll be wearing a Cincinnati uniform.” Shore concluded his ideas with one more thought for the newspapers, which then carried into a confident prediction. “If we lose more than one game in the World Series, I will be disappointed. I’m not trying to belittle anyone, and I’m not trying to sound cocky. But I’m supposed to know baseball, and if

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I say I think the World Series will go seven games, people will think I’m stupid.” Gullett was indeed the choice for Anderson in Game One. Almost humorously, the hurler without a contract stated before the game, “I haven’t given up hope that I will sign with the Reds.” His New York opponent was right-hander Doyle Alexander, who had joined the Yankees in a massive mid-season trade, just before the trading deadline on June 15 in a deal that also brought veteran pitchers Ken Holtzman, Grant Jackson, and veteran catcher Elrod Hendricks to the Yankees. Alexander had proven to be a valuable commodity to Steinbrenner, having won 10 games in 19 starts after settling in the Bronx. Alexander had one previous post-season start on his resume, having pitched (and lost) the decisive Game Five of the Orioles’ 1973 ALCS battle against the Oakland A’s. Coming into the 1976 World Series, he had not pitched in three weeks, with his last outing being a five-inning start at Detroit on September 25. Alexander expressed concern before the game that the long layoff might affect his control on the cool evening. Gullett started in fine form, retiring the Yankees in order in the first inning that included strikeouts of Rivers and Munson. Alexander appeared to be on his way to a perfect bottom-half as well, but Morgan surprised him with a quick swing and a home run to the right field stands as the fans leapt to their feet at the Reds getting the first score. The Yankees came back to tie the game immediately in the second when Lou Piniella shot a double to right field and was later driven home by a Nettles sacrifice fly. From that point, Gullett allowed his teammates to rebuild their lead, holding the Yankees while the Reds posted lone runs in the third and sixth. Rose added a sacrifice fly following a Concepcion triple, and Perez later singled home Griffey, who brashly stole second on the confident Munson. In the bottom of the seventh with the Reds keeping the 3–1 lead, Alexander would fail to retire a batter, allowing a single by Foster and a triple by Bench before being replaced by Lyle. The lefthander promptly issued a wild pitch to Geronimo that scored Bench for a 5–1 Cincinnati advantage, which was much more than the Cincy southpaw would require. Gullett continued to roll without a blemish on the scoreboard after permitting the lone Yankee run in the second inning. Pitching to Rivers to start the eighth inning, Gullett induced the “slap” hitter to pop up meekly to Bench behind the plate. (After Bench had thrown out Rivers trying to steal in the sixth inning, Martin — apparently intimidated by Bench’s presence — would not try another steal until the series’ final game.) To take away Rivers’ ability to bunt for a hit, the Reds had employed yet another of Shore’s suggestions by playing Rose in closely on him, with the third baseman only 60 feet away from Rivers when he took his swings. “He does not have the bat control to hit it past me,” Rose claimed. In retiring Rivers, however, Gullett heard a strange popping noise in his right ankle as his foot planted near the bottom of the pitching mound. Startled, he took a few steps around the back of the mound in


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hopes of the pain subsiding. Upon taking his place back on top of the rubber, Gullett threw one more pitch, “a terrible fastball” (as he would later put it), which Roy White shot to center field for a single. Putting his hands on his knees with his head down, Gullett knew he could no longer continue. The later diagnosis was a dislocation of the ankle; team doctor George Ballou immediately put his leg in a cast after viewing the x-rays at the hospital. Gullett was suddenly finished for the series with yet another injury, and would be in a cast for the next six weeks. When Gullett was removed by Anderson, the roaring home crowd was unaware of the severity of the injury. With Borbon taking over, the right-hander cruised through the final five outs in perfect fashion, with Gamble popping out in foul territory to Rose near third base to end Game One. As evidenced by his 0-for-4 performance, Driessen was not comfortable in his role as the National League’s first designated hitter in the modern era of baseball. To keep himself warm in between his four plate appearances, he disappeared to the clubhouse to sit in the team’s sauna. Driessen was so unaccustomed to the strange assignment that he unwittingly grabbed his glove and jogged out to the outfield after popping out to Munson to end the sixth inning, ready to take a defensive position that did not exist for him. Munson, meanwhile, attempted to find a reason for his club’s less-than-inspired play in first contest, although some felt it was a strange attempt at a justification. “If you just won a [league] championship, partied until six o’clock in the morning, and had to play again 30 hours later, how would you feel?” Fans at Riverfront, on the other hand, were apparently indifferent about the Yankee catcher’s impact, as a large sign that read “THURMAN WHO?” was seen hoisted above the Yankees’ dugout. Naturally, the triumph in Game One was considered a pyrrhic victory by Anderson because of Gullett’s injury. He now had to consider moving Norman back into the rotation since he was now the only southpaw on the roster with an ability to start. Nonetheless, Sparky was as confident as ever in meeting the American League’s best for the second year in a row. In the tunnel leading to the clubhouse after Game One, Anderson was heard telling Si Burick of the Dayton Daily News, “We’re going to win it in four.” The box score from Game One: NY CIN

0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0—1 5 1 1 0 1 0 0 1 2 0 x — 5 10 1

New York

AB

R

H

RBI

Rivers cf White lf Munson c Piniella dh May ph, dh Chambliss 1b Nettles 3b

4 4 4 3 1 3 3

0 0 0 1 0 0 0

0 1 1 1 0 1 0

0 0 0 0 0 0 1

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The 1976 Cincinnati Reds New York

AB

R

H

RBI

Maddox rf Gamble ph Randolph 2b Stanley ss Velez ph Mason ss Alexander p Lyle p Totals

2 1 2 1 1 0 0 0 29

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1

1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5

0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1

DP: 2. Alexander-Randolph-Chambliss, Randolph-StanleyChambliss E: Chambliss (1) 2B: Piniella (1, off Gullett) 3B: Maddox (1, off Gullett) SF : Nettles (1, off Gullett) HBP: Chambliss (1, by Gullett) Team LOB: 6 CS: Rivers (1, 2nd base by Gullett/Bench)

Cincinnati

AB

R

H

RBI

Rose 3b Griffey rf Morgan 2b Perez 1b Driessen dh Foster lf Bench c Geronimo cf Concepcion ss Gullett p Borbon p Totals

2 4 4 4 4 3 3 3 3 0 0 30

0 1 1 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 5

0 0 1 3 0 2 2 1 1 0 0 10

1 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 4

DP: 2. Morgan-Concepcion-Perez, Morgan-Perez E: Geronimo (1) 2B: Perez (1, off Alexander); Geronimo (1, off Lyle) 3B: Concepcion (1, off Alexander); Bench (1, off Alexander) HR: Morgan (1, 1st inning off Alexander 0 on 2 out) SF : Rose (1, off Alexander) Team LOB: 4 SB: Griffey (1, 2nd base off Alexander/Munson) CS: Perez (1, 2nd base by Alexander/Munson)

New York

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Alexander L (0–1) Lyle Totals

6 2 8

9 1 10

5 0 5

5 0 5

2 0 2

1 3 4

1 0 1

Alexander faced 2 batters in the 7th inning. WP: Lyle (1)


201

Cincinnati

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Gullett W (1–0) Borbon Totals

7.1 1.2 9

5 0 5

1 0 1

1 0 1

3 0 3

4 0 4

0 0 0

HBP: Gullett (1, Chambliss) Umpires: HP — Lee Weyer; 1B — Lou DiMuro; 2B — Bill Williams; 3B — Bill Deegan; LF — Bruce Froemming; RF — Dave Phillips Time of Game: 2:10 Attendance: 54,826

Despite his ruling on the “Walkie-Talkie Incident,” not all of Kuhn’s judgments would go in the Reds’ favor. When Gullett went down with his injury, both Anderson and Howsam assumed they would be permitted to fill the vacant roster spot with another player, whom they planned on being relief pitcher Joe Henderson. The request was denied by the commissioner, pointing to the precedent he had set in the 1973 World Series. After a couple of crucial errors by Oakland second baseman Mike Andrews, an angry Charlie Finley tried to put Andrews on the disabled list for the remainder of the series as a punitive measure. Kuhn ruled that since Andrews was not actually hurt, he could not be placed on the disabled list; even though Gullett was indeed injured, recent rule changes forbid any new players being placed on the active roster once the World Series had begun. Thus, the Reds would now have to beat the 25 Yankees with 24 of their own. As with his scorn of the designated hitter rule, Anderson looked at it simply as another opportunity to show the superiority of the National League. Howsam, however, thought the commissioner should look at such situations on a case-by-case basis and not unilaterally. “It would be better if the rule allowed the commissioner to use judgment,” Howsam figured. “A team with two catchers that loses one needs to activate a player.” It was obvious that Anderson felt a renewed confidence in McEnaney when he immediately summoned Norman — with Gullett down, the team’s only other lefthander — to start Game Two. McEnaney had not appeared in a game since the last week of September, but Anderson had been impressed enough with his bullpen practice exhibitions to warrant another chance. After the nation had its fill of professional football on television during the afternoon of October 17, it reloaded on apple pie before settling in for the first-ever World Series game on a Sunday night. The Yankees were confident in their ability to rebound, sending Catfish Hunter to the mound to start opposite Norman. Hunter was as playoff-hardened as anyone on either staff, having pitched in 16 post-season games in the past five years, 14 of them starts. He had, in one effect, launched baseball into a new era of money, contracts, and courtroom drama as the eye of the free agent movement’s new storm, but no role of his was more important than the one that faced him this evening in Riverfront Stadium. As for Norman, it was his fourth playoff start, his last being a dreadful performance in Game Four against Boston in the 1975 World Series.

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Poised and confident this time, Norman darted to the hill and promptly retired Rivers, White, and Munson in the Yankees’ first turn at bat. With the sun going down, the temperatures dipped into the 40s as everyone in the ballpark struggled to stay warm. Not the least of these was Driessen, who was still trying any measure possible to stay ready for his four or five trips to the plate without the benefit of being involved on the defensive side. Intent on getting himself off to a good start in Game Two, he rocketed a double past Rivers in center to lead off the second inning. Following him was Foster, who lined the ball just past Hunter for a center-field single and a 1–0 Reds lead. After Foster was caught stealing, the Reds resumed their assault with a Bench double, a Geronimo walk, and a base hit by Concepcion for another run. When Griffey added a sacrifice fly to the over-worked Rivers, Cincinnati had jumped out to a three-run advantage in mere moments. Singles by Munson, Chambliss, and Nettles got the Yankees on the board in the fourth, and they stormed back to tie with two more runs off Norman in the seventh. With the short road ahead to the end of the season, Anderson knew that his elongated pitching staff — with Billingham also now at his disposal in the bullpen — worked to his advantage. He brought the former starter into the game to face the tough right-handed bats in Munson and Piniella with the goahead runs on base. Looking for a chance to contribute in the midst of a struggling year, Billingham produced two of his finest pitches of the season. He was able to cause both men to ground into force plays, ending the threat and keeping the game tied at three. With neither team able to dent the scoreboard in the eighth, Billingham went back to work on the Yankees in the ninth, buoyed with a renewed vigor from his most recent success. Second baseman Willie Randolph was a quick victim on called strikes, while shortstop Fred Stanley popped weakly to Morgan and Rivers grounded easily to Perez at first to send the Reds to the bottom half with yet another chance for a riveting, last-moment victory. The game appeared destined for extra innings as Hunter pushed on, getting the first two Cincinnati batters in Concepcion and Rose to fly out. Griffey was next, and as he had done so well for the past two years, used his speed to induce an errant play on the part of an infielder, with Stanley being the current victim. He hurried his throw in an attempt to end the inning quickly, and it sailed out of play, putting Griffey in scoring position at second base. Wishing to keep Hunter in the game, Martin walked the dangerous left-handed hitting Morgan with first base open. Perez then sauntered to the plate, the RBI hero so many times. Not missing a golden chance, he ripped a Hunter fastball into left field for a hit. Griffey raced around the waving arms of Scherger in the third base coach’s box and cruised across the dish as Roy White’s poor arm was no match for Griffey’s speed. The game was over, and the Reds had captured both initial games at home in defense of their title, with Billingham getting a well-deserved win in relief of the strong start by Norman. To the


203

witnesses, it was not only the fact that the Cincinnati club held a two-game lead on the Yankees that made them seem indomitable; it was the manner in which they were victorious, finding infinite ways in which to beat teams, even on the occasional night in which the opponent seemed to have a fighting chance. In consideration of popular opinion against his pronouncement of the designated hitter, the majority of the opinions of Kuhn’s other idea of Sundaynight playoff baseball was negative as well. This was expressed in no uncertain terms by Hertzel in one of his most scathing articles of the season, which blasted the control that television producers were now exerting over the sport. “Baseball no longer thinks of the men who play the game, or the suckers who shelled out $15 a seat ... all baseball thinks about is the dollar and the ratings.... They played on Sunday night for one reason. The reason is NBC. It has nothing to do with the good of the game, the glory of the spectacle or the fan. NBC wants to play football on its network and follow it with baseball. That is why you, the reader who went to the game, froze your posterior off. “Will baseball ever free itself from the dominion of the networks? The World Series remains the premier sporting event in the nation and it should dictate to [NBC executive] Carl Lindeman, not vice versa.” More of the same was forecasted in Yankee Stadium for the continuation of the series— both in the weather and on the scoreboard. “The series now moves to New York for Game Three on Tuesday night,” observed Charles Maher of the Los Angeles Times, “and there’s a good chance the show will close there. The Reds, though two games up, still haven’t played their best baseball. But even something less than their best may be too much for New York.” Sparky Anderson agreed. “On a scale of ten,” Anderson said in subdued confidence afterwards, “we’ve played about a seven.” The box score from Game Two: NY CIN

0 0 0 1 0 0 2 0 0—3 9 1 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 — 4 10 0

New York

AB

R

H

RBI

Rivers cf 5 White lf 3 Munson c 4 Piniella rf 4 Chambliss 1b 4 Nettles 3b 4 Maddox dh 3 May ph, dh 1 Randolph 2b 4 Stanley ss 3 Hunter p 0 Totals 35 E: Stanley (1) 2B: Stanley (1, off Norman) Team LOB: 7

0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 3

0 1 1 2 2 1 0 0 1 1 0 9

0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 3

204

The 1976 Cincinnati Reds Cincinnati

AB

R

H

RBI

Rose 3b Griffey rf Morgan 2b Perez 1b Driessen dh Foster lf Bench c Geronimo cf Concepcion ss Norman p Billingham p Totals

4 4 4 5 4 4 4 2 4 0 0 35

0 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 0 0 4

0 0 2 2 2 1 2 0 1 0 0 10

0 1 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 4

DP: 1. Concepcion-Morgan-Perez 2B: Driessen (1, off Hunter); Bench (1, off Hunter) 3B: Morgan (1, off Hunter) SF : Griffey (1, off Hunter) IBB: Morgan (1, by Hunter) Team LOB: 10 SB: Morgan (1, 2nd base off Hunter/Munson); Concepcion (1, 2nd base off Hunter/Munson) CS: Foster (1, 2nd base by Hunter/Munson)

New York

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Hunter L (0–1) Totals

8.2 8

10 10

4 4

3 3

4 4

5 5

0 0

Cincinnati

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Norman Billingham W (1–0) Totals

6.1 2.2 9

9 0 9

3 0 3

3 0 3

2 0 2

2 1 3

0 0 0

Umpires: HP — Lou DiMuro; 1B — Bill Williams; 2B — Bill Deegan; 3B — Bruce Froemming; LF — Dave Phillips; RF — Lee Weyer Time of Game: 2:33 Attendance: 54,816

The Yankees were certain that a return trip home would do them good; the upbeat mood of their skipper was first noticed by Armand Schneider, covering the series for the Chicago Daily News. “Billy Martin and Sparky Anderson like to use the term ‘aggressive’ in describing their teams,” he wrote. “Martin’s Yankees haven’t been yet, which is why they’re down two games to none. Martin says his team will play its type of game when the series resumes on natural grass in Yankee Stadium.” The debated issues of designated hitters, walkie-talkies, and night games, while annoying, were generally innocuous to the actual games being played. As the Series moved into the Bronx, however, a larger matter was looming, one that some feared would threaten the very conclusion of the series. When Chambliss made his pennant-winning jaunt around the bases after his home run against Kansas City in the ALCS, he was assaulted — albeit happily — by numer-


205

ous spectators that had made their way through security personnel and onto the field. Additionally, Hertzel confirmed that “nine times the game was stopped Thursday night in Yankee Stadium [the evening of Chambliss’s clinching home run]. Bottles were tossed from the stands at the Kansas City players. Debris was everywhere.” Since these were not the first such incidents seen in recent years in New York, concerns were raised about law enforcement’s ability to maintain crowd control, especially in a hyped-up event such as the Yankees’ first World Series appearance in twelve years. Additionally, the New York City Police Department was currently in a contract squabble with the mayor’s office. The stand-off led to off-duty officers handing out pamphlets on the street which read, “Welcome to Fear City,” as the string of recent murders had also gone unsolved. The Reds were particularly anxious about local security after Rose’s confrontation with Bud Harrelson in the 1973 National League playoffs across town in Shea Stadium and the resulting barrage of objects hurled his way from New York fans when he re-entered the playing field (not unlike the situation Cardinals outfielder Joe Medwick experienced with Detroit fans when he became entangled in a high-spikes slide with Tigers third baseman Marv Owen in the 1934 World Series). The potential for violence particularly troubled Anderson, and he made it clear that the safety of his players was his utmost priority. “I will meet with the commissioner and the umpires,” he announced before the Series began. “I will tell them in that meeting what I will do if there is violence, and I will do what I tell them I’m gonna do. The game should not have to go through something like what happened at Yankee Stadium.” As for Bench, he wondered where the ubiquitous Kuhn was on this issue. “It’s up to the commissioner to control it — he tries to do everything else,” the catcher jeered. Morgan added that “if it comes to clinching it there [in Yankee Stadium], I won’t let my wife go to the game.” Despite Joe’s trepidation, the Reds’ wives would enjoy the opportunity of seeing Manhattan — all but Karolyn Rose, who preferred to remain at the hotel. “I’m in the lobby every day,” she revealed. “I’ve always been a ‘lobby lizard.’” But while the wives frolicked around the city, the Reds players continued to wonder about their own safety and that of their families. Furthermore, it was not any more comforting for the Reds that the starting pitcher for the Yankees in Game Three was Dock Ellis, a man who unabashedly marketed himself as one of baseball’s loosest cannons in the early 1970s while playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates. While grappling via the newspapers with his bosses in Pittsburgh, Ellis had openly abused drugs and even wore his hair in curlers while parading around the clubhouse and the Pirates bullpen. He was also immensely talented, evidenced by the no-hitter he threw at the Padres in 1970 (despite being under hallucinogens at the time, as Ellis admits in his autobiography co-authored with poet Donald Hall, Dock Ellis in The Country of Baseball). And as evidenced by one of the more bizarre pitching performances in recent baseball history, Ellis also had a more contemptu-

206


ous past with the Cincinnati club than any other pitcher the Reds had known. On May 1, 1974, Ellis had started a game for the Pirates against the Reds in Pittsburgh’s Three Rivers Stadium. Later confessing that he was high on drugs during the outing, he took the mound with the sole intent to hit as many Cincinnati batters as he could. After plunking Rose, Morgan, and Driessen to start the game, he fired four close pitches to Perez that missed him. “The first pitch to Pete Rose was directed toward his head,” Ellis would later reveal. After two pitches nearly missed Bench as well, Ellis was finally removed from the game by Murtaugh. The pitcher had reportedly refused to meet with Murtaugh and catcher Manny Sanguillen before the game to go over the Reds’ batting order since he planned to “mow the lineup down” anyway. Ellis had first mentioned the idea of attacking the Reds in his first opportunity on the year to some teammates in spring training, but they figured he was only joking. He claimed to be a changed man, however, and was even named The Sporting News’ 1976 Comeback Player of the Year in the American League after winning 17 games in his first season in New York, arriving with Randolph and pitcher Ken Brett (brother of the Royals’ George) in a trade with the Pirates. Nonetheless, the writers wondered about Sparky Anderson’s state of mind as the unpredictable pitcher was taking the mound in the lately unpredictable gladiator ring of Yankee Stadium. Would he pull his team off the field, if necessary? “I won’t have to,” Anderson answered. “The commissioner says he will take immediate action if there is any trouble.” Ellis was the Yankees’ representative to the Players Association, and as a gesture of good faith, announced to the press that the Yankees would leave the field if New York fans hurled bottles at Reds players as they did at the Kansas City team. As the Yankees emerged from the dugout for Game Three, a full throng of more than 56,000 stomped its feet in the House that Ruth Built, attempting to conjure the many ghosts that wandered between 157th and 161st streets, and who had brought the Bronx so much glory for sixty years. One of the ghosts actually appeared in human form when DiMaggio made his way to the center of the turf to throw out the first pitch, adding more positive energy to the faithful. Facing no bigger stage in sports than a visiting pitcher in Yankee Stadium for a World Series game, Zachry showed a few jitters as he misplayed a Rivers bunt to start the Yankee first, the gazelle galloping across the first base bag as the crowd roared its approval. The young hurler composed himself, and soon became as unflappable as he had been all year. Peeking over his shoulder at Rivers, he rotated quickly and snagged the runner at first, picking him off as Martin charged from the dugout in protest of the call by umpire Bill Deegan. Martin claimed that Zachry had clearly balked, but his complaint fell on the typical deaf ears. Just as he had done in Game Two, Driessen got himself and his club off to a fine start in leading off the second inning. He singled and promptly stole


207

second on Munson, and was driven home on a Foster double for the first run of the game. Bench and Concepcion followed with hits to produce two more runs off Ellis, who became the latest Yankee to permit an early lead to the Cincinnati offense. Driessen ignited things in the fourth as well, beginning that frame with a solo homer for a 4–0 Reds lead. Zachry continued to hold serve, allowing the New Yorkers only scant and scattered baserunners here and there. After permitting a run in the fourth, a true mathematical oddity struck Zachry and the Reds in the seventh. Up to bat was light-hitting infielder Jim Mason, who had entered the game merely as a defensive replacement in the fifth inning and who had compiled only ten home runs in over 1,200 major league at-bats at the time of the 1976 World Series. Zachry, conversely, had been the stingiest pitcher in the major leagues in allowing round-trippers in 1976, giving up a mere eight homers in 204 innings pitched. Thus, it was amazing to all observers when Mason deposited a Zachry offering over the wall, making the score 4–2 in what would be the only World Series at-bat in Mason’s career. Sensing further danger after Rivers walked and Munson singled, Anderson removed the rookie to have McEnaney face Chambliss, since one tremendous swing from the homer-capable first baseman would give the Yankees the lead in the game, and perhaps the momentum in the series. After his brilliant first half of the season, McEnaney had fallen in disfavor with Anderson, used sparingly by the manager in September and not at all since the last week of the regular season. Recalling his tension-filled situation in Fenway Park twelve months earlier, McEnaney focused on his job and battled Chambliss, the pennant hero. The Yankee tried to pull a tough slider that Will had targeted for the outside corner, and the result was a meek grounder to Perez, who flipped the ball to McEnaney for the clutch out as the threat was subsided. Two more Reds runs followed in the eighth, the process of which included Rose launching one of his legendary head-first leaps into third base, opening up a 6–2 lead. This encouraged Sparky to permit McEnaney to continue and thus re-assert his confidence on the mound. After a scoreless bottom of the eighth, Rivers and Munson hit safely in the ninth, but once again Chambliss was retired to end the game when he sliced a soft liner to Foster in left. The Reds had opened a 3–0 advantage on the American League’s best; could they finish off a perfect postseason? The box score from Game Three: CIN NY

0 3 0 1 0 0 0 2 0 — 6 13 2 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0—2 8 0

Cincinnati

AB

R

H

RBI

Rose 3b Griffey rf Morgan 2b Perez 1b Driessen dh

5 4 4 4 3

1 0 1 0 2

2 1 1 0 3

0 0 1 0 1

208

The 1976 Cincinnati Reds Cincinnati

AB

R

H

RBI

Foster lf Bench c Geronimo cf Concepcion ss Zachry p McEnaney p Totals

4 4 4 4 0 0 36

1 0 1 0 0 0 6

2 2 1 1 0 0 13

2 0 1 1 0 0 6

E: Morgan (1); Zachry (1) DP: 1 Perez-Concepcion 2B: Foster (1, off Ellis); Driessen (2, off Jackson); Morgan (1, off Jackson) HR: Driessen (1, 4th inning off Ellis 0 on 0 out) IBB: Driessen (1, by Tidrow) Team LOB: 4 SB: Driessen (1, 2nd base off Ellis/Munson); Geronimo (1, 2nd base off Ellis/Munson)

New York

AB

R

H

Rivers cf White lf Munson c Chambliss 1b May dh Nettles 3b Gamble rf Piniella ph, rf Randolph 2b Stanley ss Hendricks ph Mason ss Velez ph Ellis p Jackson p Tidrow Totals

4 3 5 5 4 2 3 1 4 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 35

0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2

2 0 3 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 8

RBI 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 2

DP: 3 Stanley-Randolph-Chambliss, Nettles-Chambliss, Nettles-Randolph-Chambliss HR: Mason (1, 7th inning off Zachry, 0 on, 1 out) Team LOB: 11

Cincinnati

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Zachry W (1–0) McEnaney S (1) Totals

6.2 2.1 9

6 2 8

2 0 2

2 0 2

5 0 5

6 1 7

1 0 1

New York

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Ellis L (0–1) Jackson Tidrow Totals

3.1 3.2 2 9

7 4 2 13

4 2 0 6

4 2 0 6

0 0 1 1

1 3 1 5

1 0 0 1


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Jackson faced 3 batters in the 8th inning. IBB: Tidrow (1, Driessen). Umpires: HP — Bill Williams; 1B — Bill Deegan; 2B — Bruce Froemming; 3B — Dave Phillips; LF — Lee Weyer; RF — Lou DiMuro Time of Game: 2:40 Attendance: 56,667

It appeared that only the Almighty could forestall the seemingly inevitable. As the skies opened with a deluge of rain showers, the announcement came at 2:22 P.M. on Wednesday, October 20, that Game Four would be moved to the night of Thursday the 21st. Gary Nolan, the man who had launched the season for the Reds as the starting pitcher in an Opening Day win, would try to finish the campaign in grand style as well. He basked in the unexpected extra day to contemplate his surroundings, despite the poor atmospheric conditions. “It’s going to be a thrill to pitch in Yankee Stadium, cold or not,” Nolan expressed, although he admittedly preferred warmer temperatures when taking the hill. Contrarily working in Nolan’s favor was the fact that the game would be played at night, for the pitcher had posted a 12–4 record under the lights during the regular season, but just a 3–5 mark in daytime hours. The game had been once again positioned perfectly for NBC’s desire of a prime-time broadcast; if a fifth game in New York were necessary, Kuhn made it clear that television preferences would once again dictate the time of the first pitch. In the end, the Saturday opener at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati would be the only day game that this World Series would see, a tradition that would evaporate completely in later years. The barometer in the Yankees’ locker room, meanwhile, was rising. The agitated Steinbrenner was making more frequent visits to the sanctuary to give his self-entitled “pep talks” to Martin and the club. While unclear if it was a directive from the owner, it was amazing to several New York writers that Martin had yet to utilize Ken Holtzman, the only left-handed starter available to him, in the postseason. Holtzman, along with Alexander (the other starter the Yankees had received from the Orioles in their mid-season trade), had posted a 9–7 record for New York since June despite being treated harshly by opponents, permitting 165 hits in 149 innings of work. He had only started three times since the third week of August, and even though the Reds had struggled against Randy Jones and other quality lefthanders during the regular season, Martin declined to opt for the playoff veteran in both the ALCS and the World Series. Critics pointed out to the Yankee manager that Holtzman was also the career owner of an 8–3 record against the Reds, including his victory versus Cincinnati in the 1972 World Series among his six lifetime postseason wins. In addition, Holtzman had batted 4-for-7 with three doubles and a homer in his last two World Series appearances for the Oakland A’s. Even so, he remained what the press would dub as a “non-pitcher” due to his inactivity in the playoffs. The longer the series wore on without a Holtzman appearance, the more the Yankees players wondered what his assistance might have meant. He would

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remain on the bench for Game Four as well, as Ed Figueroa, the Yankees’ top winner in 1976 with 19, would be given the ball by Martin. Despite a leadoff double from Rose, he escaped the first inning unharmed. In the bottom half, the Yankees would finally take their first lead of the series. After Nolan had retired the first two batters, Munson singled and subsequently scampered all the way around the bases as a Chambliss double rattled in the right field corner. The fact that the Reds would tie the score in the fourth inning hardly fazed the New York team; they had already grown accustomed to Cincinnati pecking away during the series with a run here, a run there, but with no major salvo hitting them with a knockout punch. This run appeared accordingly, as Morgan walked and stole second, and with two out, was driven home on a single by Foster. It was at this point, however, that a longdormant weapon would finally engage at full force. The press, the baseball world, and even many Cincinnati fans had written off Johnny Bench, assuming that his dismal 1976 season was the white flag that his career was in its twilight. “Slumps are like a soft bed,” Bench had once observed in 1976. “They are easy to get into, but hard to get out of.” In approaching the plate in the fourth inning, he had hardly resembled the feared hitter of the early 1970s. Figueroa became careless with a pitch by leaving it up in the strike zone, and Bench unleashed a furious rip from summers gone by, a flash-speed swing that sent the ball instantly into orbit. It was a beautiful launch, a shot that projected just inside the left field foul pole and put the ballpark in a state of mouths collectively agape. Foster, who scored ahead of him, welcomed Bench back to the slugger’s club with a pat at home plate as the Reds charged in front, 3–1. The Yankees found within themselves one last round of fight, one final flurry to throw at the overwhelming force confronting them. In the fifth, a charge was ignited by Rivers once again when he led off with a single and stole second, the first stolen base against Bench in his last 23 post-season games; in those same 23 games, the Reds had stolen 50 bases. (Through the completion of the 1976 playoffs, Bench had allowed only three steals in 42 career post-season contests.) Munson, struggling to maintain the dignity of his team, drove Rivers home with a single to cut the lead to 3–2. The rally would die there, however, as Chambliss and designated hitter Carlos May were retired by Nolan to keep the lead in tact. For nearly four entire games, the Reds had clearly succeeded in following the advice of Kansas City Royals manager Whitey Herzog. After his club had fallen short in its bid for the American League pennant, Herzog offered this piece of wisdom to the Reds. “The key to beating the Yankees is keeping Mickey Rivers off base.” Within a few years, Herzog would move across Missouri to manage the Cardinals, building Rivers-like players into an outfit that ran roughshod around the basepaths of the National League. A growing uneasiness in the stands carried through the sixth and seventh while the Yankees failed to score and were left grasping for a lone run that would prolong the Series. A resurgent McEnaney had taken the mound once


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again in the seventh, with Nolan having recorded the first two outs and permitting yet another single to Munson, his sixth hit in a row to set a World Series record. The lefty entered to confront the exact same situation he had faced in Game Three, with Chambliss at the plate with two out in the seventh and the potential tying run on base. History would repeat itself for both men, as Chambliss— who had hit lefties virtually as well as righties (.290 to .296) during the regular season — again grounded softly to the right side, with Morgan flipping the ball easily to Perez. Thus, it was the second time in consecutive nights that the ALCS hero could not provide a game-changing hit in the seventh inning. Neither team crossed the plate in the eighth, leaving the Yankees one final chance to secure the tying run — if they could hold the Reds at bay in the top of the ninth. Seeing their final opportunity of 1976 to get in their licks, the Cincinnati hitters unloaded on Billy Martin’s staff. Figueroa was removed when he walked Perez, issued a wild pitch, and walked Driessen to start the inning. In entered Dick Tidrow, a side-winding right-hander who had arrived with Chambliss in the hotly-debated 1974 trade with Cleveland. He was able to convince Foster to fly to center, as Perez scooted into third. Bench followed, seeing a unique opportunity to close his magnificent final weeks of the season in a flourish. A floating Tidrow pitch waffled out over the plate, and Big John walloped his second home run of the game, a prodigious blast that was captured by film cameras carrying far into the Bronx night sky while Bench inflated his series average to .533. Geronimo and Concepcion doubled for two more runs and a 7–2 lead, causing both the fans and Tidrow to head for the exits. Lyle was summoned to retire Rose and Griffey, which he did. After Bench had socked his second homer, Anderson turned to Scherger — his long-time confidant, and whose name among the Reds had transformed over the years into simply “Sugar Bear”— as Sparky was finally willing to accept that victory was assured. “I’m gonna tell you something, Sugar Bear. We’s gonna be world champions again!” Mason, the Yankees’ only (and unlikely) power source in the series, was not permitted to bat to lead off the ninth. In his place went back-up outfielder Otto Velez, who struck out on pitches that Martin felt were well out of the strike zone. Perhaps as a general display of over-boiling frustration, Martin unleashed his fury on the home plate umpire Deegan, first hollering at the arbiter and then firing a baseball past Deegan’s feet, which drew an immediate ejection from first base umpire Froemming, who had raced (as quickly as possible) toward the Yankee dugout to prevent further missiles from being fired. The trouble between Martin and Deegan had carried over from Game Three, when Martin repeatedly claimed that Zachry was balking several times with Yankee runners on first, which ultimately led to Billy charging out of the New York dugout in that contest. When order was restored, McEnaney threw a pitch that Rivers was able to

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drive on a line, but wound up in the glove of Rose near third. Last was Roy White. And when Will tossed the last pitch, Foster had the opportunity to do in Yankee Stadium what Geronimo had done in Fenway Park —close his glove around a flyball for a clinching out in a World Series. McEnaney was right back where he was a year ago, once again on the mound when the final curtain came down on a season of Cincinnati domination. He (along with Bench, Borbon, Billingham and others who had various pockets of struggle during the summer) had found atonement at the season’s very end. “I guess Sparky had lost some of his confidence in me,” McEnaney said of his dwindling work load in recent weeks, and Norman’s earlier move to presumably take his place in the bullpen at the start of the playoffs. In fact, before Game Three of the World Series, McEnaney had not pitched since September 29 in San Diego. “But I couldn’t blame him,” the reliever continued. “I wasn’t getting the job done.” Yet, because of “Captain Hook” being in the dugout, the team, the organization, and the city had once again secured baseball’s top honor. There was not one pitcher on the Reds’ staff who, at one point or another in 1975 or 1976, had complained to (or about) Anderson in regard to being removed too early from a game. In the end, Sparky showed himself as the true master of the chess board, occasionally sacrificing a pawn for the ultimate conquest of the overall match. “Billingham was unhappy ... Norman was unhappy ... Borbon was ready to jump the club,” Hertzel recalled as examples. “He is called other things [besides Captain Hook] by his pitchers. Those other things are unprintable. There are times when they don’t like him one bit ... but all the pitchers contribute under Anderson. They pitch well enough to win. Not games. World championships.” The box score from Game Four: CIN NY

0 0 0 3 0 0 0 0 4—7 9 2 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0—2 8 0

Cincinnati

AB

R

H

RBI

Rose 3b Griffey rf Morgan 2b Perez 1b Driessen dh Foster lf Bench c Geronimo cf Concepcion ss Nolan p McEnaney p Totals

5 5 3 3 3 3 4 4 3 0 0 33

0 0 1 1 1 1 2 1 0 0 0 7

1 0 1 0 0 1 2 2 2 0 0 9

0 0 0 0 0 1 5 0 1 0 0 7

E: Morgan (2), Concepcion (1) 2B: Rose (1, off Figueroa); Geronimo (2, off Tidrow); Concepcion (1, off Tidrow) HR: Bench 2 (2, 4th inning off Figueroa, 1 on, 2 out; 9th inning off Tidrow 2 on, 1 out)


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Team LOB: 4 SB: Geronimo (2, 2nd base off Figueroa/Munson); Morgan (2, 2nd base off Figueroa/Munson) CS: Foster (2, 2nd base by Figueroa/Munson); Concepcion (1, 2nd base by Figueroa/Munson)

New York

AB

R

H

RBI

Rivers cf White lf Munson c Chambliss 1b May dh Piniella ph, dh Nettles 3b Gamble rf Randolph 2b Stanley ss Hendricks ph Mason ss Velez ph Figueroa p Tidrow p Lyle p Totals

5 5 4 4 3 1 3 4 4 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 36

1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2

1 0 4 1 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 8

0 0 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2

DP: 1 Stanley-Nettles-Chambliss-Randolph 2B: Chambliss (1, off Nolan) Team LOB: 9 SB: Rivers (1, 2nd base off Nolan/Bench)

Cincinnati

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Nolan W (1–0) McEnaney S (2) Totals

6.2 2.1 9

8 0 8

2 0 2

2 0 2

1 1 2

1 1 2

0 0 0

New York

IP

H

R

ER

BB

SO

HR

Figueroa L (0–1) Tidrow Lyle Totals

8 0.1 0.2 9

6 3 0 9

5 2 0 7

5 2 0 7

5 0 0 5

2 0 0 2

1 1 0 2

Figueroa faced 2 batters in the 9th inning. WP: Figueroa (1) Umpires: HP — Bill Deegan; 1B — Bruce Froemming; 2B — Dave Phillips; 3B — Lee Weyer; LF — Lou DiMuro; RF — Bill Williams Time of Game: 2:36 Attendance: 56,700

It was the first time since 1922 that a National League team had won successive World Series. And in the midst of their October rampage of 1976, the Reds had also become the first team to win seven straight post-season games, and would be the last to do so until the Colorado Rockies performed the feat in 2007. It was the final four games, however, that truly defined Sparky Ander-

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son and the manner in which he orchestrated his team. While Anderson (according to his typical precedent) had liberally utilized his bullpen during the series, he also (and also according to his precedent) relied on a set, unwavering starting lineup of position players. Incredibly, no non-starting position players made it into any series box score for the Reds. Thus, at no time in his career was Anderson’s trust in his starting eight (and conversely, his lack of confidence in a starting pitcher finishing a game) more apparent than in the 1976 World Series. This was illustrated in the fact that the Reds had tied a World Series record by not utilizing a single pinch-hitter in any of the four games. They also tied another mark by not having any complete games among its starting pitching staff. As Anderson did not use any pinch-runners or fielding substitutes, he was perhaps mocking further the designated hitter rule that he abhorred. Sparky had emerged triumphant in this angle as well — Driessen ended the Series with a .357 average as the DH for the Reds, while three different men played the role for New York and managed only one total hit among them. Billy Martin did not offer any gesture of congratulations to Anderson or any of the Reds; in fact, he was nowhere to be found after the final game. “I was disappointed,” Sparky said of not getting word from the Yankee manager. “I have taken that long walk [to the winner’s locker room] myself. I know it hurts, but you do it.” Added Hertzel quickly to that sentiment, “You do it if you are a gentleman. If you are Billy Martin, you sit in a room and sulk and talk of bloopers that fell in and line drives that were caught and any other alibi you can think of.... They [the Yankees] lacked class.” Days later, the only comment that could be squeezed out of Martin was in regard to his ejection in the final inning. He used the opportunity to question yet another of baseball’s rules, the rotation system (in lieu of a merit process) of assigning umpires to postseason games. “[Second base umpire in Game Four Dave] Phillips is one of the best in our league, but Deegan isn’t even one of the ten best. So why would you allow him to umpire in the World Series?” Not only had the majority of the New York outfit shown little dignity in their defeat, there was also a resounding disappointment among the witnesses in the raw performance of the Yankees, who had barely offered a whimper of resistance to the defending champions. Rose, for one, was almost bored with the ease in which the Reds had won. “It just isn’t as exciting as last year,” he grumbled before the start of Game Four in 1976, in comparison to the vintage 1975 World Series duel with the Red Sox. And while many of his Reds’ teammates dismissed Munson’s verbal assaults with compliments of the New York squad, Rose offered no gratuity. “They have some guys at the bottom of that order who aren’t exactly mashers,” Rose chirped in reference to Stanley and Randolph, who batted .167 and .071, respectively, during the series; in making his point, he acknowledged the paltry numbers that he (.188) and Ken Griffey (.059) put up during the series. “What happens if Griffey and I are batting .330,


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like during the season? We’d beat the hell out of ’em.” Joe Morgan was not even convinced the “Bronx Bombers” were the best team in the city. “The Yankees would not score three runs off Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, and Jon Matlack in a series,” the second baseman said of the Mets’ starting pitching. A teammate speaking on condition of anonymity added, “There are five or six clubs in our league better than the Yankees.” Munson, from the beginning, had touted his impact that would be felt in the Series, and proceeded to support his claims. After hitting .435 in the ALCS against Kansas City, he had gone 9-for-17 (.529) in the World Series, including his record six straight hits in his final six trips to the plate. Even so, all of the hits were singles, partially indicative of his team’s larger inability to generate power and deliver striking blows in important situations. The statistics bore out that the Yankees had not executed in the clutch, batting only .143 (2for-14) with runners in scoring position and two outs, while the Reds had excelled in such circumstances (13-for-38, a .342 average). While not having Munson in mind when he made the comment, Anderson nonetheless made the statement after the Series that it was “a sin to compare any other catcher with Johnny Bench.” Munson was insulted when he heard the quote; in clarification, Anderson further explained that Bench, in his opinion, was simply far ahead of anyone currently at the position in the game, and perhaps ever. During the course of the season, Munson had felt slighted by the Yankee fans as well, feeling that he was being expected to perform nightly at an optimal level. “The fans in New York still compare us to the old Yankees,” he complained. “I’m not Yogi [Berra] or Ellie [Howard, two outstanding former Yankee catchers]. They only seem to want to see a guy do great or foul up.” As for Anderson, he was not overly concerned if he had hurt Munson’s feelings; his only concern was that the Reds’ defense contain Munson’s offensive skill in the series. “Our scouting report from Ray Shore was, ‘This guy can hit. Let’s don’t worry about his hitting; let’s keep him from going deep. Let’s keep him in right and center field.’ And that’s what he did and he hit over .500, but he never hurt us because we kept him there.” In the end, it was beyond question to most any witness that Bench had greatly distanced himself from his latest American League counterpart, as had been the case with Fisk in 1975. Even though Anderson continued to insist that he meant no defamation towards Munson in his comment about Bench, he sent a note of apology to the Yankee catcher anyway. Munson claimed he never received it, even though a mail clerk in Yankee Stadium was reported to have seen the return address from Anderson on the envelope and remembered delivering it to Munson’s locker. It was the final straw for Hertzel, who had heard enough of the catcher’s excusemaking for himself and his team. “Thurman Munson says Cincinnati pitching hasn’t really impressed him,” the confused writer pondered. “He says Don Gullett did not throw hard. He says Fred Norman had nothing. He says Pat Zachry threw nothing unexpected. Yet the Yankees did not hit them.” In the coming

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days, Munson would be named the American League’s Most Valuable Player for 1976; nonetheless, he would always feel that he was held to an unfair comparison with his counterpart from Cincinnati. But in the mind of Johnny Bench, the Series was never reduced to some sort of one-on-one duel between him and Munson; it was, in fact, a one-onone duel between Bench and himself. For while Munson was seeking his place among the game’s great catchers, Bench was already there, and was only looking for redemption— to stake a claim to the absolute dominance he had once displayed. That dominance finally surfaced, and while he had been improving with each passing week late in his mostly-miserable 1976 season, Bench waited until the last half of the final World Series game to reaffirm that he was, unquestionably, still one of baseball’s true clutch masters. “My greatest performance,” Bench said simply afterwards, even considering his long-winding list of past individual awards and honors. He and his allies were in the midst of another champagne bath in the clubhouse, this time at Yankee Stadium. “This made up for a lot of things that didn’t happen during the season. The guys on the team took up the slack for me most of the year. Now, I’ve given something back to them.” He was quickly named the World Series MVP, an award he had always coveted and which, ironically, finally came to him in the poorest statistical year of his career. The Reds had trailed for only three innings in the entire Series, which did not occur until the first three innings of Game Four. Writer Edwin Pope was among the millions who were dismayed with the deplorable showing of the American League representative. “Pete Rose said, ‘It wouldn’t be a World Series without the Yankees,’” Pope overheard the Reds’ third baseman utter. “It wasn’t much of one with them, either.” Another New York scribe, Joe Gergen, agreed. “There is really no excuse for what transpired in Riverfront Stadium and Yankee Stadium this week,” he angrily pecked away on his typewriter. “But the real joke was on the Reds. The series sweep represented a hollow victory for a team that wants desperately to believe it is the best ever assembled. The Reds were nothing of the kind in this series, but then, they didn’t have to be.” Roy White, who sent the final out to Foster’s waiting mitt off McEnaney, was a bit more balance-viewed than his teammates. “They talk about the Reds not having any 20-game winners, but one reason is that they have such a good bullpen.” Many years later, in 2007, the man who by then would have to be distinguished as Ken Griffey, Sr., would agree with that sentiment. “When we got to the Yankees, we knew we had a better team,” the right fielder remembered. “Our way of playing was different than most. We were very businesslike on the field, but we had fun also. No one talks about it, but we had excellent pitching. Our offense and defense was there every night. We didn’t make any mistakes. But our pitchers kept us in the games and gave us an opportunity to win every night.”


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The celebration back in Cincinnati got off to a very slow start. Two hundred police officers were stationed and ready on Fountain Square when McEnaney made his final pitch; at that time, they outnumbered the “revelers” by almost a ten-to-one margin. By one o’clock in the morning, Jim Delaney of the Enquirer reported that 20 arrests had been made, mostly for minor disorderly conduct. Most eyewitnesses described the scene as unusually calm for a city’s celebration of a championship — perhaps, some figured, because it was expected. Where would the 1975–1976 Reds be ranked in history? Sparky, retreating to the visiting manager’s office from the bubbly that was awash in the next room, left it for the scribes to decide as he slumped in relaxed satisfaction in his chair. “This team won 115 games last year. It has won 109 this year. We beat Philadelphia three straight in the playoffs, and now four over the Yankees. You writers are going to have to judge how good we are.” But there was a more pressing question on the fans’ minds as they looked to the future of the game. Could the Reds stay together, and offer baseball one last glimpse of longitudinal, dynastic greatness seen only in past decades? It appeared unlikely as the era of free agency seemed destined to take its toll. “It is no longer a matter of front-office sagacity,” Dick Young reminded his readers about the bankroll currently being the chief tool in procuring talent. “It is up to the ballplayers now. They can take a hike. Marvin Miller has seen to that, and Peter Seitz, and a federal judge or two.... By this time, a successful team like the Reds usually has half its key players signed. As best I could learn, only two have signed for 1977.” Almost on cue after the World Series was completed, the clamoring began. Concepcion launched the first volley, stating that he was looking for a “three-to-five year contract.” Howsam, however (and as usual), was not about to budge. “We don’t plan to sign anybody for more than two years,” he replied, using his oft-repeated phrase that was as trusted for him over the years as his gold watch or his fountain pen. “We have to be sound in approach. Players who sign long-term contracts do not play well. It’s human nature.” Howsam also knew that such talented players on the Reds’ bench as Driessen, Armbrister, and Flynn would be difficult to keep as well, as they desired starting roles and larger salaries, be it in Cincinnati or elsewhere around the major leagues. It had been the massive juggling act among this wealth of talent the manager had executed, however, which impressed Hertzel the most over the course of the summer. “Sparky Anderson merely took the best team in baseball, and won with it. If you think that isn’t tough, write a letter to Chuck Noll, care of the Pittsburgh Steelers.... True, Sparky had players and was expected to win. So what? He also had a team that is ridiculously high-paid, a team that well could have sat back on its overweight wallet and let the world pass it by.” And the one in charge was determined to enjoy the good times while they lasted. “Nothing this club does anymore amazes me,” said Anderson, the man

218


who had overseen the on-field development of the team the past six years. Reflecting on what he had conquered, he again leaned back in his chair, palmed through his famous white hair, and looked thoughtfully upwards. “From the time this club leaves spring training through 162 games, it is the best there is.”

Epilogue How can you have a much better team than this one? — Joe Morgan, October 21, 1976

While the 1976 U.S. presidential election on November 2 would be close (with Jimmy Carter defeating Gerald Ford by only 57 electoral votes), the race in the balloting for the National League’s Most Valuable Player — announced three weeks later on November 24 — revealed a Reds’ runaway for Morgan and Foster. The teammates were the only National League players to receive firstplace votes, with Morgan outdistancing Foster, 19–5, to win the award. Rose finished fourth in the voting, Griffey eighth, Eastwick 13th, and Geronimo 25th; Bench, with his poor regular season numbers, did not receive any consideration after finishing fourth in the voting in both 1974 and 1975. While none of the Reds’ pitchers took home any individual awards for statistical leadership, Zachary and Butch Metzger of the Padres tied in the voting for the National League Rookie of the Year award, while Fidrych was the landslide choice in the American League. If the Reds’ second straight World Series victory was not indicative of baseball’s last dynasty in the pre–free agent era, a more powerful symbol followed on November 4 with the first “Free Agent Re-Entry Draft” taking place at the Plaza Hotel in New York. The first to receive a lucrative new deal was Minnesota relief pitcher Bill Campbell, who won 17 games out of the bullpen for the Twins in ’76 and then signed with the Red Sox for $1 million over a four-year span. Many stars would change hands in the coming days, and many other lesser-known players would find themselves on brand-new teams the following day as well. The expansion draft for the Toronto Blue Jays and the Seattle Mariners took place on November 5, with the two franchises each selecting 30 players who were left unprotected by the other American League teams, further weakening what some viewed as an already-stale talent pool in that circuit. That talent pool was actually augmented slightly on November 18, but it 219

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came in the form of an answer to the year-long Gullett question that the Reds had feared. That day, the lefthander signed a $2 million deal with the team his mates had just defeated for the championship, the New York Yankees. Just after the World Series had ended, a misled Anderson had stated that “if Don Gullett is the kind of kid I think he is, he will be wearing a Cincinnati uniform next season.” The Yankees, determined to not let another chance for a world championship get away, were not finished after Gullett had inked his deal. Eleven days later (and just days before the Microsoft company would incorporate itself with the secretary of state of New Mexico), Steinbrenner wooed the attentionhappy Reggie Jackson to New York with a $3.5 million contract. Just before the 1976 season had begun, Dick Young had, almost prophetically, carried this opinion: “Cincy’s dynasty has one more year before Pete Rose and Joe Morgan start the age slide and Johnny Bench gets hurter and hurter.” The first changing of the guard would occur before January. Despite the popularity of Tony Perez, Reds management had long cited the all-around potential of Driessen to take over at first base, and felt he could not sit on the bench any longer. Perez and World Series hero McEnaney were thus dealt to Montreal on December 16, 1976, for pitchers Woodie Fryman and Dale Murray, the latter of whom had broken Concepcion’s hand with a pitch in 1975. It was, undoubtedly, the first salvo in the break-up of the Big Red Machine — and perhaps, the first swing of the ax in the dismantling of the last, true pre–freeagency dynasty. “Have they considered that maybe we can’t win without him?” Morgan wondered of the management’s decision on Perez. After the World Series victory over New York, it was revealed that Perez had nearly been sent to the Yankees three years earlier in a proposed deal in which the Reds insisted upon receiving Nettles in return. The Yankees declined, disposing of a scenario that would have kept Rose in the Reds’ outfield and would have delayed the advancement of Griffey, Foster, or both, or would have seen them move on to other organizations. “Could I play until I am 40 or 45 as a designated hitter?” Perez was asked late in the 1976 season. “I think I can play a few more years as a regular. Then I think I can play in the American League until I’m 50. I’ve got a young body.” He would ultimately retire from the major leagues in 1986 at the age of 44; after 1971, Perez would not play any other position besides first base, save for a short stint as a DH in the American League with the Red Sox. Several years after his retirement, “Doggie” would return to Cincinnati to manage the Reds in the first 44 games of the 1993 season before being replaced by Davey Johnson. “That team had a lot of leaders,” Anderson would say years later about the 1975–76 Reds club. “Rose and Morgan were obvious leaders. But only when Perez left did I realize that he was the leader. He did the most to keep all those egos in harmony. Doggie could handle them all.” As Dick Young had imagined, the Reds and Dodgers would indeed switch their positions in 1977, as the Cincinnati club fell ten games out in second place,

Epilogue

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which was exactly where Los Angeles had finished 1976. (The Reds also fell to having only the tenth-best record in the major leagues at 88–74, after holding the top mark in that category for two straight seasons.) The Cincinnati pitching staff had undergone profound change, as Gullett’s departure and sub-par performances by others through midseason forced Howsam to make drastic moves. The strangest transaction involved that of Fryman, who decided to leave the team at the middle of the year and return to his farm in Ewing, Kentucky, and in doing so forfeited nearly half of his salary for the season. (The next winter, Fryman would be dealt to the Chicago Cubs for pitcher Bill Bonham.) Eastwick, playing without a signed contract (as Gullett had done during 1976), was not his consistent self in the bullpen. Shortly after the Reds had reached a low point of being thirteen-and-a-half games behind the Dodgers near the end of May, a desperate Howsam got the wheels turning. On the 21st, he traded Acala to the Expos for players to be named later, two of whom turned out to be pitchers Shane Rawley and Angel Torres. Then, just before the trading deadline on June 15, Eastwick was dealt to the Cardinals for lefthander Doug Capilla, while Nolan was sent to the California Angels for minor leaguer Craig Hendrickson. The Big Red Machine had changed its pitching staff nearly overnight. Nolan was essentially finished, as he pitched in only five games for the Angels in 1977 before announcing the retirement of his successful but injury-riddled career before the age of 29. The blockbuster deal, however, came a few hours later (and minutes before the midnight trading deadline on June 15) when Flynn, prospects Steve Henderson and Dan Norman, and Zachry (Acala’s fellow rookie phenom from 1976) were sent to the New York Mets. In return, Howsam — who took criticism for trading away the up-and-coming youngsters, but who was never afraid to launch a controversial deal — landed one of the preeminent starting pitchers in baseball. Tom Seaver, the three-time Cy Young winner and nine-time All-Star, was joining the Reds just eight days after he had dominated them in an 8–0 shutout at Shea Stadium on June 7. In 1976, Seaver set a record with his ninth straight season of 200 or more strikeouts; he would fall just short in 1977 with 196, making 33 starts in his combined time with New York and Cincinnati (and under the average of this last five years of 35 starts per season). As a result of all the deals, Borbon was the only experienced reliever left in bullpen from the championship team the year before, while Billingham and Freddie Norman were now the only holdovers from the 1976 starting staff. Also providing hope was a 20-year-old whiz kid named Mario Soto, who would make ten starts in his initial year of big league action. People in Cincinnati were wondering, hoping, and trusting that Howsam could be working his magical trades once again, as he did in the early 1970s. But perhaps overall, Howsam had finally relented to the new money taking over the game. In 1977 he signed Morgan, Bench, Rose, Griffey, Foster, and Concepcion to long-term deals, something virtually unknown in the Reds organi-

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zation to this time. He may have feared that his stars would soon walk out for larger checks elsewhere, as Gullett had done. Throughout the major leagues, the average salary would rise nearly nine-fold from 1976 to 1986, going from $52,300 to $431,000. Howsam’s maneuvers would not be enough to catch the Dodgers; Los Angeles easily overtook the Big Red Machine, made victims of the Phillies in the NLCS once again, but then bowed to Gullett, Jackson, and the Yankees in the 1977 World Series in six games. Gullett would sport a 14–4 regular-season record for New York in yet another season filled with aches and pains before losing a game in the ALCS to the Royals and in the World Series as well. Like Nolan, he would see a promising career come to an early end, pitching only 45 innings with New York in 1978 before retiring at age 27. All told, the precocious lefthander would throw only three complete seasons in the major leagues (1971, ’73, and ’74), all before he reached the age of 24. “Don Gullett has money now, and security,” Anderson would write in 1978, obviously in a disappointed tone. “But I guarantee you he will never have the peace of mind or respect for himself that he would have had if he remained in Cincinnati, which wouldn’t have left him exactly poor and insecure, either.” Anderson cited a breakdown in fundamentals by the 1977 Reds as a cause for their slippage, exemplified by the defense allowing Dodgers speedster Davey Lopes to escape a rundown on two different occasions during the season. Anderson traced the problem to spring training, when he permitted the regulars not to make long road trips. The manager regretted this decision, believing that it had much to do with the team’s 4–10 start to the 1977 season, which had — almost inconceivably — settled them into last place at the early juncture. Also, he noted that in 1977, he allowed the starters to go longer in games that he had in previous years, in part due to the thinned-out bullpen that was essentially being held up by Borbon alone. But even in the midst of relinquishing the title, Howsam had not lost faith in Anderson. He called the manager in St. Louis on July 25 to let him know that his contract had been extended through the 1979 season, a deal that was originally set to expire at the end of 1977. Sparky had profound respect for his boss, ever since receiving that first phone call back in 1969 while in the actual process of signing his contract with the Angels. “I say that Howsam maintained the great standards of the game, what it had been,” Anderson admired about the man. “I’ve seen many men since Howsam tear it down.” Howsam died on February 19, 2008, one of the last true general managers to adhere to the old-time principles of the game. “From what I’ve seen, I think the Big Red Machine could have been the greatest ballclub ever,” Howsam would say in a 2004 interview. “I know the Yankees compared in the 1920s. We had such great balance.” Following Howsam’s death by mere days was Chief Bender, his director of minor league operations with the Reds, a post Bender would hold from his arrival to Cincinnati with Howsam in 1967 until 1989.

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In his later years, Howsam would reflect sourly but fairly to his memories of dealing with Marvin Miller, Commissioner Kuhn, and the Players Association. In late 2007 — just after he had turned 90, being only a year older than Howsam — Miller pondered the possibility of being elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame by the Veterans Committee, ironically, along with Kuhn. “That’s absurd,” he laughed. “I don’t think there are reasons to believe it will happen.” He figured that a number of people he had undercut in the 1970s now constituted a large portion of the voters. “In the last vote, the number of management people among the voters was a certain percentage. On the new committee, management is completely dominant. Aside from miracles, there’s no reason to believe the vote will do anything but go down.” And judging from Dick Young’s comment, the media was not entirely in favor of the idea anyway. “While Marvin Miller and his legal aid may be the best negotiators around,” Young had written in the midst of the 1976 crisis, “it is obvious they know little about baseball, and sometimes appear to care less.” Kuhn had his own reflection on the monumental 1976 baseball season, and the events before and after that impacted it. “What the Messersmith case did was set up arbitration. The arbitration should never have worked, because the [labor] agreement clearly said matters relating to free agency were not within the gambit of the arbitration provision.... Because of that decision by the arbitrator [in Messersmith’s case], it had enormous impact on the game. It changed the modern game, and not for the better.” As expected, several of the Reds’ reserve players from the championship years signed elsewhere for 1977 in the hopes of more playing time. Flynn was the 1977 version of Darrel Chaney from the previous year, as he moved on to become the starting second baseman of the Mets as a result of the Seaver trade. The 1976 season would turn out to be a quick stay in Cincinnati for Youngblood, who was traded to the Cardinals before the ’77 season for pitching prospect Bill Caudill. Youngblood would go on to play for four other major league teams before returning to the Reds for one final season in 1989 as a 37 year old. As a part of baseball history, he would become the only player to ever get hits for two different teams in the same day — and both off Hall-of-Fame pitchers. On August 4, 1982, after he got a base hit for the Mets against Ferguson Jenkins and the Cubs at a day game in the then-lightless Wrigley Field, he was traded to Montreal. Youngblood quickly boarded a plane to Philadelphia, dressed in his new Expos’ uniform, and managed to get a pinch-hit single that evening off Steve Carlton in Veterans Stadium. An exception to the reserve players’ 1977 exodus, however, was Bill Plummer. When labor troubles in baseball were coming to a head in March 1976, Plummer saw the value in remaining loyal to the Reds; for while he could have sought a regular catching job with another team, he chose to remain in the job security of being Bench’s understudy — unless one scenario would play itself out. “Expansion,” Plummer imagined with a glint in his eye at the time, offer-

224


ing a spark of hope. “I would like to go in expansion, and get with a new team. That probably would prolong my career and give me the chance I’ve always wanted — the chance to prove myself.” The long-patient Plummer fulfilled this dream in 1978 when he signed as a free agent with the second-year franchise Seattle Mariners after being released by the Reds in March. Instead of becoming the Mariners’ regular catcher, however, Plummer—a nine-year major league veteran at that point —found himself as a backup again, this time to another veteran catcher the Mariners had acquired the year before in Bob Stinson. One thing was certain —1977 would be George Foster’s year. His total of 52 home runs was the third-most ever in the National League to that time, gaining the MVP award while on his way to the second of three straight National League RBI titles. He would be traded to the Mets before the 1982 season and play four years in New York until given his outright release on August 7, 1986. Missing the Mets’ ultimate run to 108 wins and a World Series victory over the Boston Red Sox that year, Foster was picked up by the Chicago White Sox a week later. He batted .216 in 15 games for Chicago before being let go by the White Sox on September 7, bringing the end to his career in which his 13 grand slams would rank tenth-most in baseball history. Morgan became a free agent in 1980, signed with the Astros and returned to the city he had left almost ten years earlier. He missed the All-Star team for the first time in nine seasons, but propelled the Houston club to a memorable season. Still displaying a keen batting eye, Morgan led the league in walks once again that year — and only Babe Ruth and Ted Williams would leave the game with more bases on balls in their careers. In 1980, the Astros nearly struck a World Series berth before bowing to the Phillies in the National League Championship Series after they were only nine outs away from a decisive Game Five victory. At that point, Philadelphia scored five runs in the seventh inning and one in the tenth in the Astrodome, capping a tremendous comeback for an 8–7 win and, ultimately, a world championship over the Royals. Looking back, Morgan would always reminisce fondly on the Big Red Machine moniker. “I took pride in the name before I even came to Cincinnati,” he revealed. “But, to be honest with you, I didn’t help build the name. That bothered me a little when I first got here. The first thing I did was go out and get me one of those Big Red Machine T-shirts. I’d wear it everyday under my uniform. It helped make me feel like I belonged. It’s sort of like being with the old Yankees; you took pride because there was something there before you, and now you were a part of it.” Morgan, Rose, and Perez would be reunited as teammates with the pennant-winning Phillies of 1983, and Morgan would finish his career after the following season with the Oakland A’s at the age of 41. Bench set a major league record in 1977 by catching at least 100 games for the tenth consecutive season, a steak that would run to 13 by the completion of the 1980 schedule. He also captured his tenth consecutive (and final) Gold Glove in 1977, another record of consistency that would not be approached by

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another catcher until Ivan Rodriguez would string ten straight together by 2001. In fact, Bench and his teammates that formed the defensive core up the middle for the Machine — Morgan, Concepcion, and Geronimo— would all win four consecutive Gold Gloves from 1974 through 1977. Bench would wind up a 14-time All-Star, batting .409 with three home runs in the mid-summer contests. He would also leave the game with the most RBIs of any player of the 1970s with 1,013, followed right behind by Perez with 954. The old catcher was honored with “Johnny Bench Night” in front of a then-record crowd of 53,790 at Riverfront Stadium on September 17, 1983. Bench entered the ballpark to a raucous ovation, touring the premises before the game in an open convertible. He disembarked from the vehicle, and spoke a few final words to the Cincinnati faithful. “I love the city, I love the fans, and I was fortunate to play for the Reds.... I am going to try like hell to play good for you tonight.” As a measure of respect, he was returned to the position of catcher by manager Russ Nixon for this special evening. Bench had appeared behind the plate only 13 times in the past three seasons since moving to third base in an effort to prevent further wear on his body. Even though the Reds had fallen from their days as the Big Red Machine, the man from Binger, Oklahoma, was able to thrill the local crowd one more time. In the third inning, he stepped to the plate and knocked his 389th and final home run, joyously leaping onto the home plate that he had guarded defensively for so many years while scoring teammate Paul Householder in front of the on-deck batter Nick Esasky, both of whom caught Bench with open arms. In his final plate appearance in the seventh, he brought the crowd to its feet again, driving another long ball to right field, only to be hauled in by Terry Puhl before Dann Bilardello replaced Bench at catcher. His final appearance in Riverfront Stadium would come twelve days later when he entered a game against the Giants as a pinch-hitter in the fifth inning, delivering a two-run single to finalize his career RBI total at 1,376. In 1989, Bench would receive nearly 97 percent of the votes for the Baseball Hall of Fame; at that time, it was the third-highest total in Hall of Fame history. Concepcion would follow his third All-Star selection in 1976 with six more consecutive nominations through 1982, when he capped his final appearance in the mid-summer classic with an MVP award for his two-run home run in the contest. Keeping a flair for the dramatic to the very end, Concepcion ended his career in 1988 as a 40 year old, but not before stealing home that season, as well as appearing in one game as a pitcher, striking out a batter and permitting no runs in over an inning of work. When he finally hung up his spikes, he was second to Rose on the Reds’ all-time list in games played, hits, and doubles, and trailed only Morgan in stolen bases by a Cincinnati player. Throughout the rest of the 1970s, Concepcion would continue his competitive match with Bowa for the Gold Glove Award at shortstop in the National League.

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(Bowa, in 1985, would leave the game with the National League’s highest alltime fielding percentage.) Additionally, he would end his career only 44 games played behind Bowa for the most ever at shortstop. Griffey would make history in 1989 with the Mariners when he joined his son, Ken, Jr., as the first father-son teammate tandem in major league history. And his outfield partner Geronimo also made history, having been Bob Gibson’s 3,000th strikeout on July 17, 1974, as well as Nolan Ryan’s 3,000th victim on the Fourth of July in 1980. ********** While Howsam would always regret his trade of Perez, he felt his greatest move was in bringing Pete Rose back home to Cincinnati, which he did on August 16, 1984. Howsam traded infielder Tom Lawless to Montreal, where just eight months earlier, Rose had signed a free agent contract with the Expos after playing five seasons in Philadelphia. Rose was immediately named player-manager for the Reds, taking the place of skipper Vern Rapp. In an instant, it looked as if Howsam had worked one more bit of sorcery, putting Rose in a position to lead the franchise back to the glory days of the mid–1970s. He celebrated his return in full throttle a year later when he reached the personal goal he had always desired — the all-time hit record. With a single off San Diego’s Eric Show in the first inning on September 11, 1985, at Riverfront Stadium, no one had more major league hits than the 4,192 owned by Rose. Hitting, for certain, remained Pete Rose’s favorite thing to do. “I like to come to the park and hit,” he had once mentioned to Hertzel back in 1976. “It’s not because I need the practice. It’s because if I don’t, I’m sluggish all day and for the next game.” Then, as Tommy Helms had once pointed out when they were roommates in the minor leagues long ago, Rose added, “It’s a way of getting me out of bed.” But being back in Cincinnati also meant Rose’s reconnection with other aspects of local life he loved the most. According to him, the “three big things” in Cincinnati culture in the 1940s and ’50s were “baseball, other sports, and sports gambling.” He enjoyed these things as much as anything, and their convergence would commence a web of trouble that would follow him for decades to come. Rose traced his interest in gambling back to his childhood, as he had witnessed his father and other friends placing bets and rolling dice in the various taverns that lined the Ohio River in the Sedamsville neighborhood, just west of downtown Cincinnati. Soon, young Pete noticed that he looked forward to going to the horse races at River Downs with his father, accompanied by fellow future big-leaguers Zimmer and Brinkman and their fathers, too. “Other than Crosley Field, I’d never seen anything quite like the racetrack,” Rose recalled from his younger days. “The energy and the atmosphere fascinated me.... I sat in the bleachers with my dad, Mr. Zimmer, and Mr. Brinkman and tried to follow along as they laughed and told jokes.” Even though many would

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later speculate that Rose’s father had passed along gambling traits to his son, Pete claimed to acquire the interest on his own. “I’ve just never understood the connection. I got my desire and work ethic from my dad — not my gambling.” Those who observed him at betting parlors witnessed no unusual activity, however, and Rose continued to be adored in all corners of Cincinnati, representing (if not returning) the Reds from their proudest moments of years gone by. His final appearance as a player would come on August 17, 1986, when he struck out as a pinch-hitter against Rich Gossage in a game in which future Reds star Barry Larkin would hit his first major league home run. Now looking to devote the entirety of his baseball time to managing, Rose sought to rid the Reds of the lethargy which, he felt, had overtaken the club since the departure of Anderson as the manager (which had come in 1978). “Looking back at the earlier ’80s, the Cincinnati teams seemed to lose their will to win,” he recalled. It was at this point that Rose also turned his leisure-time attention to more hours at the racetrack and talking to bookies. He had first garnered the commissioner’s office notice about his gambling habits in the mid–1970s, when Kuhn heard from a variety of sources that Rose was involved with certain nefarious characters in the business. Kuhn had asked retired FBI agent Henry Fitzgibbon to speak to all major league teams about the dangers of gambling, and to keep a particularly close eye on Rose. Under scrutiny for the moment, Rose was able to temporarily limit his gambling interests to the race track and lowprofile bookies that placed his bets on college and professional football. At one point earlier in his career, gambling actually appeared to be something from which he may have shied away. “Society won’t let umpires and players get together — things like gambling make it impossible,” Rose had ironically written in his journal of the 1974 season. This was in reference to a time when Rose’s wife, Karolyn, had gotten to know umpire Al Barlick and wanted Pete to take him out to dinner. At one point in the late 1980s, Rose’s main trouble was not in the gambling racket, but on the field. He was suspended for 30 days in 1988 after a shoving incident with umpire Dave Pallone, a penalty imposed by National League President A. Bartlett Giamatti. It was the longest suspension ever given to a manager for an on-field cause, and was a prelude to the difficulties Rose would encounter with Giamatti as the latter was slated to take over the commissioner’s post from Peter Ueberroth in early 1989. Called into the major league offices in February of that year to finally come clean on his gambling habits, Rose’s on- and off-field activities now came under the closest microscope of perhaps any player since Babe Ruth. By August, Giamatti had discovered so much evidence of Rose betting on Major League Baseball that he summoned Pete to his New York office once again. There, on August 24, he asked Rose to sign a fivepage summary of findings about Rose’s activities, which listed no formal charges. Taking the document as a virtual admission of Rose’s guilt, Giamatti would later announce that he was banning Rose from baseball for life. The

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commissioner would pass away from a heart attack only eight days later at the age of 51, thus leaving many questions about Rose’s case unanswered for many inquisitors desiring more direct information. As Tommy Helms and Lou Piniella would thereafter take over managing the Reds, Rose’s separation from the game would lead to his life spiraling out of control, culminating in a conviction on tax evasion charges in 1990. He was sentenced to serve five months at the federal prison in Marion, Illinois, in addition to a $50,000 fine. It was as if Rose was having an out-of-body experience, not believing it was he who had committed the offense, a mindset he would carry over into his betting on baseball. “I could calculate batting averages and fielding percentages in my head and never make a mistake. I could remember players, games, and won-loss records from 30 years in the past. I could remember every railroad crossing between Fort Myers and Tampa in spring training. But I couldn’t remember to save a single receipt to give to my accountant for tax purposes.” Despite his circumstances, Rose attempted to make the best of his time in the penitentiary. He joked with prison guards and others when he arrived in Marion. “I figured a little humor would help to keep things in perspective,” he reasoned. “After all, I faced Sandy Koufax, Nolan Ryan, and Bob Gibson; I could damn sure face five months in southern Illinois.” Nonetheless, while he was serving his sentence, the twelve-member board of directors of the National Baseball Hall of Fame voted unanimously to keep Rose off their ballot for membership permanently, unless he was reinstated to the game by 2005. Although Rose would ultimately acknowledge betting on baseball in early 2004, his re-admittance to the game remains denied by Commissioner Bud Selig. Still holding out hope, Rose continues his quest for being welcomed back to the game he has loved since growing up in Western Hills. By the people in Cincinnati, he is largely remembered — more than anything else — as a winner. For despite amassing the greatest hit total in the game’s history, Rose is nonetheless even more proud of another record he holds— that of playing in the most games won by teams on which he played, a grand figure of 1,972. “Pete Rose may be the last ballplayer of his kind,” Anderson would write of one of his most cherished players in his 1978 autobiography. “Deep down inside, he believes he owes the game of baseball something, or everything. In a fight, they’d have to declare Rose dead before he would give up.” ********** Speaking of himself, Anderson had once admitted that “I didn’t quite make it as a player.... I came terribly close to not making it as a manager.” In 1978, Anderson’s run with the Reds would finally conclude, the season in which Alex Grammas would reunite with him as an assistant coach after two seasons of managing the Brewers in Milwaukee. The loyalty to his assistants over the course of his career — primarily Scherger, Grammas, Nixon, and a few others— would ultimately lead to his demise. When Anderson was fired on Novem-

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ber 27, 1978, he believed it was partially the result of his protest of the ownership’s wish to replace some of the assistants. “You come with a bag and put it down in the office,” he told Hertzel later in 1976. “Someday it will be time to leave, and you pick up your bag and go. But it won’t matter if you do your job honestly and fairly.” He would find new work very quickly, however, as the new leader of the Detroit Tigers, finally being forced to embrace the usage of the designated hitter and the American League–style of baseball that he long disfavored. Beginning an even longer managerial stretch than the one he enjoyed with the Reds, Anderson would remain as the Tiger skipper through the 1995 season. Under his guidance, Detroit sprinted out to a major-league record 35–5 mark in 1984, en route to Anderson’s third world title. Even after his managerial days were over, Anderson always hearkened back to Lefty Phillips, the old scout from Los Angeles who was the first to teach Sparky the finer points of baseball, as a primary reason for his success in the game. Through the years Sparky never forgot him, even though Phillips passed away in 1971. And as one of his last jobs in baseball, Anderson would return to his home area of Los Angeles area, finally “honoring” his Angels contract in becoming a broadcaster for them briefly in the late 1990s. With his departure from Cincinnati being somewhat distasteful to him, Anderson would not return to assist the organization in any capacity until new manager Dusty Baker invited him to participate in the team’s 2008 spring training exercises (due to an illness, Sparky would have to decline the offer). In the interim, however, Sparky would be enshrined in both the Reds and the national halls of fame in 2000, as well as having his number 10 retired by the Reds on May 28, 2005. “I was a really smart man,” Anderson told the crowd at Great American Ball Park that day about his managerial skill. “I had this lineup card, see, and every day I would write the names ‘Morgan,’ ‘Bench,’ ‘Concepcion,’ ‘Foster,’ ‘Perez,’ and on down the line ... it was a really tough job I had,” as the crowd burst into appreciative laughter. The Tigers honored him after his career as well, with an invitation to throw out the first pitch of Game Two of the 2006 World Series. These gestures were testaments to the man’s heart who had touched so many in Detroit, Cincinnati, and other places, ever since the honest young George had tried to return that first baseball to Coach Dedeaux in Los Angeles as a boy. It was also a simple goodness that came with no desired notoriety; according to Rose, Anderson would visit sick children in Cincinnati hospitals at least once a week — and Anderson made it clear to the local writers that he did not want any media covering such events. When the sun finally set on his magnificent career, Anderson in retrospect was never prouder of a team than his one called the “Big Red Machine.” “You have no idea how hard it is to be a star — to perform well and live with constant attention focused on you,” he asserted about that collection of players. “I was very fortunate in Cincinnati, because the key players knew how to do that.” Joe Morgan was one of those players who likewise knew he was part of

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something special. “The 1976 team, to me, was the best team ever,” Morgan said. “That’s just my opinion. It’s not just because I played on it, either. They were so good. It wasn’t a team of Phi Beta Kappas off the field, but everyone knew his role, and together that made it a very special team. We were on a roll at the right time.”

1976 Final Major League Baseball Standings National League West

W

L

Pct.

GB

Cincinnati Los Angeles Houston San Francisco San Diego Atlanta

102 92 80 74 73 70

60 70 82 88 89 92

.630 .568 .494 .457 .451 .432

— 10 22 28 29 32

National League East

W

L

Pct.

GB

Philadelphia Pittsburgh New York Chicago St. Louis Montreal

101 92 86 75 72 55

61 70 76 87 90 107

.623 .568 .531 .463 .444 .340

— 9 15 26 29 46

American League West

W

L

Pct.

GB

72 74 77 86 86 97

.556 .540 .525 .469 .469 .398

— 2.5 5 14 14 25.5

Kansas City Oakland Minnesota California Texas Chicago

American League East New York Baltimore Boston Cleveland Detroit Milwaukee

90 87 85 76 76 64

W 97 88 83 81 74 66

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L

Pct.

GB

62 74 79 78 87 95

.610 .543 .512 .509 .460 .410

— 10.5 15.5 16 24 32


1976 Final Cincinnati Reds Statistics Batting Werner Griffey Rose Morgan Geronimo Foster Bailey Armbrister Flynn Concepcion Perez Plummer Driessen Bench Lum Youngblood

G

AB

R

H

2B 3B HR RBI

BB

SO Avg. SB

3 148 162 141 149 144 69 73 93 152 139 56 98 135 84 55

4 562 665 472 486 562 124 78 219 576 527 153 219 465 136 57

0 111 130 113 59 86 17 20 20 74 77 16 32 62 15 8

2 189 215 151 149 172 37 23 62 162 137 38 54 109 31 11

1 28 42 30 24 21 6 3 5 28 32 6 11 24 5 1

1 74 63 111 49 121 23 7 20 69 91 19 44 74 20 1

1 62 86 114 56 52 16 6 10 49 50 14 43 81 22 2

1 65 54 41 95 89 26 22 24 68 88 36 32 95 24 8

0 9 6 5 11 9 1 2 2 7 6 1 1 1 1 1

0 6 10 27 2 29 6 2 1 9 19 4 7 16 3 0

.500 .336 .323 .320 .307 .306 .298 .295 .283 .281 .260 .248 .247 .234 .228 .193

0 34 9 60 22 17 0 7 2 21 10 0 14 13 0 1

Pitching Henderson Sarmiento Eastwick Zachry Gullett Norman Borbon Nolan Billingham Alcala McEnaney

G

ERA W–L SV GG CG IP

H

ER

HR BB SO

4 22 71 38 23 33 69 34 34 30 55

0.00 2.06 2.09 2.74 3.00 3.09 3.35 3.46 4.32 4.70 4.85

9 36 93 170 119 153 135 232 190 131 97

0 10 25 62 42 62 45 92 85 69 39

0 1 3 8 8 10 4 28 17 12 3

2–0 0 5–1 0 11–5 26 14–7 0 11–3 1 12–7 0 4–3 8 15–9 0 12–10 1 11–4 0 2–6 7

0 0 0 28 20 24 1 34 29 21 0

233

0 0 0 6 4 8 0 7 5 3 0

11 43 107 204 126 180 121 239 177 132 72

8 12 2 83 48 70 31 27 62 67 23

7 20 70 143 64 126 53 113 76 67 28

234

1976 Final Cincinnati Reds Statistics G

ERA W–L SV GG CG IP

H

ER

Darcy 11 6.23 2–3 2 4 0 39 41 27 Hinton 12 7.64 1–2 0 1 0 17 30 15 Shutouts— Norman 3, Billingham 2, Nolan 1, Zachry 1, Acala 1

HR BB SO 2 4

22 11

15 8

Sources of Quotations Chapter One p. 4 “After six years”— Sparky Anderson and Simon Burick, The Main Spark: Sparky Anderson and the Cincinnati Reds (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1978), p. 182. p. 4 “The greatest game ever played”— Ibid., p. 181. p. 5 “It’s sitting somewhere”— Phil Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, and Hammerin’ Hank: The Unforgettable Era That Transformed Baseball (Chicago: Triumph Books, 2005), p. 208. p. 5 “Think what that will do for baseball”— Bob Hertzel, The Big Red Machine (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1976), p. 197. p. 5 “Beer today, champagne tomorrow”— Ibid. p. 5 “It’s a darn shame we have to play it”— Ibid. p. 6 “The championship is home where it belongs.”— Ibid., p. 22. p. 9 “I only had a high school education”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 36. p. 10 “One day in Chicago”— Ibid., p. 54. p. 12 “Howsam is a listener”— Ibid., p. 79. p. 14 “Dave was extremely kind”— Ibid., p. 96. p. 14 “I might as well see if I can help the kids”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 9, 1976. p. 14 “George figured he was gonna drive off the road”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 1, 1976. p. 14 “The guys would shout for air conditioning”— Ibid. p. 14 “He didn’t have much speaking experience”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 93. p. 15 “I’m the highest-paid player on this team”— Ibid. p. 15 “We’re not giving Peter anything he hasn’t earned”— Pete Rose and Rick Hill, My Prison Without Bars, (Emmaus, PA: Rodale Press, 2004), p. 70. p. 15 “But I believe when you operate as a team”— Ibid., p. 139. p. 16 “Somehow, I had been schooled, almost hypnotized into believing”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, pp. 102–103. p. 19 “We were going for something in the future”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 118. p. 19 “I adopted a simple rule”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, pp. 126–127. p. 19 “The way the Reds look is appropriate to the city”— Ibid., p. 172.

235

236


p. 20 “I’m going to wear this beard”— Ibid., p. 196. p. 20 “There should have been a way for us to get together”— Ibid., p. 158. p. 21 “I’ll be honest — I have no idea about handling players”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 40. p. 21 “The people of Cincinnati have never loved him”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 8, 1976. p. 21 “Why were you booing me?”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 47. p. 21 “Like our announcer Marty Brennaman says”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 158.

Chapter Two p. 23 “Half-mile past the sign”— Mike Shannon, Johnny Bench (New York: Chelsea House, 1990), p. 15. p. 27 “That’s the same date that Abe Lincoln”— Pete Rose and Bob Hertzel, Charlie Hustle (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1975), p. 41. p. 27 “My grandmother used to talk about the floods”— Pete Rose and Roger Kahn, Pete Rose: My Story (New York: Macmillan, 1989), p. 43. p. 27 “Dad was not a hug-and-kiss type of father”— Rose and Hertzel, Charlie Hustle, p. 10. p. 28 “I didn’t do my schoolwork”— Rose and Kahn, My Story, p. 78. p. 28 “He was tough as nails”— Ibid., pp. 68–69. p. 28 “I wanted to be a pro in sports”— Ibid., p. 81. p. 29 “They say Brinkman took his check to the bank”— Ibid., p. 89. p. 29 “Rose is an aggressive and eager ballplayer at second”— Ibid., p. 93. p. 30 “Pete Rose is a physical freak”— Rose and Hill, My Prison, p. 43. p. 30 “We’re professional ballplayers— we have to get to Macon for a game”— Rose and Kahn, My Story, p. 99. p. 30 “The minors were good days”— Ibid., p. 86–87. p. 31 “When he was young, I treated him like a human being”— Ibid., p. 178. p. 31 “People keep trying to make it a competitive thing between him and me”— Ibid. p. 32 “Pete Rose is a once-in-a-lifetime performer”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 21, 1976. p. 33 “I was sitting about twenty rows up behind the screen”— Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, pp. 33–34. p. 34 “No hitter in the league can match Rose’s concentration”— Rose and Hill, My Prison, p. 48. p. 35 “He belonged to Atlanta”— Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, p. 129. p. 35 “Anyone can hit homers”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 24, 1976. p. 35 “He is what you’d call a chip off the old block”— Rose and Hertzel, Charlie Hustle, p. 13. p. 35 “We couldn’t do anything”— Red Smith, New York Times, April 8, 1976. p. 36 “There’s one thing you’d better get straight, kid”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, pp. 165–166. p. 37 “I’m like a kid with a new toy”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 81. p. 37 “A bargain-basement outfield behind the million-dollar infield”— Ibid., p. 82. p. 39 “Here’s a guy who gets on base an awful lot of the time”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 79.


237

p. 40 “I have always loved base running”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 23, 1976. p. 40 “It’s not a coincidence that Sparky named Concepcion the captain”— Marty Brennaman, Cincinnati Enquirer editorial, December 2, 2006. p. 41 “My salary and World Series money is not enough”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 9, 1976. p. 41 “I didn’t invent that one-hop throw”— Robert Walker, Cincinnati and the Big Red Machine (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988), p. 88. p. 42 “I’m the only one who’s ever seen him mad”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 13, 1976. p. 43 “Well, we weren’t sure if he would hit”— Walker, Cincinnati, p. 62. p. 44 “It didn’t have an emblem on it”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 46. p. 44 “That kid is the best young player in our system”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 1, 1976. p. 44 “But I’m not bringing you back”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 160. p. 45 “Much of the Reds’ success last year must be credited to Geronimo”— Bob Addie, Washington Post, June 13, 1976. p. 45 “They don’t get the recognition they should”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 89. p. 46 “Can I ask you something, Sparky?”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 59. p. 47 “I just wish they’d do away with the ‘complete game’ statistic”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 96. p. 48 “I got $45,000”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 24, 1976. p. 48 “Maybe I expected too much”— Ibid., May 25, 1976. p. 49 “Not winning a game in May”— Ibid., March 25, 1976. p. 49 “They thought they had a shot at the pennant”— Ibid. p. 50 “It really hurt when I went to the minor leagues”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 100. p. 50 “I always sat in the back of the room”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 23, 1976. p. 50 “Hey, I pride myself on being flaky”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 97. p. 50 “I was messing around in the outfield, throwing left-handed”— Rose and Hertzel, Charlie Hustle, p. 33. p. 50 “He is the oldest man in the Dominican”— Ibid. p. 51 “If he isn’t losing his temper”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 2, 1976.

Chapter Three p. 52 “The 28-year-old all-star catcher has been the target”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 26, 1976. p. 53 “I thought I was a home run hitter”—(no author), Associated Press, July 9, 1976. p. 53 “In Montreal, when you got a hit”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 20, 1976. p. 54 “I’m not here to sit around and bunt”— Ibid., June 10, 1976. p. 54 “Roughly 1,500 letters”— Ibid., March 29, 1976. p. 54 “I bunted the ball and, for a split second, I froze”— Ibid.

238


p. 55 “I’d read about guys who spent five years in Class A”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 25, 1976. p. 55 “Last year it took 25 guys to do what we did”— Ibid. p. 55 “I had the best seat in the house”— Ibid. p. 55 “Our front line is the best eight men in either league”— Norm Clarke, Associated Press, April 8, 1976. p. 55 “There are guys on the bench in this league who better hope nothing happens”— Red Smith, New York Times, April 8, 1976. p. 56 “It had no staff of its own. It had no office of its own”—Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, p. 9. p. 58 “Collective bargaining agreement supersedes the individual”—(no author), Associated Press, February 2, 1976. p. 59 “What we have is an owners’ strike”—(no author), Associated Press, March 7, 1976. p. 59 “What we have is a postponement of spring training, not a lockout”— Ibid. p. 59 “The Red Rooters of Ruby Wright Rapp are scheduled to on their annual trek”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, February 24, 1976. p. 59 “I can only speak for myself ”— Ibid., February 26, 1976. p. 59 “Ownership has to go as far as necessary to get a fair and equitable agreement”— Ibid. p. 60 “Baseball, with a reserve clause, has been good for the players”— Ibid. p. 60 “A nothing proposal”—(no author), Associated Press, February 27, 1976. p. 60 “When Miller refers to Cincinnati Reds president Bob Howsam”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, February 28, 1976. p. 60 “In other words, a success for Miller could kill the game of baseball.”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 7, 1976. p. 61 “I will play as long as I can”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 9, 1976. p. 61 “Gullett always has some arm trouble in the spring”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 5, 1976. p. 61 “You’d think that the owners would want us to be working out, to be getting in shape”— Ibid. p. 62 “I had quite a temper in those days”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 7, 1976. p. 62 “There’s plenty to do here”— Ibid., March 4, 1976. p. 63 “We’ve moved from one year to six”—(no author), Associated Press, March 4, 1976. p. 63 “I don’t know what’s happening”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 5, 1976. p. 63 “What happens if I don’t sign, and I can’t find anyone who wants me?”— Ibid., March 10, 1976. p. 63 “Freedom was available to Bill Plummer, and he rejected it”— Ibid. p. 63 “It is, in a way, a lesson for both management and players”— Ibid., March 7, 1976. p. 64 “This is a game we helped create”— Ibid., March 8, 1976. p. 64 “I’m ready to play ball, and all this isn’t doing any good”— Ibid. p. 64 “Miller had made a major concession by offering to place his troops in servitude for six”— Dave Nightingale, Chicago Daily News, March 6, 1976. p. 64 “The players have won a substantial philosophical victory”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 7, 1976. p. 64 “The introduction of Marshall in the labor dispute”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 11, 1976.


239

p. 64 “It’s about time the whole society stopped being intimidated”— Ibid. p. 65 “We are requiring of Mike Marshall the same thing we require of anyone else”—(no author), Associated Press, August 28, 1976. p. 65 “I don’t think any pitching coach”— Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, p. 159. p. 65 “And they should be able to explain”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 29, 1976. p. 65 “He honestly believes that he knows more about pitching”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 11, 1976. p. 66 “The players are willing and able and want to play”—(no author), Associated Press, March 7, 1976. p. 66 “Ought to lock ’em in a room”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 8, 1976. p. 67 “When Sparky Anderson held drills the players were pooped”— Ibid., March 12, 1976. p. 67 “Neither just nor fair”—(no author), Associated Press, April 2, 1976. p. 68 “It’s an outstanding group of men”— Ibid., March 27, 1976. p. 68 “We don’t think this is the proper time to expand”— Ibid. p. 68 “I don’t think it’s good common sense to pay any man two or three times what he’s worth”— Ibid. p. 68 “We have admiration for Messersmith’s pitching ability”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 24, 1976. p. 69 “The situation of Catfish Hunter”—(no author), Associated Press, March 18, 1976. p. 69 “He can decide who wins pennants”— Jerome Holtzman, Chicago Sun-Times, March 11, 1976. p. 69 “Frankly, he gives us real concern”— Ibid. p. 69 “Fear him more than Marvin Miller”— Ibid. p. 70 “We have gambled”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 22, 1976. p. 70 “With your help, Chicago will again be number-one”—(no author), Associated Press, June 25, 1976. p. 70 “People berate me for making my money for catching 140 games a year”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 11, 1976. p. 70 “Because we tried to come up with something the players will accept”— Ibid., March 16, 1976. p. 71 “A free agent is a free agent”— Ibid., March 17, 1976. p. 71 “They will accept anything now”— Ibid. p. 71 “The most powerful man in the game”— Dick Young, New York News, March 17, 1976. p. 71 “If at some point I feel that sufficient progress”—(no author), Associated Press, February 28, 1976. p. 71 “Kuhn’s authority extends only to matters involving the integrity or honesty of the game”—(no author), Associated Press, March 2, 1976. p. 72 “There are no winners or losers in collective bargaining”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 17, 1976. p. 72 “Their [the owners’] lawyers had assured the owners”— Phil Pepe, Talkin’ Baseball: An Oral History of Baseball in the 1970s (New York: Ballantine Books, 1998), p. 212. p. 72 “I can remember when I wanted to be the first $100,000 player”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 26, 1976. p. 72 “That’s why the players get called ‘greedy’”— Ibid., June 23, 1976.

240


p. 72 “If we ever look at it as a total business, we’re through”— Ibid. p. 72 “If I hear Bowie Kuhn say just once”— Ibid., March 6, 1976. p. 73 “The pitching isn’t that much of a problem”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 15, 1976. p. 73 “In Montreal, we’d still be working on trick plays”— Ibid., March 20, 1976. p. 73 “It all goes back to something Billy Goodman told me”— Ibid., April 8, 1976. p. 74 “It’s looks pretty crowded”— Ibid., March 20, 1976. p. 74 “I’ll have Tony angry at times and Danny at times”— Norm Clarke, Associated Press, April 8, 1976. p. 75 “Both are kids who can throw the ball hard”— Sparky Anderson, Cincinnati Enquirer editorial, April 8, 1976. p. 75 “You can’t pick the ball up on him”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 16, 1976. p. 75 “He never showed me anything”— Ibid., May 1, 1976. p. 75 “I was known as a klutz then”— Ibid., May 25, 1976. p. 75 “Last year, I wanted Nolan to be the ‘Comeback Pitcher of the Year’”— Ibid., March 31, 1976. p. 76 “I’ve always believed that when Gary Nolan is just 85 percent”— Ibid. p. 76 “I’ve been dead for a year and a half ”— Jim Montgomery, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 11, 1976. p. 76 “The kids were looking for a lot more”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 1, 1976. p. 76 “The worst humiliation of his pitching career”— Ibid., April 5, 1976. p. 76 “If you know it takes you longer to get ready than most guys”— Ibid. p. 77 “But this is only the second time”— Ibid. p. 77 “I grew up in California and the Dodgers have a good organization”—(no author), Associated Press, March 30, 1976. p. 77 “a $500,000 insurance policy, guarantee of $35,000 a year for life”—(no author), Associated Press, March 3, 1976. p. 77 “Oh, no— we’re only looking for lefthanded pitching”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 4, 1976. p. 78 “This has been a very emotional time for all involved”—(no author), Associated Press, March 23, 1976. p. 78 “The word ‘Boycott’ is being used more and more”— Dick Young, New York News, April 7, 1976. p. 78 “For the public, the basic facts of life remain”— Joseph Durso, New York Times, April 8, 1976. p. 79 “I could see it”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 3, 1976. p. 79 “We’ll have to find someone to take his place”— Ibid., April 2, 1976. p. 79 “Without this pitching arm of mine” Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 104. p. 79 “I got me a ’54 Ford”— Ibid. p. 80 “We intend to perform our obligations”—(no author), Associated Press, April 1, 1976. p. 81 “The wearing of the Yankee uniform”—(no author) Associated Press, April 4, 1976. p. 81 “Make life uncomfortable”— Dave Anderson, New York Times, April 8, 1976. p. 81 “This trade was made because I feel this deal will lead us”—(no author), Associated Press, April 3, 1976. p. 81 “His disposition is that he feels strongly about the West Coast”—(no author), Associated Press, April 6, 1976.


241

p. 82 “I don’t know if it is going to be as easy or tougher”—(no author), Cincinnati Enquirer, April 7, 1976. p. 82 “The fans here in Cincinnati”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 7, 1976.

Chapter Four p. 84 “I didn’t expect to be recognized”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 62. p. 85 “The Reds, despite operating in the second smallest major league baseball market”— Norm Clarke, Associated Press, March 25, 1976. p. 86 “Brennaman is a snappy dresser”— David Fuselier, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 11, 1976. p. 87 “It doesn’t take a smart man to look at a kid like that and realize”—(no author) Associated Press, May 11, 1976. p. 88 “I am now a third baseman”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 8, 1976. p. 88 “For the first time”— Ibid., March 24, 1976. p. 88 “I’ll be hitting third all year”— Ibid. p. 88 “It is an honor”— Ibid., April 8, 1976. p. 89 “Everything but Cliff Johnson’s shin guards”— Ibid., April 9, 1976. p. 90 “There is no defensing Borbon”— Ibid. p. 90 “You’ve got to know him”— Ibid. p. 90 “Talking about getting to the major leagues”— Ibid., June 3, 1976. p. 90 “He had a very bad temper”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 4, 1976. p. 90 “If he was supposed to pitch and didn’t, he would get mad”— Ibid. p. 90 “I pulled him over and told him”— Ibid. p. 91 “I don’t care that I gave up four runs”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 9, 1976. p. 91 “Barring any injuries, there’s no reason we shouldn’t do it again”—(no author), Associated Press, April 8, 1976. p. 91 “We became a good solid ballclub last year”— Ibid. p. 91 “The fact that Reggie is not here has hurt the attitude of the club”—(no author), Associated Press, April 16, 1976. p. 92 “This is a gorgeous thing”— Dick Young, New York News, April 16, 1976. p. 92 “They already wrote me off in one paper”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 11, 1976. p. 93 “Cincinnati will embarrass a lot of catchers before the season is over”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 9, 1976. p. 93 “This year I gave him double or nothing”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 12, 1976. p. 93 “This a quite an honor”— Ibid. p. 94 “If it’s unsafe”— Ibid., April 14, 1976. p. 94 “If they win 101”— Ibid., May 12, 1976. p. 94 “The fans will be right down on top of the action”— Ibid., April 14, 1976. p. 95 “Anytime I get a hit off him, I’ll ask for a raise”— Dick Young, New York News, April 20, 1976. p. 95 “It covered two points”— Murray Chass, New York Times, April 25, 1976. p. 95 “There’s not a doubt in my mind a baseball franchise”—(no author), Associated Press, March 26, 1976.

242


p. 96 “A few beers”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 15, 1976. p. 96 “Candlestick Park is a sad excuse for a ballpark”— Rose and Hertzel, Charlie Hustle, p. 44. p. 96 “A couple of days ago, they were cheering”— Ibid., p. 45. p. 97 “It was just a case of something having to be done”— David Fuselier, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 9, 1976. p. 97 “Kubek told me they wouldn’t bother me if I stood still”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 18, 1976. p. 98 “The last time I was stung by a bee, I pitched a one-hitter”— Ibid. p. 98 “Bees are like people”—(no author), Associated Press, June 12, 1976. p. 98 “I had one foot out the door and I was ready to go”— Ibid. p. 98 “The bees like us [umpires] because we’re so sweet”— Ibid. p. 99 “I was booed by 50,000 people”— Ron Rapoport, Los Angeles Times, April 8, 1976. p. 99 “All I was shooting for was to get past the second inning”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 19, 1976. p. 99 “Not even a hole in it”— Ibid., April 21, 1976. p. 100 “DiMaggio’s record is the most meaningful in baseball history”— Ibid., April 20, 1976. p. 100 “It is pretty much a losing battle”— Ibid., April 27, 1976. p. 101 “He’s got to be my big cat, and I know it”— Ibid,. April 25, 1976. p. 101 “I didn’t have this many [RBIs] until July last year”— Ibid., April 22, 1976. p. 101 “It will be his first start”— Ibid. p. 101 “He wasn’t impressive”— Ibid. p. 101 “The time has come to say it aloud”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 24, 1976. p. 101 “Jack Billingham is a less-respected pitcher here”— Ibid. p. 102 “There seems to be only one question pertinent”— Dink Carroll, Montreal Gazette, April 27, 1976. p. 104 “There’s nobody on a field who’s not in a baseball uniform that I don’t notice fast”— Armand Schneider, Chicago Daily News, April 27, 1976. p. 104 “There’s nobody going to burn a flag while I’m on the field”— Ibid. p. 104 “Now we’ve got three patriots”— Ibid. p. 105 “I wasn’t trying to be a hero or anything”—(no author), Associated Press, April 28, 1976. p. 105 “I wasn’t worried. See this face?”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 29, 1976. p. 105 “I’ve still got the scar where the Mets stuck a knife in my back”— Allen Lewis, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 5, 1976. p. 105 “He laughs so much, I think he goes home and cries”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 13, 1976. p. 106 “He must really have hit that bell hard”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 29, 1976. p. 106 “And he no speak any of them very good”— Ibid., May 2, 1976.

Chapter Five p. 107 “Throw a Mets’ uniform over a sore-armed has-been”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 14, 1976.


243

p. 107 “We were playing New York, and Jerry Koosman”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 67. p. 108 “Pete Rose has contributed too much to baseball”— Ibid., p. 45. p. 109 “I never thought so until last year”— Dick Young, New York News, March 3, 1976. p. 109 “I can’t blame him”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 4, 1976. p. 109 “I don’t think we have to worry about the Dodgers”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 13, 1976. p. 110 “This issue will determine my future with the club”— Thomas Boswell, Washington Post, May 4, 1976. p. 110 “Why not have 25 policies for 25 players?”— Ibid. p. 110 “I never really decided to stay out of baseball”—(no author), Associated Press, May 1, 1976. p. 111 “A pitcher here with a 4.00 earned average is a good pitcher”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 8, 1976. p. 111 “Maybe I wash away the bad luck”— Ibid., May 7, 1976. p. 113 “Who’s Captain Hook?”— Ibid. p. 113 “I no afraid of Seaver”— Ibid. p. 113 “They get every decision”— Ibid. p. 114 “You just don’t worry about it”— Bob Berghaus, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 25, 1976. p. 114 “He picked me up and threw me down like a body slam”—(no author), Associated Press, May 22, 1976. p. 115 “Using no fewer than 27 bleep-bleeps in a three-minute span”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 19, 1976. p. 116 “The National League record is only a thousand away”— Ibid., May 21, 1976. p. 116 “I could sure go for a ham sandwich about the fifth inning”— Ibid., May 25, 1976. p. 117 “I don’t understand these people”— Ibid., May 27, 1976. p. 118 “A lot of managers never want to go out in front of 40,000 people and be the goat”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 38. p. 118 “Exhibition, championship (regular season) and post-season games”—(no author), Chicago Sun-Times, May 17, 1976. p. 118 “Not a scratch or a bruise on him”—(no author), Associated Press, May 24, 1976. p. 118 “Sad what money, and the promise of more, does to people”— Dick Young, New York News, May 25, 1976. p. 120 “Pitching to a bunch of high school kids”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 30, 1976. p. 120 “Klu [Coach Ted Kluszewski] was standing next to me and was afraid to say anything”—(no author), Associated Press, June 3, 1976.

Chapter Six p. 124 “You may think I’m loony”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 25, 1976. p. 124 “We didn’t even have a top-notch lefthander in the minor leagues”—(no author), Associated Press, April 8, 1976. p. 125 “What we’re concerned about is defense”— Ibid. p. 125 “That’s a season for me”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 7, 1976.

244


p. 126 “Republican regulars tended at first to view Reagan as little more than a sparring partner”— Warren Wheat, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 6, 1976. p. 126 “Heading from his California sweep”— Robert Webb, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 13, 1976. p. 126 “The team to beat”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, April 8, 1976. p. 127 “Sure, we’ve got bats”—(no author), Associated Press, April 8, 1976. p. 127 “When you’re a competitor and start getting the weeds of doubt”— Red Smith, New York Times, April 8, 1976. p. 127 “Last year, I batted eighth”— Ray Buck, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 16, 1976. p. 127 “Guys come here and become good players”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, August 9, 1976. p. 128 “He should be brought up immediately”—(no author), Cincinnati Enquirer, June 9, 1976. p. 129 “This is my mound”— Bill Nack, Newsday, April 8, 1976. p. 129 “In action a man of almost bizarre intensity”— Ibid. p. 129 “A negative thought cannot be allowed into your mind”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 6, 1976. p. 129 “Doug Flynn is the best utility player in baseball”— Ibid., June 2, 1976. p. 131 “Strictly for cash”—(no author), Associated Press, June 16, 1976. p. 131 “The night’s not over”— Ibid. p. 131 “A dark day for baseball”— Ibid. p. 131 “If a man owns a ball club, he ought to have the right”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 21, 1976. p. 132 “The commissioner is left with the lonely job of deciding integrity”—(no author), Associated Press, June 19, 1976. p. 132 “Shorn of much of its finest talent”— Ibid. p. 132 “This is not a vindictive move”—(no author), Associated Press, June 21, 1976. p. 132 “Kuhn ordered me to ‘remove any restraints’”—(no author), Associated Press, June 25, 1976. p. 132 “A strike at this time would have enabled Finley”—(no author), Associated Press, Juen 28, 1976. p. 132 “I’ll suspend any striking players for the rest of the year”—(no author), Associated Press, June 26, 1976. p. 133 “I’m not letting this bother me”—(no author), Associated Press, June 28, 1976. p. 133 “The spectacle of the Yankees and Red Sox buying contracts”— Pepe, Talkin’ Baseball, p. 228. p. 133 “For Philadelphia to get caught”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 18, 1976. p. 134 “You know, it wasn’t long ago”— Ibid., October 10, 1976. p. 134 “Hey — is your name Elmer?”— Ibid., June 20, 1976. p. 134 “What do you want me to say?”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 13, 1976. p. 135 “If he showed up at a tryout camp”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 23, 1976. p. 136 “By doing that, guys like Bench, Perez, Bailey, and Foster”— Ibid. p. 137 “Every time I used him that spring, he got people out”— Pepe, Talkin’ Baseball, p. 230. p. 137 “[It’s] the same as you see some hitters talk to themselves”— Ibid., p. 237.


245

p. 137 “Fidrych was brilliant”— Ibid., pp. 235–236. p. 137 “This is the most I’ve ever made in my life”—(no author), Associated Press, July 6, 1976. p. 138 “I want to play as long as I can do the job”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 23, 1976.

Chapter Seven p. 140 “There has been no more exciting play”— Rose and Kahn, My Story, p. 57. p. 140 “Break out the flags, strike up the band — Jules Koh, Associated Press, July 4, 1976. p. 140 “45,000 decked the walls of Yeatman’s Cove”— Walt Schaefer, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 4, 1976. p. 141 “There are managers who say that instant replay should be used”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 175. p. 141 “Give or take a few, one-third of all the umpires”—(no author), Associated Press, June 10, 1976. p. 142 “I didn’t really expect to be here”—Bill Ford, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 13, 1976. p. 144 “Hey Morgan — when you were with the Houston Astros, nobody ever heard of you”— Ibid., July 14, 1976. p. 144 “If I was hitting .220, I’d feel funny being the lineup”— Ibid. p. 144 “I think 16 wins is enough work for half a season”—(no author), Associated Press, July 9, 1976. p. 145 “Americans are strong”— Warren Wheat, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 13, 1976. p. 146 “Quality and depth”— Bill Ford, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 15, 1976. p. 146 “Our second-line players are better”— Ibid. p. 149 “The way the team has been going”—(no author) Associated Press, July 20, 1976. p. 149 “We cannot blame everything on Darrell Johnson”— Ibid. p. 149 “The players have got to know that I’m going to be the boss”—(no author), Associated Press, July 21, 1976. p. 149 “There is the scent of fear at the Olympic Village”— Stan Hochman, Knight News Wire, July 4, 1976. p. 149 “We’ve got 300 police in this building alone”— Ibid. p. 150 “We are seriously considering withdrawing”—(no author) Associated Press, July 15, 1976. p. 150 “United States medal chances in the 1976 Olympic Games seem best”—(no author), Associated Press, July 9, 1976. p. 150 “I think it’s tragic that international politics and foreign policy get involved”—(no author), Associated Press, July 11, 1976. p. 151 “We’re told that we’re having a solid economic recovery”—(no author), Associated Press, July 11, 1976. p. 151 “Tonight gave me my greatest thrill”— Al Drooz, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 22, 1976. p. 152 “I will try to perfect my present routine”—(no author), Associated Press, July 22, 1976. p. 152 “There were 17 votes for approval”—(no author), Associated Press, July 20, 1976. p. 154 “We have great reports on him”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 31, 1976.

246


p. 154 “Here I got to think baseball”— Ibid. p. 154 “I’m glad he didn’t throw it any lower”— Ibid., August 1, 1976. p. 155 “The beaning of Jackson”— Thomas Boswell, Washington Post, August 1, 1976. p. 156 “The most tainted no-hitter I’ve ever seen”—(no author), Associated Press, July 30, 1976.

Chapter Eight p. 157 “Let me put it this way. I’m having a good year”— Bill Ford, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 15, 1976. p. 158 “Well, at least you’re going down nine [games] in front”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, August 3, 1976. p. 158 “To be brutally honest, they have double-crossed a town”— Wells Twombly, San Francisco Examiner, May 20, 1976. p. 158 “You can’t back up the truck”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 20, 1976. p. 158 “Once there was pride in being a Giant”— Ibid., July 28, 1976. p. 160 “He’s got to improve the rest of the season”— Michael Precker, Associated Press, August 10, 1976. p. 160 “They pour into Wilmington”— Ray Buck, Cincinnati Enquirer, August 8, 1976. p. 161 “Played the best ball I had seen in seven years with the club”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 189. p. 161 “He is, right now, the best pitcher in the National League”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, August 7, 1976. p. 161 “The toughest pitcher I’ve ever faced”— Ibid., August 6, 1976. p. 162 “Reports of Johnny Bench’s baseball demise” Randy Harvey, Chicago SunTimes, August 13, 1976. p. 162 “If I were ever going to ask the Reds to trade me”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, August 13, 1976. p. 162 “Next year, I play here for the Cubs”— Ibid. p. 162 “Who could go 20 at-bats without a hit”— Ibid., August 14, 1976. p. 162 “It takes a cannon to get a ball through that high infield grass”— Ibid., May 8, 1976. p. 163 “He is a clanking six-foot-six”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, May 16, 1976. p. 164 “If you inspected the major league baseball standings”— Charles Maher, Los Angeles Times, August 12, 1976. p. 165 “I don’t take a very big lead when I’m on first base”—Rose and Kahn, My Story, p. 183. p. 165 “We’re just not hitting, and that happens”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, August 18, 1976. p. 166 “The average baseball crowd”—(no author), Associated Press, August 18, 1976. p. 166 “That scoreboard hasn’t drawn one person”— Jerry Sullivan, Cincinnati Enquirer, July 4, 1976. p. 166 “It’s not my job to make a big winner”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 17, 1976. p. 167 “I want to start stealing a lot of bases now”— Ibid., August 23, 1976.


247

p. 167 “I have pitched against the greatest baserunners of all time”— Ibid., May 14, 1976. p. 167 “We’re gonna win it”— Ibid., August 28, 1976. p. 168 “From the manager and the leaders”— Ibid., August 29, 1976. p. 168 “There is something that haunts the Phils”— Tom Fitzpatrick, Chicago SunTimes, August 22, 1976. p. 168 “I don’t think there is such a word as ‘tenseness’”—(no author), Associated Press, September 7, 1976. p. 168 “A choking epidemic is upon the National League”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 5, 1976. p. 168 “There can be no doubt that we are tired”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 1, 1976. p. 169 “We have offered two years”— Ibid., September 8, 1976. p. 169 “Maybe he doesn’t want to play here”— Ibid. p. 169 “I didn’t see a baseball until I was ten”— Ibid., September 15, 1976. p. 169 “He’s got something that very few have”—(no author), Associated Press, September 12, 1976. p. 170 “I’m very proud of the accomplishment”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 6, 1976. p. 170 “I want you to stay here in Cincinnati this winter”— Ibid., May 14, 1976. p. 170 “We just have to keep it up”— Dick Young, New York News, September 8, 1976. p. 171 “Scoreboard is a game that requires broad peripheral vision”— Ibid. p. 171 “I really don’t have extra men”—Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 12, 1976. p. 171 “The ‘extra’ men have won at least ten games this year”— Ibid. p. 171 “If he can throw any better, I’ve never seen it”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 17, 1976. p. 172 “Every year I got tired of going home early”— Ibid., September 21, 1976. p. 172 “Obviously, you have to knock him out to beat him”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 29–30, 1976. p. 173 “He has retired before”—(no author), Associated Press, October 2, 1976. p. 173 “Madlock is a pure hitter”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 24, 1976. p. 173 “I played against him in the minor leagues and the majors”— Ibid. p. 173 “I feel we’ve got the best club in baseball”—(no author), Associated Press, September 27, 1976. p. 174 “There comes a time when you get enough of everything”—(no author), Associated Press, September 28, 1976. p. 174 “It’s a shame that 30 guys didn’t win for him this year”— Ibid. p. 174 “It’s a sad day”— Ibid. p. 174 “Never once did he embarrass the Dodgers”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 29, 1976. p. 175 “If it’s good enough for Walter Alston, it’s good enough for me”—(no author), Associated Press, September 30, 1976. p. 176 “We pitchers are in the back of the bus”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 27, 1976. p. 176 “I’m really sorry about Randy”— Ibid., September 30, 1976. p. 177 “I think I’ve been around long enough”—(no author), Cincinnati Enquirer, October 2, 1976.

248


p. 178 “With his speed, he can lead the league in hitting some year”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 22, 1976. p. 178 “You don’t hear a word about him”— Ibid., September 27, 1976. p. 180 “This is America. Not much has changed”—(no author), Associated Press, October 4, 1976. p. 180 “I just messed up”—(no author), Associated Press, October 9, 1976. p. 181 “The curious thing is why Brye would want me to win the batting title instead of his own teammates”— Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, p. 246. p. 181 “There is no doubt in my mind, there was no doubt in Darrell’s [Johnson] mind”— Dave Nightingale, Chicago Tribune, August 22, 1976. p. 181 “To win you must sacrifice”— Skip Myslenski, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 10, 1976.

Chapter Nine p. 183 “When I came here, all I knew was that the Phillies hadn’t won in 25 years”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 10, 1976. p. 183 “He hit the longest home run I ever saw”— Ibid., August 27, 1976. p. 184 “It’s hard to believe”—(no author), Associated Press, October 1, 1976. p. 184 “He [Allen] makes $250,000 a year”— Ibid. p. 184 “Allen compares himself to ‘an ex-convict’”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 10, 1976. p. 184 “My brother and I would go to the games”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 7, 1976. p. 185 “He’s one of the better ones”— Ibid., October 14, 1976. p. 185 “I hope I go broke”— Allen Lewis, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 5, 1976. p. 185 “I think the way you have to pitch to them”— Bruce Keidan, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 6, 1976. p. 185 “When the game is really on the line”— Ibid. p. 185 “I have nowhere else to go”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 7, 1976. p. 186 “Philadelphia is number one”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 13, 1976. p. 186 “There are two or three guys we’ve got to keep off base”—(no author), Associated Press, October 5, 1976. p. 187 “There is about them always an air”— Skip Myslenski, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 10, 1976. p. 187 “If Bench gets hot in the post-season”— Bruce Keidan, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 6, 1976. p. 187 “A playoff or a World Series brings out the best in him”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 7, 1976. p. 188 “It’s the U.S. Marines against Cub Pack 89”— Dick Young, New York News, October 9, 1976. p. 188 “Throughout the South Side here in the ’50s and ’60s”— Bill Gleason, Chicago Sun-Times, October 8, 1976. p. 188 “We can get four of five runs off Lonborg”— Bruce Keidan, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 7, 1976. p. 188 “The Reds are working awfully hard to psych us”— Ibid. p. 188 “What are we, children? Who cares?”—(no author), Cincinnati Enquirer, October 8, 1976.


249

p. 189 “There is no long hair on the Reds”— Skip Myslenski, Philadelphia Inquirer, October 10, 1976. p. 191 “The Reds must have been the toughest team to close out”— John Wilson, Houston Chronicle, October 19, 1976. p. 192 “I think I touched them all”—(no author), Associated Press, October 16, 1976. p. 192 “There is an aura of supreme confidence”— Will Grimsley, Associated Press, October 19, 1976. p. 193 “They carted the hair away in bushel baskets”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 27, 1976. p. 193 “I’m trying to impose a certain sense of order and discipline”—(no author) Associated Press, March 24, 1976. p. 193 “Where did you get that haircut?”— Ibid. p. 193 “When they hired pepperpot manager Billy Martin”— Hal Bock, Associated Press, April 22, 1976. p. 193 “He is a man without peer as a manager”—(no author), Associated Press, September 12, 1976. p. 193 “He lets me run my own ship”— Ibid. p. 194 “We don’t have the one or two guys”— Ibid. p. 194 “I’ll take my pitching anytime”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 16, 1976. p. 194 “I think the designated hitter is the worst gimmick”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 2, 1976. p. 194 “When you haven’t been playing, it’s not easy”— Ibid. p. 194 “A compromise, really”— Dick Young, New York News, August 15, 1976. p. 194 “Howsam is against the rule because of its merits”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 8, 1976. p. 195 “If he can do this”— Ibid. p. 195 “We have a great game that doesn’t need gimmicks”— Ibid. p. 195 “It changes strategy”— Ibid. p. 195 “I’m not sure if I will or if I won’t”—(no author) Cincinnati Enquirer, October 9, 1976. p. 195 “The designated hitters take away from the utility players too”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 18, 1976. p. 195 “Sunday afternoon — that’s what baseball is for”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 16, 1976. p. 195 “You decide: Do you like it 60 degrees or 45?”— Ibid. p. 195 “It’s good; I get to see the football games”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 18, 1976. p. 196 “While more people may be able to tune in”— Joe Gergen, New York Newsday, October 24, 1976. p. 196 “What’s his name — Howser”— Terry Flynn, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 17, 1976. p. 196 “We would be more prepared to contain them”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 16, 1976. p. 197 “We’ll run all over Munson”— Ibid., October 14, 1976. p. 197 “The Yankees don’t have a Johnny Bench in Munson”— Ibid. p. 197 “If we lose more than one game in the World Series, I will be disappointed”— Ibid. p. 198 “I haven’t given up hope that I will sign with the Reds”— Ibid., October 15, 1976.

250


p. 198 “He does not have the bat control to hit it past me”— Ibid., October 23, 1976. p. 199 “A terrible fastball”— Ibid., 10-17-76 p. 199 “If you just won a [league] championship”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 17, 1976. p. 199 “We’re going to win it in four”— Si Burick, Dayton Daily News, October 17, 1976. p. 201 “It would be better if the rule allowed the commissioner to use judgment”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 17, 1976. p. 203 “Baseball no longer thinks of the men who play the game”— Ibid., October 18, 1976. p. 203 “The series now moves to New York”— Charles Maher, Los Angeles Times, October 19, 1976. p. 203 “On a scale of ten”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 17, 1976. p. 204 “Billy Martin and Sparky Anderson like to use the term ‘aggressive’”— Armand Schneider, Chicago Daily News, October 19, 1976. p. 205 “Nine times the game was stopped Thursday night in Yankee Stadium”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 16, 1976. p. 205 “I will meet with the commissioner and the umpires”— Ibid. p. 205 “It’s up to the commissioner to control it”— Ibid. p. 205 “If it comes to clinching it there”— Tom Callahan, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 16, 1976. p. 205 “I’m in the lobby every day”— Terry Flynn, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 21, 1976. p. 206 “The first pitch to Pete Rose was directed toward his head”— Donald Hall and Dock Ellis, Dock Ellis in the Country of Baseball (New York: Coward, McCann and Georghegan, 1976), p. 145. p. 206 “Mow the lineup down”— Ibid. p. 206 “I won’t have to”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 20, 1976. p. 209 “It’s going to be a thrill to pitch in Yankee Stadium”— Jack Murray, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 18, 1976. p. 209 “Pep talks”—(no author), Associated Press, October 19, 1976. p. 210 “Slumps are like a soft bed”— Shannon, Johnny Bench, p. 110. p. 210 “The key to beating the Yankees is keeping Mickey Rivers off base”—(no author), Associated Press, October 16, 1976. p. 211 “I’m gonna tell you something”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 176. p. 212 “I guess Sparky had lost some of his confidence in me”— Terry Flynn, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 21, 1976. p. 212 “Billingham was unhappy”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 23, 1976. p. 214 “I was disappointed”— Ibid. p. 214 “You do it if you are a gentleman”— Ibid. p. 214 “Phillips is one of the best in our league”—(no author) Associated Press, October 23, 1976. p. 214 “It just isn’t as exciting as last year”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 21, 1976. p. 214 “What happens if Griffey and I are batting .330”— Ibid., October 22, 1976. p. 215 “The Yankees would not score three runs off Tom Seaver, Jerry Koosman, and Jon Matlack”— Ibid., October 23, 1976. p. 215 “There are five or six clubs in our league better than the Yankees”— Ibid.


251

p. 215 “A sin to compare any other catcher with Johnny Bench”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 177. p. 215 “I’m not Yogi”—(no author), Associated Press, June 6, 1976. p. 215 “Our scouting report from Ray Shore”— Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, p. 251. p. 215 “Thurman Munson says Cincinnati pitching hasn’t really impressed him”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 22, 1976. p. 216 “My greatest performance”— Ibid. p. 216 “Pete Rose said, ‘It wouldn’t be a World Series without the Yankees’”— Edwin Pope, Knight News Wire, October 23, 1976. p. 216 “There is really no excuse for what transpired”— Joe Gergen, New York Newsday, October 24, 1976. p. 216 “They talk about the Reds not having any 20-game winners, but one reason is that they have such a good bullpen”— Edwin Pope, Knight News Wire, October 23, 1976. p. 216 “When we got to the Yankees, we knew we had a better team”— Mark Sheldon, mlb.com web site, October 18, 2007. p. 217 “This team won 115 games last year. It has won 109 this year”— Dick Young, New York News, October 23, 1976. p. 217 “It is no longer a matter of front-office sagacity”— Ibid. p. 217 “We don’t plan to sign anybody for more than two years”— Ibid. p. 217 “Sparky Anderson merely took the best team in baseball and won with it”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 16, 1976. p. 217 “Nothing this club does anymore amazes me”— Ibid.

Epilogue p. 220 “If Don Gullett is the kind of kid I think he is, he will be wearing a Cincinnati uniform next season”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 24, 1976. p. 220 “Cincy’s dynasty has one more year before Pete Rose and Joe Morgan start the age slide”— Dick Young, New York News, April 7, 1976. p. 220 “Have they considered that maybe we can’t win without him?”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, October 19, 1976. p. 220 “Could I play until I am 40 or 45 as a designated hitter?”— Jim Montgomery, Cincinnati Enquirer, September 8, 1976. p. 220 “That team had a lot of leaders”— Walker, Cincinnati, p. 73. p. 222 “Don Gullett has money now”—Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 210. p. 222 “I say that Howsam maintained the great standards of the game”— Walker, Cincinnati, p. 43. p. 222 “From what I’ve seen, I think the Big Red Machine could have been the greatest ballclub ever”— Dan Elliott, Washington Post, February 19, 2008. p. 223 “I don’t think there are reasons to believe it will happen”— Hal Bodley, USA Today, November 30, 2007. p. 223 “While Marvin Miller and his legal aid may be the best negotiators around, it is obvious they know little about baseball”— Dick Young, New York News, April 8, 1976. p. 223 “What the Messersmith case did was set up arbitration”— Pepe, Catfish, Yaz, p. 184. p. 224 “I would like to go in expansion”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, March 10, 1976.

252


p. 224 “I took pride in the name before I even came to Cincinnati”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, pp. 7–8. p. 225 “I love the city, I love the fans, and I was fortunate to play for the Reds”— Shannon, Johnny Bench, p. 10. p. 226 “I like to come to the park and hit”— Bob Hertzel, Cincinnati Enquirer, June 12, 1976. p. 226 “It’s a way of getting me out of bed”— Ibid. p. 226 “Baseball, other sports, and sports gambling”— Rose and Hill, My Prison, p. 9. p. 226 “Other than Crosley Field, I’d never seen anything quite like the racetrack”— Ibid., p. 29. p. 227 “I got my desire and work ethic from my dad — not my gambling”— Ibid., p. 37. p. 227 “Looking back at the earlier ’80s, the Cincinnati teams seemed to lose their will to win”— Walker, Cincinnati, p. 114. p. 227 “Society won’t let umpires and players get together — things like gambling make it impossible”— Rose and Hertzel, Charlie Hustle, p. 170. p. 228 “I could calculate batting averages and fielding percentages in my head”— Rose and Hill, My Prison, p. 92. p. 228 “I figured a little humor would help to keep things in perspective”— Ibid., p. 8. p. 228 “Rose may be the last ballplayer of his kind”— Anderson and Burick, The Main Spark, p. 211. p. 228 “I didn’t quite make it as a player... I came terribly close to not making it as a manager.”— Ibid., p. 144. p. 229 “You come with a bag and put it down in the office”— Hertzel, The Big Red Machine, p. 46. p. 229 “I had this lineup card, see, and every day I would write the names”— speech at Great American Ball Park, Cincinnati, May 28, 2005. p. 229 “You have no idea how hard it is to be a star”— Walker, Cincinnati, p. 89. p. 230 “The 1976 team, to me, was the best team ever”— Mark Sheldon, mlb.com web site, October 18, 2007.

Bibliography Books Anderson, Sparky, and Simon Burick. The Main Spark: Sparky Anderson and the Cincinnati Reds. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1978. Bjarkman, Peter C. The Baseball Scrapbook. New York: Dorset Press, 1991. Chadwick, Alex. The Illustrated History of Baseball. Edison, NJ: Chartwell, 1995. Gettelson, Leonard. Official World Series Records. St. Louis: Sporting News, 1977. Hall, Donald, and Dock Ellis. Dock Ellis in the Country of Baseball. New York: Coward, McCann and Georghegan, 1976. Hertzel, Bob. The Big Red Machine. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1976. LeFlore, Ron, and Jim Hawkins. One in a Million. New York: Warner Books, 1978. Nemec, David, ed. 20th Century Baseball Chronicle: A Year by Year History of Major League Baseball. Montreal: Tormont Publications, 1992. Pepe, Phil. Catfish, Yaz, and Hammerin’ Hank: The Unforgettable Era That Transformed Baseball. Chicago: Triumph Books, 2005. Pepe, Phil. Talkin’ Baseball: An Oral History of Baseball in the 1970s. New York: Ballantine Books, 1998. Reidenbaugh, Lowell. Take Me Out to the Ball Park. St. Louis: Sporting News, 1987. Rose, Pete, and Bob Hertzel. Charlie Hustle. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1975. Rose, Pete, and Rick Hill. My Prison Without Bars. Emmaus, PA: Rodale Press, 2004. Rose, Pete, and Roger Kahn. Pete Rose: My Story. New York: Macmillan, 1989. Shannon, Mike. Johnny Bench. New York: Chelsea House, 1990. Sokolove, Michael. Hustle: The Myth, Life, and Lies of Pete Rose. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990. Walker, Robert H. Cincinnati and the Big Red Machine. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988. Wills, Maury, and Don Freeman. How to Steal a Pennant. New York: G.P. Putnam, 1976.

Newspapers Chicago Daily News Chicago Sun-Times Chicago Tribune

Cincinnati Enquirer Cincinnati Post Dayton Daily News

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254 Houston Chronicle Latino Legends in Sports Los Angeles Herald-Examiner Los Angeles Times New York News New York Newsday

Bibliography New York Times Philadelphia Daily News Philadelphia Inquirer San Francisco Chronicle Washington Post

Websites for Statistics, Box Scores, and other Interviews Baseball-Almanac.com Baseball-Reference.com Baseballlibrary.com

MLB.com Retrosheet.org

Index A&P Food Company 14 Aaron, Henry “Hank” 34, 49, 84, 131, 143, 153, 169; final game 177 ABC Television 137, 145 Abernathy, Ted 62 Acala, Santo 75, 78–79, 82, 90, 106, 112–113, 115, 117, 121, 123, 130, 139, 141, 153, 161–162, 188, 221 Adams, Clarence 97 Albert, Jeff 105 Alexander, Doyle 198, 209 Ali, Muhammad (Cassius Clay) 118, 150, 172–173 All-Star Game, Major League: (1935) 145; (1954) 145; (1965) 32; (1967) 41; (1970) 32–33, 84; (1971) 143, 145–146; (1973) 40, 145; (1976) 100, 116, 118, 131, 142–148, 154, 163 Allen, Dick 183–185, 188–189 Alston, Walter 65, 120, 122, 158, 161, 171; retirement 174–175, 177 Altrock, Nick 177 Amateur draft (MLB) 24, 89, 126, 128– 129, 136 Amelia, OH 170 American Association 12, 169 American Basketball Association 131 American Football League 12 American League Championship Series: (1973) 198; (1976) 188, 192, 204, 209, 211, 215 Anderson, Carol (Sparky’s wife) 10, 12, 21, 52 Anderson, Elmer (Sparky’s uncle) 8 Anderson, George “Sparky” 4, 6, 15–18, 20–23, 25, 29–30, 33–36, 38–40, 42– 47, 49, 52–56, 59, 62, 67, 72–76, 82–

83, 87–88, 90, 102–103, 106–108, 111, 114–117, 120–121, 123–125, 127, 129– 130, 133, 135, 139–141, 144–146, 153, 157–158, 160–162, 164–165, 167, 169– 171, 174–175, 177–179, 181, 183–189, 191, 194–199, 201, 203–207, 211, 213, 215, 217–218, 220, 222, 227–228; boyhood 8–9; as “Captain Hook” of the pitching staff 19, 93, 101, 112–113, 118, 154, 166, 212, 214; joins the Reds 12– 14; manages Detroit Tigers 229; professional playing career 10–11 Anderson, Ken 161 Anderson, Lee (Sparky’s son) 21 Anderson, Oscar (Sparky’s grandfather) 8 Anderson, Shirlee (Sparky’s daughter) 21 Anderson Ferry (Cincinnati) 27–28 Andrews, Mike 57, 201 Andujar, Joaquin 90, 123, 139 Angels, California 11, 50, 63, 69, 153, 169, 177, 181, 221–222, 229 Apple Computer Company 76 Arizona State University 128 Armbrister, Ed 18, 103, 109, 116, 120, 127, 154–155, 171, 191, 194, 217; controversial bunt play 54 Armstrong, Neil 153 Asheville, NC 53 The Astrodome (Houston) 18, 39, 51, 84, 121, 123, 224 Astroturf 18, 44 Atlanta Braves 8, 24, 34–35, 37, 46, 49, 52–53, 68, 79, 81, 83, 93–98, 100, 102, 115, 117, 124, 134, 153, 163, 165–166, 168, 172, 176, 178–179

255

256

Index

Augustana College 161 Autry, Gene 11 Bailey, Bob 52–54, 63, 73, 96, 116, 135– 136, 152, 171–172, 179, 194 Baker, Johnnie “Dusty” 94, 115, 128, 229 Ballou, Dr. George 199 Baltimore Orioles 6, 14, 16, 54, 58, 61, 77, 81, 84, 91, 110, 114, 137, 155, 187, 189, 198, 209 Bando, Sal 156, 189 Banks, Ernie 169 “Banks Project” (Cincinnati) 83 Bannister, Floyd 128 Barlick, Al 227 Barnett, Larry 54 Barr, Jim 172 Barrios, Francisco 156 Bartholomay, Bill 34 Battle of Bunker Hill 4 Bauer, Hank 48 Bavasi, Peter 69 Baylor, Don 81, 133 Belanger, Mark 189 Bench, Johnny 1–2, 6, 14–16, 20–22, 34– 35, 37–39, 42, 45, 52, 59, 61–64, 70, 73, 79–80, 82, 88–89, 92, 95–96, 98– 99, 103, 105–107, 112, 115, 117, 120, 125, 130, 136, 141, 143–144, 148, 155, 160, 162–163, 167, 169–170, 178, 182, 186– 187, 191, 195–196, 198, 202, 205–207, 212, 219–221, 223–224, 229; dominance in World Series play 197, 210– 211, 215–216; Johnny Bench Night 225; and Reds 24–26, 31; revolutionizes catcher’s mitt 23 Bench, Katy (Johnny’s mother) 23–24 Bench, Ted (Johnny’s father) 23–24 Bender, Chief 222 Berkowitz, David Richard 156 Berra, Lawrence “Yogi” 168, 194, 215 Berry, Sam 9 Betcher, Ralph 97 Biittner, Larry 113 Bilardello, Dann 225 Billingham, Jack 7, 18, 48, 61, 63–64, 75, 88, 95–96, 101–102, 111, 113, 116, 130, 141, 160–161, 165–166, 175–177, 188, 202, 212, 221 Billings, MT 13, 128 Binger High School 23

Binger, OK 23, 225 Binghamton, NY 48 Blanks, Larvell 46 Blateric, Steve 15–16 Bloebaum-Rose, LaVerne (Pete’s mother) 27 Blue, Vida 131, 133, 144 Blyleven, Bert 60, 71 Bonds, Bobby 43, 83 Bonham, Bill 110–111 Boone, Bob 144, 148, 167, 186, 188–189 Borbon, Pedro 50–51, 74, 89–90, 98–99, 108–109, 111, 121, 135, 140–141, 169, 189, 191, 199, 212, 221–222 Bostock, Lyman 181 Boston Bruins 23 Boston Red Sox 3, 40, 54, 57, 70, 77, 87, 91, 100, 114, 131–132, 142, 148, 181, 185, 192, 201, 219–220, 224 Bowa, Larry 105, 134, 187, 189, 225– 226 Bowen, Joe 13 Boyle, Ralph “Buzz” 28–29 “Bozo’s Circus” (television show) 1 Brennaman, Marty 21, 40, 43, 52, 85– 86, 155, 158, 195 Brennaman, Thom 43 Breschler, Bob 167 Brett, George 143, 148, 178, 180–181, 206 Brett, Ken 126, 206 Bridgewater, SD 8 Brigham Young University 53 Brinkman, Eddie 29, 149, 226 Bristol, Dave 11, 14, 29–30, 87, 93 Bristol, TN 136 Brock, Jim 128 Brock, Lou 6, 125–126, 130 Brooklyn Dodgers 7, 9, 12, 29, 79, 92 Brown, Joe 177 Brunner, Mike 151 Brye, Steve 180–181 Buckner, Bill 105, 115 Buckner, Quinn 150 Budweiser Beer 5 Buffalo Bills 161 Burkhart, Ken 16 Burris, Ray 91, 110–111, 162 Busch, August, Jr. 13 Busch Stadium (St. Louis) 84 Bush Stadium (Indianapolis) 36 Butterfield, Jack 61

Index Cabell, Enos 89 Cable News Network 93 Caldwell, Mike 130 California League 9 Camden, NJ 184 Campaneris, Bert 133, 156 Campbell, Bill 219 Campbell, Jim 137, 143 Candelaria, John 164 Candlestick Park (San Francisco) 96, 158 Capilla, Doug 221 Capra, Lee “Buzz” 108 Carbo, Bernie 5, 16, 24, 48 Cardenal, Jose 1, 104 Carew, Rod 60, 143, 145, 181 Carey, Max 167 Carlton, Steve 185–187, 197, 223 Carney, Art 53 Carolina League 24 Carpenter, Ruby 68 Carroll, Clay 79–80 Carroll, Tom 75 Carter, Pres. Jimmy 59, 109, 148, 219 Cash, Dave 71, 103, 112, 134, 183, 187, 189, 191 Cash, Norm 193 Castro, Fidel 64 Caudill, Bill 223 CBS Radio 145, 195–196 Cedeno, Cesar 89, 96, 146 Cey, Ron 115 Chambliss, Chris 192, 196, 202, 204– 205, 207, 210–211 Chaney, Darrel 25, 46, 52–53, 117, 223 Charles River 4 Chattahoochee River 79 Chesser-Bench, Vickie 52 Chester, PA 177 Chicago Blackhawks 70 Chicago Bulls 131 Chicago Cubs 1–2, 7, 10, 23, 32, 77, 91, 96, 100, 104, 109–114, 117, 127, 130, 144, 161–162, 165, 173, 178 Chicago White Sox 38, 41, 59, 68, 71, 79, 109, 111, 156, 169, 177, 188, 224 Christ Hospital (Cincinnati) 148 Christenson, Larry 185 Cincinnati Bengals 83, 160 Cincinnati Police Department 84 Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame 229 Clanton, AL 79

257

Clay, Cassius see Ali, Muhammad Clearwater, FL 10 Clemente, Roberto 143 Cleveland Indians 32, 137, 192–193, 211 Cobb, Ty 86, 125, 132, 167, 172 Cohen, Al 97 Coleman, Joe 137 Colerain High School (Cincinnati) 128 College World Series 128 Collins, James “Ripper” 167 Colorado Rockies 213 Colosi, Nick 96 Colt Stadium (Houston) 123 Comaneci, Nadia 151–152 Comiskey Park (Chicago) 156, 177 Commissioner’s Trophy (All-Star Voting Leader) 144 Concepcion, Dave 6, 8, 36–37, 40–42, 44–45, 53, 55, 59, 61, 69, 73–74, 76, 88, 90, 95, 98–99, 103, 106–107, 109, 111–113, 116–117, 120, 125, 129–130, 134, 154, 165, 170, 179, 182, 186, 189, 191, 198, 202, 207, 211, 217, 220–221, 225–226, 229 Conigliaro, Tony 57 Conlan, Jocko 34 Connie Mack Stadium (Philadelphia) 184 Cornell University 82 Cosgrove, Mike 140 County Stadium (Milwaukee) 153 Crosley, Powel 84 Crosley Field (Cincinnati) 16, 29, 32, 45, 83–84, 86, 226 Crowley, Terry 53–54, 74, 78 Cruz, Hector “Heity” 124 Daley, Richard J. 70, 105 Dallas Cowboys 7, 86 Dantley, Adrian 152 Darcy, Pat 47–49, 88, 93, 97, 101, 103, 106, 114–115, 123–124, 130, 139, 154 Davidson, Ted 13 Deaconess Hospital (Cincinnati) 27 Dean, Jay “Dizzy” 79, 98 Debenedetti, Reno 28 Dedeaux, Rod 9, 229 Deegan, Bill 206, 211, 214 DeJesus, Ivan 105 Delhi Neighborhood (Cincinnati) 28 Demko, Steve 98

258

Index

Democratic National Convention, 1976 145, 148 Denny, John 125, 129 Denver Broncos 12–13 Denver Nuggets 131 Designated hitter rule 194–195, 204, 214, 220, 229 De Tocqueville, Alexis 3 Detroit Tigers 3, 66, 82, 114, 132–133, 136–137, 142, 229 Dettore, Tom 2 Devine, Vaughn “Bing” 11, 13, 169 Dierker, Larry 49 Dimaggio, Dom 149 Dimaggio, Joe 100, 149, 191, 206 Dissinger, Craig 171, 176 Dodger Stadium (Los Angeles) 17, 85, 104–105, 115, 157–158, 163, 166 Dole, Senator Robert 165 Dorsey High School (Los Angeles) 9 Downing, Al 34 Drago, Dick 153 Drapeau, Jean 102 Driessen, Dan 25, 35–36, 42, 44, 61, 74, 107, 113, 135, 154–155, 178, 189, 194, 199, 202, 206, 214, 207, 211, 217, 220 Drysdale, Don 115 Duffy, Frank 17 Dunn, Richard 118 Durham, Leon 128 Durocher, Leo 12–13, 32, 158 Eastern League 48, 171 Eastwick, Rawly 5, 49–50, 54, 69, 79, 95, 100–101, 103, 115, 117–118, 120–121, 129, 141, 153, 161, 166–167, 169, 179, 184–185, 187, 189–190, 219 Eckerd College 60, 66 Edwards, John 31 El Cajon, CA 151 El Camino College 43 Ellis, Dock 126, 155, 205–207 Engle, Bob 98 Englehardt-Rose, Karolyn 32, 52, 205, 227 Enid, OK 24 Erskine, Carl 114 Esasky, Nick 225 ESPN Television Network 137 Evangelista, Alfredo 173 Expansion of the Major Leagues 55, 67– 68, 95, 142, 192, 219, 224

Falcone, Pete 124–125 Farley, James, Jr. 173 Feeney, Charles “Chub” 94 Fenway Park (Boston) 3–5, 51, 91, 212 Ferguson, Jim 196 Ferguson, Joe 77, 120, 122 Fidrych, Mark 136–137, 142–143, 145, 219 Fifth Third Bank 27 Figueroa, Ed 210–211 Findlay Market Association (Cincinnati) 86 Fingers, Rollie 19, 131–133 Finley, Charles 19, 48, 57, 69, 81, 131– 133, 155, 181, 201 Finley Street Neighborhood Club (Cincinnati) 27 Fisk, Carlton 4–5, 49, 54, 69, 197, 215 Fitzgibbon, Henry 227 Flood, Curt 58 Florida Downs Race Track 62 Florida State League 30, 143 Flynn, Doug 38, 55, 127, 129–130, 171, 179, 217, 221, 223 Foote, Barry 38, 103 Ford, Edward “Whitey” 31, 76 Ford, Pres. Gerald 6, 54, 100, 126, 140, 145, 150–151, 165–166, 219 Foreman, George 118 Forrester, Billy 151 Forsch, Bob 125 Forsch, Ken 146 Forster, Terry 79 Fort Lauderdale (FL) Inn 193 Fosse, Ray 32–33 Foster, George 1–2, 5, 17, 69, 74, 88, 90, 97, 99, 112, 117, 121, 127, 131, 136, 141, 145–146, 157, 165, 167, 178–179, 182, 187, 190–191, 198, 202, 207, 210–212, 216, 219–221, 229; and Reds 43; retirement of 224 Fountain Square (Cincinnati) 6, 217 Fox, Nellie 38 Foxx, Jimmie 184 Foyt, A.J. 120 Frankfort, KY 17 Franklin, Toby 59 Frazee, Harry 132 Frazier, Joe 87, 113 Free agency 57–58, 60, 64, 68–70, 77, 81, 91, 94, 110, 131–133, 142, 201, 217, 219–220, 223; see also Labor issues

Index Freed, Roger 131 Freisleben, Dave 135 Frisch, Frankie 34, 116, 170 Froemming, Bruce 34, 98, 103 Fryman, Woodie 178, 220–221 Fulton County Stadium (Atlanta) 94, 96 Gaherin, John 58–59 Gamble, Oscar 193, 196, 199 Garber, Gene 185, 191 Garman, Mike 110, 124, 162 Garr, Ralph 37, 135 Garvey, Steve 6, 115, 145, 174 Gas House Gang (1934 St. Louis Cardinals) 19, 32 Geishart, Vern 17 Geneva, NY 29, 41 Geronimo, Cesar 2, 4, 6, 18, 34, 43, 54, 74, 88, 90, 99, 103, 120, 128, 135, 141, 170, 176, 182, 190–191, 198, 202, 211– 212, 219, 225–226; and Reds 45 Giamatti, A. Bartlett 227–228 Gibson, Bob 89, 125–126, 164, 226, 228 Giles, Warren 93 Gilmore, Artis 131 Glenn, Sen. John 145 Gomez, Luis 180 Gomez, Preston 11 Goodman, Billy 73 Gossage, Rich “Goose” 79, 226 Gowdy, Curt 195 Graeter’s Ice Cream 86 Grammas, Alex 73, 87, 89, 114, 228 Granger, Wayne 83–84 Great American Ball Park (Cincinnati) 229 Great Depression 8, 28 Green Bay Packers 160 Greg, Steve Grich, Bobby 69, 110 Griffey, Ken, Jr. 226 Griffey, Ken, Sr. 43–44, 61, 73, 87–89, 98, 103, 115, 120–121, 129, 131, 140–141, 144, 146, 154–155, 161, 165, 167, 170, 182, 186–188, 191, 198, 202, 211, 214, 216, 219–221, 226; and batting title 173, 178–180 Griffin, Archie 160 Griffin, Tom 49 Griffith, Calvin 60, 69, 131 Grimsley, Ross 53, 110

259

Grubb, Johnny 100 Guckert, Elmer 97 Guifoyle, Bill 98 Gullett, Don 7, 40, 49, 61, 69, 74–77, 88–89, 95, 101–104, 106–107, 112, 114, 117, 124–125, 127, 130–131, 134, 139– 141, 154, 159–160, 166, 168–169, 171, 175–176–177, 185, 187, 194, 198–199, 201, 215, 220–222; and Reds 46–47 “Haiti Balls” 163 Halicki, Ed 97 Hall, Gary, Jr. 151 Hall, Gary, Sr. 151, 153 Hall, Tom 49, 109 Hamilton, OH 86, 174 Harlem River 92 Harper, Tommy 13 Harrelson, Derrel “Bud” 105, 108, 164, 205 Harrelson, Ken 57 Heisman Trophy 160 Helms, Tommy 18, 30, 33, 226, 228 Henderson, Dave 169 Henderson, Joe 169, 201 Henderson, Ken 43 Henderson, Steve 221 Hendricks, Elrod “Ellie” 16, 198 Hendrickson, Craig 221 Henley (Henderson), Rickey 128–129 Hernandez, Keith 124, 169 Herseth, Bud 97 Herzog, Dorrel “Whitey” 210 Hickman, Jim 32 Hill, Marc 136 Hilton Head, SC 74 Hinton, Rich 75, 139, 153–154 Holland, John 77 Holtzman, Ken 81, 110, 198, 209 The Honeymooners (TV show) 53 Hooton, Burt 49, 111, 115, 161 Hornsby, Rogers 60, 165, 170 Hough, Charlie 121 Houk, Ralph 137 House, Dr. Tom 65 Householder, Paul 128, 225 Houston Astros 7, 18, 30, 39, 42–43, 45, 47–49, 75, 86–90, 92–93, 95–96, 123– 124, 128, 135, 139–140, 144, 170, 224 Houston Colt .45s 38 Howard, Elston 193, 215 Howard, Frank 163

260

Index

Howard, Wilbur 89 Howsam, Bob 11–13, 15–17, 20, 29, 42– 45, 47, 52, 55, 59–60, 62, 68–70, 82, 97, 124, 154, 160, 194–195, 201, 217, 221, 223, 226; death of 222; trade with Houston 18–19 Hoyt, Waite 86, 167 Hrabosky, Al 129, 134 Huggins, Miller 3 Hume, Tommy 75 Hundley, Randy 23, 25 Hunter, Jim “Catfish” 41, 57, 68–69, 131, 146, 188, 193, 201–202 Hutchinson, Fred 31 Hutton, Tom 187 Illinois Legislature 105 Indiana Pacers 131 Indiana University 150 Indianapolis 500 Car Race 120 Innsbruck, Austria 59 International League 10, 102 International Olympic Committee 150 Interstate 75 137 Jack Russell Stadium (Clearwater) 10 Jackson, Grant 198 Jackson, Reggie 81, 91, 110, 143, 155, 189, 220, 222 Jackson State Penitentiary (Michigan) 143 Jarry Park (Montreal) 102 Jaster, Larry 171 Jenkins, Ferguson 91, 111, 223 Jobe, Dr. Frank 115, 160 Jobs, Steve 76 John, Tommy 115, 121, 160 Johnson, Cliff 89, 92–93, 121 Johnson, Darrell 13, 54, 91, 149, 181 Johnson, Davey 220 Johnson, Deron 41 Johnstone, Jay 183, 188 Jones, Cleon 108–109 Jones, Randy 116, 135–136, 144–146, 157, 172, 176, 209 Jurgenson, Sonny 161 Kaat, Jim 103, 134, 185 Kansas City A’s 48, 86 Kansas City Royals 24, 110, 142, 148, 156, 173, 180–181, 187–188, 192, 196, 205–206, 210, 222, 224

Kapstein, Jerry 69, 74, 77, 169 Keane, Johnny 13 Kennedy, Pres. John F. 32 Kennedy, Junior 59 Kentucky Colonels 131 Kessinger, Don 1, 110, 124, 169 Kibler, John 141 Killebrew, Harmon 143 King, Mark 128 Kingman, Dave 144, 163 Kirby, Clay 7, 50, 79 Kison, Bruce 127 Kluszewski, Ted 18, 73, 93, 97, 120 Knight, Bob 150 Koosman, Jerry 24, 77, 107, 152, 215 Korean War 4 Koufax, Sandy 76, 101, 114, 228 Kranepool, Ed 95 Kraus, Jeff 128 Krumm, Phillip 150 Kubek, Tony 54, 97 Kuehl, Karl 87, 102 Kuhn, Bowie 7–8, 34, 57, 66–68, 71–72, 80, 84, 95, 131–133, 142, 152, 192, 194– 196, 201, 203, 205, 209, 223, 227 Labatt’s Brewery 67 Labor issues 8, 51, 56–64, 66–72, 78, 118, 142, 152, 223; see also Free agency LaCorte, Frank 178 Lacy, Lee 94, 134 La Jara, CO 12 Landrieu, Maurice “Moon” 95 Lanning, Bob 22–23 LaPorte, IN 133 Larkin, Barry 227 Lasorda, Tommy 104, 175 Laurel County High School (KY) 128 Lawless, Tom 226 Lawrenceburg, IN 27 Lee, Bill 5, 114, 139 LeFlore, Gerald 143 LeFlore, Ron 143, 145 Levy, Herman 116 Lexington, KY 55 Liberty Bell 106, 134 Lincoln, Pres. Abraham 27, 104 Lindeman, Carl 203 Locklear, Gene 47 Lockout 56 Lolich, Mickey 113, 143 Lombardi, Vince 107

Index Lonborg, Jim 5, 183, 185–186, 188 Longstreet, Gen. James 27 Lopes, Davey 115, 222 Los Angeles Dodgers 6–7, 10, 16, 24, 29, 33–34, 41, 48–49, 58, 64, 68–69, 71, 76–77, 85, 88, 94–96, 98, 104–105, 109–111, 113–115, 117, 119–120, 122, 133–134, 140–141, 155, 158, 161, 166–168, 171–174, 176–177, 183, 220– 222 Louganis, Greg 151 Louisiana Superdome 95 Lum, Mike 52–54, 63, 74, 102–103, 135, 171–172, 179 Lurie, Robert 97, 158 Luzinski, Greg 39, 105–106, 131, 146, 177, 183, 188–189 Lyle, Albert “Sparky” 193 Lynn, Fred 3, 39, 69, 71, 77, 81, 143, 146 Lynn High School (KY) 46 Mack, Connie 132 Mackanin, Pete 103, 106 MacPhail, Lee 67, 132 Maddox, Gary 173, 177, 183, 190–191 Madlock, Bill 1, 111–112, 144, 161–162, 165, 167, 173, 178–179 Major League Baseball Players Association 56, 59, 61, 68, 71–72, 110, 118, 142, 158, 195, 206, 223 Mantle, Mickey 31, 167, 194 Maranville, Walter “Rabbit” 117 Marion, IL 33, 228 Maris, Roger 163, 194 Marshall, Jim 110 Marshall, Dr. Mike 6, 48, 50, 64–66, 71, 120, 133–134 Martin, Billy 193–194, 196, 202, 204, 206, 209–211, 214 Martin’s Ferry, OH 177 Mason, Jim 207 Mathewson, Christy 48, 136 Matlack, Jon 34, 163, 215 Matthews, Gary 73 Mauch, Gene 53, 73, 102, 144 Mauritius 150 May, Carlos 210 May, Lee 18–19, 41–42, 100, 110 May, Scott 150 Mays, Willie 43 McBride, Arnold “Bake” 125, 144 McCarver, Tim 185–187

261

McCovey Willie 100 McDowell, Sam 33 McEnaney, Will 3–5, 49–50, 69, 74, 79, 99–100, 121, 130, 141, 166, 168, 175, 201, 207, 211–212, 216–217, 220 McGlothen, Lynn 91, 125 McGraw, Frank “Tug” 105, 184–185, 189, 190 McIntyre, Jim 86 McKell High School (KY) 46 McLain, Denny 153 McLaughlin, Bo 170 McNally, Dave 58, 68 McNamara, John 144 McNicholas High School (Cincinnati) 128 McRae, Hal 178, 180–181 McSherry, John 154–155 Medich, George 126–127 Medwick, Joe 19, 205 Menke, Dennis 18, 49 Messersmith, Andy 58, 68–69, 71–72, 80–81, 94–95, 100, 111, 114–115, 117, 134, 166, 223 Metzger, Clarence “Butch” 157, 219 Mexican League 131 Miami University 28 Michaels, Al 85 Michigan State University 64–65 Mickles, Gale 65 Microsoft Corporation 220 Mile High Stadium (Denver) 13 Millan, Felix 113 Miller, Marvin 52, 56, 58–60, 63–64, 66, 69, 71–72, 118, 132, 142, 152, 158, 194–195, 217, 223 Milner, John 109 Milwaukee Braves 79 Milwaukee Brewers 35, 73, 87, 114, 153, 177 Minnesota Twins 60, 69, 92, 124, 131, 143, 180, 194, 219 Minnesota Vikings 65 Minoso, Minnie 41, 177 Mitchell, Paul 81 Modesto, CA 62 Monday, Rick 1, 104–105, 109, 111, 128, 175 “Monday Night Baseball” (ABC Television) 137 Montague, Ed 96 Montefusco, John 98–99, 146

262

Index

Montreal Canadiens 102 Montreal Expos 1, 38, 40, 52–53, 55, 58, 66, 73, 87, 91, 102–103, 105, 107, 113, 117, 140, 148–149, 172–173, 176, 178, 220–221, 223, 226 Montreal Forum 102, 152 Moose, Bob 177 Moran, Pat 186 Morehouse College 151 Moret, Roger 117 Morgan, Joe 1–2, 5, 18, 20, 36–38, 40, 44–45, 54–55, 61, 73–74, 87–90, 92– 93, 95, 97, 103, 109–110, 112, 115–117, 120, 123, 127, 129–130, 134, 136, 141, 144, 146, 165, 167–168, 170, 173, 178– 179, 182, 186–187, 189, 191, 198, 202, 205–206, 210, 215, 219–221, 225, 229– 230; and Reds 18–19, 39; retirement 224; struggles against Mets 107–108 Morton, Carl 96 Moses, Edwin 151 Munich, Germany 118 Municipal Stadium (Cleveland) 145 Munson, Thurman 71, 143, 193, 197– 199, 202, 207, 210–211, 215–216 Murcer, Bobby 99 Murray, Dale 40, 220 Murtaugh, Danny 6, 127, 170, 206; retirement 177 Musial, Stan 13, 116, 126, 169 Nappi, Pat 150 National Aeronautics and Space Administration 171–172 National Baseball Hall of Fame 223, 225, 228–229 National Basketball Association 131 National Football League 72, 83, 91, 160–161 National Hockey League 23, 70 National League Championship Series (1970) 16; (1972) 19; (1973) 6, 20, 108, 205; (1975) 6, 39–40, 100, 127, 192; (1976) 171, 173, 175, 177, 182–191; (1977) 222; (1980) 224 NBC Television 54, 97, 120, 195–196, 203, 209 Negro Leagues 24 Nettles, Graig 114, 196, 198, 202 New York Central Railroad 27 New York City Police Department 205 New York Cosmos 91

New York Giants (baseball) 92 New York Giants (football) 91–92 New York Mets 6–7, 14, 20, 24, 29, 34, 57, 77, 87, 91, 95, 105, 107–109, 113– 115, 152–153, 162–164, 173, 176, 215, 221, 223–224 New York Nets 131 New York State Athletic Commission 173 New York Yankees 3, 13, 30, 45, 48, 57, 60, 74, 80–81, 86, 91–92, 95, 114, 126, 128, 131–132, 143, 148, 155, 167, 173, 181, 188, 192–194, 196, 198–199, 201– 203, 207, 209–212, 220, 222, 224 New Zealand 150 Newcombe, Don 114 Newport Central Catholic High School (KY) 128 Newton, Isaac 65 Niekro, Joe 96 Niekro, Phil 96, 163, 176 Nigeria 150 Nippert Stadium (Cincinnati) 83 Nixon, Pres. Richard 126, 192–193 Nixon, Russ 55, 73, 89, 225, 228 Nohr, Paul 28 Nolan, Gary 37, 48, 61, 75–76, 88–91, 94, 99, 102, 117–118, 130, 139, 141, 152– 153, 162, 164–166, 168–169, 175–176, 189–190, 209–211, 222; and Reds 47; retirement 221 Noll, Chuck 217 Norman, Dan 221 Norman, Freddie 95–98, 100, 109, 139, 141, 153, 155, 161, 175, 188, 199, 201– 202, 212, 221; and Reds 47–48 North Haven, CT 128 Northern League 46 Norton, Ken, Sr. 172–173 Nuxhall, Joe 86 Oakland A’s 6, 19–20, 57, 69, 81, 110, 128, 131–133, 155–156, 173, 181, 198, 201, 209, 224 Oakland Coliseum 57 Oakland Oaks 38 Oates, Johnny 191 O’Connell, Dick 149 Odom, John “Blue Moon” 155–156 Oh, Sadaharu 153 Ohio River 4, 19, 27, 46, 83–84, 226 Ohio State University 160

Index

263

Oliver, Al 126, 144 Oliver, John 59 Olympics: 1960 Summer 150; 1972 Summer 149–151; 1976 Summer 102, 149–152; 1976 Winter 59 O’Malley, Peter 68 Opening Day Parade (Cincinnati) 86 Oroville, CA 9, 47 Orr, Bobby 23, 70 Osmond, Herb 68, 80 Osteen, Claude 49 Otis, Amos 180 Owen, Marv 205 Owens, Paul 184 Owensboro, KY 128 Oxford, OH 28 Ozark, Danny 9, 126, 168, 170, 173–174, 183–187, 189–191

Piniella, Lou 198, 202, 228 Pinson, Vada 13, 31, 100, 153 Pittsburgh Pirates 6, 9, 12, 39, 53, 55, 86, 96, 100, 103, 109, 126–127, 133– 134, 140–141, 155, 164, 168, 170–171, 173, 177, 183, 185, 192, 205–206 Pittsburgh Steelers 7, 86, 217 Plaza Hotel (New York) 219 Plummer, Bill 51, 61–63, 96, 99, 103, 112, 125, 148, 163, 171, 223; leaving Reds 224 Poquette, Tom 180 Poway, CA 135 Presidential Election, U.S. 1976 59, 126, 148, 151, 219 Prince, Bob 86 Puhl, Terry 225 Puskaric, Joe 97

Pacheco, Ferdinand “Ferdie” 118 Pacific Coast League 38, 117 Paciorek, Tom 94 Paige, Satchel 24 Pallone, Dave 227 Palmer, Jim 61, 77, 91 Papiano, Neil 132 Pappas, Milt 13 Parker, Dave 126–127 Parker, Harry 108 Parkes, Dr. James 173 Patek, Fred 180 Pattin, Marty 110 Paul, Gabe 60, 64, 80, 91, 192, 196 Pearl Harbor 23 Peoples’ Republic of China 150 Pepitone, Joe 57 Perez, Tony 1–2, 18–19, 29, 35, 37, 42, 44–45, 61, 69, 73–74, 88, 90, 103, 107– 108, 112–113, 129, 135–136, 141, 144, 154–155, 161–163, 170, 176, 178–179, 182, 187, 198, 202, 206–207, 211, 224, 226, 229; and Reds 41; retirement 220 Philadelphia Phillies 10–11, 35–36, 39, 50, 58, 67–68, 76, 98, 100, 103, 105, 114, 126, 128, 131, 133–134–136, 140, 144, 155, 164, 167–168, 170, 173–174, 177, 182–191, 194, 197, 217, 222, 224, 226 Phillips, Dave 214 Phillips, Harold “Lefty” 9, 229 Phillips University 24

Queen Elizabeth II 151 Quick, Jim 105 Quinn, Bob 148 Quirk, Jamie 180 Randolph, Willie 126, 202, 206, 214 Rangers, Texas 67, 91, 148 Rapp, Vern 44, 226 Rathgeber, Bob 166 Rau, Doug 115, 164 Rawley, Shane 221 Reagan, Pres. Ronald 126, 151, 193 “Red Rooters” of Cincinnati 59 Reed, Ron 185, 189–190 Reitz, Ken 124 Renewal Clause 58 Renko, Steve 113 Republican National Convention, 1976 126, 165–166 Reserve Clause 58, 142 Rettenmund, Merv 53–54, 71, 74, 78, 101 Reuschel, Paul 111 Reuschel, Rick 1, 110–111, 165 Revering, Dave 74 Revolutionary War, American 87 Rhoden, Rick 115–116, 120, 146, 161 Rice, Jim 3 Richard, J.R. 88–89 Richards, Paul 53, 87 Richardson, Spec 18 Rickey, Branch 11–13, 19 Rigney, Bill 87

264

Index

River Downs Race Track (Cincinnati) 32, 226 Riverfront Stadium (Cincinnati) 15–16, 18, 21, 25, 32–34, 41, 45, 47, 83–85, 88–89, 92, 99, 105, 113, 117, 135, 139– 141, 153, 164, 166, 168, 172, 176, 178, 184, 189, 196–197, 199, 201, 209, 225– 226 Rivers, Mickey 196–198, 202, 206–207, 210–211 Rixey, Eppa 189 Rizzuto, Phil 195 Roberts, Dave 49 Robinson, Bill 127 Robinson, Brooks 41 Robinson, Frank 31, 143, 153 Robinson, Jackie 12, 170 Rock Hill, SC 14 Rockefeller, VP Nelson 165–166 Rockies, Utah 131 Rodriguez, Ivan 225 Rogers, Roy 83 Rose, David (Pete’s brother) 28 Rose, Harry (Pete’s father) 27, 29–30, 32–33, 35, 226–227 Rose, Pete 1–2, 5–6, 15, 17, 20, 33–35, 38–39, 43, 50–52, 55–56, 59, 61, 64, 72–73, 79, 83–84, 87–89, 92–93, 95– 96, 99–100, 102, 105, 107–108, 112–113, 115–117, 120, 127, 130–131, 135, 137– 139, 141, 144–146, 153–154, 157, 161– 165, 170, 172–173, 176, 178–179, 182, 186–187, 189–190, 195, 198–199, 202, 205–207, 210–212, 214–216, 220–221, 224, 229; all-time hit record 226; boyhood 27–30; dive into third 140; NL home run record for switch-hitters 167; origins of gambling habits 149, 226; and Reds 31–32; suspension from baseball 227–228; switch to 3B 36–37 Rose, Pete, Jr. (Pete’s son) 34–35 Royals Stadium (Kansas City) 145, 180 Royster, Jerry 94, 117 Ruby, Jeff 82 Rudi, Joe 131–133, 156 Ruhl, Roger 18 Ruhle, Vern 3 Runge, Paul 96 Russell, Bill (baseball player) 174 Russo, Jim 187 Ruth, George “Babe” 3, 23, 132, 177, 206, 224, 227

Rutherford, Johnny 120 Ryan, Nolan 24, 181, 226 St. Louis Cardinals 5, 8, 11–13, 22, 33, 47, 50, 58, 62, 68–69, 109–110, 114, 122, 124–125, 128–130, 140, 144, 164– 165, 168–169, 171, 185–186, 210, 221, 223 Saltwell, E.R. “Salty” 77–78 San Antonio Spurs 131 San Diego Padres 11, 39, 47–48, 69, 78, 100–102, 116–117, 135, 144, 149, 154, 157, 172–173, 205, 226 San Francisco Giants 16, 43, 67–68, 71, 83, 85, 87, 89, 96–101, 116, 124–125, 136, 153, 160, 167, 172, 225 Sanguillen, Manny 39, 126, 206 Santa Barbara, CA 14 San Tomas de Aquino Seminary 45 Sarasota, FL 109 Sarmiento, Manny 153, 162, 190 Sawyer, Eddie 186 Schaeffer, Rudy 87 Scherger, George 9, 14, 73, 89, 120–121, 146, 188, 202, 211, 228 Schmidt, Mike 25, 50, 100, 103, 134– 135, 163, 177, 183, 187, 189–190 Schoendienst, Albert “Red” 13, 124– 125, 129 Schratz, Joe 97 Schulte’s Fish House (Cincinnati) 28 Scott, Charlie 28 Seattle Mariners 219, 224 Seaver, Tom 7, 24, 60–61, 66–67, 71, 77–78, 81, 91, 108–109, 113, 136, 146, 163, 215; and Reds 221, 223 Sedamsville Neighborhood (Cincinnati) 226 Seghi, Phil 29 Seitz, Peter 57, 59–60, 63, 71, 217 Selig, Allan “Bud” 228 “Sesame Street” (television show) 136 Shamsky, Art 13, 29 Sharkey, Bob 92 Shavers, Earnie 173 Shea Stadium (New York) 57, 91, 108, 113, 162–163, 173, 205 Shepard, Larry 47, 51, 61, 67, 73, 75–76, 101, 112, 171 Sheraton-Mount Royal Hotel (Montreal) 102 Sherry, Norm 9

Index Shore, Ray 185, 188, 197–198, 215 Show, Eric 226 Simmons, Ted 125–126 Simpson, Wayne 172 Sims, Duke 33 Sinatro, Greg 59 Skyline Chili 86 Smith, Dean 150 Smith, Reggie 122, 161 Snyder, Jimmy “The Greek” 87 Somalia 150 Sosa, Elias 134 Soto, Mario 221 South Africa 150 South Atlantic League 29 Southern League 53 Soviet Union 150, 152 Space shuttle 171–172 Spahn, Warren 48, 76 Spinks, Leon 173 spring training (MLB) 17, 22, 50, 53, 59–64, 66, 71–76, 82, 137, 142, 193, 228 Springfield, OH 50 Stanhouse, Don 148 Stanley, Fred 202, 214 Stanley Cup 102 Stargell, Willie 103, 126–127, 140, 163 Starr, Larry 46, 160 State University of New York at Plattsburgh 150 Staub, Daniel “Rusty” 137, 145–146 Steinbrenner, George 60, 68, 81, 91, 95, 192–193, 196, 209, 220 Stennett, Rennie 127 Stewart, Jimmy 18 Stinson, Bob 224 Stone, Steve 104–105, 111, 113 Stoneham, Horace 97, 158 Stowe, Bernie 39 Strat-O-Matic Baseball Game 2 Strike 56, 59 Strom, Brent 154–155 Sullivan, Claude 86 Super Bowl X 7, 86 Sutcliffe, Rick 171 Sutter, Bruce 112, 162, 165 Sutton, Don 77, 115, 120, 161 Swisher, Steve 144 Tabler, Pat 128 Taiwan 13, 150

265

Tanner, Chuck 132, 156 Tanzania 150 Tarkenton, Fran 65 Taylor, Tony 10, 184 Teamsters Union 97 Technical High School (Oakland) 128 Television, and baseball 7, 56 Templeton, Garry 169 Tenace, Gene 133, 156 Texas A&M University 128 Thomaser, Herbert 118 Thompson, Mike 78 Thomson, Bobby 192 Thornton, Andre 111, 113 Thousand Oaks, CA 11 Three Rivers Stadium (Pittsburgh) 84, 96, 98, 164, 206 Thurman, Bob 23 Tiant, Luis 5, 142 Tidrow, Dick 211 Tiger Stadium (Detroit) 142, 205 Titanic 27 Todd, Jim 132 Tolan, Bob 16–17, 20–21, 34, 43, 103, 179, 188, 191 Toronto Blue Jays 219 Torres, Angel 221 Torrez, Mike 81 Troy, OH 49 Trudeau, Pierre 150 Tufts University 4 Turner, Ted 93–94, 96 Tuscaloosa, AL 43 Tyson, Mike (as baseball player) 124 Ueberroth, Peter 227 Underwood, Tom 185, 191 United Auto Workers 56 United States Marine Corps 188 United States Military Academy 28 United States Navy 12 United States Olympic Committee 150 United States Supreme Court 58, 66 United Steelworkers 56 University of Cincinnati 29, 151, 153 University of Colorado 12 University of Kentucky 55 University of Michigan 151 University of Minnesota 136 University of North Carolina 150 University of Notre Dame 152

266

Index

University of South Florida 61 University of Southern California 8–9 Valentine, Ellis 102–103 Valkenburg, Mary Lyn 105 Van Bommell, Bill 81 Vander Meer, Johnny 29 Veeck, Bill 59, 87, 156 Velez, Otto 211 Veterans’ Stadium (Philadelphia) 106, 134, 145, 184, 186, 188, 223 Vietnam War 36, 43, 139 Viking I Explorer (NASA) 153 Virdon, Bill 87, 93 Vukovich, John 35–36, 50, 186 Waco, TX 75 Wagner, Dick 15, 69, 97–98, 154, 169 Wagner, Honus 60 Walker, Gary 81 Walker, Harry 39 Walsh, Dick 11–12 Wapakoneta, OH 153 Washington, Pres. George 104 Washington Senators 29 Watson, Bob 7–8, 152 Waycross, GA 79 Western Hills High School (Cincinnati) 15, 28–29, 61, 116, 228 Weyer, Lee 96 WGN Television (Chicago) 1 White, Roy 199, 202, 212, 216 Williams, Charlie 167 Williams, Dick 5, 9 Williams, Ted 4, 22–23, 114, 140, 224 Wills, Maury 9, 115, 141 Wilmington, OH 160 Wilson, Don 49, 88–89 Wilson, Lewis “Hack” 163 Winfield, Dave 101, 136, 163 Winter Haven, FL 181 Wirtz, William 70 Wohlford, Jim 180 Wood, Wilbur 79

Woodward High School (Cincinnati) 128 World Series: (1934) 205; (1960) 177; (1964) 186, 192; (1967) 5, 13; (1968) 113; (1969) 14; (1970) 6, 16, 84; (1971) 177; (1972) 6, 19–20, 209; (1973) 57, 201; (1974) 66; (1975) 3–7, 44, 48–49, 52, 54–56, 59, 82, 90, 100, 197, 201, 207, 212, 214; (1976) 176, 192, 194, 195–196, 201, 203–204; 197–200, 205– 216, 219–220; (1977) 222; (1980) 224; (1984) 229; (1986) 224; (2006) 229 World War II 4, 14, 27, 86–87 Wozniak, Steve 76 Wrigley Field (Chicago) 1, 10, 100, 105, 109, 111–112, 127, 162, 178, 223 WTBS Television (Atlanta) 93–94 Wurtland, KY 46 Wynn, Jimmy 94 Xavier University 28 Yankee Stadium (New York) 91–92, 172, 196, 203, 204–206, 209, 212, 216 Yastrzemski, Carl 4, 91, 114 Yawkey, Tom 148–149 Yeager, Steve 121–122; development of throat guard 174 Yeatman’s Cove (Cincinnati) 140 Youngblood, Joel 78–79, 103, 171, 195, 223 Yount, Robin 87 Yugoslavia 152 Zachry, Pat 75, 78–79, 82, 90, 102, 111– 112, 115, 117, 119–120, 123–124, 139, 141, 161–164, 171–172, 175–176, 188– 189, 206–207, 211, 219, 221 Zamora, Oscar 2 Zeckendorf, William 12 Zimmer, Don 149, 181, 192, 226 Zippo’s Cigarette Lighters 30 Zisk, Richie 126–127

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