RetroSimba

(Updated Nov. 25, 2019)

On Aug. 14, 1971, a Saturday night in Pittsburgh, Ted Simmons caught Bob Gibson’s no-hitter, produced four hits, scored three runs and drove in one in the Cardinals’ 11-0 victory. Boxscore

It was the only no-hitter in the career of the franchise’s best pitcher.

Simmons became the only catcher in franchise history to collect four hits while catching a no-hitter.

Simmons’ performance went a long way toward validating him as a quality catcher in the view of Gibson and others.

In control

Since early in his career, when he surrended a home run on a fastball he was ordered to throw by Carl Sawatski, Gibson never again let a catcher select a pitch for him.

“When I want to throw a pitch, that’s what I’m going to throw,” Gibson said in the book “Sixty Feet, Six Inches.” “If the catcher wants to fight about it, we’ll fight about it, but I’m not going to throw something I don’t want to throw.”

Regarding the pitcher and catcher relationship, Gibson said he believed the player with the most experience should “take the lead” in controlling a game. With Simmons, that meant Gibson always was in charge.

“Ted Simmons used to drive me crazy when he was a young catcher,” Gibson said. “One day he called time and came out to ask if I was giving him a hard time … I said, ‘I’m trying to win the ballgame. I don’t have the luxury of giving you a hard time.’ ”

Simmons caught 135 of Gibson’s starts. Only Tim McCarver (197) caught more. Simmons also caught 13 of Gibson’s shutouts. McCarver caught the most, 29.

“Simmons was a bright guy and he learned,” Gibson said. “It took him a while, but he caught on. As a rookie, all he thought about was hitting line drives, which he did very well. You can forgive a catcher for a lot of sins when he clears the bases with a double.”

In a June 1973 article by Bob Broeg for Baseball Digest, Simmons said, “Gibson is a picnic to catch because he works rapidly and is always around the plate with his pitches.”

In a November 2019 interview with Cardinals broadcaster Dan McLaughlin, Simmons recalled having trouble giving signs in his early encounters with Gibson.

“I was having difficulty, frankly,” Simmons said. “I’d never seen a guy pitch at that pace with such great stuff. So, trying just to get the fingers down and coordinate it throughout the game was a task for me.

“Finally, Gibson came to me and said, ‘Look, I only throw two pitches _ fastball, slider. You put down whatever you want. If I’m shaking, go to the other.’ So, if I put down fastball and he was shaking his head, I knew the pitch was going to be slider. That way, I wasn’t disrupting his pace.”

Heat is on

In his no-hitter against the Pirates _ the first in Pittsburgh since 1907 _ Gibson struck out 10 and walked three.

“He had two unhittable pitches (fastball and slider) and they couldn’t hit either one,” Simmons recalled in a 2020 interview with Stan McNeal of Cardinals Gameday Magazine.

Simmons contributed a RBI-single off Bob Johnson in the first, a double against Bob Moose in the fifth, and singles in the sixth and eighth off Bob Veale.

When Pirates slugger Willie Stargell struck out looking for the final out, Simmons raced to the mound, leaped and threw his arms around Gibson’s neck.

“That was the greatest thrill of my life, catching a no-hitter,” Simmons said to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “Man, he was throwing fire.”

Simmons had a premonition Gibson would get the no-hitter against the Pirates.

“Two nights ago, (teammate) Chris Zachary and I were having dinner, and I told him, ‘Gibson is going to pitch a no-hitter Saturday night,’ ” Simmons said. “I don’t know why, I just said it.”