(Updated June 29, 2019)
Joe Cunningham hit for average, not for power, so the three home runs he slugged in his first two big-league games with the 1954 Cardinals were surprising.
A left-handed batter and first baseman, Cunningham, 22, began the 1954 season at Class AAA Rochester. On June 28, 1954, the Cardinals came to Rochester to play an exhibition game versus the Red Wings. Cardinals manager Eddie Stanky said the prospect he was most interested in seeing was Cunningham.
Cunningham had two singles and walked twice in four plate appearances against the Cardinals.
Impressed, the Cardinals decided to promote Cunningham. On June 29, 1954, before the Red Wings played a doubleheader against Havana at Rochester, Cunningham was told he would be joining the Cardinals in Cincinnati the next day.
Cunningham was replacing rookie first baseman Tom Alston. In 66 games, Alston, the Cardinals’ first black player, hit .246 with four home runs and 34 RBI, but he slumped in June (.181 batting average for the month).
Whirlwind journey
Cunningham planned to catch an overnight train from Rochester to Cincinnati after playing both games of the doubleheader against Havana, but because of the length of the games, he missed the train.
A member of the Rochester publicity staff agreed to drive Cunningham from Rochester to the Buffalo airport the next morning. Cunningham took a flight from Buffalo to Cincinnati, arrived in the afternoon and went to the ballpark.
Cunningham barely had time “to bolt down a meal, sign a contract and learn the club’s signs,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
Stanky put Cunningham in the starting lineup, batting him fifth against the Reds that night.
St. Louis slugger
In his debut game on June 30, 1954, Cunningham produced five RBI.
In the fifth inning, facing Art Fowler, a 32-year-old rookie, Cunningham hit a three-run home run for his first big-league hit, “a towering drive that landed well up into the right-field bleachers,” according to the Cincinnati Enquirer.
Cunningham followed with a two-run single off Harry Perkowski in the seventh, helping the Cardinals to an 11-3 victory. Boxscore
Immediately afterward, the Cardinals traveled to Milwaukee for a game the next day, July 1, 1954, against the Braves and their ace, Warren Spahn.
Cunningham hit two home runs off Spahn. The first was a 390-foot solo shot to right in the second inning. In the fifth, he connected for a three-run home run that landed just inside the right-field foul pole. The Cardinals won, 9-2. Boxscore
Dream come true
“This is just like a dream,” Cunningham said to the Associated Press. “I always wanted to be a big leaguer, but I had no idea it would come so soon.
“I left the minors in such a hurry I only brought along one pair of trousers,” Cunningham said. “I guess I’m still in a sort of shock. I had all my stuff at the cleaners and the only pants I’ve got are the ones I’ve been wearing.”
The next day, July 2, 1954, playing in his third game in his third city in three days, Cunningham was 1-for-3 with a single and a walk against the Cubs at Chicago. Boxscore
Cunningham finished the 1954 season with a .284 batting average, 11 home runs and 50 RBI in 85 games for the Cardinals.
In 12 big-league seasons, seven with the Cardinals, Cunningham hit .291 with 64 home runs. His single-season high in home runs was 12 for the 1958 Cardinals.
RetroSimba 
It’s too bad he injured himself the way he did, for just simply hustling in an attempt to beat the throw. I had a good time looking at his game logs for the 1959 season. After a slow start he just began to hit and became a model of consistency. I do have a question however. Other than the final three games of the season in which he went hitless, the only other extended period without a hit came in the second week of august. I noticed though, that he had only 7 at-bats over a six game stretch. Were they resting him, was he nursing a minor injury? I only mention this because who knows, it might have cost him the batting title.
The Aug. 9, 1959, St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported “recurrent leg trouble” forced Joe Cunningham to leave the first game of an Aug. 8 doubleheader in the seventh inning. On Aug. 14, 1959, the Post-Dispatch reported Cunningham was ready to return to the starting lineup. According to the newspaper, “He has been out a week because of ailing legs,” but was used during that time as a pinch-hitter.
[…] he hit for average rather than power, Cunningham packed a wallop at times. His first major-league hit for the Cardinals was a three-run home run against the Reds’ Art Fowler in June 1954. The next […]