Before he became a celebrated author with “Ball Four,” Jim Bouton was a power pitcher whose cap flew off with nearly every delivery.
Bouton died July 10, 2019, at 80. Fifty-five years earlier, in 1964, he made two starts for the Yankees against the Cardinals in the World Series and won both.
The Cardinals won the championship, but Bouton impressed with his ability to produce on the big stage. He was the first pitcher to earn two wins in a World Series versus the Cardinals since the Yankees’ Spud Chandler in 1943.
Stubbornly effective
Bouton, 25, was 18-13 with a 3.02 ERA for the 1964 Yankees. The right-hander led the team in wins, starts (37) and innings pitched (271.1).
For the first two World Series games in St. Louis, Yankees manager Yogi Berra started ailing ace Whitey Ford, who lost, and rookie Mel Stottlemyre, who won. Bouton was the starter for Game 3 at Yankee Stadium and was matched against Curt Simmons.
In his book “October 1964,” author David Halberstam called Game 3 “probably the best played and best pitched game of the series.”
Played on Saturday afternoon, Oct. 10, 1964, before 67,101 spectators, the game became a duel between Bouton and Simmons.
Bouton threw “virtually straight overhanded with his delivery and his forearm brushed the back of his cap, sending it sailing,” the Sporting News noted.
Said Berra: “We’ve tried a dozen different caps on him, and he wears a small, tight one now, but it doesn’t do any good.”
The Yankees got a run in the second on Clete Boyer’s RBI-double and the Cardinals tied the score, 1-1, on a RBI-single by Simmons in the fifth.
After retiring the Cardinals in order in three of the first four innings, Bouton worked out of multiple jams. The Cardinals loaded the bases in the sixth with two outs, but Mike Shannon grounded into a forceout. In the seventh, Dal Maxvill led off with a double and moved to third on Simmons’ sacrifice, but Curt Flood and Lou Brock stranded him.
“Bouton was keeping the ball away from me good,” Flood said to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
Said Brock: “I was out in front of this guy all day. I never do this … I hit the ball off the end of the bat all four times.”
In the ninth, Tim McCarver led off and reached on an error by shortstop Phil Linz. Shannon’s sacrifice bunt moved McCarver to second. Carl Warwick, batting for Maxvill, walked, but Bouton retired Bob Skinner and Flood.
Barney Schultz relieved Simmons in the bottom of the ninth and Mickey Mantle walloped his first pitch, a knuckleball, into the upper deck in right for a walkoff home run and a 2-1 Yankees victory. Boxscore
Bouton threw 123 pitches in what the New York Daily News described as a “stubborn pitching performance.” Video highlights at 1:30 mark
Under pressure
The Cardinals won Games 4 and 5 at Yankee Stadium. Back in St. Louis with a chance to clinch the title in Game 6 on Wednesday afternoon, Oct. 14, 1964, the Cardinals started Simmons in a rematch with Bouton, who welcomed the challenge.
“Far more than most baseball players, he was an adrenaline player, and he liked pitching under this kind of pressure,” said Halberstam. “He loved being the center of attention and being given the ball in a game this big.”
When Flood and Brock opened the bottom of the first with singles, it was a wakeup call for Bouton, who said, “I had to stop and boot myself in the fanny. Those hits kind of shook me up.”
Bouton got the next batter, Bill White, to ground into a double play. Flood scored from third, but Bouton settled down.
In the fifth, Bouton lined a single over the head of shortstop Dick Groat, driving in Tom Tresh from third and tying the score at 1-1.
The game turned in the sixth when Roger Maris and Mantle hit back-to-back home runs against Simmons, giving the Yankees a 3-1 lead.
In the seventh, Bouton told Berra to get a reliever ready because his right shoulder was getting tight. The Yankees extended their lead in the eighth, scoring five times. The big hit was a grand slam by Joe Pepitone against Gordon Richardson.
Bouton yielded a run in the eighth and another in the ninth. He went 8.1 innings before being relieved by Steve Hamilton, and the Yankees won, 8-3. Boxscore and Video highlights at 1:45 mark
Cardinals slugger Ken Boyer said Bouton “kept the ball low and away all afternoon, and, if he missed the plate, he barely missed it.”
Jim and Joe
Bouton’s career took a downturn the next year. He developed a sore arm, posted records of 4-15 in 1965 and 3-8 in 1966, and was dropped from the starting rotation.
The Yankees sold Bouton’s contract to the Seattle Pilots, who joined the American League as an expansion team in 1969. The Pilots’ manager was Joe Schultz, who was a Cardinals coach from 1963-68 after managing in their farm system.
Schultz, a round, balding, good-natured baseball lifer, became a central character in “Ball Four.” Two samples of Bouton’s musings:
_ “Joe Schultz stopped by again today to say a kind word. I noticed he was making it his business to say something each day to most of the guys. He may look like Nikita Khrushchev, but it means a lot anyway. I’m sure most of us here feel like leftovers and outcasts and marginal players and it doesn’t hurt when the manager massages your ego a bit.”
_ “After the game, Joe Schultz said, ‘Attaway to stomp on ’em, men. Pound that Budweiser into you and go get ’em tomorrow.’ Then he spotted John Gelnar sucking out of a pop bottle. ‘For crissakes, Gelnar,’ Joe said, ‘You’ll never get them out drinking Dr. Pepper.’ ”
Fitting in
Bouton was 2-1 with a save and a 3.91 ERA in 57 appearances for the Pilots. On Aug. 24, 1969, they traded him to the Astros for pitchers Dooley Womack and Roric Harrison.
Two nights later, on Aug. 26, 1969, Bouton made his National League debut, relieving Larry Dierker and pitching a scoreless eighth against the Cardinals at St. Louis. Bouton retired Shannon on a groundout and Julian Javier on a pop-up before striking out Maxvill on a 3-and-2 knuckleball.
“The knuckleball was a doll,” Bouton said.
When Bouton got to the dugout, Astros pitching coach Jim Owens asked him why he threw a knuckleball with the count full.
“I told him that first time around I want to earn a little respect,” Bouton said. “I want everyone to know that I’m liable to throw that pitch in any situation … I want them to know that they can’t count on getting the fastball.” Boxscore
October 1964: Great baseball book by a great author. Ball Four was pretty good (entertaining for an almost-13-year-old in the summer of 1970), too.
Well said. Two must-read books for any baseball fan.
His book exposed many well kept secrets. A book like Ball Four written today, with the culture and society we live in, wouldn’t be as controversial. But 50 years ago, it turned the baseball world upside down. In all fairness, he spoke a great deal of his own shortcomings and struggles. I remember once reading an interview of Bob Gibson where he too talked about “greenies”. And Bill Lee even admitted that he took to the mound as a starting pitcher while under the influence of LSD. I had forgotten about Bouton’s comeback attempt in 1978.
I agree. I also think Jim Brosnan’s books, written in diary style nearly a decade before, were every bit as insightful and humorous and controversial, just lacking in the profanity found in Bouton’s book. Brosnan used clever prose and sly humor to tell the same, or similar, stories Bouton did without resorting to the graphic language. Brosnan’s description, for example, of Don Blasingame and Joe Cunningham returning to the Cardinals’ hotel at daybreak after spending the night visiting the geisha baths and other delights of Japan during the club’s 1958 winter tour there was eyebrow-raising stuff for the time but trusted the readers to use their imaginations.
I was present for Bouton’s last big league win, at Candlestick Park on 9/14/78. Sat right behind the screen, and man, did that knuckler come in slow. Baffled the Giants, 3 hits in 6 innings. Before that start, Tommy Lasorda had complained, ‘he should have to face us too.” LOL.
Very cool! Thanks for sharing those insights.