(Updated June 28, 2024)
During his core years with the Pirates, Bob Skinner did a convincing impersonation of Stan Musial whenever he played against the Cardinals in St. Louis.
An outfielder who batted from the left side, Skinner had a level swing admired by teammates and foes alike.
In a six-season stretch from 1957-62, these were the numbers Skinner produced for the Pirates in games at St. Louis:
_ 1957: .412 batting average (14-for-34); .459 on-base percentage.
_ 1958: .364 batting average (8-for-22); .462 on-base percentage.
_ 1959: .410 batting average (16-for-39); .465 on-base percentage.
_ 1960: .345 batting average (10-for-29); .367 on-base percentage.
_ 1961: .500 batting average (14-for-28); .517 on-base percentage.
_ 1962: .308 batting average (8-for-26); .500 on-base percentage.
No wonder the Cardinals acquired him in their bid to get back into the 1964 pennant race.
Late bloomer
At La Jolla High School near San Diego, where his father taught Spanish and French, Skinner batted .200 as a junior. According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, his high school coach said, “Of all the players I coached, I figured Bob Skinner was the least likely to succeed in baseball.”
Described by writer Myron Cope as sloped-shoulder, gangly and with “the features of a friendly hound dog,” Skinner moved deliberately around a ballfield. “It’s not that I’m lazy,” he told the Post-Gazette. “I just don’t waste any steps.”
Nonetheless, Pirates scout Tom Downey became fascinated with Skinner’s textbook swing, placed him in an amateur Sunday league and monitored his progress, the Post-Gazette reported. When Skinner, 19, learned to use that classic batting stroke to rap base hits consistently, Downey signed him to a Pirates contract in 1951.
He played in the minors that summer, then served two years stateside in the Marines and played baseball for service teams.
Skinner, 22, made the leap to the big leagues with the 1954 Pirates, becoming their first baseman and hitting .249 for a team that finished 53-101. Sent back to the minors in 1955, he returned to the Pirates the next year and settled in as their left fielder in 1957.
In the groove
Skinner’s sweet swing produced results _ .305 batting average and .370 on-base percentage in 1957, and .321 batting mark and .387 on-base percentage in 1958.
The Cubs’ Ernie Banks rated Musial, Hank Aaron and Skinner as the best hitters in the National League in 1958, The Pittsburgh Press reported. In the book “We Played the Game,” Tom Cheney, who pitched for the Cardinals and Pirates, said Skinner “was one of the best left-handed hitters I ever saw.”
In April 1959, New York Times columnist Arthur Daley wrote, “The successor to Stan Musial as the best left-handed hitter in the National League is Bob Skinner.”
Pittsburgh Press baseball writer Les Biederman noted, “The Pirates who see Skinner every day put him in Musial’s class as a hitter.”
Skinner told the newspaper, “I’ve become a better hitter now because I’m a better judge of the strike zone. I won’t swing at a bad pitch.” He credited Pirates instructor George Sisler, the former Browns first baseman, with helping him learn the strike zone.
“Mr. Sisler would show up any time you wanted to work with him and he’d stay as long as you wanted him to,” Skinner told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “He’d work mainly on the mental approach to hitting, on concentration, being ready and hitting only strikes.”
Two-time American League batting champion Mickey Vernon, who became a Pirates coach, said to the Post-Gazette, “Skinner has a beautiful, level swing. That’s the mark of a good hitter _ a level swing. Skinner has it. No reason why he shouldn’t hit well over .300 each year.”
Yet, after the 1958 season, Skinner didn’t hit better than .280 for three years in a row. “He is the first to tell you that his pretty swing has produced, over the years, some mighty ugly results,” the Post-Gazette noted.
Hit and miss
In 1959, Skinner hurt his back when he crashed into a fence chasing a Hank Aaron drive in Milwaukee. “I was out for nine days after foolishly trying to knock that fence down,” Skinner said to the Post-Gazette. “It pained like the devil. I realized later I tried to get back in the lineup too soon. My timing was off for a long time.”
He still managed to be a pain to Cardinals pitchers. On Aug. 6, 1959, Skinner had four hits, a walk and scored twice during an 18-2 rout of the Cardinals at St. Louis. Boxscore
In 1960, Skinner had a team-leading 33 doubles and a career-high 86 RBI, helping the Pirates win the pennant. In Game 1 of the World Series against the Yankees, he injured a thumb making a headfirst slide and didn’t play again until Game 7, scoring a run in the Pirates’ 10-9 triumph. Boxscore
Though he had a subpar 1961 season (.268), Skinner did have three doubles, three RBI and four runs scored in a 19-0 romp over the Cardinals at St. Louis. Boxscore
In 1962, Skinner hit .302 and led the Pirates in on-base percentage (.395), slugging percentage (.504), home runs (20), walks (76) and total bases (257).
(Though more a contact hitter than a slugger, Skinner had power. In May 1966, the Post-Dispatch reported that only nine fair balls ever had been hit to or over the right field roof at Pittsburgh’s Forbes Field and the only two batters to do it twice were Skinner and the Braves’ Eddie Mathews.)
Looking to make room for a young, slugging left fielder, Willie Stargell, the Pirates sent Skinner to the Reds in May 1963 for Jerry Lynch. Unable to crack an outfield of Frank Robinson, Vada Pinson and Tommy Harper, Skinner was a reserve.
Helping hand
The departures of three left-handed batters (Musial and Carl Sawatski retired, and George Altman was traded) after the 1963 season left the Cardinals with a gap in 1964. They hoped a couple of promising outfielders who batted from the left side, Doug Clemens and Johnny Lewis, could do the job, but both struggled, prompting general manager Bing Devine to go shopping.
On June 13, 1964, the Cardinals (in sixth place at 28-28) got Skinner from the Reds for cash and minor-league catcher Jim Saul. “Skinner fills the Cardinals’ need for an experienced outfielder who bats left-handed,” the Post-Dispatch reported.
Two days later, the Cardinals got another left-handed batter, Lou Brock, from the Cubs to take a starting spot in the outfield.
Brock’s acquisition was crucial to the Cardinals becoming National League and World Series champions in 1964. Skinner helped, too.
Playing almost exclusively against right-handed pitching, Skinner, 32, hit .333 with runners in scoring position for the 1964 Cardinals. He also hit .389 (7-for-18) against the front-running Phillies.
On July 14 at St. Louis, the Dodgers led, 7-4, entering the bottom of the ninth, but the Cardinals scored four times for an 8-7 triumph. With two outs, Skinner, batting for Julian Javier, drove in the tying and winning runs with a two-run single versus ex-Cardinal Bob Miller. Boxscore
A month later, Skinner again batted for Javier, and cracked a three-run home run against the Dodgers’ Howie Reed, carrying the Cardinals to a 4-1 victory at St. Louis. Boxscore
As he had as a Pirate, Skinner hit well in St. Louis for the Cardinals. His home batting average for them in 1964 was .290.
Skinner also provided leadership. The Post-Dispatch described him as “commander in chief of the St. Louis reserves.”
In the 1964 World Series against the Yankees, Skinner made four pinch-hit appearances and produced two hits and a walk.
All in the family
Skinner was an asset to the Cardinals again in 1965. He hit .309 overall and .319 as a pinch-hitter. According to the Post-Dispatch, Skinner in 1965 had the most pinch-hits (15) and the most pinch-hit RBI (15) in the National League. In games at St. Louis in 1965, he batted .339 overall.
Released by the Cardinals after an unproductive 1966 season, Skinner went on to manage the Phillies (1968-69) and coached for 19 years in the big leagues with the Padres, Pirates, Angels and Braves. He coached for manager Chuck Tanner’s 1979 World Series champion Pirates.
A son, Joel Skinner, was an American League catcher for nine seasons. Joel also coached in the majors for 10 years and was Cleveland manager for part of the 2002 season.
Besides Bob Skinner and Joel Skinner, other fathers and sons who have managed teams in the majors are Felipe Alou and Luis Rojas; Buddy Bell and David Bell; Bob Boone and Aaron Boone; and George Sisler and Dick Sisler.
RetroSimba 
I saw Skinner’s last career home run-May 8, 1966-and it was a long one, into dead-centerfield at the ballpark on Grand and Dodier.
You were fortunate to witness that two-run pinch-hit home run by Bob Skinner against the Giants’ Bob Shaw in the last game played at the ballfield formerly known as Sportsman’s Park before the Cardinals moved to Busch Memorial Stadium downtown: https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1966/B05080SLN1966.htm
This story hits home for me because my mom grew up in Pittsburgh and gave me a 1960 World Series ashtray that says on the bottom BUCS BEAT YANKS and Bob Skinner is listed as one of the outfielders for the Pirates. I still have the ashtray. It’s beautiful…appropriately Pirates – black with yellow writing. Mom attended one of the games in that series. I’m gonna call her later today. I enjoy whatever she remembers. She seems to recall new details every time she talks about the 1960 Pirates and Bob Skinner is a name she has mentioned on a number of occasions. It never gets old.
This is such a remarkable story, that his high school coach said “Of all the players I coached, I figured Bob Skinner was the least likely to succeed in baseball.” Reminds of what the “experts” said about Prince Fielder, that he was too fat and would never make it and yet, he went on to hit 319 homeruns and speaking of father/son, Prince’s father Cecil also hit 319 homeuns. Bizarre.
What mind blowing stats against the Cardinals!
I remember watching Bob Skinner’s son Joel when he played for the Sox in the early 80’s, back up to Fisk.
Thanks for sharing with us the terrific anecdote about your Mom and the World Series ashtray, Steve. Glad you encourage your Mom to tell stories about her life. Those are true treasures to cherish: https://www.ebay.com/itm/204801631097?itmmeta=01HZEZST3AC25V5T7Z9KSBJP86&hash=item2faf20e379:g:rJsAAOSwPC1mT1Hj&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAA0CIwbYZbXzcLeJ3XNdOhdaJhpRWdYLbTyB%2FvyZ3MfU9G00QIcEiAYsDbp2Mv0qBvRCBRVeNFRisvlF78hyiDxUDRyeRpMJALEHymohfb81%2Fr42UOyGj%2FZAwlKtACdJGqKETSmdXxZZcPXPK2a5lBufNPyMOBn9Y4punpm0Tu1DTituX%2F5K%2BxjVxn3ScR%2FeWjPgc8q%2BFJ4VglGj%2F5lZhCWaw6I7YXWR6x0FwM1zMVGXP9HyZYcz%2F4jCDPDjrTtCr5e2yGPSrdvo4ASoDBkRXFDh4%3D%7Ctkp%3ABk9SR-Kh59_7Yw
There it is! Thanks for the link Mark. I’m hoping to make it back to Milwaukee this summer and now I have the desire to dig out that ashtray and bring it back to Montreal.
Bob Skinner was also a tough out for Bob Gibson. 10 for 29 with 7 doubles and 8 walks. Bob Skinner did an incredible job as hitting coach for the 1979 Pittsburgh Pirates. During the regular season the Pirates had the second best team batting average in the NL and led the NL in runs scored. In the World Series they turned it up even more hitting .323 for the entire Series.
Yes, indeed, Phillip, Bob Skinner’s career .345 batting average and .472 on-base percentage versus Bob Gibson is mighty impressive. In 1961, Skinner reached base safely seven times (three doubles and four walks) in 11 plate appearances versus Gibson _ a .636 on-base percentage.
Another brilliant write up and I’m tickled that George Sisler was mentioned for a reason that only we know. When you mentioned Joel Skinner his 1987 Topps immediately popped into my head. Man, I must have memorized the whole damn set. How weird.
Yep, George Sisler popping up everywhere this week. How about that?
Joel Skinner was bench coach for the 2011 A’s. Manager Bob Geren, who was a teammate of Joel’s with the 1988 Yankees, hired him for the coaching job. After Geren was fired in June 2011, Bob Melvin stuck with Skinner for the rest of the season. But, in 2012, Skinner was out and Chip Hale was A’s bench coach on Melvin’s staff.