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How Cardinals came calling on Walter Alston

Posted in Games, Hitters, Managers, Prospects on June 26, 2025| 10 Comments »

After he was graduated from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, Walter Alston was ready to become a high school teacher. A knock on his door altered those plans.

Ninety years ago, in June 1935, Alston grabbed an opportunity to play professional baseball, signing a minor-league contract with the Cardinals.

The offer came from Frank Rickey, a Cardinals scout and brother of the club’s general manager, Branch Rickey. The day after Miami’s commencement ceremony, Alston was at home in tiny Darrtown, Ohio, when Frank Rickey surprised him with a rap on the door.

“Want to play pro baseball?” he asked.

In the book “Walter Alston: A Year at a Time,” Alston recalled to author Jack Tobin, “What a question to ask! I’d dreamed about that since I was old enough to throw that little rubber ball against the brick smokehouse out on our first farm.”

Alston went on to spend 10 seasons in the Cardinals’ system. He didn’t make it big as a player _ just one shaky appearance in a major-league game _ but it was the Cardinals who gave him the chance to manage in the minors.

That experience helped launch him into a long and successful career with the Dodgers that led to his election to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Hard work and patience

Alston was born on a small farm just north of Cincinnati, in Venice, Ohio. (Renamed Ross Township.) His father was a tenant farmer and stonemason. The family moved from farm to farm, wherever work was available, in southwest Ohio.

When Alston was a boy, his parents bought him a black Shetland pony. He named her Night. Alston rode the pony bareback to grade school in Ohio villages such as Camden and Morning Sun.

The family fell into debt when Alston was in seventh grade and moved to the hamlet of Darrtown. Alston’s father found work in nearby Hamilton at a Ford auto plant, producing wheels and running boards for $4 a day.

Alston developed a passion for baseball. His father taught him to throw with velocity. “Put some smoke on the ball,” he’d say. The youngster did it so well he got nicknamed “Smokey” and pitched in high school.

In May 1930, near the completion of his freshman year at Miami, Alston, 18, married his childhood sweetheart, Lela. The Great Depression had devastated the economy and Alston couldn’t afford to stay in college. He and Lela moved in with her parents in Darrtown and he took work wherever he could find it, going from farm to farm to seek pay for day labor. The county gave him a job cutting roadside weeds with a scythe. “That paid a dollar a day and I was happy to have it,” Alston told author Jack Tobin.

Two years later, in the summer of 1932, Alston still was whacking weeds when a local Methodist minister, Rev. Ralph Jones, an education advocate, urged him to return to Miami and earn a degree. According to author Si Burick in the book “Alston and the Dodgers,” Jones said to Alston, “Smokey, you’ve got a good mind. You can be somebody if you go back to college.”

Jones gave Alston $50 to use toward his tuition. Alston re-enrolled at Miami for the 1932 fall semester. “We never could have saved $50 on my dollar a day cutting weeds,” Alston told Jack Tobin. “That $50 … got me back in and paid a good part of my tuition for that year.”

Alston majored in industrial arts and physical education. He also played varsity baseball and basketball. There were no athletic scholarships and money was scarce. In between classes and athletics, Alston worked jobs on campus.

“I took a job driving a laundry truck for 35 cents an hour and I got my lunch free every day in exchange for racking up billiard balls in a pool hall,” he told journalist Ed Fitzgerald. “Summers, the college gave me a job painting dormitories.”

Alston played sandlot baseball for various town teams, too. One of those, the Hamilton Baldwins, had Alston at shortstop and Weeb Ewbank, the future football coach of the Baltimore Colts and New York Jets, in center field.

Cardinals prospect

Alston was taking an exam near the end of his senior year in 1935 when he was told someone was waiting to see him. It was Harold Cook, school superintendent in New Madison, Ohio. Cook was recruiting teachers and offered Alston a salary of $1,350 to come to New Madison. Alston accepted.

A few days later, Frank Rickey showed up at the door. (The Alstons didn’t have a home telephone then.) Rickey had seen Alston play two games _ one at shortstop and one as a pitcher _ for Miami and was impressed. When Alston mentioned he’d made a commitment to teach in New Madison, Rickey explained the minor-league season would be finished by Labor Day, enabling him to return to Ohio for the school year.

Rickey offered no signing bonus. He told Alston, 23, he’d be paid $135 a month to play in the Cardinals’ system that summer. Alston signed on the spot.

The next day, Alston’s wife drove him to Richmond, Ind., where he boarded a bus for St. Louis. Upon arrival, Alston checked into the YMCA downtown. The next morning, he went to the Cardinals’ offices to find out where he was being assigned. The Cardinals told him to come back tomorrow. This went on for a week until, finally, Branch Rickey informed Alston he would play for the Greenwood (Mississippi) Chiefs of the East Dixie League.

Cardinals scout Eddie Dyer (who, years later, became St. Louis manager) drove Alston from St. Louis to Mississippi in a roadster. Player-manager Clay Hopper put Alston at third base and he hit .326 in 82 games.

Every fall and winter for the next 14 years, Alston taught high schoolers _ six years at New Madison and eight at Lewiston, Ohio _ in order to make ends meet after spending spring and summer in the minors. He taught industrial arts, general science and biology, and coached basketball before leaving in March for spring training.

The teaching experience later helped him as a manager. “Like students, ballplayers can’t all be treated the same,” Alston told Si Burick. “Some need encouragement. Some do better if left alone. Others need to be driven. You simply have to study each individual and get him to produce the best that’s in him.”

Darrtown remained Alston’s home. Los Angeles Times columnist Jim Murray described it as “the place where time forgot” and “where the 11 o’clock news is the barber.” Alston built a house at the corner of Apple and Cherry streets. It was the first brick house in Darrtown. “My dad laid all the bricks and mixed the mortar,” he told Sports Illustrated.

In the backyard tool shed, Alston put his industrial arts skills to good use, making most of the furniture for his house. “His bookshelves and chests and spice racks and desks are a wonder of patient, meticulous workmanship,” Sheldon Ocker of the Akron Beacon-Journal reported.

When he wasn’t woodworking, Alston enjoyed skeet shooting, riding his two Honda motorcycles and playing billiards.

After Alston became an established big-league manager, billiards legend Willie Mosconi was a guest at Alston’s Darrtown home, where Alston had a pool table. “I ran 47 balls, which is pretty good for me,” Alston told Gordon Verrell of the Long Beach Press-Telegram. “He shot, made six or seven and missed, and then I ran 10 or 12. I didn’t get another shot. He ran the next 154.”

Alston didn’t mind losing to a master such as Mosconi. Getting defeated by Cardinals pitcher Steve Carlton in 1969 was another matter. “He beat us 1-0 that night at the ballpark and, if that didn’t make me mad enough, he beat me later that night in a game of pool,” Alston told Gordon Verrell. Boxscore

Ready or not

For his second season in the Cardinals’ system in 1936, Alston was assigned to Huntington, W.Va. Player-manager Benny Borgmann taught him to play first base. The club’s shortstop was a skinny teenage rookie, Marty Marion.

For the second consecutive year, Alston hit .326. He also produced 35 home runs and 114 RBI. Scout Branch Rickey Jr., son of the Cardinals’ general manager, was impressed. On Rickey Jr.’s recommendation, Alston was called up to the Cardinals in September and instructed to join the team in Boston.

Alston packed a beat-up cardboard suitcase and took a train to New York City, where he was to make a connection to Boston. At Grand Central Station, he was gawking at the ceilings and the people when he bumped into a woman. “The suitcase hit the floor, broke open and scattered all my clothes and belongings across the floor,” he recalled to Jack Tobin. “There seemed to be hundreds and hundreds of people all racing in a different direction. I was on my hands and knees, trying to pick up my shirts and shorts … and to keep from being trampled.”

A Good Samaritan directed him to a luggage shop nearby. Alston spent most of the $20 he had on a new suitcase and boarded the train to Boston.

When he arrived at the Kenmore Hotel, the team was at the ballpark. The desk clerk told Alston he could go to the dining room and sign for anything he ordered. “One look at the menu convinced me I was in for a hard time,” Alston told Jack Tobin. “I had never heard of half the things and couldn’t pronounce most of the words … Finally I decided on some clams. I’d always heard Boston was famous for them. When they brought them out, I wasn’t sure just how you were supposed to eat them.”

During his month with the Cardinals, Alston pitched batting practice, took infield practice with other rookies and otherwise sat on the bench. A fellow Ohioan, pitcher Jesse Haines, 43, took a liking to Alston, 24, and showed him what to do and how to do it. “No matter what I asked, he knew the answer,” Alston said to Jack Tobin. “Most days he took me to and from the ballpark. He was my buddy.”

Put me in, coach

On the final day of the season, the Cardinals played at home in the rain against the Cubs. Plate umpire Ziggy Sears had a miserable time. Neither team cared for the way he called balls and strikes. Sears ejected Cardinals coach Buzzy Wares and Cubs manager Charlie Grimm for arguing with him.

As the Cardinals came off the field in the seventh, first baseman Johnny Mize made a remark while passing the umpire. Offended, Sears ejected Mize.

Because the Cardinals’ other established first baseman, Rip Collins, had been used as a pinch-hitter a couple of innings earlier, manager Frankie Frisch had to go with his only other first baseman, Alston.

When the Cubs batted against Dizzy Dean in the eighth, Alston was at first, making his big-league debut. Augie Galan led off with a single. Phil Cavarretta followed with a bunt. Third baseman Don Gutteridge fielded cleanly and made an accurate throw to Alston, but the first baseman bobbled the ball. Cavarretta reached safely on the error and Galan stopped at second.

Next up was Billy Herman. He bunted toward Alston. The rookie threw to third, but not in time to nab Galan, and the bases were loaded. All three runners eventually scored, giving the Cubs a 6-1 lead.

In the ninth, the Cardinals scored twice and had a runner on base, with two outs, when Alston batted for the first time. The pitcher was Lon Warneke, a three-time 20-game winner. Alston fouled off a pitch. He ripped another down the line in left but it, too, curved foul near the pole. Then he struck out, ending the game. Boxscore

The next day, the headline in the St. Louis Star-Times blared, “Walter Alston Makes Blunders That Eventually Beat Dizzy Dean, 6-3.”

Follow the leader

The Cardinals put Alston on their 40-man winter roster, but Johnny Mize still was on the team and the club acquired another first baseman, Dick Siebert, from the Cubs. Because of his teaching job, Alston couldn’t report to 1937 spring training until March 15. A couple of weeks later, he was back in the minors.

Alston had a few more good seasons in the Cardinals’ system, but knew he likely wouldn’t be returning to the big leagues. “I had enough power, but … I couldn’t hit the good pitching, just the mediocre pitching,” he told Sports Illustrated.

Branch Rickey asked Alston to become a player-manager in 1940 and he eagerly accepted. Alston managed Cardinals affiliates for three seasons (1940-42). Then Rickey moved to the Dodgers. Alston kept playing for Cardinals farm teams desperate to fill rosters depleted by World War II military service.

In 1944, Alston was released by the Cardinals. He returned to Darrtown, figuring to go fulltime into teaching. Then came another bang on the door. It was the son of the man who operated the Darrtown general store. The boy told Alston there was an urgent long-distance phone call for him at the store. Alston darted the two blocks, grabbed the receiver and heard the voice of Branch Rickey.

“First thing he did was give me a good going over for not having a phone and told me to get one,” Alston said to Jack Tobin. “Then he offered me the manager’s job at Trenton (N.J.) in the Interstate League.”

Alston managed for 10 seasons in the Dodgers’ system. In November 1953, he was chosen to replace Chuck Dressen as Dodgers manager. Working on one-year contracts, Alston managed the Dodgers for 23 years, leading them to seven National League pennants and four World Series titles. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1983.

As Jim Murray wrote, “He made his profession’s hall of fame not because he could hit or throw a curveball better than anyone else but because he excelled in the far more difficult area of human endeavor.”

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Why Cardinals preferred Rogers Hornsby to Branch Rickey

Posted in Executives, Games, Hitters, Managers on May 26, 2025| 9 Comments »

As Cardinals manager, Branch Rickey either was ahead of his time or hopelessly out of step with the times. Take your pick. Either way, Cardinals owner and president Sam Breadon decided Rickey no longer should be manager.

One hundred years ago, on May 30, 1925, Breadon changed managers, replacing Rickey with Rogers Hornsby. Rickey remained with the club in a front-office role.

The shakeup turned out to be good for the Cardinals. Player-manager Hornsby led them to their first National League pennant and World Series championship in 1926. Focused on baseball operations, vice president Rickey built the Cardinals into a perennial contender.

On shaky ground

After managing the St. Louis Browns (1913-15), Rickey joined the Cardinals and became their manager in 1919. In his first six years, he piloted the club to three winning seasons: 1921 (87-66), 1922 (85-69) and 1923 (79-74). Then the Cardinals took a big step backwards, finishing 65-89 in 1924 and drawing a mere 272,885 at its home games.

Knowing Breadon was considering a change, Rickey offered to resign during 1925 spring training but reconsidered, according to St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist John Wray. “I look at this team I have put together and I can visualize it winning the flag,” Rickey told Breadon. “I have the stuff here and I want another chance. I think I deserve it because I assembled all this talent.”

Breadon wasn’t convinced. In his autobiography, “My War With Baseball,” Hornsby said Rickey sought his help with Breadon. “I went to Breadon and said that Rickey was the smartest man in baseball,” Hornsby recalled. “Breadon suggested I take the job as manager, but I wasn’t interested.”

Before spring training ended, Breadon formerly offered Hornsby the job, but he declined. “I recommended that Breadon keep Rickey,” Hornsby said in his autobiography. “I also told Breadon that if the Good Lord himself were to … manage this club, he couldn’t do any better. It was a lousy team.”

Decision time

The 1925 Cardinals won five of their first eight, then nosedived, losing seven in a row at home before mostly small crowds.

When the Cardinals were in Pittsburgh for a series with the Pirates, Breadon showed up. On Friday, May 29, Hornsby was having breakfast at the Hotel Schenley when traveling secretary Clarence Lloyd approached him and said Breadon wanted to meet. In his autobiography, Hornsby recalled that as he passed by the table of Rickey and coach Burt Shotton, Rickey said to him, “Breadon wants you to manage the team.”

Hornsby replied, “I don’t want to manage. He knows that.”

“Then will you ask Breadon to give me another chance?” Rickey said to Hornsby. “If he won’t, see if you can get him to let Shotton here be the manager.”

Hornsby said, “OK.”

(In addition to coaching, Shotton managed the Cardinals on Sundays, because Rickey promised his mother before signing his first professional contract that he would abstain from baseball activities on Sundays.)

Hornsby met in Breadon’s room and was offered the job. Hornsby said no.

According to the book “Branch Rickey: A Biography” by Murray Polner, Breadon barked back, “I won’t have any goddamned Sunday school teacher running my team. You’re going to run it.”

In his autobiography, Hornsby said he and Breadon had the following exchange:

Hornsby: “You mean, Rickey’s through?”

Breadon: “That’s exactly right _ as manager.”

Hornsby: “What about Shotton as manager?”

Breadon: “I don’t want any Rickey man either.”

It was agreed Hornsby should think over the proposal and inform Breadon of the decision the next day. “I went back down and told Rickey what Breadon had said,” Hornsby recalled in his autobiography. “Rickey didn’t cuss or anything, but he got pretty mad and said he would sell all his stock in the Cardinals.”

According to the Rickey biography, Rickey said to Hornsby, “Judas priest, the man (Breadon) is stabbing me in the back.”

At the ballpark that day, Hornsby slugged a two-run home run, but the Cardinals lost, dropping their record to 13-23. It turned out to be the last game Rickey would manage. Boxscore

Making the switch

According to his autobiography, Hornsby went to Breadon on Saturday, May 30, and told him “the only way I would be interested in becoming manager would be if I could buy Rickey’s stock … Then baseball could be my business for life.” Breadon assured him that would be arranged. The two agreed Hornsby would become player-manager, effective Sunday, May 31. “I expect him to put new fight into the Cardinals,” Breadon told the Associated Press.

In reporting on the managerial switch, James M. Gould of the St. Louis Star-Times wrote, “The pupil succeeds the master.”

Hornsby, 29, became the youngest manager in the National League. He was a few months older than player-manager Bucky Harris, 28, of the American League’s Washington Senators. Other player-managers in the majors in 1925 included Dave Bancroft of the Braves, Ty Cobb of the Tigers, Eddie Collins of the White Sox, George Sisler of the Browns and Tris Speaker of the Indians.

“I feel that with Rickey as vice president and business manager, and Hornsby as playing manager, we have one of the greatest combinations in baseball,” Breadon told the Post-Dispatch.

He also said to the Associated Press, “Rickey is a valuable man and we want to utilize his knowledge of baseball and his great judgment of players. He is a great organizer and a builder, and that is his sphere.”

Breadon’s words, though, didn’t appease Rickey, who resented being ousted as manager. According to Rickey’s biography, he described Breadon’s action as “clumsily brutal.”

According to author Murray Polner, Rickey felt betrayed and considered leaving the Cardinals to become athletic director at Northwestern University, but his wife Jane talked him out of it.

In his book “Mr. Rickey’s Redbirds,” author Mike Mitchell wrote that Rickey later said, “My fault as a manager … was due to my apparent zeal. I discussed the game every day … as if the game coming up was the game of the year.”

With Rickey out and Hornsby taking over effective May 31, coach Shotton was tasked with managing the Cardinals in the May 30 Saturday doubleheader at Pittsburgh, according to “Mr. Rickey’s Redbirds.” The Pirates won both, totaling eight triples in Game 2. Boxscore

Rickey’s reviews

Reaction to the managerial move mostly was favorable:

_ J. Roy Stockton, Post-Dispatch: “The Cardinals should do well under Hornsby. He will not overmanage the team. If there was any just criticism of Branch Rickey’s regime, it was that he burdened the team with too much management. He tried to pitch for the pitchers and to catch for the catchers … He lacked poise when directing his men … He decided on a plan of action and then … he hesitated, pondered over the danger and changed the plan.”

_ Tommy Holmes, Brooklyn Eagle: “Some attribute the failure of the team to Rickey’s attempt to mastermind the Cardinals. He wanted to do all the thinking that was to be done on the team … Branch exercised his managerial authority by requiring the batter to keep in constant touch with his wagging from the bench. A hitter up there with the bases full, to bust it and nothing else, had to strain his neck getting the signal on every ball pitched.”

_ Henry Farrell, United Press: “Rickey had a lot of trick ideas about handling of a ballclub that made some of the older athletes feel like they were being treated like children. He not only had blackboard talks on baseball but he extended his skull practice to include arithmetic and the grammar school arts and sciences.”

_ John B. Foster, Dayton Daily News: “The greatest weakness of (Rickey) was … his lack of playing instinct. He usually managed to change pitchers at the wrong time … Almost every manager in the National League figured upon his doing the wrong thing at the wrong time … Opposing managers figured they would get away with games if they forced Rickey to change pitchers.”

_ The Sporting News: “The elevation of Hornsby to the management was the most popular choice that could have been made for the fans.”

Different approach

Indeed, fans gave Hornsby a big reception when he was led to the plate by St. Louis mayor Victor Miller and presented with several floral pieces before the start of his managerial debut on Sunday, May 31. During the game, the Post-Dispatch noted “a new spirit exhibited by the players” and “a dash that had been missing for some time.” Hornsby contributed two hits, two walks, two runs scored and a RBI in a 5-2 Cardinals victory over the Reds. Boxscore

The next day, Hornsby started Jesse Haines against the Reds. In four starts for Rickey in 1925, Haines was yanked from the games and lost all four. In his first start for Hornsby, he pitched a complete game and won. Boxscore

A week later, Hornsby bought 1,167 shares of Rickey’s Cardinals stock at $43 a share, a total investment of $50,181, the St. Louis Globe-Democrat reported. As author Mike Mitchell noted, “Upset about being removed as manager, Rickey made an emotional and short-sighted decision.”

Meanwhile, Hornsby canceled the daily team meetings and daily morning workouts that had been the norm when Rickey managed. “You can’t drill for two hours and then get out in the afternoon with all your pep and play some more,” Hornsby explained to the Star-Times.

The Cardinals won 15 of their first 19 games with Hornsby as manager and finished at 77-76. Hornsby’s hitting helped, too. In 1925, he was named recipient of the National League Most Valuable Player Award and led the league in batting average, on-base percentage and slugging percentage for the sixth year in a row.

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How Yogi Berra performed an encore against Cardinals

Posted in Games, Hitters, Opponents on May 12, 2025| 9 Comments »

Yogi Berra wasn’t kidding when he said, “It ain’t over till it’s over.”

Berra’s playing days certainly appeared to be over in October 1963 when he became manager of the Yankees. “I’ll have enough trouble managing,” he said to the Associated Press in explaining why he was done playing.

More than a year later, though, the St. Louisan was behind the plate, catching for the 1965 Mets in a spring training game against the Cardinals.

Five months earlier, as Yankees manager, Berra’s club lost to the Cardinals in the 1964 World Series. Afterward, Berra was fired and replaced by the Cardinals’ manager, Johnny Keane. The Mets hired Berra to be a player-coach on the staff of the manager he played for the most as a Yankee, Casey Stengel.

Never say never

Berra appeared in a World Series in 14 of 18 seasons as a Yankees player. A three-time recipient of the American League Most Valuable Player Award, he totaled 2,148 hits and 1,430 RBI with the Yankees.

After the 1963 World Series, Yankees manager Ralph Houk was moved to the front office and Berra replaced him, getting a one-year contract for $35,000, a $5,000 cut from his salary as a player. Asked to describe his feelings about the job, Berra told the New York Daily News, “I just hope I can stay in the same shoes as Houk did.” Asked what he’d learned from those who managed him, Berra said, “You can observe a lot just by watching.”

Though the 1964 Yankees won the American League pennant with the best record (99-63) in the majors and reached Game 7 of the World Series, Berra was fired. As the Daily News noted, “It is generally believed the Yankees brass felt Berra had lost disciplinary control of the ballplayers.”

The Yankees offered him a contract to remain as a consultant. Berra accepted, but got them to include an escape clause. A month later, in November 1964, he jumped to the Mets. In addition to coaching, Berra would be added to the playing roster as a catcher and pinch-hitter if he performed well enough at spring training.

Old-timers’ days

On the first day of spring training for the 1965 Mets at St. Petersburg, Fla., observers had flashbacks to another era. Berra took cuts in the batting cage. Pitcher-coach Warren Spahn, the former Braves ace, instructed prospects on the mound. Four-time 1936 Olympic gold medalist Jesse Owens, listed as Mets track coach, led players in conditioning exercises. Former Cardinals manager Eddie Stanky, director of player development, was in uniform, directing infield drills.

As Joseph Durso of the New York Times noted, “The Mets opened their spring training circus while manager Casey Stengel (approaching 75) stood like a ringmaster behind home plate bellowing, ‘Yes, sir, come see the amazing Mets.’ ”

Berra was the main attraction, drawing cheers from onlookers when he put on a catcher’s mitt to warm up a teenage pitcher and then again at batting practice.

A couple of weeks later, on March 14, Stengel selected Spahn (nearly 44) and Berra (nearly 40) to start in a Grapefruit League game against the Cardinals. Philadelphia Daily News columnist Larry Merchant described the pitcher-catcher combination as “the oldest, ugliest battery in captivity.”

When the Cardinals took batting practice, their vice president, Stan Musial, 44, came out in uniform and joined in. Musial, who retired from playing two years earlier, “slammed out a dozen drives,” Cy Kritzer of the Buffalo News reported.

Some of the Mets, including Berra and Spahn, gathered to watch him. After sending a pitch to the bleachers in right, Musial said to them, “You fellows inspire me. If you ancients can make a comeback, maybe I’ll try it, too. I’m only nine months older than you, Spahnie.”

Spahn replied, “Don’t do it, please. This league is rough enough without you to worry about.”

According to the Buffalo News, Stengel chimed in. “You’re a vice president, ain’t you?” he said to Musial. “You can do what you want to do. If you’re aiming for a comeback, we can use you. I’d have some fun in those late innings, sending you and Yogi to pinch-hit.”

Musial replied, “Yogi will hit. Hitting is like swimming. If you learn early enough, you’ll hit long after you’ve lost the rest of your skills.”

When the game began, the sight of Spahn on the mound and Berra behind the plate “was enthusiastically greeted by the Geritol set” that made up most of the crowd of 2,989 at Al Lang Field, the Daily News reported.

Spahn’s first pitch, a fastball that cut across the plate for a strike to Lou Brock, sent “a murmur of approval” through the stands, columnist Red Smith noted.

Brock then beat out a high bouncer over the mound for an infield single and Curt Flood walked on a 3-and-2 pitch. After getting two strikes on the next batter, Bill White, Spahn spun a roundhouse curve from a sidearm delivery, fooling White, who swung and missed for strike three, then stood there and laughed. “The pitch fooled me, too,” Berra told Red Smith. “I didn’t expect it to act like that.”

Spahn worked three innings and allowed three runs. Berra was hitless. He flied out against Bob Gibson and whiffed versus rookie Nelson Briles. “He struck me out with a heck of a quick-dipping sinker,” Berra told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “The kid has a real arm.”

Asked by the New York Times what was the hardest thing to do in catching a game for the first time since September 1963, Berra replied, “Bend down.”

Like old times

On April 27, two weeks after the Mets began the 1965 season, Berra was activated to the playing roster while maintaining his coaching duties. In his first week, he made one pinch-hit appearance. Then came one last moment of glory.

A couple of hours before the Mets played the Phillies on May 4 at Shea Stadium, Berra was talking with Newsday’s Joe Donnelly. “Give me a cigarette,” Berra said to the reporter. After inhaling deeply, Berra continued, “Maybe I’ll play tonight.” When Donnelly chuckled, Berra barked, “Why not? Let’s find out.”

Moments later, Berra met with Stengel and asked to catch. Stengel put him in the No. 6 spot in the batting order.

When Berra saw Phillies ace Jim Bunning before the game, he needled him: “I wish you were pitching. If I couldn’t get a hit off you, I’d know I was through.”

The Phillies’ starter instead was Ray Herbert, a pitcher Berra faced often during the 1950s when both were in the American League.

Berra’s first test came on defense in the first inning and he did well, making a tough putout at the plate. With Johnny Callison on third, Alex Johnson hit a chopper that was fielded by pitcher Al Jackson. As Callison charged home, Jackson threw to Berra, “who had the plate guarded beautifully,” Red Foley of the Daily News reported. “Callison stopped short, ducked, then tried to veer around Yogi,” but Berra ‘”was spry enough to pin him with the ball.”

Berra got a standing ovation when he batted with Ed Kranepool on second and Joe Christopher on first, two outs, in the first. Herbert threw a pitch around Berra’s eyes and he lined it to center for a single, his first National League hit.

It also should have been his first National League RBI, but this being the Mets, the hit didn’t deliver a run. Center fielder Cookie Rojas threw to third, where Christopher was tagged out before the slow-moving Kranepool reached the plate.

As the game unfolded, Al Jackson got into a good groove with Berra catching him. The Phillies couldn’t score.

With the Mets ahead, 1-0, in the seventh, reliever Gary Wagner gave up a leadoff single to Berra. “I was going to take him out for a pinch-runner,” Stengel told the Philadelphia Daily News. “I only wanted to catch him five innings.”

Jackson interceded, saying to Stengel, “Leave him in there.”

Berra took second on Ron Swoboda’s single, then scored on Roy McMillan’s single to center. When Swoboda reached second, he applauded while watching Berra cross the plate. “I get such a kick out of it because I think a lot of people decided he was no longer capable of this,” Swoboda told Newsday.

Berra’s run turned out to be the difference in a 2-1 Mets triumph. Jackson pitched a complete game and struck out 11. In the book “Baseball’s Greatest Players,” Jackson said, “Yogi was … a huge asset to me … You looked in for the sign like he had some magic. He did.” Boxscore

Stepping aside

When he tried to catch five days later against the Braves, it was a different story. Berra went hitless, striking out three times, and made an error, dropping a pop fly. “Essentially, his reflexes weren’t up to the major league standards,” the New York Times declared.

Berra knew that this time his playing days really were over, and he called it quits. “It’s hard for me to see the ball,” he confessed to the New York Daily News.

As he told Joe Donnelly, “I always felt when a guy couldn’t hit a fastball, he might as well hang up the bat.”

Berra remained with the Mets as coach until 1972, when he took over as manager after the death of Gil Hodges and led them to a pennant a year later.

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Diamond dash: Slow and steady wins the race? You bet!

Posted in Executives, Games, Hitters, Managers, Opponents on May 5, 2025| 11 Comments »

In a race to determine the slowest runner in the National League, the loser was the commissioner of baseball, and he didn’t even run.

A pair of catchers, Del Rice of the Cardinals and Rube Walker of the Dodgers, were the contestants in what Bob Broeg of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch described as “a snail versus tortoise match race.”

When some of the Cardinals made small, friendly wagers with their Dodgers counterparts on which of the two leadfoots would win, heavy-handed baseball commissioner Ford Frick initiated a gambling investigation.

Frick backed down quickly after baseball writers mocked him in their newspaper stories for being unable to see the difference between harmless fun and scandal.

Slow going

Signed by Cardinals scout Frank Rickey, brother of general manager Branch Rickey, Del Rice was 18 when he began his pro baseball career in the minors in 1941. Rice reached the majors with the Cardinals four years later.

Listed as 6-foot-2, Rice also played one season (1945-46) of pro basketball with the Rochester Royals. His teammates included Red Holzman (the future head coach of the St. Louis Hawks and New York Knicks), Otto Graham (better known as quarterback of the Cleveland Browns) and Chuck Connors (the big-league first baseman who became TV’s “The Rifleman”). Rochester won the National Basketball League (NBL) championship that season. (In 1949, the NBL merged with the Basketball Association of America and became the National Basketball Association, or NBA.)

Like Rice, Rube Walker also was 18 when he became a pro baseball player, signing with the Cubs in 1944 and advancing to the majors with them four years later. Joe Donnelly of Newsday described him as “a large man with a twinkle in his eye and a heart that reached out to people.”

Rice and Walker were good defensive catchers who didn’t hit much. In 17 seasons in the majors, mostly with the Cardinals and Braves, Rice batted .237. Walker hit .227 in his 11 seasons with the Cubs and Dodgers.

Both also were notorious plodders on the base paths. “Neither could outrun me,” Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley, who chain-smoked cigars, said to Dan Daniel of The Sporting News. (Rice managed to steal bases twice in the majors; Walker did it three times.) A good case could be made for either being the slowpoke of the league. Their teammates decided to settle the matter with a footrace.

Amazing race

During warmups before their game on May 17, 1955, at St. Louis, the Cardinals and Dodgers got into some good-natured bantering about who was the slowest man in the league. Rice and Walker were coaxed into having a 50-yard race across the outfield.

(Walker was not the type to back down from a test. According to the New York Times, “he once challenged manager Walter Alston to a billiards match after Alston had taken 130 shots without missing.”)

Members of the teams lined up in two rows _ Cardinals on one side; Dodgers on the other _ forming a lane for Rice and Walker to rumble through, the New York Times reported.

Cardinals manager Eddie Stanky joined some of his players in making bets with Dodgers on who would win, according to the Post-Dispatch. Most of the wagers were for $5. “All told, it was guessed that $45 rested on the outcome,” the St. Louis Globe-Democrat reported.

(Dick Young of the New York Daily News noted that the wagers on the Rice-Walker footrace were pocket change compared with what went on in earlier times. When speedy outfielder Ben Chapman was with the Yankees in the 1930s, he’d routinely race all challengers and usually won. According to Young, “Babe Ruth used to bet hundreds of dollars on every race.” Chapman’s teammate, Dixie Walker, told Young, “The first time, Babe bet against Chapman and lost. After that, Babe always bet on Chapman, and cleaned up.”)

In the St. Louis contest, Rube Walker trudged out to a lead but Rice steamed ahead at the finish and won by a yard. One of the observers, 19-year-old Dodgers rookie Sandy Koufax, recalled to the New York Times years later, “They didn’t go fast enough for a photo finish. It was a study in slow motion.”

Little big man

Walker took his loss in good spirit. “I once was a gazelle,” he told the New York Times. However, baseball commissioner Ford Frick was not amused when he learned wagering was involved. He decided to investigate. According to the Daily News, the wires Frick sent to managers Stanky and Alston read: “You are ordered to submit names and amounts bet by the ballplayers.”

While Frick awaited the reports from the managers, the newspapers ridiculed him for overreacting.

_ Dan Parker, syndicated columnist: “Ford Frick is a man of fine character, but a sense of humor forms no part of it.”

_ Morris McLemore, Miami News: “It would appear Ford Frick might have more to do than worry about the footrace between Del Rice and Rube Walker.”

_ Whitney Martin, Associated Press: “Frick probably feels that from such molehills mountains grow, and that the first thing you know the boys will be … gambling that when they put a penny in a (vending) machine a stick of gum will come out.”

_ Dick Young, New York Daily News: “Frick may have been watching too many ‘Dragnet’ shows.”

Soon after, Frick dropped the investigation, the Jersey Journal reported.

Changes afoot

Stanky, Rice and Walker made headlines for a variety of other reasons in the days following the slowest man contest.

On May 27, 1955, the Cardinals fired Stanky. A week later, they traded Rice to the Braves. (The footrace had nothing to do with either move.)

On June 30, 1955, Walker was carted off the field and sent to a hospital for treatment of a gashed shoulder after Willie Mays ran over him while trying to score. “Walker went down flat on his back, clutching the ball grittily,” the Daily News reported.

(Four years later, in June 1959, Rice suffered a broken left leg in a collision with Mays near home plate. Mays slid hard into Rice, who was straddling the line while awaiting a throw. “It wasn’t his fault,” Rice told the Associated Press. “He had to slide _ that’s baseball _ but he certainly slides hard.”)

After his playing days, Walker coached in the majors for 21 seasons. He was the pitching coach for the 1969 World Series champion Mets. He later was a scout for the Cardinals when Whitey Herzog was their manager.

Rice ended his playing career with the 1961 Angels. He was the first player signed by the American League expansion franchise and was the starting catcher in their first regular-season game. Boxscore

According to the Los Angeles Times, during his stint as an Angels coach in the 1960s, Rice “etched his name into the club’s lore by organizing and winning a golf tournament played in the halls of the team’s Boston hotel (Rice wore golf spikes, glove, hat and pajamas), with the players putting into cocktail glasses.”

After four seasons managing in the minors, Rice was the Angels’ manager in 1972, Nolan Ryan’s first season with the club after being coached by Rube Walker with the Mets.

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How Roger Bresnahan instilled Cardinals with tenacity

Posted in Games, Hitters, Managers on April 28, 2025| 11 Comments »

Trying to inspire a ballclub that had become accustomed to losing, Roger Bresnahan was willing to do whatever it took for the Cardinals to win, even if it meant playing second base.

Bresnahan, the Cardinals’ player-manager in 1911, would become the second catcher (after Buck Ewing) elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Yet, when the Cardinals were in a pinch at second base, Bresnahan inserted himself there in a game against the Pirates.

According to researcher Tom Orf, Bresnahan is one of six Cardinals who have played both at catcher and at second base in the same game. The others: Art Hoelskoetter (1907), Jose Oquendo (1988), Scott Hemond (1995), Tony Cruz (2011) and Pedro Pages (2025).

Quality catcher

A 5-foot-9 scrapper, Bresnahan made his mark with the Giants, displaying the same kind of intensity as the club’s manager, John McGraw.

In the 1905 World Series, Bresnahan caught four shutouts _ three from Christy Mathewson; the other from Joe McGinnity _ in wins against the Athletics. Bresnahan also produced a .500 on-base percentage in that Series, with five hits, four walks and two hit by pitches in 22 plate appearances.

Two years later, Bresnahan became the first catcher to wear shin guards and brought other protective gear innovations, including a rudimentary batting helmet, to the sport, according to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

The Cardinals, who had the worst record in the majors (49-105) in 1908, acquired Bresnahan, 29, after the season and made him player-manager, giving him the task of injecting fight and hustle into the moribund ballclub.

As a syndicated item in The Cincinnati Post noted in 1911, Bresnahan “is a fighter, and dead anxious to make fighters of others. That’s why he keeps after his men all the time _ to keep them in a fighting mood while on the diamond.”

The Cardinals got a little bit better in each of Bresnahan’s first two seasons as player-manager _ 54-98 in 1909 and 63-90 in 1910 _ but he was looking for greater improvement in 1911. That also was the year Helene Britton took over the Cardinals as the first woman to own a major-league team.

Cincinnati commotion

Determined to establish an aggressive tone early on, Bresnahan gave the Reds a steady stream of trash talk from behind the plate during an April 18, 1911, game at Cincinnati. As the Cincinnati Enquirer put it, “Bresnahan had been using a great deal of coarse language and the Reds claim that his remarks were such that they could not be passed by unnoticed.”

On their way to the clubhouses after the game, Bresnahan and Reds left fielder Bob Bescher continued jawing at one another. “Both men were thoroughly angry,” the Enquirer noted. Bescher threw a punch, socking Bresnahan “flush on the mouth,” The Cincinnati Post reported. “Blood squirted right and left like thick spray from a wind-blown fountain.”

Bresnahan retaliated and the two engaged in what the Enquirer described as “a ferocious fistfight” before Bescher’s teammates, shortstop Dave Altizer and first baseman Dick Hoblitzell, joined in. According to the St. Louis Star-Times, though Altizer and Hoblitzell appeared to be trying to separate the men, “in reality they were taking sly punches at Bresnahan.”

Bresnahan fought back until police and other players broke up the melee, the Star-Times reported.

“Bescher hit at me and, of course, I came back,” Bresnahan told the St. Louis newspaper. “Then Hoblitzell and Altizer broke into the fray. I attended to them. The Cincinnati fans then tried to get us, but the police stopped the doings.”

Bescher said to the Star-Times, “Bresnahan had been goading me all afternoon to the point where I lost my temper. I did not need any help from Altizer and Hoblitzell, but as fellow teammates they felt called upon to interfere.”

The brouhaha made the headlines but another significant story was the injury suffered by Cardinals second baseman Miller Huggins in the game.

With two outs and the bases loaded in the eighth inning, the Reds’ Johnny Bates looped a fly ball to short right. Huggins, first baseman Ed Konetchy and right fielder Steve Evans all chased after the ball. As Huggins made the catch, Konetchy and Evans collided with him. Huggins injured a leg and had to remain in Cincinnati for treatment while the Cardinals returned to St. Louis. Boxscore

Rough and tumble

Beginning a homestand with four games against the Cubs, Bresnahan replaced Huggins with rookie Wally Smith at second base. Smith started two games, but then third baseman Mike Mowrey became bedridden with a severe cold. So, Bresnahan shifted Smith to third and put another rookie, Dan McGeehan, at second for the final two games of the Cubs series. The Cubs swept all four, dropping the Cardinals’ record to 2-5.

Then the Pirates came to town. In 1910, the Cardinals lost 17 of 21 against Pittsburgh. Bresnahan was determined to show the Pirates his 1911 club wasn’t intimidated by them, but three regulars (Steve Evans, Miller Huggins and Mike Mowrey) were sidelined and Bresnahan was playing with a bum knee “swollen to almost twice its normal size,” the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.

The series opener on Monday afternoon, April 24, 1911, at Robison Field in St. Louis was played with the intensity of a pennant race showdown. Pirates runners were tagged out at the plate by Bresnahan in the second and in the sixth.

In the seventh, the Cardinals’ Jack Bliss batted for Dan McGeehan, then stayed in the game at catcher as Bresnahan moved to second base. (He had filled in at second for nine games late in the 1909 season.)

With the Pirates ahead, 5-4, in the eighth, Honus Wagner was on third when Dots Miller tried a suicide squeeze bunt. He tapped the ball toward first but Ed Konetchy got to it quickly and flipped to Bliss. Wagner tried to knock over the catcher, but Bliss blocked the dish and tagged out The Flying Dutchman.

The Cardinals tied the score in the bottom half of the eighth and the game advanced to extra innings.

In the last half of the 11th, Bresnahan punched a single to right and Rebel Oakes moved him to second with a sacrifice bunt. Bliss followed with a tapper to pitcher Lefty Leifield, who fielded the ball and threw to rookie first baseman Newt Hunter.

According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Bliss “deliberately threw himself at Hunter, knocking him on his back.” The ball fell from Hunter’s grasp and rolled away as he writhed on the ground in agony. Bresnahan, who had reached third, streaked to the plate and scored the winning run.

“Bliss undoubtedly intentionally knocked Hunter down,” The Pittsburgh Press declared. “Bliss could have veered to the right instead of throwing his entire weight upon the Pirates’ first baseman. The Cardinals are evidently being taught by Bresnahan to be aggressive.”

Though Hunter dropped the ball, rookie umpire Bill Finneran ruled that Bliss was out for interference but allowed Bresnahan’s run to count. As the Post-Gazette noted, “If he called Bliss out for interference, why did he permit Bresnahan to move up on the play? Bresnahan should have been sent back to third, where he started from after Hunter had been rendered helpless.” Boxscore

Off the rails

Bresnahan and his Cardinals players faced a far more dire challenge three months later in July 1911 when they boarded the Federal Express train at Philadelphia’s Broad Street Station for a 10-hour ride to Boston.

Here’s an account by Tom Shieber, senior curator of the Baseball Hall of Fame:

“Originally, the ballplayers occupied a pair of Pullman sleepers located near the front of the train, close behind the 10-wheel locomotive and a U.S. Fishery coach. The position wasn’t ideal. Amid the sweltering heat that saw the mercury rise to 100 degrees that day, it was nearly impossible to sleep with the car windows closed, but opening the windows only made matters worse, letting in the unpleasantness of engine cinders and the stench of baby trout.

“The engine had been reduced to a mound of twisted metal and glowing coals. Behind the ruins of the engine lay a melee of crushed cars haphazardly strewn about, their structures mangled into splinters of wood and piles of iron.

“Miraculously, the last two cars, the ones that carried the Cardinals, remained on the rails and escaped serious damage, as did the individuals within. The rest of the scene, however, was one of calamitous destruction and horrifying injuries.”

Bresnahan led his players in rescue attempts and they removed 15 to 20 injured people from the day coach, the Washington Herald reported. Fourteen of the 150 passengers were killed.

The Cardinals boarded another train to Boston. At Bresnahan’s request, the Braves postponed that day’s game and rescheduled it as a doubleheader the following day. Because their uniforms were lost in the train accident, the Cardinals played the July 12 doubleheader wearing the Braves’ dark blue road uniforms. After the Cardinals won the opener, the nightcap was halted with the score tied.

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Carl Warwick came through in a pinch for Cardinals

Posted in Games, Hitters, Opponents, Records, Trades on April 21, 2025| 14 Comments »

Carl Warwick seemed an unlikely candidate to shine for the Cardinals in the 1964 World Series.

A week before the season ended, Warwick suffered a fractured cheekbone when he was struck by a line drive during pregame drills. He underwent surgery the next day.

After the Cardinals clinched the National League pennant in the season finale, manager Johnny Keane opted to put Warwick on the World Series roster as a pinch-hitter, even though he hadn’t swung a bat in a game in almost two weeks.

Warwick delivered, with three pinch-hit singles, two of which contributed to wins against the Yankees, and helped the Cardinals become World Series champions.

An outfielder who played for the Dodgers (1961), Cardinals (1961-62, 1964-65), Colt .45s (1962-63), Orioles (1965) and Cubs (1966), Warwick was 88 when he died on April 5, 2025.

Left and right

After leading Texas Christian University in hitting (.361) as a junior in 1957, Warwick got married and planned to start a family. So when Dodgers scout Hugh Alexander offered a contract in excess of $30,000, Warwick signed in December 1957, opting to skip his senior season. “I figured one year in pro ball would be worth more than a final year in college,” Warwick told the Austin American.

(Warwick earned a business administration degree from Texas Christian in 1961.)

He was the rare ballplayer who threw left and batted right. “I’m a natural southpaw,” Warwick said to the Los Angeles Mirror, “but as long as I can remember I’ve always picked up a bat with my right hand and hit right-handed.”

(Before Warwick, big-leaguers who threw left and batted right included outfielders Rube Bressler and Johnny Cooney, and first baseman Hal Chase.)

Though listed as 5-foot-10 and 170 pounds, Warwick looked shorter and lighter. As Joe Heiling of the Austin American noted, “Carl didn’t fill the popular image of a slugger. His shoulders weren’t broad as the side of a barn.”

In college, Warwick hit drives straightaway and to the gaps. To hit with power in the pros, he’d need to learn to pull the ball, said Danny Ozark, his manager at Class A Macon (Ga.). Taught by Ozark how to get out in front of pitches with his swing, Warwick walloped 22 home runs for Macon in 1958.

Moved up to Class AA Victoria (Texas) in 1959, Warwick roomed with future American League home run champion Frank Howard and tore up the Texas League, hitting .331 with 35 homers and scoring 129 runs. Victoria manager Pete Reiser, the St. Louis native and former Dodgers outfielder, rated Warwick a better all-around prospect than Howard.

“Carl can play there (in the majors) sooner than Howard,” Reiser told the Austin American. “Carl has a better knowledge of the strike zone than Howard and he’s starting to hit the curveball. To me, that’s a sign that a hitter is coming into his own. You won’t find any better than Carl. Defensively, there’s not too many better than him in the minors or big leagues. He can go get the ball.”

Climbing another notch to Class AAA in 1960, Warwick was a standout for St. Paul (Minn.), with 104 runs scored and double digits in doubles (27), triples (11) and homers (19).

Seeking a chance

Warwick, 24, opened the 1961 season with the Dodgers, who were loaded with outfielders. A couple were veterans (Wally Moon, Duke Snider); most, like Warwick, hadn’t reached their primes (Tommy Davis, Willie Davis, Don Demeter, Ron Fairly, Frank Howard). In May, the Dodgers sent Warwick and Bob Lillis to the Cardinals for Daryl Spencer. According to the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, Cardinals manager Solly Hemus called Warwick the “key man for us” in the deal and named him the center fielder, replacing Curt Flood. “Warwick fits into our future plans very well,” Hemus told the Los Angeles Mirror.

Warwick’s first hit for the Cardinals was a home run he pulled over the fence in left against Bob Buhl of the Braves at Milwaukee. Of his first 12 hits for St. Louis, seven were for extra bases _ four doubles, one triple, two homers. Boxscore

Harry Walker, the Cardinals’ hitting coach, didn’t want Warwick swinging for the fences, though, and suggested he alter his approach.

“He said I didn’t have the power to hit the ball out,” Warwick told the Austin American. “He said I wasn’t strong enough. He wanted me to punch the ball to right field. After you’ve been hitting a certain way so long, it’s hard to change. He made me go to a heavier bat with a thicker handle.”

Out of sync, Warwick said he tried hitting one way in batting practice, then another in games. On July 4, his season average for the Cardinals dropped to .217. Two days later, Solly Hemus was fired and replaced by Johnny Keane, who reinstated Flood in center. Warwick was dispatched to the minors. “We’re sending him out so that he’ll have a chance to play every day the rest of the season,” Keane told the Globe-Democrat.

Houston calling

The next year, Warwick figured to stay busy with the 1962 Cardinals subbing for their geriatric outfielders, Minnie Minoso in left and Stan Musial in right. (“Our outfield has Old Taylor and Ancient Age with a little Squirt for a chaser,” Flood quipped to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.)

However, when an expansion club, the Houston Colt .45s, offered the Cardinals a pitcher they’d long coveted, Bobby Shantz, they couldn’t resist. On May 7, 1962, the Cardinals swapped Warwick and John Anderson for Shantz.

The trade was ill-timed for the Cardinals. Four days later, Minoso fractured his skull and right wrist when he crashed into a wall trying to snare a drive.

Warwick became Houston’s center fielder. In his first appearance in St. Louis after the trade, he produced four hits and a walk, including four RBI against Bob Gibson with a two-run double and a two-run homer. (For his career, Warwick hit .333 versus Gibson.) Boxscore

In addition to Gibson, Warwick also homered against Don Drysdale, Sandy Koufax and Juan Marichal that season.

When Cardinals general manager Bing Devine had a chance to reacquire Warwick, he swapped Jim Beauchamp and Chuck Taylor for him on Feb. 17, 1964.

Shifting roles

On Opening Day in 1964 against the Dodgers’ Sandy Koufax, Warwick was the Cardinals’ right fielder, with Flood in center and Charlie James in left. Boxscore

After two months, the club determined an outfield overhaul was needed. Flood remained, but Lou Brock was acquired from the Cubs in June to replace James and Mike Shannon was promoted from the minors in July to take over in right. Warwick primarily became a pinch-hitter.

He went to Cardinals coach Red Schoendienst and pinch-hitter deluxe Jerry Lynch of the Pirates for advice on how to perform the role. “Both of them agree you’ve got to be ready to attack the ball,” Warwick told Newsday.

On Sept. 27, 1964, before a game at Pittsburgh, Warwick was walking to the sidelines from the outfield during warmup drills when a line drive from a fungo bat swung by pitcher Ron Taylor struck him in the face, fracturing his right cheekbone. The next day, in St. Louis, Cardinals surgeon Dr. I.C. Middleman and plastic surgeon Dr. Francis Paletta performed an operation to repair the damage.

When the World Series began on Oct. 7 in St. Louis, Warwick was on the Cardinals’ roster, even though he hadn’t played in a game since Sept. 23. He also hadn’t produced a RBI since Aug. 2 or a home run since May 8.

However, as Keane explained to columnist Bob Broeg, “Pinch-hitting, Carl is extremely aggressive.”

Big hits

With the score tied at 4-4 in the sixth inning of World Series Game 1 at St. Louis, the Cardinals had Tim McCarver on second, two outs, when Warwick was sent to bat for pitcher Ray Sadecki. As Warwick stepped to the plate against the Yankees’ Al Downing, “my head was aching and my (scarred) cheek was hurting,” he later told United Press International.

Warwick whacked Downing’s first pitch past shortstop Phil Linz for a single, scoring McCarver and putting the Cardinals ahead to stay. St. Louis won, 9-5. Video, Boxscore

“I went up there with the idea of swinging at the first one if it was anywhere close,” Warwick told the Post-Dispatch. “I was looking for a fastball and I got one.”

In Game 2, Warwick, batting for second baseman Dal Maxvill in the eighth, singled and scored against Mel Stottlemyre. Batting again for Maxvill in Game 3, Warwick was walked by Jim Bouton.

The Cardinals, though, were in trouble. The Yankees won two of the first three and led, 3-0, in Game 4 at Yankee Stadium as Downing limited the Cardinals to one hit through five innings.

Needing a spark, Warwick provided one. Sent to bat for pitcher Roger Craig leading off the sixth, Warwick stroked a single on Downing’s second pitch to him.

“I seem to carry a different attitude up there coming cold off the bench,” Warwick told Joe Donnelly of Newsday. “I wouldn’t call it confidence. I come up there swinging. You’ve only got three swings. I don’t want to pass up an opportunity.”

The Cardinals loaded the bases with two outs before Ken Boyer clouted a Downing changeup for a grand slam and a 4-3 triumph. Video, Boxscore

Warwick’s three hits as a pinch-hitter tied a World Series record. The Yankees’ Bobby Brown (1947) and the Giants’ Dusty Rhodes (1954) also produced three pinch-hits in one World Series. Since then, Gonzalo Marquez of the Athletics (1972) and Ken Boswell of the Mets (1973) matched the mark.

(Allen Craig of the Cardinals had four career World Series pinch-hits _ two in 2011 and two more in 2013 _ but not three in one World Series.)

With a chance for a record fourth pinch-hit, Warwick batted for Maxvill in Game 6 but Bouton got him to pop out to third baseman Clete Boyer.

The Cardinals clinched the championship in Game 7, but for Warwick the good vibes didn’t last long. Bob Howsam, who replaced Bing Devine as Cardinals general manager, sent Warwick a contract calling for a $1,000 pay cut. “An insult,” Warwick told the Associated Press.

The magic of 1964 was gone in 1965. Warwick had one hit in April, one more in May and entered June with an .077 batting average. In July, the Cardinals shipped him to the Orioles, who traded him to the Cubs the following spring.

Bing Devine, who as Cardinals general manager twice traded for Warwick, became Mets general manager and acquired him again. Warwick, 29, was invited to try out at 1967 spring training for a reserve spot with the Mets but declined, opting to embark on a real estate career.

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