(Updated March 4, 2019)
Leron Lee, who once hit so poorly he lost the starting right field job with the Cardinals, recovered to become the career batting leader in Japan.
Lee has held the Japanese career batting average record (.320) for players with a minimum of 4,000 at-bats.
The statistics help round out the story of how Lee revived his career after stumbling with the Cardinals.
Support from Sparky
Lee, a left-handed-hitting outfielder, was the first-round choice of the Cardinals in the 1966 draft. He began his professional career in 1967 with the Cardinals’ Class A Modesto team, managed by Sparky Anderson. After a terrible start, Lee finished the season with a .297 batting average and 22 home runs.
In a story in the April 18, 1970, edition of The Sporting News, Lee told how Anderson never lost confidence in him.
“Sparky kept me in the lineup and pitched extra batting pratice to me himself,” Lee said.
Lee progressed through the Cardinals’ system. After he hit .303 with 30 doubles, 17 home runs, 96 RBI and 14 steals for manager Warren Spahn’s Tulsa Oilers in 1969, Lee went to spring training in 1970 with a chance to make the Cardinals’ Opening Day roster.
He took advantage of the opportunity, hitting .308 with a team-best 12 RBI in spring training. Joe Medwick, the Hall of Fame outfielder and Cardinals minor-league batting instructor, said Lee hit the ball so hard “he made it wave,” The Sporting News reported.
“Lee has been learning how to pick his pitches,” said Cardinals batting coach Dick Sisler. “He hasn’t been swinging at too many bad pitches. He’s standing back, waiting for the pitch instead of jumping at it.”
Cardinals manager Red Schoendienst said Lee was “100 percent improved over last year at this time,” according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
“What has helped me most was just playing a lot,” Lee said.
Outfield starter
When the Cardinals opened the 1970 season on April 8 at Montreal, Lee started in right field and went 1-for-5 with a run scored in St. Louis’ 7-2 victory. Boxscore
Lee was the starting right fielder in the Cardinals’ first 21 games of 1970 (Lou Brock was in left; Jose Cardenal in center) and hit .272 in that stretch.
Lee appeared in more games (76) in right field than any other Cardinal in 1970, but he eventually split time with Carl Taylor and Joe Hague as his hitting declined. In 121 games, Lee batted .227 with six home runs, 23 RBI and a .290 on-base percentage.
“I like Leron,” said Schoendienst. “He’s like a young bird dog _ Sometimes they come around all of a sudden.”
In 1971, the Cardinals moved Cardenal to right field and went with Matty Alou and Jose Cruz in center. Lee was relegated to pinch hitting. With his batting average at .171, Lee and pitcher Fred Norman were traded to the Padres on June 11, 1971, for pitcher Al Santorini.
“You take a kid like Leron and use him as little as we did and what can he show you?” said Cardinals general manager Bing Devine. “Leron wanted to play.”
Lee’s career statistics as a Cardinal: .222 batting average, .291 on-base percentage, seven home runs and 25 RBI.
On the rise
Lee played for the Padres, Indians and Dodgers before getting released by the Dodgers on Nov. 2, 1976.
Lee, 28, signed with the Lotte Orions of Japan’s Pacific League and fulfilled his potential.
Lee batted .317 for Lotte in 1977 and led Japan’s Pacific League in home runs (34) and RBI (109). He played 11 years with Lotte. He led the Pacific League in batting (.358) in 1980 and twice led the league in total bases (286 in 1977 and 310 in 1980).
A year-by-year look at Lee’s career with the Lotte Orions:
1977: .317 batting average, 34 homers, 109 RBI
1978: .317 batting average, 30 homers, 88 RBI
1979: .333 batting average, 28 homers, 95 RBI
1980: .358 batting average, 33 homers, 90 RBI
1981: .302 batting average, 19 homers, 71 RBI
1982: .326 batting average, 15 homers, 60 RBI
1983: .317 batting average, 25 homers, 82 RBI
1984: .309 batting average, 31 homers, 88 RBI
1985: .328 batting average, 28 homers, 94 RBI
1986: .331 batting average, 31 homers, 94 RBI
1987: .272 batting average, 9 homers, 41 RBI
In the book “Remembering Japanese Baseball: An Oral History of the Game” by Robert K. Fitts, Lee said the spring training regiment of the Orions helped him.
“I did a lot of (batting practice) when I was in the States _ a couple of hundred balls a day. But in Japan we were hitting 500 to 700 balls a day,” Lee said. “… Over the years, all the practice turned out to be a blessing. It made me a more consistent hitter because my swing was fixed. As the years went by, I realized that kind of spring training was exactly what I should have been doing here in the States.”
According to the Elias Sports Bureau, before Garagiola, the only other rookie with four hits and at least two RBI in a World Series game was third baseman Freddie Lindstrom of the Giants. Lindstrom was 4-for-5 with two RBI in Game 5 of the 1924 World Series against Walter Johnson of the Senators. 
Musial’s first walkoff home run was a two-run shot in the 11th inning off Dick Errickson of the Braves, lifting the Cardinals to a 7-5 win on July 14, 1942, at St. Louis. 
Musial was 38 when he slugged No. 400 _ and he did it in dramatic fashion.
Morris would have gone 17-0 at home with a little better run support.
Of the eight Cardinals teams to qualify for the postseason since Tony La Russa became manager, seven have won 42 or more games after the All-Star Game.
