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How Spud Davis mashed National League pitching

Posted in Games, Hitters, Trades on November 6, 2023| 9 Comments »

For a time, the battery of pitcher Dizzy Dean and catcher Spud Davis formed a dynamic duo for the Cardinals. Dizzy and Spud. Comic strip names. Gashouse Gang characters.

On Nov. 15, 1933, the Cardinals got Davis and infielder Eddie Delker from the Phillies for catcher Jimmie Wilson. The trade was a reverse of one made five years earlier when the Cardinals sent Davis to the Phillies for Wilson.

A right-handed batter, Davis was a consistent .300 hitter. His return to the Cardinals helped them become World Series champions in 1934, a year when Dean became the last National League pitcher to achieve 30 wins in a season.

The hard-throwing Dean and the hard-hitting Davis seemed right for one another, but then their relationship splintered.

Tater time

Virgil Lawrence Davis was born and raised in Birmingham, Ala. He got the nickname Spud at an early age from a cousin who noted his fondness for potatoes, according to the Birmingham Post-Herald.

Sent to a military academy in Mississippi, Davis was a standout in baseball and football. According to the Post-Herald, he was offered college football scholarships, but opted for professional baseball, joining the Gulfport (Miss.) Tarpons of the Class D Cotton States League in 1926.

On the recommendation of their scout, Bob Gilks, the Yankees signed Davis in September 1926. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle rated him “the best-looking catcher in the minors.”

Placed on the big-league spring training roster, Davis was given a chance to make the leap from Class D to the 1927 Yankees. In a March 8 intrasquad game, he was the catcher on a team managed by Babe Ruth. The New York Daily News described Davis as “garrulous, a bundle of energy.”

Three weeks later, the Yankees sent Davis to a farm club, the Reading (Pa.) Keystones, managed by Fred Merkle, whose baserunning blunder prevented the 1908 Giants from winning the National League pennant.

Davis hit .308 for Reading in 1927. A rival manager, Burt Shotton of the Cardinals’ Syracuse club, was impressed. Afterward, when baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis declared Davis eligible for the minor-league draft, the Cardinals chose him on Shotton’s recommendation, the Post-Herald reported.

Contact hitter

Davis, 23, made the Opening Day roster of the 1928 Cardinals and played in two April games for them. In May, he was dealt as part of a package to the Phillies, who had hired Burt Shotton as their manager. The key player the Cardinals got in return was a shrewd, experienced catcher, Jimmie Wilson.

With Wilson as their catcher, the Cardinals won three National League pennants (1928, 1930, 1931) and a World Series title (1931).

Davis, meanwhile, developed into a fearsome hitter with the Phillies. He hit better than .300 for them in each of five consecutive seasons (1929-33). The Sporting News declared Davis “the best-hitting catcher in the National League.”

Davis ranked second in the league in both batting (.349) and on-base percentage (.395) in 1933. The league leader in both categories was his Phillies teammate Chuck Klein, who hit .368 and had a .422 on-base percentage.

Against the Cardinals in 1933, Davis hit .425 (31-for-73).

The Cardinals wanted to get Davis back because of his bat and because Jimmie Wilson was not getting along with Frankie Frisch, who had replaced Gabby Street as manager during the 1933 season, the St. Louis Star-Times reported.

So, the Wilson-for-Davis deal was made. Frisch got the catcher he wanted. The Phillies got both a catcher and a leader. Wilson became their player-manager, replacing Burt Shotton.

Time share

Davis began the 1934 season with a bang. He hit .395 in April. In consecutive games against the Reds in July, Davis totaled eight hits, seven RBI. Boxscore and Boxscore

The Cardinals’ pitching was led by the Dean brothers, Dizzy and Paul. Davis told the Post-Herald, “Paul was the fastest pitcher I ever caught. The difference between him and Diz was Dizzy had everything else _ a good curve, control, change of pace and lots of heart.”

(Davis also told the Birmingham newspaper that the Cardinals’ Bill Hallahan “was the best money pitcher I ever saw. If there was one game you needed, I’d take Hallahan.”)

As the 1934 season unfolded, backup catcher Bill DeLancey impressed when given chances to start. The Cardinals, in third place in the National League at the end of July, surged in August (19-11) and September (21-7) and won the pennant. DeLancey contributed, hitting .345 in August and .311 in September.

In the meantime, friction developed between Davis and Dizzy Dean. According to Dean biographer Robert Gregory in his book “Diz,” Dizzy was complaining in the clubhouse late in the season about how hard it was to keep winning without enough support from his teammates. “I ought to whip the whole bunch of you _ at the same time,” Dean ranted. Davis looked up and said, “Shut the fuck up.”

Davis hit .300 (.375 with runners in scoring position) and had an on-base percentage of .366 for the 1934 Cardinals, but Frankie Frisch decided to start DeLancey (.316 batting mark, .414 on-base percentage) at catcher in the World Series against the Tigers. According to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, when Frisch, who was fond of Davis, told him about the decision, Davis replied, “The hell with how I or anybody else may feel. Bill (DeLancey) has been hot. He’s winning for us. Keep him in there. The pitchers have confidence in him.”

DeLancey started all seven World Series games and the Cardinals prevailed. Davis made two pinch-hit appearances and singled both times, driving in a run. After his first hit, Davis was replaced by a pinch-runner, Dizzy Dean. On attempting to move from first to second on a grounder, Dean got conked in the right temple by a throw from shortstop Billy Rogell. “The first thing I knew, a thousand little stars and big stars was jumping around before my eyes, but I never did see no tigers,” Dean told the Post-Dispatch. Boxscore

Dissed by Dizzy

Davis and DeLancey split catching duties with the 1935 Cardinals. Davis hit .317 (.398 with runners in scoring position) and had a .386 on-base percentage. DeLancey hit .279 with an on-base mark of .369.

To Dizzy Dean, though, the choice was clear: He wanted DeLancey to be his catcher. With Dizzy on the mound, Davis dropped a pop fly in Cincinnati and called for a pitch in Brooklyn that was drilled for a home run. Dean told the Cardinals he lost faith in Davis after that. “Having confidence in a catcher, no matter how good a pitcher a fellow is, means an awful lot,” Dean wrote in a letter to Cardinals executive Branch Rickey.

(In defending Davis, Frisch told the Post-Dispatch, “Diz didn’t know Spud wasn’t calling the pitches. I was.”

Dean went public with his criticism of Davis after the 1935 season.  According to his biographer, Dean said, “I ain’t pitching no more with him back there.”

Rickey wrote to Dean, “I was utterly amazed that you would think about Davis as you do about him.”

Frisch and the team captain, shortstop Leo Durocher, rallied around Davis. Frisch called Dean’s criticism of Davis “unfair and uncalled for” and described Davis as “a great catcher,” the Star-Times reported.

Durocher told the newspaper, “Spud Davis is probably the most popular man on our ballclub. He’s the smartest catcher in the big leagues today and Dizzy overlooks all those games that Spud won for him with his hitting. Davis can catch for my money every day in the week.”

J. Roy Stockton of the Post-Dispatch noted, “The men in the dugout know that Davis is valuable. They know his stout heart.”

When Dean got to spring training, he and Davis shook hands, and, in a statement prepared for him by Rickey, Dizzy said, “Give me a ball and glove and put Davis behind the plate.”

Davis hit .273 for the 1936 Cardinals, ending a streak of seven straight seasons of .300 or better. He was sent to the Reds after the season.

Davis caught more of Dean’s games (68) than any other catcher, according to baseball-reference.com. Dean’s ERA in games with Davis as catcher was 2.87 _ better than his overall career mark of 3.02.

Hitting the best

Frankie Frisch and Spud Davis stuck together. When Frisch managed the Pirates in the 1940s, Davis was his catcher and then a coach. Davis also was a coach on Frisch’s staff when he later managed the Cubs.

In his 16 seasons as a big-league player, Davis batted .308 and produced 1,312 hits. His on-base percentage was .369. In 459 career at-bats versus the Cardinals, Davis hit .305. He batted .333 (11-for-33) against Dizzy Dean and .406 (13-for-22) against another future Hall of Famer from the Cardinals, Jesse Haines.

Asked by the Post-Herald to name the best right-handed pitcher he played with or against, Davis chose Dizzy Dean. His pick for best left-hander was Carl Hubbell of the Giants.

Davis hit .301 (41-for-133) versus Hubbell, who told the Newspaper Enterprise Association, “He’s hard to outguess. I try to make each pitch something unexpected but somehow Spud anticipates a fair number of my offerings.”

Davis explained to the Post-Herald, “I could hit a low ball well and Hubbell’s best pitch (a screwball) was low.”

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Homeward bound: Sonny Siebert, Cardinals connect at last

Posted in Games, Pitchers, Trades on October 6, 2023| 12 Comments »

As a youth in south St. Louis County, Sonny Siebert was a fan of second baseman Red Schoendienst and the hometown baseball teams, Cardinals and Browns. Years later, Siebert played for Schoendienst when he managed the Cardinals.

A right-hander with the skill to pitch a no-hitter or belt a home run, Siebert was acquired by the Cardinals from the Rangers on Oct. 26, 1973, when he was at the back end of his playing career.

After achieving double-digit win totals in eight of his 10 seasons in the American League, Siebert was up to the challenge of switching to the National League. He pitched a shutout in his Cardinals debut and punctuated his 1974 season with a win in an epic marathon during the September title chase.

At home on the hardwood

Named after his father, a foreman at a lead company, Wilfred Siebert (better known as Sonny) was an infielder for the Bayless High School baseball team in St. Louis and a high jumper for the track squad, but he got the most attention for his basketball abilities. Described by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in February 1953 as a “sprout who is the pride of the Bayless fans,” Siebert got selected to the South County League all-star basketball team his sophomore season.

When Siebert was 15, he attended a Cardinals tryout camp. “They put me at shortstop,” he said to the Post-Dispatch. “Four balls were hit to me and I fielded all of them perfectly and flipped perfectly underhand to first base. I was quite proud. Red Schoendienst had been my idol and I copied his underhanded flip.”

The Cardinals told him to stay home. “They said I didn’t throw hard enough and I ought to forget about baseball,” Siebert said to the Post-Dispatch.

Experiencing a growth spurt, Siebert was 6-foot-2 when he reported for his junior basketball season in high school. (He eventually grew another inch.) He was a prolific scorer, popping jump shots from all ranges. Siebert topped 1,000 points for his varsity career early in his senior year. On Jan. 14, 1955, his 18th birthday, Siebert scored 43 points against Eureka.

“I don’t think there is a shot in the book that Sonny didn’t make that night,” Bayless coach Clyde Ficklin told the Post-Dispatch. “Jump shots, hook shots, drive-ins, layups, fall-away shots _ you name ’em.”

The Post-Dispatch noted, “Wilfred Siebert is an unobtrusive, retiring sort of high school boy who does average-well in class and seldom makes himself noticed. There is almost nothing out of the ordinary about him except when he puts on a basketball uniform for the Bayless High team. Then Wilfred becomes Sonny Siebert, a running, shooting demon who drives opponents batty.”

A two-time Class B all-state selection, Siebert accepted a basketball scholarship to the University of Missouri in June 1955. As a sophomore in his first varsity season, Siebert averaged 13.4 points a game. His 308 total points broke the Missouri sophomore record held by Norm Stewart (256).

Playing in a conference dominated by Wilt Chamberlain of Kansas and Bob Boozer of Kansas State, Siebert averaged a team-high 16.7 points for Missouri as a junior. He scored 27 in an upset victory against Indiana and his free throw with four seconds left gave Missouri a one-point triumph versus Marquette.

Missouri coach Sparky Stalcup called Siebert the “league’s best shot,” United Press reported. The wire service also observed that Siebert “is troubled by myopia, an eye condition making distant objects blurry.” Siebert was taking “pupil dilation treatment” for his eyes.

Change in plans

Siebert didn’t play baseball at Missouri as a sophomore but he did his junior year. A first baseman, he hit .368 with eight home runs in the regular season. Missouri reached the championship game of the 1958 College World Series before losing to University of Southern California, 8-7, in 12 innings on June 19. Two days later, Siebert, 21, got married.

Receiving interest from professional baseball teams, Siebert decided to skip his senior year at Missouri. The Cleveland Indians brought him to their ballpark for workouts that summer under the supervision of talent evaluators Hoot Evers and Bob Kennedy.

“(Outfielder) Rocky Colavito was there then and he worked with me every day, teaching me how to make the throw from the outfield,” Siebert recalled to The Sporting News. “Evers and Kennedy seemed to like the way I threw the ball, so they decided to make an outfielder out of me.”

Siebert signed with the Indians on July 16, 1958, and received a $48,000 bonus, the Post-Dispatch reported. He was one of three St. Louis athletes who left University of Missouri early for pro baseball deals in 1958. The others, football players Charlie James and Mike Shannon, signed with the Cardinals.

Sent to a Class B farm club in Burlington, N.C., Siebert struggled in the outfield, didn’t hit (.147) and was dropped to Class D Batavia, N.Y. “On the last day of the season, we didn’t have any pitchers left, so I pitched two innings of relief and I did all right,” Siebert told The Sporting News. “I think the batters were afraid to stand in there against me. It was the first time I was ever on the mound.”

Still an outfielder in 1959 with the Class C Minot (N.D.) Mallards, Siebert broke an ankle and was limited to 185 at-bats. After the season, he went to the Indians’ Florida Instructional League team. Asked to pitch batting practice, Siebert impressed coach Spud Chandler, the former Yankees pitcher, who urged him to stick with pitching.

(Siebert then accepted an invitation to try out for the NBA St. Louis Hawks. He participated in their training camp before the 1959-60 season but didn’t make the team.) 

An outfielder at spring training in 1960, Siebert got frustrated when instructors tried to change his batting style. According to The Sporting News, he “was ready to quit,” but then, remembering Chandler’s advice, asked to become a pitcher.

On the rise

Success was not immediate but Siebert persevered. He was 27 when he reached the majors with the 1964 Indians.

In 1965, Siebert had 16 wins and a 2.43 ERA for Cleveland. He struck out 15 in shutting out the Washington Senators. Boxscore

The next year, Siebert won 16 again, including a no-hitter versus the Senators. Boxscore

He got to pitch in St. Louis for the first time as a professional, appearing in the 1966 All-Star Game at Busch Memorial Stadium. Siebert retired all six batters he faced _ Jim Ray Hart, Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente, Hank Aaron, Willie McCovey, Ron Santo. Boxscore

Experienced pro

In April 1969, Siebert was traded to the Red Sox. He had 15 wins for them in 1970 and 16 in 1971. He also hit .266 with six home runs for the 1971 Red Sox. Two of those homers came in a game versus Pat Dobson of the Orioles, who were shut out by Siebert. Boxscore

“Sonny Siebert has the best stuff on the staff,” Red Sox pitcher Bill Lee said to The Sporting News.

In 1973, Siebert had a falling out with Red Sox manager Eddie Kasko, who banished him to the bullpen. The Rangers, managed by Whitey Herzog, acquired Siebert in May 1973 and he became their ace.

In his Rangers debut, Siebert pitched five scoreless innings to beat Catfish Hunter and the Athletics. Boxscore On June 20, Siebert shut out the Twins and ended Rod Carew’s 18-game hitting streak. Boxscore Five days later, he pitched six scoreless innings in a win versus Ken Holtzman and the A’s. Boxscore

Mike Shropshire of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram wrote, “When Sonny Siebert pitches, the Rangers’ games take on a peculiar air of dignity and sophistication. Instead of the usual orgy of runs, it’s strictly a matter of law and order.”

In July, with his ERA at 2.10 for the Rangers, Siebert suffered a shoulder separation and was sidelined for a month. When he returned, he lost five decisions in a row. Herzog was fired in September and replaced by Billy Martin.

Headed for home

The Cardinals acquired Siebert (for outfielder Tommy Cruz) to join a revamped starting rotation that included two other former Red Sox pitchers, John Curtis and Lynn McGlothen, and holdovers Bob Gibson and Alan Foster.

At 1974 spring training, Siebert, 37, pitched well and Schoendienst declared him the No. 2 starter behind Gibson. “Siebert has been our best pitcher down here,” Schoendienst told the Post-Dispatch. “In fact, he might also be our best hitter.”

Making his National League debut in the Cardinals’ second game of the season against a Pirates lineup with Willie Stargell and Dave Parker, Siebert pitched a four-hit shutout and drove in two runs with a single. Boxscore

In May, Siebert made five starts and had a 1.66 ERA for the month. He pitched consecutive shutouts against the Cubs and Padres. Boxscore and Boxscore

After he won his fourth straight decision on June 5 versus the Giants, giving up one unearned run in 8.2 innings, Siebert had a season record of 6-3 with a 1.95 ERA for the Cardinals. Boxscore

The bubble burst when Siebert went on the disabled list on July 4 because of an inflamed tendon in his right elbow. He returned on July 28, went winless in August and was moved to the bullpen in September.

Siebert’s last win for the Cardinals came in a doozy of a game _ a 25-inning endurance test with the Mets. Siebert, the Cardinals’ seventh pitcher, performed a high-wire act for 2.1 scoreless innings.

Relieving Claude Osteen with two on and two outs in the 23rd, Siebert walked Felix Millan to load the bases, then got Cleon Jones to fly out to right.

In the 24th, the Mets had the bases loaded with two outs, but Siebert got Rusty Staub to ground out.

The Cardinals broke the 3-3 tie in the 25th when Bake McBride scored from first on a wild pickoff throw by pitcher Hank Webb. Siebert gave up a single to Brock Pemberton (his first big-league hit) in the bottom half of the inning but then shut down the Mets. Boxscore

In 28 games, including 20 starts, for the 1974 Cardinals, Siebert was 8-8 with a 3.84 ERA. After the season, he was traded to the Padres.

Siebert, 38, finished his career with the 1975 Athletics, winning four times for a team that finished with the best record in the American League (98-64) and secured its fifth consecutive West Division title.

His career record was 140-114 with 16 saves. Of his 114 hits, 12 were home runs.

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Hit or miss: Roric Harrison and the Cardinals

Posted in Games, Opponents, Pitchers, Prospects, Trades on October 1, 2023| 7 Comments »

Roric Harrison was an intriguing talent with a distinctive name. A right-hander, he possessed power on the mound and at the plate.

After seeing Harrison pitch at spring training in 1973, Phillies ace Steve Carlton told the Philadelphia Daily News, “Just a super, fantastic arm. He could win 20 with that arm just throwing strikes with his fastball.”

Harrison had some special performances, but inconsistent command of his pitches, as well as injuries, hampered him. A pitcher for the Orioles (1972), Braves (1973-75), Indians (1975) and Twins (1978), he had a career mark of 30-35 with 10 saves. He also produced 15 hits _ six were home runs.

During his five seasons in the majors, Harrison earned two wins versus the Cardinals. Both were complete games. He hit a home run in each, including one against Bob Gibson.

Later, Harrison went to spring training with the Cardinals but failed in an attempt to make the club as a reliever.

Top of the morning

Roric Harrison was from Los Angeles but his family roots were in Ireland, which is how he got his name. He told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in 1973, “I’m Irish and the first rebel king of Ireland was named Roric. My father liked it.”

(The rebel king in the 1500s was Brian O’Rourke, or O’Ruairc in Irish Gaelic. Handsome, proud, defiant, he got into territorial disputes with the English, who arrested and executed him for his rebelliousness.)

Harrison was a Dodgers fan as a youth. He turned 13 a couple of weeks before they clinched the 1959 World Series title against the White Sox at Chicago. At the Los Angeles airport, Harrison hung on a fence to glimpse the players arriving home. “I had tears in my eyes seeing my heroes get off the plane _ Maury Wills, Don Drysdale, Gil Hodges,” he recalled to the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.

Five years later, when he turned 18, Harrison signed with the Astros. Pitching in their farm system, he threw hard, not accurately. Harrison struck out the first seven batters he faced as a pro, then walked the next five, according to the Akron Beacon Journal. He told the Rochester newspaper, “My fastball was hard to control at times. I was overthrowing.”

In 1969, still in the minors, Harrison tore up his left knee while fielding a bunt and had surgery. (He’d need operations on the knee again in 1971 and 1974.) An American League expansion team, the Seattle Pilots, took a chance on him while he mended. On Aug. 24, 1969, they traded pitcher (and “Ball Four” author) Jim Bouton to the Astros for Harrison and Dooley Womack.

The Pilots moved from Seattle to Milwaukee in 1970 and were renamed the Brewers, but Harrison was not in their immediate plans. He got assigned to the minors for a sixth straight year.

Change of plans

Finally, at spring training with the Brewers in 1971, Harrison had a breakthrough. He pitched well and made the Opening Day roster. Then, the day before the season opener, with the Brewers in need of a left-hander, he got traded to the Orioles for Marcelino Lopez.

“It was the kind of deal you sometimes hate to make because a fine young arm can come back to haunt you,” Brewers general manager Frank Lane told The Sporting News. “Harrison showed a lot of stuff this spring.”

The 1971 Orioles (who would win the American League pennant) were loaded with pitchers, so Harrison was sent again to the minors. He joined a Rochester Red Wings team featuring prospects such as Don Baylor, Bobby Grich and Ron Shelton, who later became director and screenwriter of the 1988 film “Bull Durham.”

Harrison found his groove with Rochester. In June 1971, he pitched a two-hit shutout and slugged a grand slam versus the Toledo Mud Hens. A month later, against Toledo again, he struck out 18, pitched a three-hitter and drove in a run with a triple. Harrison told the Rochester newspaper, “My fastball was really doing its thing. Jumping. Tailing off.”

On Aug. 12, 1971, Harrison pitched a one-hitter against Syracuse. Three days later, he was in the dugout when a foul ball struck him on the right side of the head, damaging an ear drum. “Thank God he turned his head,” Dr. Armand Cincotta told the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle. “If he hadn’t turned his head, the ball would have hit him flush in the face.”

Harrison was treated at a hospital, but two days after the accident he started the first game of a doubleheader versus Syracuse. Despite a ringing sound in his right ear, he pitched a seven-inning one-hitter. “It was a strange feeling,” he told the Rochester newspaper, “because I couldn’t hear the ball hit the catcher’s mitt.”

Harrison finished with a 15-5 record, including five shutouts, and a 2.81 ERA for Rochester in 1971. He struck out 182 in 170 innings. He also hit .273 with four home runs.

At spring training in 1972, Harrison impressed Orioles manager Earl Weaver, who told the Baltimore Evening Sun, “Harrison exceeds my expectations. He throws as hard as anyone we’ve got in this camp except maybe one guy (Jim Palmer).”

With a starting staff of Palmer, Mike Cuellar, Pat Dobson and Dave McNally, Harrison primarily was a reliever with the 1972 Orioles, but, at last, he was in the big leagues for the first time. The rookie led the club in appearances (39) and was second (to Palmer) in ERA (2.30).

When the Orioles made a pitch for Braves slugger Earl Williams after the season, they had to include Harrison (along with Davey Johnson, Pat Dobson and Johnny Oates) to complete the trade. Video

Clashes with Cardinals

After beginning the 1973 season in the bullpen, Harrison became part of the starting rotation for the Braves. His first win for them was on June 10, a 5-2 victory against the Cardinals. His home run against Tom Murphy broke a scoreless tie in the third. Harrison held the Cardinals to one hit (a Ken Reitz triple in the sixth) in eight innings before Danny Frisella relieved in the ninth.

Regarding Harrison, Cardinals manager Red Schoendienst told the Post-Dispatch, “He’s the best pitcher they got.” Boxscore

Two months later, the Cardinals torched Harrison in a seven-run third inning capped by pitcher Rick Wise’s grand slam, but the Braves (with four RBI from Dusty Baker, three from Hank Aaron and three scoreless innings of relief from Phil Niekro) rallied and won, 11-7. Boxscore

Harrison made 38 appearances, including 22 starts, for the 1973 Braves and finished 11-8 with five saves.

Placed in a Braves starting rotation with Phil Niekro, Ron Reed and Carl Morton, Harrison struggled in 1974. He had ERAs of 5.20 in April and 4.41 in May.

A highlight came on June 14, 1974. Matched against Bob Gibson, Harrison hit a two-run homer and limited the Cardinals to one unearned run for the win. Braves manager Eddie Mathews told the Atlanta Journal, “It might have been the best I’ve seen him look since he got here last year.” Boxscore

A month later, Gibson and Harrison were matched again. Gibson needed three strikeouts to become the first National League pitcher with 3,000. He got two. Harrison gave up a three-run home run to Ted Simmons and departed after six innings, but it was Gibson who took the loss. Boxscore

Out of luck

In June 1975, Harrison was traded to the Indians for Blue Moon Odom and Rob Belloir. Ten months later, in April 1976, the Indians sent him to the Cardinals for Harry Parker.

When Harrison, 29, learned the Cardinals would assign him to the minors, he thought about not reporting, but reconsidered after a talk with general manager Bing Devine. “He assured me that I was obtained with the big-league club in mind,” Harrison said to the Tulsa World.

Harrison’s 1976 season got curtailed in June when he had surgery to remove bone chips from his right elbow. “The surgery made me a sort of bionic man,” he told The Sporting News. “It seemed they put in a new arm.”

The Cardinals put him on their big-league winter roster and he went to spring training with them in 1977 as a candidate for a relief role.

The luck of the Irish was with Harrison on St. Patrick’s Day when he pitched three scoreless innings for the win in a spring training exhibition against the White Sox. “My arms feels as good as it did when I was a rookie with the Orioles,” he told The Sporting News.

His other performances, though, were inconsistent. In four Grapefruit League appearances, his ERA was 4.64.

First-year Cardinals manager Vern Rapp opted to keep nine pitchers on the Opening Day roster _ four starters (Bob Forsch, John Denny, Pete Falcone, Eric Rasmussen), a swingman (John D’Acquisto) and four relievers (Al Hrabosky, Clay Carrol and rookies John Urrea and John Sutton).

Released by the Cardinals, Harrison pitched in the farm systems of the Tigers (1977) and Twins (1978). The Twins called him up in June 1978 and he ended his big-league career with them, making nine relief appearances.

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Cardinals hoped for a playoff melody with Eddie Fisher

Posted in Games, Pitchers, Trades on August 25, 2023| 12 Comments »

Eddie Fisher made sweet music with a pitch that could dance. That’s why the Cardinals wanted his help in their bid for a division title.

On Aug. 29, 1973, the Cardinals purchased the contract of Fisher, 37, from the White Sox. The right-handed knuckleball specialist was in his 15th and final season in the majors.

On the day Fisher was acquired, the Cardinals (67-64) led a weak National League East Division. They were two games ahead of the second-place Pirates (63-64) and 6.5 in front of the last-place Mets (60-70).

With Diego Segui, Orlando Pena, Al Hrabosky and Rich Folkers, the Cardinals had a reliable bullpen but wanted the insurance of another experienced reliever for the title run. Fisher fit the bill.

Home on the range

Fisher attended grades one through 12 at Friendship School in Altus, Okla. “There were only 16 in my graduating class, nine boys and seven girls, including Betty Hudgens, whom I later married,” Fisher recalled to The Sporting News.

He excelled in baseball and basketball. His Altus American Legion baseball teammate, Lindy McDaniel, also became a big-league pitcher. As a high school senior, Fisher was a principal player in a major upset. He shut out state powerhouse Capitol Hill, ending its 66-game winning streak in 1954.

“I could throw the knuckler then, but I could win with just a fastball and curve, so I never used it in a game,” Fisher said to The Sporting News.

After graduating, Fisher got a job in Oklahoma City reading gas meters. He also pitched for the company baseball team. Its manager, Roy Deal, was the father of Cardinals pitcher Cot Deal. Roy helped Fisher get an athletic scholarship to the University of Oklahoma.

Fisher didn’t throw the knuckleball in college either. “Eddie didn’t need the knuckler to win in college ball,” head coach Jack Baer explained to The Norman Transcript, “and there are very few catchers, let alone college catchers, who can handle a knuckler.”

As a college junior, Fisher got an offer from the Kansas City Athletics but opted to return to Oklahoma for his senior year. When no offers came after Fisher completed his college career, Roy Deal contacted a minor-league team in Corpus Christi, Texas, and helped him get a roster spot there.

Tuning up

Corpus Christi, a farm club of the Giants in 1958, was managed by a former American League catcher, Ray Murray, who encouraged Fisher to add the knuckler to his assortment of pitches.

A year later, in July 1959, Fisher, 23, was called up to the Giants. For Fisher’s debut, a start against the Pirates, manager Bill Rigney used backup catcher Jim Hegan, 38, who was in his 16th season in the majors. Experienced catching the knuckler, Hegan guided the rookie through the game. Fisher pitched seven innings, limiting the Pirates to one run and three hits, and got the win. Boxscore

A popular singer at the time also was named Eddie Fisher. The singer’s marriages to actresses Debbie Reynolds (their daughter is actress Carrie Fisher), Elizabeth Taylor and Connie Stevens added to his fame. Asked about sharing a name with the crooner, baseball’s Eddie Fisher told The Norman Transcript, “I can’t sing, and what’s more, I don’t like to.”

Teammates nicknamed the pitcher Donald Duck “because of the excellent imitation he does” of the Walt Disney character, The Sporting News noted.

Higher education

After the 1961 season, Fisher was sent by the Giants to the White Sox for pitchers Billy Pierce and Don Larsen. Pierce and Larsen helped the Giants win the 1962 pennant. The White Sox helped Fisher find his niche. The turning point came during the 1964 season when his teammate, knuckleballer Hoyt Wilhelm, persuaded him to use the knuckler as his main pitch.

“We’d be out there together in the bullpen and we’d talk shop,” Fisher told The Sporting News. “He kept hammering away at me to throw the knuckler more. He insisted it was my out pitch and he finally convinced me.”

The bullpen combination of Wilhelm and Fisher confounded American League batters. With the 1964 White Sox, Wilhelm was 12-9 with 27 saves and a 1.99 ERA. Fisher was 6-3 with nine saves and a 3.02 ERA. In 1965, Fisher led American League pitchers in appearances (82) and was 15-7 with 24 saves and a 2.40 ERA. Wilhelm was 7-7 with 21 saves and a 1.81 ERA.

Their knucklers baffled White Sox catcher J.C. Martin as well. Martin had 24 passed balls in 1964 and 33 in 1965.

Fisher was effective against all styles of hitters. Contact hitter Bobby Richardson batted .103 in 29 at-bats against him. Slugger Jim Gentile came up empty _ hitless in 15 career at-bats. “If it’s a good knuckleball, it doesn’t just float. It moves,” Gentile told The Oklahoman. “Swing at it, it might dip, might rise.”

American League batters hit .192 versus Fisher in 1964 and .205 in 1965. 

That’s a winner

On June 13, 1966, the White Sox traded Fisher to the Orioles for second baseman Jerry Adair. Fisher joined a bullpen with Stu Miller, Moe Drabowsky and Dick Hall.

Fisher made an immediate impact, earning a save or a win in five of his first seven appearances with the Orioles. He pitched in 44 games for them and was 5-3 with 14 saves and a 2.64 ERA. The Orioles (97-63) won the pennant.

Though Fisher led the league in appearances (67 combined for the White Sox and Orioles) for the second year in a row, he didn’t pitch in the 1966 World Series versus the Dodgers. The Orioles swept, getting shutouts from Jim Palmer, Wally Bunker and Dave McNally. The only Orioles reliever to appear in that World Series was Drabowsky, who pitched 6.2 scoreless innings and struck out 11 in Game 1.

Fisher never got to play for another World Series participant. He was with the Indians in 1968 and the Angels from 1969-72 before returning to the White Sox.

Final season

At spring training in 1973, Fisher, 36, had a 1.33 ERA in 27 innings pitched in exhibition games. White Sox manager Chuck Tanner and pitching coach Johnny Sain decided to open the season with Fisher as their No. 3 starter behind another knuckleballer, Wilbur Wood, and Stan Bahnsen.

Fisher won four of his first five decisions, but the good times didn’t last. He slumped in June (10.67 ERA in five starts) and was moved back to the bullpen. In 10 relief appearances covering 35.1 innings, he had a 3.57 ERA, prompting the Cardinals to acquire him. Barney Schultz, Cardinals pitching coach in 1973, helped St. Louis win a World Series title in 1964 as a knuckleball reliever who joined the club in August.

Cardinals manager Red Schoendienst put Fisher to work, pitching him in three consecutive games. In his second appearance, on Sept. 2, 1973, Fisher got the win with a scoreless inning of relief against the Mets. The triumph gave the Cardinals (69-67) sole possession of first place in the division, a game ahead of the Pirates (66-66), and pushed the Mets (63-72) nine games below .500. Boxscore

The next day, the Cardinals played a doubleheader against the Pirates. In the opener, with the score tied at 4-4, Fisher entered in the bottom of the 13th inning. The first batter he faced, Richie Hebner, clobbered a knuckleball to deep right.

“I definitely thought it was gone,” Cardinals catcher Ted Simmons told The Pittsburgh Press. “I was ready to walk off the field.”

Instead, the ball hit the wall and caromed past right fielder Jose Cruz. Center fielder Luis Melendez didn’t back up Cruz as he should. The ball bounced along the artificial surface of the outfield as Hebner steamed around the bases.

Melendez said to The Pittsburgh Press, “I’ve got to be there (backing up the play). If I get there when I was supposed to, it only would have been a double.”

When Melendez finally got to the ball, he reached for it and didn’t come up with it. He reached a second time and again couldn’t grab it. Pirates third-base coach Bill Mazeroski told The Pittsburgh Press that he intended to hold Hebner at third, but when Melendez twice failed to retrieve the ball, “I sent him in. If he picks it up the first or second time, I don’t send him in.”

Hebner scooted to the plate with a walkoff inside-the-park home run, and Fisher was the losing pitcher. Boxscore

Two weeks later, on Sept. 17, Fisher got a win, pitching two scoreless innings and driving in a run with a single against the Expos’ Mike Marshall. Boxscore

By then, though, the Cardinals (74-76) were sliding. The Mets won seven in a row from Sept. 18 to Sept. 25 and finished as the only team in the division with a winning record (82-79).

(The 1973 Cardinals ended 81-81, sixth overall in the National League, a finish that today would have them popping champagne corks and selling postseason merchandise as lame playoff qualifiers.)

Fisher was released by the Cardinals after the season, ending his playing days. He was 2-1 with a 1.29 ERA for them. For his career in the majors, Fisher was 85-70 with 82 saves.

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Why Duke Carmel was a prince of a prospect for Cardinals

Posted in Hitters, Opponents, Prospects, Trades on July 21, 2023| 16 Comments »

There was a time in the late 1950s when the Cardinals thought a left-handed slugger from the streets of New York City might be the successor to Stan Musial.

Duke Carmel certainly fit the part. He was named after Duke Snider, had the mannerisms of Ted Williams and could hit with the power of Mickey Mantle.

Rangy (6-foot-3) and strong (200 muscular pounds), “Duke Carmel on a baseball field looks like the player you’d put together if somebody asked you to draw a picture of a prospect destined for major-league stardom,” The Buffalo News reported. “The throwing arm, the running speed, the hitting power, the ideal size, the versatility.”

Problem was, he also had a hitch in his swing.

From city to country

Born and raised in East Harlem (“A pretty rugged neighborhood,” he told The Sporting News. “I’ve had to fight my way through all my life.”), Leon James Carmel was nicknamed Duke for his favorite player.

“All the kids there at the time rooted for either the Yankees or Giants,” Carmel told The Sporting News. “When I took up for the Dodgers, and particularly for Duke Snider, they started calling me Duke, too, and it stuck.”

As for his given name of Leon, Carmel said, “If anyone called me that, I might not turn around. I wouldn’t know who they meant.”

A first baseman and pitcher at Benjamin Franklin High School, Carmel, 18, was signed by Cardinals scout Benny Borgmann in 1955.

His breakout season came in 1957 for the Class C farm club at Billings, Mont., 2,000 miles (and worlds apart) from East Harlem. Carmel, 20, hit .324 with 29 home runs and 121 RBI. Moved from first base to the outfield, he had 18 assists. “The best prospect I have ever managed,” Billings manager Eddie Lyons told The Sporting News.

Though Carmel tried to downplay the achievements _ “The pitchers there are mostly throwers and sooner or later they run out of gas,” he told The Sporting News _ the Cardinals were intrigued and brought him to spring training in 1958.

Carmel has “a batting form and a willowy swing that remind observers of Ted Williams,” The Sporting News reported in February 1958.

A manager in the Cardinals’ farm system, former pitcher Cot Deal, said, “Carmel reminds you of Ted Williams.”

J. Roy Stockton of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch noted, “Carmel seems to have most of the requisites _ sharp eyes, lithe muscles, a cocky, happy disposition, and a sparkling desire to bash a baseball to distant places.”

Blind spot

Facing better pitching at Cardinals camp than he did at Billings, Carmel struggled to hit pitches with movement, especially those that jammed him. That’s when the flaw in his swing became evident.

Cardinals hitting coach Stan Hack, who batted .301 in 16 seasons in the majors, told the Post-Dispatch, “He has a hitch. He lowers his hands, holding the bat, and when the pitch is high, he’s helpless. He can correct it if he listens, understands and keeps trying, but it takes a lot of work. You can’t correct a thing like that in an hour, or a day, or a month.”

Carmel said to The Buffalo News, “You have to stay loose and relaxed to play this game, and every time I go up to the plate determined to hit that long ball, I hitch too much. Then I get upset, and before you know it, I’m in a slump. I have to conquer myself, not the pitcher.”

Looking to find a groove, Carmel spent most of 1958 and 1959 at the Class AA and AAA levels of the minors. He played for Johnny Keane at Omaha, Cot Deal at Rochester, Harry Walker at Houston and Vern Benson at Tulsa. There were flashes of brilliance, but nothing like the kind of season he’d had at Billings.

Carmel, 22, got called up to the Cardinals in September 1959. He and teammate Tim McCarver, 17, made their big-league debuts in the same game. After striking out against Braves reliever Don McMahon, Carmel told The Sporting News, “I still haven’t seen any of the three pitches he threw by me.” Boxscore

Cardinals general manager Bing Devine said Carmel was in the club’s plans for 1960. “He’s showing signs of arriving,” Devine told the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle. “His possibilities for the future look very good.”

Traveling man

Carmel went to spring training with the Cardinals for the third straight year in 1960, and, like the other times, didn’t make the Opening Day roster.

The Cardinals traded him each of the next three seasons and reacquired him every time. They traded him to the Dodgers in 1960, reacquired him that year, traded him back to the Dodgers in 1961 and reacquired him again. In 1962, Carmel was sent to the Indians, then the Cardinals got him back a third time. In his stints with the Dodgers and Indians, Carmel never got out of the minors.

Carmel was not on the Cardinals’ roster when he went to spring training with them in 1963. Little was expected, but he became “the pleasant surprise of the spring,” The Sporting News reported. In his first 29 at-bats in the exhibition games, Carmel made 14 hits, including two home runs, two doubles and a triple.

The performance earned him a spot as a reserve outfielder and first baseman on the 1963 Opening Day roster of Cardinals manager Johnny Keane.

In his first at-bat of the season, Carmel hit his first big-league home run, tying the score in the bottom of the ninth against Pirates closer Roy Face. Boxscore

The highlights, though, were too few. Carmel was batting .227, with more strikeouts (11) than hits (10), when the Cardinals traded him for the fourth time. He was shipped to the Mets on July 29, 1963. This time, there would be no return.

Carmel had mixed emotions about departing. “I had been with that organization for eight years and it had become like a home to me,” he said to The Sporting News. However, he told the New York Daily News, “I didn’t want to sit around there, playing maybe 60 games a year. I want to make money in this game, and if I do the job, I’ll make it here (with the Mets).”

Meet the Mets

In joining the Mets, Carmel, 26, became a teammate of his boyhood idol, Duke Snider. In his Mets debut, Carmel started at first base and Snider was the right fielder. Boxscore

A week later, Aug. 8, 1963, Carmel hit a game-winning home run against Cardinals left-hander Bobby Shantz at the Polo Grounds in New York. Shantz threw him a slow curve and Carmel propelled it “onto the overhanging scaffold which fronts the upper tier in right,” the New York Daily News reported. Boxscore

(That was the first major-league game I attended. I was 7, and to my eyes, Duke Carmel was quite a mighty player.)

Carmel hit .235 with three home runs for the 1963 Mets. After the season they acquired two outfielders who, like Carmel, batted from the left side (George Altman from the Cardinals and Larry Elliot from the Pirates). Another left-handed batter, Ed Kranepool, 19, was projected to take over at first base.

Carmel did himself no favors at spring training in 1964, hitting .217 and getting into a personality clash with manager Casey Stengel, according to the New York Daily News.

Expecting to make the 1964 Mets’ Opening Day roster, Carmel instead was sent to the Buffalo farm club. “I don’t think they have anybody on the Mets better than I am,” Carmel told The Buffalo News.

Playing for Buffalo manager Whitey Kurowski, a former Cardinals third baseman, Carmel, 27, had a big season _ 35 home runs, 99 RBI and 100 walks. In August, the Yankees tried to acquire him for the 1964 pennant stretch but the Mets wouldn’t deal, general manager Ralph Houk told United Press International.

(If the Yankees, who won the 1964 American League pennant, had gotten Carmel, he would have faced the Cardinals in the World Series.)

New York, New York

After the Cardinals won the 1964 World Series title, manager Johnny Keane left for the same job with the Yankees. Two of the coaches he hired were Vern Benson and Cot Deal. All three had managed Carmel in the Cardinals’ system. On their recommendations, the Yankees chose Carmel in the November 1964 draft of players left off big-league rosters.

Keane told Carmel he would open the 1965 season as a Yankees utility player. “He had a golden chance to have a glorious new life in his hometown, playing for the team that cashes checks every fall,” George Vecsey wrote in Newsday. “All he had to do was not get hit by the D train.”

Carmel avoided getting hit by a train, but also avoided getting any hits for the Yankees. He was 0-for-26 in spring training exhibition games and then 0-for-8 in the regular season.

Released in May 1965, Carmel returned to the minors. His last season was in 1967 with Buffalo, then a Reds farm club. Among his teammates was a 19-year-old catching prospect, Johnny Bench.

New game

In 1972, five years after Carmel’s professional baseball career ended, Joe Gergen of Newsday found him playing as a ringer for a CBS-TV softball team in New York’s Central Park.

At 230 pounds, Carmel was the team’s catcher and slugger. In the game Gergen saw, Carmel had a single, a triple and a three-run home run, “a towering fly ball which carried over the right fielder’s head.”

“Between innings,” Gergen wrote, “there was time for Duke to eat an ice cream pop, drain a bottle of soda, puff on a cigarette and sit with the kids.”

Carmel said, “I enjoy this. Here, there’s no curfew.”

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Neil Allen: Good start, bad finish, with Cardinals

Posted in Games, Pitchers, Trades on June 27, 2023| 9 Comments »

Pitcher Neil Allen was given a mission impossible of sorts in his first assignment with the Cardinals.

Having worn out his welcome in New York, Allen felt instantly unwelcomed in St. Louis when the Cardinals acquired him and pitcher Rick Ownbey from the Mets for first baseman Keith Hernandez on June 15, 1983. When the crowd attending a game at Busch Memorial Stadium heard about the deal, they booed.

Being traded for Hernandez _ a World Series hero, Gold Glove winner and league MVP _ was challenge enough for Allen. The Cardinals increased the degree of difficulty by having him make his debut for them against Hernandez and the Mets.

Though Allen made a good first impression, it wasn’t a lasting one.

Under pressure

A right-hander from Kansas City, Kan., Allen was 21 when he earned a spot on the Mets’ Opening Day roster in 1979. He flopped as a starter, moved to the bullpen and flourished as a reliever. His first big-league win came against the Cardinals. Boxscore

Entrusted with the closer role, Allen ranked among the top six in saves in the league for three consecutive seasons (1980-82). The New York Times described him as “the life of the locker room, endearing but hyperactive and volatile.”

Trouble developed in 1983. In his second appearance of the season, Allen gave up a game-winning single. The next night, after he allowed a walkoff grand slam to the Phillies’ Bo Diaz, Allen “stalked off the mound, flung his glove into the dugout and then sat there with his head in his hands for fully five minutes, the tears flowing like a faucet,” the New York Daily News reported. Boxscore

From there, the Mets went to St. Louis for a series with the Cardinals. Allen got involved in a barroom fracas across the river in Illinois, told Mets management he had a drinking problem and asked for help. He was sent to a specialist, who determined Allen’s problem was stress, not alcohol, The Sporting News reported.

(Allen later told the New York Times he knew he didn’t have an alcohol problem. “I was talking out of desperation,” he said. “I’m ashamed of myself for saying it … What I had was an emotional problem.”)

Nothing was wrong with his arm though. The Mets discovered there was a trade market for him, and the Cardinals made the best offer.

Strong start

The Cardinals had a closer, Bruce Sutter, but needed a starter, so manager Whitey Herzog put Allen in the rotation. His first appearance came on June 21, 1983, against the Mets at New York’s Shea Stadium.

Allen pitched eight scoreless innings and got the win. He struck out Hernandez twice and held him hitless. Boxscore

“That was vintage Neil Allen,” Hernandez said to the Daily News. “That was one of the best curves I’ve faced in eight years in the league.”

Allen told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “I felt like I had a lot to prove. Everybody thought the trade was so outrageous. To be honest, I thought so at first, too.”

Allen also got his first career RBI in the game. His squeeze bunt scored Ozzie Smith from third. “I couldn’t believe I got it down,” Allen told the Post-Dispatch.

In the groove

Nine days later, in St. Louis, Allen beat the Mets again. The only run he allowed came on a Jose Oquendo RBI-single. Allen again held Hernandez hitless. 

Allen also got another RBI, lining a Walt Terrell pitch off the outfield wall for a double. “I floated that one in at about 50 mph,” Terrell told the Post-Dispatch.

Thinking the ball would carry over the wall, Allen went into a home run trot. “I never hit a ball like that in my life,” Allen said to the newspaper. “I took a lot of kidding for my home run trot.” Boxscore

In July, Allen pitched shutouts in consecutive starts versus the Padres and Dodgers, giving him a 5-1 record and 2.02 ERA with St. Louis. Boxscore and Boxscore 

Then he lost four consecutive decisions and was moved back to the bullpen before returning to the rotation in September.

On Sept. 14, Allen beat the Mets for the third time, winning a matchup with Tom Seaver. Boxscore

Allen was 3-0 with an 0.87 ERA against the Mets in 1983. Overall for the Cardinals, he was 10-6.

Another adjustment

The Cardinals rewarded Allen with a four-year contract. At 1984 spring training. Herzog named him to the starting rotation, then changed his mind. With the 1983 Cardinals, Allen’s ERA as a reliever (1.88) was better than it was as a starter (3.94). “Neil has been a good starter, but I think he’ll be an excellent reliever,” Herzog told The Sporting News.

Another factor in Herzog’s decision was Allen’s inability to develop a changeup or to mix pitches during a game. “In short relief, he can get by with just his fastball and big breaking curve _ more power than brainpower,” The Sporting News noted.

Allen told the publication, “I’m not your ideal brain surgeon. if I start worrying about what’s in my noodle, what I have there, then I’ll be in real trouble.”

He said to the Post-Dispatch, “I don’t have the pitches for a starting pitcher. And, if I did, I’m still too hyper. I’ve got to have the ball, and if I die out there, I’ve got to have the ball again tomorrow or I go berserk. If I don’t get the ball except every fifth day or so, I go crazy.”

With Bruce Sutter established as the closer, Allen took a setup role with the 1984 Cardinals. In 56 relief appearances, he was 9-5 with three saves.

Wrong role

Sutter, who had 45 saves for the 1984 Cardinals, became a free agent and went to the Braves. Herzog named Allen the closer. Asked about replacing Sutter in 1985, Allen told The Sporting News, “Nobody but God can get 45 saves, and God is in Atlanta. If I can do half, I’ll be happy.”

Post-Dispatch columnist Kevin Horrigan wrote, “The fact remains that unless Neil Allen does the job _ two dozen saves or more _ the Cardinals will be lucky to stay out of the National League East basement.”

The Cardinals opened the 1985 season at New York against the Mets and it was a disaster for Allen. On Opening Day, he gave up a game-winning home run to Gary Carter. The next day, the Mets won when Allen walked Danny Heep with the bases loaded. Boxscore and Boxscore and Video

“I didn’t use the right psychology,” Herzog told the Post-Dispatch. “I was trying to get him past the first one and I doubled the whammy.”

In his book “White Rat: A Life in Baseball,” Herzog said, “His confidence was shot. A relief pitcher without confidence is like tits on a boar hog.”

Allen said to the Post-Dispatch, “Mentally, I was messed up.”

In 22 appearances for the 1985 Cardinals, Allen was 1-4, with two saves and a 5.59 ERA. In June, they sent him to the Yankees. According to the Post-Dispatch, Herzog told Yankees manager Billy Martin, “He can help you if he can get his head on straight.”

Cardinals pitcher Joaquin Andujar told the newspaper, “Someone with a weak mind, like Neil Allen, will go into a slump for two months. If he had a strong mind, I think Neil Allen would be pitching good. He gives up too easy.”

In his book, Herzog said, “Neil Allen, a fine young man with a live arm and a great curveball, kept expecting disaster to strike, and it usually did.”

The Cardinals, who called up rookie closer Todd Worrell in late August, won the 1985 pennant.

Allen went on to pitch for the Yankees (1985, 1987-88), White Sox (1986-87) and Indians (1989). His career record: 58-70, 75 saves. In three years with the Cardinals, he was 20-16 and five saves.

Allen was pitching coach on the staff of Twins manager Paul Molitor from 2015-17.

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