RetroSimba

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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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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Orlando Pena was a baseball sorcerer, a mound magician who delivered a mix of deceptive pitches and overcame formidable odds to repeatedly revive his career.

Pena worked his wizardry for the Cardinals after they acquired him from the Orioles for cash on June 15, 1973.

Pena was 39, a castoff who had gone to spring training that year as a batting practice pitcher after suffering an elbow injury a few months earlier. Acquiring him turned out to be a marvelous, or even Merlinesque, move.

Give me a chance

Born and raised in Cuba, in the town of Victoria de las Tunas, Pena ran errands as a youth for his father, a grocer. The boy made a baseball glove from a pair of kid’s cowboy boots, cutting off the upper halves and sewing the two portions together to create a mitt, according to the Kansas City Star.

A right-handed pitcher, Pena was signed by the Cincinnati Reds, who sent him to their Daytona Beach (Fla.) farm club in 1955. Pena was 21, skinny (about 140 pounds, according to The Cincinnati Post) and considered a marginal prospect.

The Reds told Daytona Beach manager Johnny Vander Meer (who pitched consecutive no-hitters for Cincinnati in 1938) to give Pena a look and, if he didn’t like what he saw, the club would release the pitcher, the Associated Press reported. Given a chance to relieve in a game, Pena impressed. “To think I was told to let this man go was something I couldn’t believe when I saw him pitch,” Vander Meer said to the wire service.

Moved to the starting rotation, Pena was 21-8 with a 1.96 ERA for Daytona Beach in 1955. Three years later, the Reds brought him to the majors.

“I tell him he does not have a major-league fastball,” the Reds’ Cuban-born coach, Reggie Otero, informed The Cincinnati Post in 1959, “but he has a real good sinker. I tell him to keep the ball down, or you will find yourself back in Havana.”

Pena got too many pitches up (6-10 with Cincinnati), returned to the minors and resurfaced with the Kansas City Athletics in August 1962. He lost 20 games with the 1963 Athletics, gave up 40 home runs in 1964 and went 0-6 for them in 1965 before being placed on waivers.

Fork in the road

The Tigers took a chance and signed Pena in June 1965.

A high school player, Ted Simmons, was the Tigers’ batting practice catcher for home games. “Pena was the only guy on the team who would even talk to me,” Simmons recalled years later to Hal McCoy of the Dayton Daily News.

With a wink, Simmons added, “That’s how I learned to catch a forkball.”

McCoy wrote, “The wink was meant to inform the listener that he really meant a spitball.”

Pena told the Associated Press, “Everybody accuses me of spitting on the ball. I call it my Cuban forkball.”

Pena said a Reds minor-league manager, Bert Haas, taught him to throw the forkball, the Miami News reported.

To throw the forkball, Pena gripped the ball between his index and middle fingers, “which he spreads as wide as the extension of an average person’s three middle fingers,” the Miami News noted. Pena told the newspaper, “The forkball has a rotation the same as a spitter … If it weren’t for the forkball, I’d be selling peanuts in Cuba.”

Besides the forkball, Pena threw a wide assortment of other offerings and tried to distract the batter by turning his back on him in the middle of his delivery. Orioles manager Earl Weaver said to The Sporting News, “He’s got every pitch in the book _ a forkball, curve, fastball, slider and sinker from several arm positions, and a screwball, too.”

Pena also threw a palmball (a type of changeup) and dabbled with a knuckleball.

Down and out

In three seasons with the Tigers, Pena had eight wins, 11 saves and a 3.01 ERA but in May 1967 they sent him to the Indians. Pena notched eight saves with the 1967 Indians, but was demoted to the minors the following year. At 34, he seemed done as a big-league pitcher.

Pena, 36, was a batting practice pitcher for the Royals in 1970 when the Pirates came to Kansas City in June to play an exhibition game. After watching Pena throw, Pirates outfielder Roberto Clemente met with club officials and, according to The Pittsburgh Press, told them, “Pena is as good as anyone in our bullpen.” 

Desperate for relievers, the Pirates signed him that day. (The Pirates used 20 pitchers in 1970 and 18 of those made relief appearances.) Pena was 2-1 with two saves in 23 games for the 1970 Pirates, but they released him in August after he injured an ankle.

Miami marvel

When spring training began in 1971, Pena, 37, was at home in Miami. Looking to stay in the game, he accepted a coaching job with the Orioles’ Miami farm club in the Class A Florida State League. The job also called for him to appear on Spanish-language radio and promote interest in the team.

“I was going to pitch some, help the young pitchers and try to sell tickets,” Pena told the Kansas City Star.

Instead, Pena became a starter. He was 9-4 with an 0.70 ERA when the Orioles called him to the big leagues in July. He made five relief appearances for them, then finished the season with the Class AAA Rochester (N.Y.) affiliate.

Back with minor-league Miami (where, according to The Sporting News, his teammates called him Poppa), Pena, 38, performed remarkably in 1972, posting a 15-3 record and 1.38 ERA for the Class A club. Promoted to Rochester late in the season, he dazzled there, too (7-0, 0.96), and helped the club reach the International League playoffs.

Pitching in pain

On Sept. 4, 1972, Pena was a front-seat passenger in a car driven by Rochester coach Chico Fernandez when the vehicle was struck broadside at an intersection, the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle reported.

According to the Baltimore Sun, the right front wheel of the car took the brunt of the collision. “If it had hit my door, I’d be a dead man,” Pena told the Rochester newspaper.

Pena said his right elbow slammed against the car door and he felt a “pulsing ache” from the shoulder blade to the elbow of his pitching arm, but the next day he threw for 15 minutes and declared himself ready to pitch in the playoff series against Louisville, the Democrat and Chronicle reported.

On Sept. 6, 1972, two days after being hurt in the accident, Pena started Game 2 of the playoff series and pitched nine innings before he gave in to the pain and asked manager Joe Altobelli to lift him for a pinch-hitter with the score tied at 3-3. Roger Repoz hit a two-run homer in the 10th and Rochester won, 5-3.

“He’s got heart,” Rochester trainer Rudy Owen told the Democrat and Chronicle. “I could tell he was going through some kind of pain, but he hung in there.”

Throughout the game, Owen applied a hot preparation to Pena’s aching elbow. “I mixed up a special compound of Capsulin and an analgesic,” Owen said. “We put it on him every other inning.”

Pena told the Rochester newspaper, “I’ve never had such a burning sensation before. Every time Doc would put it on, I’d hold my breath.”

After Louisville won the best-of-three series, Pena had the elbow re-examined and it was discovered he had fractured it in the car accident, the Baltimore Sun reported. He underwent surgery and, for the first time in 17 years, didn’t play winter league baseball in the Caribbean.

Unfinished business

There was no market for a 39-year-old pitcher on the mend from an elbow injury. As a courtesy, the Orioles invited Pena to spring training in 1973 as a batting practice pitcher.

In their second exhibition game, against the Yankees at Fort Lauderdale, the Orioles ran out of pitchers in extra innings. So they put Pena on the mound and he pitched well.

Given more appearances in spring training games, Pena surprised manager Earl Weaver and pitching coach George Bamberger with his effective assortment of pitches. “Pena has so many variations that Bamberger doesn’t know what they are sometimes when he charts them,” Weaver told The Sporting News.

When Opening Day came, Pena was on the Orioles roster.

In his first appearance for the 1973 Orioles, Pena earned a save against the Tigers. Three days later, Weaver named him the starting pitcher for the second game of a doubleheader versus the Brewers. It was Pena’s first start in the majors since 1967. He pitched 7.1 innings and the Orioles won. Boxscore

Helping hand

In June 1973, Cardinals starter Scipio Spinks was sidelined by a shoulder ailment and Tom Murphy was moved from the bullpen to replace him. Seeking a reliever to replace Murphy, the Cardinals purchased the contract of Pena from the Orioles.

Together with Diego Segui, Al Hrabosky and Rich Folkers, Pena gave the Cardinals a reliable relief corps. After his first nine appearances for St. Louis, Pena was 1-0 with two saves and an 0.00 ERA.

He also doubled as the Cardinals’ clubhouse clipper. Described by The Sporting News as “an accomplished barber,” Pena gave haircuts to teammates and became “one of the club’s most likeable members.”

Pena told The Cincinnati Post, “You know what they call me here? They call me Satchel. You know, like Satchel Paige.”

In September, when the 1973 Cardinals were contending for first place in the mediocre East Division, Pena was superb. In a doubleheader versus the Pirates on Sept. 3, he pitched in both games, earning a save in the second with 3.2 scoreless innings. For the month, Pena was 1-1 with two saves and a 1.71 ERA in 11 appearances. Boxscore

Pena was 4-4 in 42 games for the 1973 Cardinals and ranked second on the club in both saves (six) and ERA (2.18).

End of the line

The Cardinals were glad to have Pena, 40, back with them in 1974.

He picked up where he left off the previous year, winning his first five decisions. In 42 relief appearances for the 1974 Cardinals, Pena was 5-2 with four saves and a 2.60 ERA. He allowed no home runs in 45 innings pitched. Right-handed batters hit .158 against him.

Imagine his shock then when, to make room on the roster for newly acquired Claude Osteen, the Cardinals released Pena in August 1974.

“Sometimes they catch you by surprise and you feel like the whole ceiling falls over you,” Pena told The Sporting News.

Cardinals manager Red Schoendienst said, “Orlando is a great guy and a hell of a guy to have on the club, but we could keep only 10 pitchers.”

(Pena and Osteen had a history. Eleven years earlier, in a 1963 American League game, Pena hit a grand slam against him. Boxscore)

Pena agreed to stay in St. Louis as a batting practice pitcher. Then, on Sept. 5, 1974, he was traded to the Angels for a player to be named (pitcher Rich Hand).

Pena’s final big-league appearances were with the 1975 Angels, who had Dick Williams as manager and Whitey Herzog as a coach.

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(Updated Jan. 13, 2025)

A right-hander whose extensive mix of pitches included a spitball, Lew Burdette was supposed to give the Cardinals the edge they needed to win the 1963 National League pennant, but it didn’t work out. Instead, he helped them attain a championship the following year, even though he was gone by June.

On June 15, 1963, the Cardinals obtained Burdette, 36, from the Braves for catcher Gene Oliver and pitcher Bob Sadowski.

The Cardinals expected Burdette could make the difference in a pennant race the way June acquisitions Grover Cleveland Alexander (1926) and Burleigh Grimes (1930) did for them.

Dynamic duo

Selva Lewis Burdette was from Nitro, W.Va., along the Kanawha River near Charleston. The town sprung up during World War I as a center for the manufacturing of gunpowder for the military.

Burdette went by a shortened version of his middle name, Lew or Lou. Asked by the St. Louis Globe-Democrat in 1963 which spelling he preferred, Burdette replied that either way was acceptable. “I always (endorse) the check the way it’s written,” he said.

After reaching the majors in 1950, making two relief appearances with the Yankees, Burdette was traded to the Braves for Johnny Sain in August 1951.

Burdette and Braves teammate Warren Spahn (baseball’s career leader in wins among left-handers) liked palling around together, each bringing out the mischievous side in the other, and became road roommates. Their friendship was “as close as Damon and Pythias,” The Sporting News observed.

Asked why he and Burdette got along so well, Spahn told Bob Broeg of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “It’s because we appreciate each other’s sense of humor … No one else can stand us.”

Glory days

Burdette led National League pitchers in ERA (2.70) and shutouts (six) in 1956.

The next year, he was named the most valuable player of the World Series, winning Games 2, 5 and 7 against the Yankees. Burdette went the distance in all three games, allowing a mere two runs in 27 innings for an 0.67 ERA. Video

As the New York Times noted, Burdette relied on “sinkers, screwballs and sliders, his excellent control and his unswerving poise.”

He also mixed in a devastating spitball.

“Burdette has a great sinker, and when he gets into a tight spot, he throws a wet sinker,” Reds outfielder Jerry Lynch told The Sporting News.

With 20 wins in 1958, Burdette helped the Braves repeat as National League champions, but the Yankees prevailed in the World Series, in part because he was 1-2 with a 5.64 ERA.

He remained an ace, leading the National League in wins in 1959 (21), in complete games in 1960 (18) and in innings pitched in 1961 (272.1).

A man for all seasons

Burdette injured an ankle in May 1962 and Braves manager Birdie Tebbetts lost confidence in him. “Burdette makes no secret of the fact that he feels he was mishandled by Tebbetts,” The Sporting News reported.

Though he finished the 1962 season with a 10-9 record, Burdette allowed 172 hits in 143.2 innings (the first time since 1953 he didn’t pitch at least 230 innings) and made no starts after Aug. 16. Afterward, he told The Sporting News, “Last season was the most miserable one I ever spent in baseball. It’s the worst feeling in the world not to be a part of things.”

Bobby Bragan, who replaced Tebbetts, told The Sporting News that Burdette was not in his plans for 1963. After getting a look at him in spring training, Bragan changed his mind and named Burdette the Braves’ Opening Day starter.

“He’s an even better athlete than I had envisioned,” Bragan told The Sporting News. “He can field, he can run, he can hit _ anything.”

Let’s make a deal

When Ray Washburn, who won his first five decisions for the 1963 Cardinals, suffered a shoulder injury, general manager Bing Devine searched for a starter to replace him and to join a rotation with Bob Gibson, Ernie Broglio, Curt Simmons and Ray Sadecki.

Devine’s first choice was Burdette, but the Braves were close to trading him to the Orioles, The Sporting News reported. Devine then tried to deal for Houston’s Ken Johnson, but the Colt .45s took him off the market when Turk Farrell injured a hip, according to the Globe-Democrat.

Next, Devine approached the Mets about Roger Craig. The Mets offered Craig, pitcher Ken MacKenzie and catcher Norm Sherry for Gene Oliver, outfielder Duke Carmel and pitchers Harry Fanok, Bob Sadowski and Ron Taylor, but the Cardinals wouldn’t part with Taylor, the Post-Dispatch reported.

Devine went back to the Braves and convinced them to deal Burdette to him. When they acquired Burdette, the Cardinals (36-26) were tied with the Giants for first place in the 10-team National League. The Sporting News described him as “an ideal pickup for a St. Louis club which felt that one more established pitcher might put it in the World Series.”

Globe-Democrat sports editor Bob Burnes declared, “It’s a good deal for the Cardinals. Eight to 10 victories by Burdette the rest of the season added to what the Cardinals already have potentially on their side could mean the pennant.”

Cardinals debut

Burdette was 6-5 for the 1963 Braves and won his last three decisions, including a shutout of the Mets in his final game with Milwaukee on June 12. Boxscore

His first appearance for the Cardinals was a start against the Mets on June 18 and he pitched a complete game for the win. Burdette held the Mets scoreless until Tim Harkness hit a two-run home run with two outs in the ninth. Boxscore

“He had the ball really moving, sailing, sliding and sinking,” Cardinals third baseman Ken Boyer said to the Post-Dispatch.

Cardinals catcher Tim McCarver, 21, told the newspaper, “I’ve never seen a pitcher who can move the ball around as much as Burdette did.”

In the book “We Would Have Played For Nothing,” Burdette said, “I had an uncanny ability of throwing strikes … If you get the reputation that you don’t walk anybody, you don’t have to throw strikes. They swing at anything.”

Brave new world

On July 11, 1963, Burdette faced the Braves for the first time in a start at St. Louis. After taking a pitch from Burdette for a strike in the third inning, Hank Aaron asked plate umpire Chris Pelekoudas to check the ball to see whether it had a foreign substance. Pelekoudas took a look and kept the ball in play. “Henry has a better sense of humor than people think,” Burdette told the Post-Dispatch.

Two innings later, Aaron snapped a 1-1 tie with an RBI-double against Burdette and the Braves went on to a 5-3 victory. Boxscore

Two weeks later, Burdette made his first appearance in Milwaukee since the trade. The opposing starter was his friend, Warren Spahn.

Burdette held the Braves to a run in nine innings and got the win. Spahn allowed the Cardinals three runs in eight innings. “Spahn didn’t pitch badly for an old man,” Burdette told The Sporting News. He added, “I didn’t feel especially good about pitching against the best friend I ever had in baseball, but I had a job to do, and all I could do was go out and do my best.”

Braves manager Bobby Bragan said to The Sporting News that Burdette “won that game with less (velocity) than anybody I’ve ever seen on a major-league mound.” Boxscore

Burdette beat the Braves again with a complete game at St. Louis on Sept. 15, 1963, helping the Cardinals win their ninth in a row and end the day a game behind the first-place Dodgers. Boxscore

“We got Burdette just for a game like this,” Cardinals manager Johnny Keane said to the Post-Dispatch. “He gave us what we wanted when we had to have it.”

The Dodgers followed the Braves into St. Louis, swept a three-game series and went on to win the pennant. The Cardinals (93-69) finished in second place.

Burdette was 3-8 with two saves and a 3.77 ERA for the 1963 Cardinals. He had a 4.15 ERA in 14 starts and an 0.77 ERA in seven relief appearances. His losing record for the season was his first since 1952.

Starting over

In November 1963, the Cardinals acquired Roger Craig from the Mets and projected him to fill Burdette’s role. Burdette, 37, was moved to the bullpen in 1964. “I prefer starting,” he told The Sporting News.

Burdette was 1-0 with a 1.80 ERA in eight relief appearances for the 1964 Cardinals when he was traded to the Cubs on June 2 for pitcher Glen Hobbie.

It turned out that Burdette’s relief win for the Cardinals on April 24, 1964 _ a scoreless 11th inning against the Houston Colt .45s _ was important because the Cardinals (93-69) won the National League pennant that year by a mere one game over the Phillies (92-70) and Reds (92-70). Boxscore

“The Cardinals are a fine organization and I have no complaints with their treatment of me,” Burdette told the Associated Press. “It’s just that I didn’t get the opportunity to pitch. I guess they felt I was too old to be a starter. I’m 37, but I can outdo a majority of the 21-year-olds in most things.”

Burdette was 40 when he pitched his last game in the majors, a relief stint for the Angels versus the Twins in 1967. He faced three batters _ future Hall of Famers Rod Carew, Harmon Killebrew and Tony Oliva _ and pitched a scoreless inning. Boxscore

In 18 seasons in the majors, Burdette was 203-144.

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Dennis Ribant hoped to be the second person _ and first American _ to play in both the National Hockey League and in baseball’s major leagues.

He made a good run at it, playing in the farm systems of baseball’s Milwaukee Braves and hockey’s Detroit Red Wings.

Encouraged by the Braves to focus on baseball, Ribant reluctantly gave up hockey and pitched in the majors with six teams, including one game for the Cardinals.

Cleats and skates

A Detroit native, Ribant was 12 when he worked for tips dusting off seats for fans at Tiger Stadium, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette noted.

A right-handed pitcher, Ribant got offers from the Tigers and Yankees after he graduated from high school but both were contingent on him quitting hockey, the Detroit Free Press reported. He signed with the Braves for less money because they “didn’t object too strenuously to hockey,” according to the newspaper.

About the same time, Ribant, 19, got assigned to the Detroit Red Wings’ Junior A hockey team in Hamilton, Ontario, for the 1960-61 season. “It’s a tremendous accomplishment in itself for an American kid to make a Junior A team,” Red Wings scout Jimmy Skinner told the Free Press. “It’s really rare.”

In a late-season game, Ribant “was hit blindside by a burly defenseman of the Toronto Marlboros and sent reeling into the boards of Maple Leaf Gardens,” Dick Young reported in the New York Daily News.

Ribant dislocated his left elbow. Soon after, when he showed up for his first spring training with the Braves in 1961, they were surprised to see his left arm in a sling.

(Five years later, Ribant still felt pain in the left elbow when he swung a bat, the Daily News reported in 1966.)

Fortunately for him, Ribant’s pitching arm, the right one, was undamaged. Assigned to Davenport (Iowa), a Class D team in 1961, Ribant was 17-2 and pitched a perfect game. Promoted to Class AA Austin (Texas) late in the season, he was 4-2. His overall ERA for the year was 1.68.

Playing hardball

After his successful pro baseball debut in 1961, Ribant planned to play another junior hockey season in the Red Wings’ system, but the Braves “shudder at the thought of him playing hockey,” the Free Press reported.

Braves general manager John McHale contacted his Red Wings counterpart, Jack Adams, and asked him to help convince Ribant to give up hockey, according to the New York Daily News.

As the Free Press noted, “The Red Wings find themselves in the strange position of discouraging a hockey prospect, especially an American hockey prospect and, taking it a step further, one born and raised in Detroit … Good American boys don’t come along very often, especially one from the club’s own town.”

According to the Daily News, Adams agreed to send scout Jimmy Skinner to talk with Ribant, but told McHale, “He’s a pretty good hockey player … The decision will be up to the boy.”

Ribant told the Daily News that Skinner said, “You’re going to be a big-league ballplayer. You can make a lot of money in baseball.”

Ribant replied, “I can do both, at least for a little while. I can make the National Hockey League, too, can’t I?”

Skinner said, “Maybe. You have a chance. They tell me you have a better chance in baseball. Think it over.”

Ribant decided to make baseball his sole sport.

(In an interview with the Free Press, Skinner said, “If he stayed in hockey, he would need several more years of seasoning, and I don’t think he’d ever make the National (Hockey) League, although he could play in the high minors.”)

A Canadian, Jim Riley, is the only person to play in the NHL and in baseball’s major leagues. An infielder, Riley played four games with the 1921 St. Louis Browns and two games with the 1923 Washington Senators. He also played in the NHL with Chicago and Detroit in 1927.

On the move

Ribant never did pitch for the Braves, In August 1964, during his fourth season in their farm system, the Braves traded him to the last-place Mets, who put him in their starting rotation. His first big-league win, on Aug. 17, 1964, was a four-hit shutout of the Pirates. Boxscore

After spending part of the 1965 season back in the minors, Ribant returned to the Mets’ starting rotation in 1966, finishing 11-9 with a 3.20 ERA. He and Bob Shaw (11-10) became the first Mets starters to complete a season with a winning mark.

After the season, Mets general manager George Weiss retired and was replaced by Bing Devine, the former Cardinals general manager who had become an assistant to Weiss. Devine determined the Mets needed a center fielder and went shopping for a Pirates prospect, Don Bosch. According to the New York Times, Mets scouts rated Bosch’s fielding skills “as good as Willie Mays, Bill Virdon or Curt Flood.”

Devine offered Pirates general manager Joe Brown a choice of a starting pitcher, Bob Shaw or Jack Fisher, for Bosch, but Brown insisted on Ribant, The Pittsburgh Press reported.

On Dec. 6, 1966, the Mets dealt Ribant and outfielder Gary Kolb to the Pirates for Bosch and pitcher Don Cardwell. “I hated to give up Ribant, but you can’t expect something for nothing in this business,” Devine told the New York Daily News.

Bosch flopped, batting .140 for the 1967 Mets and .171 the next year before being banished to the Expos.

Ribant was 9-8, including 2-0 versus the Cardinals, for the 1967 Pirates, and brought a hockey player’s attitude to the diamond. “Ribant doesn’t walk, he strides,” Roy McHugh wrote in The Pittsburgh Press. “He approaches the mound like John L. Sullivan on his way through the double doors of an 1890 saloon, ready to make the announcement that he can lick anyone in the house.”

After Ribant beat the Braves for his first win with the Pirates, Hank Aaron told The Pittsburgh Press, “He battles you … You get Ribant in a tough spot and he pitches his way out.”

Pirates teammate Roberto Clemente said to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, “I like this Ribant.”

Fast fade

The Pirates traded Ribant to his hometown team, the Tigers, in November 1967. It should have been a dream come true. The Tigers were headed to a World Series championship in 1968, but Ribant didn’t get to partake in the celebration.

Though he was 2-2 with a save and a 2.22 ERA in 14 relief appearances for the 1968 Tigers, they determined they needed a more experienced reliever in the pennant stretch. On July 26, 1968, the Tigers dealt Ribant, 26, to the White Sox for Don McMahon, 38.

An American League expansion team, the Royals, acquired Ribant before the 1969 season but planned to send him to the minors. When Ribant balked, Bing Devine, who had returned to the Cardinals, bought his contract. “I know Ribant,” Devine said to The Sporting News. “I know he likes to work and I’ve never seen him when he wasn’t ready to pitch.”

Ribant was sent to minor-league Tulsa. Its manager, Warren Spahn, was a Braves ace when Ribant joined that organization. Later, Spahn was a pitcher and coach with the Mets when Ribant was there.

“I know I can pitch up there (the majors),” Ribant told the Tulsa World. “I’m young (27), no problems and in good shape. My arm is sound and I’m throwing as good as ever.”

After earning three consecutive wins, including a shutout of Iowa, for Tulsa, Ribant was called up to the Cardinals on June 4, 1969. A day later, he relieved Mike Torrez in a game against the Astros, pitched 1.1 innings and allowed two runs, including a Joe Morgan home run. Boxscore

The Cardinals never gave him another chance. A week later, he was sent to the Reds for pitcher Aurelio Monteagudo.

Ribant made seven relief appearances for the 1969 Reds, posting a 1.08 ERA, and never pitched in the majors again.

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