Friday Stuff
Sunday*
(*Note: Yes, I usually start this with Monday, but I’m swapping out with Sunday because I found this particular event to be too fascinating not to write about.)
On this date in 1958, the Cubs did one of the dumber things in their long history of doing dumb things. Nine days after he’d graduated from high school, the Cubs trotted 18-year old pitcher Dick Ellsworth out to the mound in Cincinnati and told him to start a major league baseball game despite having never thrown a professional pitch.
Six days earlier, after signing his $60,000 contract, Ellsworth was used in a charity exhibition game against the White Sox in Comiskey Park, and he’d pitched well. So well, in fact, that Cubs manager Bob Scheffing decided they weren’t going to send the kid to the minor leagues. “He’s ready right now to help us,” Scheffing said. “Can’t say anything else until someone scores a run off him, can I?”
Again, this was based off Ellsworth’s performance in an exhibition in the middle of the season against an opponent, the White Sox, who had just returned from a 17-day, 20-game road trip the night before. They’d played eight games in the prior six days, including a doubleheader in Baltimore the day before, and they weren’t exactly thrilled to be using their off day back at home playing a charity game. The effort put forth by the White Sox players wasn’t exactly tip-top level.
That didn’t impact Scheffing’s thinking at all, nor did the fact that the Cubs were a sixth-place team with a losing record and virtually no hope of climbing the standings that season. They’d lost 92 games the year before and finished seventh, and 94 games the year before that and finished last, and hadn’t had a winning record since 1946. One 18-year old pitcher with no professional experience was not going to bring them a surprise pennant, not when someone named Dave Hillman was the best pitcher in the rotation. They should have sent the kid to Class-A ball, or even lower, and let him learn the ropes while the big club struggled.
But Scheffing was undeterred by common sense and sent Ellsworth out to face the Redlegs* anyway. And the results were predictable.
(*Note: This was one of the years the Reds were known as the Redlegs because they didn’t want to be associated with communism. Yes, a major league team that called itself the Reds for 30 years before the Soviet Union even existed really did feel the need to modify their nickname to appease fans who were still in the clutches of the Red Scare. The fifties were pretty dumb in a lot of ways. But I digress.)
Ernie Banks gave Ellsworth a one-run lead to work with by driving in Al Dark with a single in the first inning. Ellsworth responding by getting the first two hitters out before hitting Frank Robinson with a pitch and walking George Crowe. A ground out by Dick Hoak ended the threat, but it was a pretty shaky beginning. The next inning was worse, as Ellsworth surrendered a back-to-back one-out singles to Gus Bell and Roy McMillan, followed by an RBI single by Johnny Temple that tied the game.
The Cubs didn’t do any more damage in the third against Joe Nuxhall, so the game was still tied when Ellsworth began the bottom of the inning. He got Robinson on a fly ball, but then all hell broke loose. He walked Crowe again, threw a wild pitch, allowed another single to Hoak, threw another wild pitch, and then walked Smoky Burgess to load the bases with Bell coming up. At that point even Scheffing had to admit the kid was probably over his head, so he pulled him favor of reliever Glen Hobbie, who promptly surrendered a grand slam to Bell.
The final line for Ellsworth was 2.1 innings, 4 hits, 4 runs, all earned, 3 walks, no strikeouts, a hit batter, and two wild pitches. He was demoted to Double-A Forth Worth after the game, but even that proved to be a bit beyond his skill set. He went 1-7 with a 5.47 ERA for the Cats, and wouldn’t work his way back to the big leagues for two more years.
Even that seemed a bit premature. He’d pitched well in the intervening seasons, but he was still barely 20 years old when he returned in 1960 and the Cubs still stunk and were on the brink of launching their preposterous “College of Coaches” period. Giving Ellsworth a bit more seasoning still was the savvy move, but “savvy” and “Cubs management” were infrequent partners in those days, so Ellsworth returned that May, pitched well for about six weeks, then had a 4.44 ERA and 4-10 record from mid-June until the end of the season. After a decent 1961 campaign his ERA ballooned to 5.09 and he lost 20 games in 1962. It wasn’t until his age-23 season in 1963 that he finally fulfilled his promise and popped for a 22-10, 2.11 ERA, 10.2-WAR season. He never had anything remotely like that kind of year again, but at least he proved that the Cubs weren’t wrong to see the potential he had.
They were just wrong to test that potential in the big league 9 days after he graduated high school.
Tuesday
Speaking of the Cubs mishandling rookie pitchers, it was on this date in 1905 that Chicago’s rookie right-hander, Ed Reulbach, threw an 18-inning complete game to beat Cincinnati, 2-1. The 22-year old allowed 15 hits and 6 walks, and only struck out 6 Reds, but got the win anyway to improve his record to 8-2. It’s hard to say what his ERA was at that point because box scores of the time didn’t break down the runs allowed that way, but we know he’d only allowed 15 total runs in the first 10 starts of his career, and averaged more than 9 innings per start (9.41 to be exact) thanks to this marathon game.
Things didn’t go so well for him after that. In his final 24 appearances that season we went from allowing 1.43 runs per 9 innings to allowing 2.58, and his record in those games was an underwhelming 10-12. In addition, that proved to be, by far, the best season of his career. He finished with a record of 18-14, which wasn’t great considering the Cubs were pretty good that year, but his 1.42 ERA, 209 ERA+, and 9.1 WAR were figures he never reached again. He also had the best strikeout rate of his career, and best WHIP, and lowest walk rate. He never again threw as many complete games as the 28 he threw as a rookie, and only once did he exceed the 291.2 innings he pitched that season.
It’s not as if Reulbach was bad for the next dozen seasons. He was a pretty good pitcher on some very good teams, including the last two Cubs World Series winners before 2016. He had a record of 164-92 and averaged 250 innings and 3.1 WAR per 162 games, with a 117 ERA+. That’s the same mark Gaylord Perry had in his Hall of Fame career, a tick better than Dennis Eckersley and CC Sabathia. It was a perfectly respectable career, but it probably could have been better with a little less abuse.
And no, I’m not saying this one 18-inning game derailed his career. It might have, but it’s not as if he reported having a sore arm afterward. No, it’s more the fact that this wasn’t even the longest appearance he had that season. On August 24, Reulbach threw a 20-inning complete game to beat the Phillies, also 2-1. That closed a month that began with an 11-inning complete game, and four traditional 9-inning complete games between those bookends.
Let’s just say I don’t think throwing 67 innings in one month as a rookie was something that helped his career.
Wednesday
As long as the subject is rookies, Wednesday marked the date in 1986 that the Phillies released veteran starter Steve Carlton and called up rookie left-hander Bruce Ruffin to take his spot in the rotation. It was literally front page news in Philadelphia, where Carlton had been a mainstay of the Phillies’ rotation since 1972.
Under ordinary circumstances, this shouldn’t have been much of a shock. Carlton was 41 years old and had a 4-8 record with a 6.18 ERA. The year before he’d been 1-8 and missed half the season with injuries. And, of course, he wasn’t exactly a team leader and ray of sunshine in the clubhouse.
Even so, the timing was a bit weird. Carlton had 3,982 career strikeouts at the time he was released, just 18 away from 4,000. That’s a plateau only Nolan Ryan had reached, and Carlton had made it clear he still intended to get there. From a public relations perspective, you’d think the Phillies would have wanted to let him reach that mark with them, particularly since they were below .500 at the time and 14 games out of first place. It’s not like swapping him out for a rookie was going to be the move that landed them in the playoffs.
They cut him anyway. There hadn’t been much good will built up between Carlton and the team over the years, and the hard-nosed fans in Philly didn’t seem broken up by the news. “He should have quit two years ago,” one said. “Let’s face it, he’s lost it,” said another. The overriding sentiment was best expressed by a fan who noted, “Now people will remember the last two bad years instead of the good years he had given the Phillies.”
They weren’t wrong. What followed was a pretty embarrassing end to a great career. Carlton signed with the Giants a week later, started six games, had a 5.10 ERA and 1-3 record, finally got his 4,000th strikeout, and was released two days later. He latched on with the White Sox for the final couple of months of the year and pitched better (4-3, 3.69 ERA), but all that did was convince him he could return in 1987. Signed as a free agent by Cleveland, he was an abysmal 5-9 with a 5.37 ERA before being traded to the Twins, where he was even worse (1-5, 6.70). For inexplicable reasons, Minnesota let him return in 1988, but he made just four appearances, had a 16.76 ERA, was released before April was over, and never pitched again.
The fan who argued Carlton should have hung up his spikes a couple of years earlier, after the 1984 season, was probably right:
Carlton, 1965-1984: 313-207, 3.04 ERA, 86.3 WAR 121 ERA+
Carlton, 1985-1988: 16-37, 5.21 ERA, -2.2 WAR, 80 ERA+
As for Bruce Ruffin, when he was Philly’s 2nd round pick out of the University of Texas in 1985 he had to assume he was going to be Carlton’s replacement eventually. A 6’2” lefty, he wasn’t the strikeout pitcher Carlton was, and he certainly didn’t have 15 years of goodwill built up with the Philly fans, so it was a tough spot to be in. He responded pretty well as a rookie, posting a 9-4 record, 2.46 ERA, and 3.7 WAR for the remainder of the season.
Then he never pitched that well again. Over the next five years he was 33-54 with a 4.50 ERA and totaled just 0.5 WAR, losing his rotation spot in that final year before moving along to Milwaukee for a pretty bad year and then landing in Colorado, where he had a short renaissance as a reliever. He was basically an average big league pitcher over the course of 12 major league seasons, which is perfectly respectable. It’s just not what he or the fans in Philadelphia expected from a guy who was replacing a legend. Even one that had hung on too long.
Thursday
Two years after the Cubs unfairly rushed Dick Ellsworth to the big leagues, they called up 20-year old third baseman Ron Santo to make his major league debut. That happened on this date in 1960, as Santo started both games of a doubleheader in Pittsburgh against the eventual World Series-winning Pirates. It was a good start to a Hall of Fame career, as he went a combined 3-for-7 with a double, a sacrifice, and five RBI. The Cubs won both games, and had found their third baseman for the next 14 years.
Unlike the Ellsworth situation, it’s not fair to say Santo was rushed. Signed out of high school, Santo hadn’t completed his contract until after the 1958 minor league season was over, so it was 1959 before he began his pro career. The Cubs somewhat aggressively place him on the roster of their Double-A affiliate in San Antonio, but he was excellent there, hitting .327/.390/.473 with a league-leading 35 doubles, proving he wasn’t overmatched at that level despite being one of the youngest players in the Texas League. That earned him a promotion to Triple-A Houston to start the 1960 season, and while his numbers weren’t as good there (.268/.351/.412) they were more than good enough to get a shot in the big leagues.
Santo cooled off after that great start, but he was still quite good. He came close to matching his Triple-A numbers by hitting .251/.311/.409, hitting 9 homers and driving in 44 in a little over half a season. That earned him a fourth-place finish in the Rookie of the Year voting, and by the time he was 24 he was a perennial All-Star, Gold Glove winner, and MVP candidate. From 1963 to 1973, Santo’s average season included a 135 OPS+ based on a .285/.375/.486 batting line, 26 homers, 98 RBI, a consistently durable 156 games per season, and 6.2 WAR. He made 9 All-Star teams in those 11 seasons, won 5 Gold Gloves, and received MVP votes in seven straight years, including four top-10 finishes.
Few third baseman can claim those sorts of accomplishments, made all the more impressive by the fact that he played his entire career with a diagnosis of Type 1 diabetes. He hid the condition for many years, knowing it would likely impact his career if the Cubs or other teams knew about it. It wasn’t until 1971 that he revealed his condition, after which he was a consistent voice in fundraising for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation. In short, Santo had precisely the sort of career, and was precisely the sort of person and ambassador for baseball, that you’d expect to sail into the Hall of Fame.
Unfortunately, far too many members of the BBWAA didn’t see it that way, and I'll never quite understand why. Do you know how many third basemen totaled 65 or more WAR, 300 homers, and 5 or more Gold Gloves?
Four.
Mike Schmidt
Adrian Beltré
Scott Rolen
Ron Santo
Only one of them wasn’t elected to the Hall of Fame by the BBWAA; Santo. He never got more than 43% of the vote for reasons I’ll never get. Yes, I know WAR wasn’t a stat at the time, but they could have seen he was unique even without that. Do you know how many third basemen had hit 300 or more homers by the time he first appeared on the ballot in 1980?
Two.
Eddie Mathews.
Ron Santo.
Failing to elect him is one of the great misses in BBWAA history, and the failure of the various iterations of the Veterans Committee to elect him until two years after his death is even more shameful.
Friday
Finally, this was the date in 1973 when the Texas Rangers decided that David Clyde was the answer to their prayers. And, to be clear, their prayers really didn’t have anything to do with winning baseball games.
To set the stage a bit, the Rangers had only moved to Texas the year before. The franchise spent 11 unhappy seasons in Washington as the replacement for the original relocated Senators, and hadn’t cracked the one million mark in attendance in any of those years. Here were their annual finishes in attendance in the American League during their time in our nation’s capital:
10th, 8th, 10th, 10th, 9th, 10th, 8th, 10th when there were 10 AL teams.
6th, 8th, 11th when there were 12 AL teams.
After that mess they moved to Texas and promptly drew only 662,974 fans in their first season, 10th in the league. They were also dead last in the AL West with a 54-100 record, more than 20 games away from moving up to fifth. Manager Ted Williams asked out of the final year of his contract, fed up with modern players and the team’s refusal to acquire better ones.
Whitey Herzog was hired to replace him, his first job as a big league manager, but things didn’t get any better. In fact, the club was back in last place with a record of 16-30 on the morning of June 5, the day of 1973’s June amateur draft. They had the first pick thanks to their Major League-worst record the year before, and owner Bob Short decided that the best possible player they could draft would be high school pitcher David Clyde.
He was a phenom in Texas high school ball, having reeled off an 18-0 record and 0.18 ERA in his senior season at Houston’s Westchester High School. A lefty, he idolized Sandy Koufax, and struck out hitters at an incredible rate, 328 in just 148 innings. More teams than just the Rangers wanted him, and he knew it. He and his father made it clear they wanted a major league contract. That didn’t mean they expected him to pitch in the big leagues right away, they just wanted a spot on the 40-man roster.
That was perfectly okay with Short, who was desperate to get attendance up and figured the high school phenom would be a draw. The team was struggling to draw attention away from the Cowboys, and if they didn’t sell more tickets Short would be in a real financial bind. He agreed to the big league contract and proposed giving Clyde a couple of starts with the Rangers before sending him to the minors. Herzog hated the idea, but went along with it presuming it was temporary.
So, to great fanfare and a packed house of 35,698 fans, Clyde started against the Twins on June 27, 1973. The stuff was clearly there, as he whiffed eight in the first five innings and gave up just one hit. The bad news was that he walked seven, and the one hit he surrendered was two-run homer. Still, the Rangers won the game as reliever Bill Gogolewski went the final four innings. Clyde got the win, and can forever say he beat a Hall of Famer, Jim Kaat, in his big league debut.
When his second start brought in another 33,000 fans and he pitched respectably enough (6 innings, 1 earned run, 6 strikeouts), Short changed the plan. Rather than farm Clyde out to the minors to work on his control and build his arm strength, it was decided to keep him in the big leagues.
It was a terrible, short-sighted decision, made solely to sell tickets. It wasn’t as if Clyde was going to make the team a competitor all by himself, and there was a real danger of wrecking a very good prospect to just make a bit more money. As expected, Clyde wasn’t very good the rest of the season. He was just 3-8 with a 5.36 ERA after those first two starts, and his shakier and shakier outings, along with the team’s poor record, didn’t help attendance at all. They only brought in 23,111 more fans than they had the year before, dropping to 11th in the league and again having the worst record in baseball. Herzog was fired before the season even ended.
As for Clyde, he was kept on the roster in 1974, too, despite an ugly 3-9 record and 4.38 ERA, then blew out his shoulder after just one start in 1975. He never pitched for the Rangers again, rehabbing in the minors and failing to recapture the promise that made him the number one overall pick. Before the 1978 season he was traded to the Indians and went 8-11 with a 4.28 ERA for them, but his shoulder issue recurred the following season. Diagnosed with a torn rotator cuff, he missed most of 1979 and all of 1980. He tried a comeback in 1981 with Houston, but was terrible in Triple-A and was never called up.
David Clyde retired the following spring with a career record of 18-33, done at 26 largely because Bob Short wanted a few more asses in seats and dollars in his pockets.
This Week’s Editions
Monday: Roberto Clemente, “Punch and Judy Hitter”
Tuesday: Hall of Fame Hitters Who Pitched
Wednesday: Forgotten Treasures: Vlad Guerrero’s Defense
Thursday: Late Bloomers: Hank Bauer
I appreciate your ability to come up with these "themes" that bind together the items in your Friday updates