The Players

[Yankee4Life]

Luis Aparicio

 

 

The name Luis Aparicio is closely linked with Venezuela. Both Luis Aparicio Ortega (Ortega) and his son, Luis Aparicio Montiel (Aparicio), had a significant impact on bringing the game of baseball to new heights in Latin America. For that reason, many say that when talking about one, you can’t help but think of the other.

 

The younger Aparicio was much more than an outstanding baseball player whose endurance, defense, and speed during an 18-year old major-league career earned him a spot in baseball’s Hall of Fame. He was a symbol of the growth and development of the game of baseball in Latin America — specifically in Venezuela and in his hometown of Maracaibo. Aparicio’s place among the greatest players in baseball signified the climax of a cycle of progress for the game of baseball, which has become the national sport of Venezuela and an intrinsic part of its cultural heritage.

 

To fully understand the significance, impact, and legacy of Aparicio’s career, one needs to take a journey back into the first steps of the game in Maracaibo.

 

The emergence of baseball in Maracaibo began around the turn of the 20th century when an American businessman, William Phelps (who later became a media mogul and philanthropist), opened the first department store in town, the American Bazaar. While he imported baseball equipment from the United States, he also saw the need for educating local children about the game in order to sell his merchandise. Phelps became a baseball enthusiast and taught schoolkids the rules of the game, which they quickly understood. He served as the first umpire of documented games and built the first baseball field in the coastal city of Maracaibo.

 

Through the years, the region had a constant flow of American workers from oil companies who helped shape the identity of the city as well as the influence of American culture. Baseball was no exception. By 1926, a heated rivalry between Vuelvan Caras and Santa Marta was catching the attention of followers and local sports media. In fact, the first big hero of local professional baseball was a shortstop from Vuelvan Caras, Rafael “Anguito” Oliver. Early on, the media shone a spotlight on the role of the shortstop.

 

Oliver became an icon and two brothers were some of his biggest fans — Luis and Ernesto Aparicio Ortega. The Aparicio Ortega brothers (in the Latin American custom, they used their father’s and mother’s surname) were also natural athletes; Luis enjoyed soccer but ended up practicing baseball with Ernesto. Both became quality infielders. Luis, however, became the big star, the super athlete, while Ernesto, who had great playing tools, concentrated on learning the game as a science. He became a successful manager, coach, and team owner, transmitting his knowledge over generations.

 

Luis gained fame for his great plays and intelligence in the position of shortstop. He became a reference, a master, and a key player sought by many teams throughout the country. He played in both professional leagues in the country, in Caracas and Maracaibo. He became the first player “exported” from Venezuela when he signed with Tigres del Licey of the Dominican Republic in 1934.

 

Also in 1934, Ortega and his homemaker wife, Herminia Montiel, welcomed their son Luis Ernesto Aparicio Montiel. By the time Aparicio was born in Maracaibo on April 29, his father was shining as one of the first baseball superstars of Venezuela and Latin America. Ortega was an All-Star player and one the most famous players ever of Venezuelan baseball. “An artist in the shortstop position,” many called him.

 

Baseball was his life. Aparicio recalls his mother washing baseball uniforms for his team and talking about baseball all day. From the age of 12, when he played shortstop for a team called La Deportiva, Aparicio displayed the grace and elegance he learned from his father. From then on, Aparicio was a member of several teams in Maracaibo, Caracas, and Barquisimeto. He was constantly moving with his family, depending on the time of year and which team his father was playing for.

 

That was his life: baseball, the stardom of his father, the knowledge of his uncle and whatever the game brought to the family table.

 

In 1953, Caracas hosted the Baseball Amateur World Series, and Luis Aparicio, then 19 years old, was selected to represent Venezuela. It was his first big tournament, and he played shortstop, third base, and left field. Although Cuba won the tournament, Aparicio was recognized both in the stands and in newspapers as the most electrifying player, who made great plays and showed security and maturity in all positions. Fans waved white handkerchiefs during this tournament, praising the teenager with great speed and a solid glove. All eyes were on him for the first time, but the name of his famous father would always be on his shoulders if he chose to be a professional player.

 

Soon after the Amateur World Series, the day arrived. Aparicio had to tell his parents he was quitting school to become a professional baseball player. His mother was not happy with the decision. His father, on the other hand, told him something that would stand out in his mind for the rest of his career. “Son, if you are going to play baseball for a living, you will have to be the number one always,” said his father. “You will never be a number two of anybody, always be the number one.”

 

That winter, the best four teams in Venezuela played in the country’s first national tournament. The teams — Gavilanes and Pastora from Maracaibo, and Caracas and Magallanes from Caracas — rotated their games in four cities and it was the first tournament played under the umbrella of major-league baseball.

 

Aparicio signed with Gavilanes and his debut was scheduled for November 17, 1953, in Maracaibo. That day it rained, and his debut was postponed until the next day, November 18, which is a special holiday in Maracaibo. The city celebrates the day of its lady patron, the Virgin of Chiquinquirá, and festivities are held all around. Among them is the special baseball game between the crosstown rivals Pastora and Gavilanes.

 

Aparicio’s father, Ortega, who also played for Gavilanes, led off the game against Pastora’s Howie Fox, a major-league veteran. After the first pitch, Ortega went back to the dugout and pointed to his son with his bat, signaling it was time for Luis to take his father’s bat and replace him at home plate for his first official at-bat.

 

The crowd of 7,000 gave a 15-minute standing ovation to this simple but magical gesture. They were recognizing Ortega — known as “The Great of Maracaibo” — for his outstanding career, his talent as the best shortstop in Venezuelan baseball, for his dedication on the field, and for more than 20 years of contributing to the development of the game in Maracaibo. At the same time, people were showing Luis the huge burden he had on his shoulders for carrying his father’s name, and for the responsibility he had on the field from that moment.

 

Aparicio ended up being named the best shortstop of the tournament. By December, the Cleveland Indians were negotiating with him. Gavilanes manager Red Kress, who was a coach for the Indians, spoke with general manager Hank Greenberg about signing Aparicio, but Greenberg replied that he thought Luis too small to play baseball. Chico Carrasquel, who was playing for Caracas and Chicago at the time, talked to Chicago White Sox general manager Frank Lane and told him about Luis, asking him to sign the youngster before someone else did. Caracas’s manager, Luman Harris, also talked to Lane. Soon after, Lane sent an offer and a contract for Aparicio with a $10,000 check. Young Luis became a member of the White Sox.

 

In October 1955, the White Sox traded Chico Carrasquel to the Cleveland Indians, leaving the door open for Aparicio. When Lane announced the trade, a Chicago journalist said: “You are trading your All-Star shortstop? You will need a machine to replace Chico.” Lane replied, “Yes, that’s precisely what we have — a machine, and his name is Luis Aparicio.”

 

Aparicio was named the American League Rookie of the Year in 1956. He was the first Latin American player to win the award. He finished with a .266 batting average and a league-leading 21 stolen bases, and also led the league in sacrifice hits. The stolen base as a strategy was becoming less and less used in baseball in those years. Aparicio revived the essence of the stolen base from the moment he reached the majors. He injected the White Sox with the game of speed, the Caribbean game, where speed is a key. He was praised for his defense but during his first season had 35 errors.

 

Luis needed work on his throw. Venezuelan journalist Juan Vené, who covered Aparicio’s entire career, recalled, “Fans were afraid to sit behind first base and they were really aware of the throw every time Aparicio was fielding a grounder because the ball often ended into the stands.”

 

In 1958, Aparicio won his first Gold Glove, was named to his first All-Star Game, hit .266, and led the league in stolen bases for the third consecutive year, with 29. Chicago ended up in second place for the second year in a row behind the Yankees. The situation in the American League was tough. The Chicago White Sox was an outstanding club but the Yankees were the Yankees, and in those years they simply dominated baseball. There were no playoffs. To go to the World Series they just needed to finish first in the American League. The White Sox needed to reach one more step, and they did it in 1959.

 

That season, the White Sox won 94 games and finally won the pennant. Among the keys to their success were Aparicio’s base-stealing skills and his defense along with his double play partner and close friend, Nellie Fox. Aparicio ended up second to his double-play partner Fox in the voting for the American League’s Most Valuable Player. He stole a career-high 56 bases that year. He realized no one in baseball was better than him at stealing. His speed was a key to victory. He led the team in runs with 98.

 

After their great season, the White Sox lost the World Series to the Dodgers in six games. Aparicio hit .308 (8-for-26), and although he was thrilled to participate in the fall classic, he was deeply frustrated in not winning the Series. “ Hoping to return to the World Series in 1960, the White Sox instead slipped to third place. They fell to fourth place in 1961 and fifth in 1962. The Sox wanted to rebuild their team, and in January of 1963, Aparicio and veteran outfielder Al Smith were traded to the Baltimore Orioles for Ron Hansen, Pete Ward, Dave Nicholson, and Hoyt Wilhelm.

 

The trade was a jolt to Luis, but he was moving to a contending team built around a foundation of power and pitching. Aparicio added speed to the Baltimore lineup, winning two more stolen base titles in 1963-64 to give him nine consecutive seasons as the American League stolen base champion, an all-time record. More importantly, he helped solidify the Oriole defense. Luis and future Hall of Famer Brooks Robinson formed one of the best shortstop-third base combinations of all time.

 

In 1966, the Orioles won the American League pennant, and Aparicio once again faced the Dodgers in the World Series. Although his offense was not as solid as it was in 1959, he still contributed with four hits and great defense during the series, which the Orioles swept in four games. It was first and only championship ring of his career. He came back to Maracaibo as a hero, dedicating his part of the title to his parents, who were his biggest supporters.

 

In November of 1967, Luis was traded back to the White Sox. As a veteran player, he became the team leader and mentor. During his second stint in Chicago, his glove was still his great tool, though his speed was not the same. He worked on his offense and in 1970, at the age of 36, batted a career-high .313.

 

Before the 1971 season, Aparicio was traded to the Boston Red Sox and played with them for three more seasons. In two of them was he was selected to the All-Star Game. In 1973, at the age of 39, he batted .271 in 132 games and stole 13 bases in 14 attempts.

 

On March 26, 1974 Aparicio was in the Red Sox spring camp when he got the notice that he was being released. He wanted to play one more season; he was 40 and still felt he had it. When he went back to the hotel he had a letter from Yankees owner George Steinbrenner. It was an open contract that had a note saying: “You put in the amount to play for the New York Yankees.”

 

Aparicio sent the envelope back with a note that said: “Dear Mr. Steinbrenner, thank you very much for your offer but I just get released once in my lifetime.” That was the end of Aparicio’s playing career. He went back to Maracaibo that day with his family.

 

From 1956 to 1973, no other shortstop was more dominant in his position than Luis Aparicio, who won nine Gold Gloves. He was a profound influence on the game during his era with his speed, helping to revive the stolen base as an offensive weapon. He was selected to 10 All-Star teams. He played in two World Series and won one, and he set the most significant personal record for himself: No player had played more games at his beloved position in the major leagues than he (2,583). (The record has since been broken by Omar Vizquel.) He finished his career with 2,677 hits, a .262 batting average and 506 stolen bases.

 

After 10 years of eligibility and a huge crusade by many Hispanic journalists pushing his candidacy for the Hall of Fame, he was elected to the Hall in 1984, becoming the first Venezuelan to ever receive this form of baseball immortality. “This is a triumph of Venezuela for all Venezuelans,” said Aparicio when he heard of his election.

 

After his election to the National Baseball Hall of Fame, Aparicio’s status of celebrity increased greatly. He became known as the most important and influential Venezuelan athlete of all time, the most revered and followed. He also made several trips a year to the US to participate in autograph sessions, fan festivals and former player activities. He was a constant supporter of Hall of Fame gatherings, including All-Star games and Cooperstown induction weekends.

 

Aparicio has since become an active baseball follower and his voice is present through his social media accounts, where he has provided opinions and personals perspective of issues around baseball. Most notably in 2017 he was invited to participate in a ceremony honoring the Latino members of the Baseball Hall of Fame prior to the 2017 All-Star Game in Miami, Florida. Aparicio respectfully declined the invitation and publicly stated: “Thank you for the honor @mlb, but I cannot celebrate while the young people of my country are dying while fighting for freedom”

 

Maracaibo still remembers every November 18 as part of the festivities around the Virgin holiday, the anniversary of Luis Aparicio’s debut. At the Aguilas del Zulia game, Aparicio has made the ceremonial first pitch. Every year the Luis Aparicio Award is given to the best Venezuelan player of the major-league baseball season. It was a tribute to his career and to the memory of his father.

 

Much more than a great player, Aparicio was recognized as a great human being. Most people knew Luis for his playing feats, but ignored his great heart and family values. During his career the integrity he brought to the game was one of his strongest assets. He gave everything he had to win and help his teams. He played simultaneously for 19 years in Venezuelan baseball, doubling the amount of work year round. As a major-league player he played fewer than 130 games in a season only once.

 

Maybe his greater value was how he embraced and understood his position and his significance on and off the field for the people of Venezuela, a country filled with social problems that universally celebrates the achievements of its people. He was much more than an icon.

 

People always expected the best from him, and he gave nothing but the best both as a player and as a human being, working hard enough and using his abilities to be among the greatest players of all time. He had huge shoes to fill under the shadow of his father and he never let this issue pressure him during his life. Luis Aparicio assumed a social responsibility and went beyond expectations.

 

 

[Yankee4Life]

Tommy Holmes

 

 

A severe sinus condition kept Tommy Holmes out of the service during World War II, but the chances are that if he had been drafted and sent into harm’s way, several hundred fans from one particular portion of Braves Field would have been willing to follow him into action.

 

Holmes was among the most popular performers in Boston baseball history, and during his career with the Braves, from 1942 to 1952, nobody enjoyed the type of unabashed love he received from the denizens of the 1,500-seat, stand-alone bleachers situated behind his right-field playing spot. Dubbed the Jury Box by a sportswriter who once counted just 12 fans seated there in leaner times, the section with its wooden benches was filled during the club’s contending years with a crew of regulars who developed a friendly give-and-take with their hero. “How many hits you gonna get today, Tommy?” a patron might yell, and Holmes would shout back a reply or hold up however many fingers he deemed appropriate. There is no record of his accuracy in forecasting, but the Pride of the Jury Box had plenty of clutch blows at the ballpark — none bigger than his eighth-inning single off Bob Feller that gave the Braves a 1-0 victory in the opening game of the 1948 World Series.

 

A .302 lifetime hitter who set a then-National League record with a 37-game hitting streak in 1945 and was one of the toughest men in history to strike out, Thomas Francis Holmes was born on March 29, 1917, in the Borough Park neighborhood of Brooklyn.

 

Brooklyn had two semipro teams that drew the attention of major-league scouts, the Bay Parkways and the Bushwicks. After graduating from high school, Holmes went seeking a job with the Bay Parkways. “Harry Hess, the manager, told me I was just a kid, but then one day a guy didn’t show up and he said, ‘Can you play left field?’ I said sure, even though I had never played left field in my life. I was a first baseman. Well, I got a couple hits, and the next Tuesday night an owner of the Bushwicks — there were two brothers, Joe and Max Rosner, who owned both clubs — he called and asked me if I would play at Dexter Park for him against Josh Gibson, Satchel Paige, and all of those great Negro League players. I told him sure. I batted against Satchel Paige; I didn’t know who he was, but I got a couple of hits.”

 

Watching the games in which Holmes suited up against Gibson and Paige’s Pittsburgh Crawfords team was Yankees scout Paul Krichell. He called Tommy’s father, and as Holmes recalled, “There were no negotiations. We got together, Krichell said ‘We’d like to sign your son,’ and they gave me a few bucks — not much. I don’t even remember what my bonus was. My father just said, ‘Sure, sounds good.’ I stayed out of the financial end of it. The average, I think, was $500 for a kid like me coming out of high school, and maybe $1,000 or a little more for a college kid with three or four more years’ experience.”

 

It was the late 1930s, and the Yankee dynasty started by Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig was continuing with Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Bill Dickey, and Co. New York would win four consecutive World Series from 1936 to 1939, and the club oozed with confidence. “The Yankees always won, and they had no signs,” Holmes said. “When I went to spring training with them, I asked what the signs were, and guys would say ‘Signs? Just swing the goddamn bat!’ I’d say, ‘Well, what about….’ and they would yell, ‘Just swing the bat! If we can hold the opposition to four runs, we’ll score seven.’ That was the Yankees — bang-bang-bang. They had the power, and they could beat the hell out of you.

 

“I was told by George Weiss, then the Yankees’ farm director, that their philosophy was that hopefully you had three years of playing Triple A ball, or at least two years. I could have come up earlier, but with DiMaggio, [Charlie] Keller, and later [Tommy] Henrich in the outfield, it was tough. Weiss said to me, ‘Tommy, don’t you sit around. You go out and play.’ Holmes did as he was told, and put up great numbers. During his first professional season at Norfolk, in the summer of ’37, the center fielder batted .320 with 25 homers and 111 RBIs. He made the All-Star team that year, then followed it up with an MVP campaign in ’38 when he led the Eastern League with a .368 average, 200 hits, 41 doubles, and 110 runs for the Binghamton Triplets.

 

This prompted a promotion to the Yankees’ top farm club, the Newark Bears — a team then considered to be the equal of many major league squads. All Holmes did there was bat .339 with 10 triples in 1939. His power numbers were down (he had just four homers, and topped 13 just once more as a pro), but it was clear that he was a first-rate hitter. Things progressed further in 1940, as Tommy topped the International League with 211 hits and 126 runs scored while batting .317. He was even better in the playoffs, setting a circuit mark for postseason hits and helping lead Newark to the Little World Series title. On September 13 of that year, the Associated Press reported that Dodgers president Larry MacPhail had supposedly offered the Yankees $40,000 for the hometown hero, but this was never substantiated and Holmes stayed put.

 

By the end of spring training in 1941, having just turned 24 and married his sweetheart, Lillian Helen Pettersen, Holmes was already a veteran of four minor-league seasons, who had shown the talent that normally warranted a promotion to the majors. But Keller, DiMaggio, and Henrich were still manning the outfield for the Bronx Bombers — with reigning AL batting champ DiMaggio in Tommy’s position of center — and that left little room for a rookie lacking home run prowess. So after a look-see in spring training, Yanks manager Joe McCarthy sent the youngster back to Newark yet again with a promise: If New York couldn’t find a space for him on its roster during the regular season, club management would make every attempt to grant his wish and send him to another big-league organization.

 

McCarthy was true to his word. Holmes hit .302 with a league-best 190 hits in his third season for the Bears in ’41, but with the Yankees’ outfield contingent seemingly set for years to come, the organization decided to trade off its still-valuable prospect. Two days after the Pearl Harbor attack, on December 9, 1941, Holmes was sold to the Braves for undisclosed cash and players to be named. The Yanks received first baseman Buddy Hassett a week later as part of the deal, and on February 5, 1942, Boston outfielder Gene Moore was sent Bronx-bound to complete it. The trade still ranks as one of the finest in Braves history; while Hassett played just one more season in the majors and Moore three subpar campaigns, Holmes was among the NL’s top hitters for much of the next decade. “I always said it took the best ballplayer in the world — Joe DiMaggio — to run me out of New York,” Tommy said, and while he was kidding, there was much truth to the statement.

 

With a tight budget, a no-frills ballpark, and a club mired deep in the second division, the Braves were the polar opposites of the aristocratic Yankees. Boston was coming off a 62-92 season and a third straight year in seventh place under manager Casey Stengel, and Tommy instantly found himself with a starting center-field job for 1942. Later he recalled that when he asked Stengel, “Who in God’s name brought me here?” Casey said simply, “I did. Someday I want to build a whole ballclub around you.” Holmes called going from the Yankees organization to the Braves like “living at the Waldorf, then going to live in Povertyville down at the Bowery.”

 

Pearl Harbor and America’s entry into World War II made for a long winter, but Holmes was still all smiles come spring. When the Braves started their season at Philadelphia on April 14, Tommy donned jersey No. 1 (which he’d wear his entire career) and batted leadoff in his major-league debut — going 2-for-5 against future teammate Si Johnson in a 2-1 Boston victory. And although the Braves wound up seventh yet again under Stengel, there were two future Hall of Famers on the playing roster all year for the rookie to learn from. Slow-footed catcher Ernie Lombardi hit .330 to capture the league batting title, and former Pirates great Paul “Big Poison” Waner played alongside Holmes in right field. Just a .258 hitter at age 39, Waner still had the knowledge of a man with three batting titles and a lifetime average of .330-plus under his belt.

 

For Holmes, Waner was nothing short of a revelation. Big Poison preached pulling the ball to right field, and in this curious rookie he had an apt pupil. “One day in ’42, I took an 0-for-9 in a doubleheader,” Tommy recalled nearly 60 years later. “I was in the clubhouse moping around, and there was Paul Waner, who liked his sauce, having a beer. He says, ‘What’s the matter, kid?’ I say, ‘Paul, I was 0-for-9 today.’ He says, ‘Don’t worry about that. Just come out in the morning.’ This was the beginning of my hitting life. I was a line-drive hitter, same as Paul. He says, ‘See that foul line over there? I’m going to show you how to hit it. Never hit the ball where three guys can catch it, not with that wind blowing in at Braves Field. Shoot for the foul lines. If a few go out of play, don’t worry about it. You don’t pay for the balls.’” (Although Holmes credited Stengel with similar batting tips at the time, he always cited Waner as his chief tutor in later interviews.)

 

The rookie learned his lessons well. Batting leadoff most of the year, Holmes hit .278, second only to Lombardi among Boston’s regulars, and struck out just 10 times in 558 at-bats. He went 10-for-19 in one August stretch against the Dodgers and Giants, broke up two no-hit attempts, and compiled a .990 fielding average to tie for second best in the league. Having not gotten his first big-league shot until he was 25 years old, he was making up for lost time. Even when he dipped a bit to .270 in his sophomore season, he led the league with 629 at-bats and collected 33 doubles and 10 triples. He was above .300 much of the season, often batted third, and later claimed that focusing on learning to pull the ball cost him 50 points in his batting average. It proved a worthwhile sacrifice.

 

Of course Tommy’s mind was likely on more than baseball that summer. With the war in Europe and Japan heating up, married players like Holmes were starting to be drafted, and he got a call in March 1944 to leave spring training and report to Brooklyn for his Navy physical. Although it was widely reported that he had passed and would be reporting for duty that summer, the call never came. Later, Holmes described an induction scene where examining doctors determined him unfit for duty due to lifelong sinus problems that they feared could be life-threatening in the European climate.

 

One of a dwindling number of strong young ballplayers left on big-league rosters, and fresh off a winter spent working in the Brooklyn shipyards, Holmes posted his first super season in 1944. Third in the NL with 195 hits, 93 runs scored, and 42 doubles, he also finished 10th in hitting at .309 after staying near the top (and above .330) into late summer.

 

Making the feat more impressive was the ballpark Tommy called home. Braves Field was a cavernous park built during the inside baseball era of 1915, just before Babe Ruth ushered in the home run age. Its center-field fence was originally built 550 feet from home plate, and with the wind blowing in off the Charles River just beyond its walls, few on the club had ever managed even 20 homers. Now, seeing that Holmes had some pop in his bat, Braves management brought the 345-foot right-field fences in by 20 feet midway through the ’44 campaign to give him an easier target.

 

Even with this move, what transpired next took the most optimistic of fans by surprise. Holmes got off to a hot start in 1945 that never let up, and Paul Waner’s star pupil reached his peak. Although the Braves stumbled to yet another second-division finish, Tommy astonished the baseball world by leading the major leagues with 28 homers, 224 hits, 47 doubles, a .577 slugging percentage, 81 extra-base hits, and 367 total bases. He batted .352 — finishing second in the NL to Phil Cavarretta of the Cubs in a race that went down to the final day — and was also runner-up (to Brooklyn’s Dixie Walker) with 117 RBIs. His 125 runs scored placed him third in that department, and he even stole 15 bases (fourth most in the NL) for good measure.

 

Making this dominant showing all the more impressive was what Holmes did in the middle of it — establishing a new NL record with a 37-game hitting streak. He started the stretch in scorching fashion with 10 total hits in back-to-back doubleheaders on June 6-7, and kept up the torrid pace into July. He tied and broke Rogers Hornsby’s old mark of 33 straight games against the Pirates in another doubleheader that featured rainy, hurricane-like conditions at Braves Field and a homer, single, and four doubles by the man of the hour.

 

The hits kept coming right up until the All-Star break (which he entered with a major-league-best .401 average), but in his first game after the three-day layoff, Holmes was stopped by Hank Wyse of the Cubs on July 12 at Wrigley Field. All told, he batted .433 during the streak, which lasted as a record for 33 years before being broken by Pete Rose. Even today, while Tommy’s breakthrough season has been largely (and unfairly) forgotten by all but fervent baseball historians, his hitting streak still stands as the ninth longest in big-league annals.

 

Perhaps the most amazing stat of all is that Holmes stepped to the plate on more than 700 occasions in 1945 (636 official at-bats plus 70 walks), and left it a strikeout victim just nine times (once swinging). This gave him the distinction of being the first man ever to lead the majors in most homers and fewest strikeouts in the same season, an incredible display of contact hitting in keeping with his career averages. Holmes never struck out more than 20 times in a season, and had more homers than strikeouts on a record-tying four occasions (Ernie Lombardi, Lefty O’Doul, and Ted Williams also accomplished this feat). In fact, Holmes’ 122 lifetime strikeouts in 4,992 career at-bats are fewer than many current major leaguers notch in just one season of less than 600 at-bats.

 

With Holmes established as a top star by the end of ’45, new Braves president Lou Perini and his ownership group began following through on Stengel’s dream of surrounding Tommy with a strong team. Ace manager Billy Southworth (a three-time pennant winner) was brought in from the St. Louis Cardinals, and the war’s end along with blockbuster trades brought many new faces onto the 1946 roster, including Warren Spahn, Johnny Sain, and Johnny Hopp. The result was a leap to third place, and Holmes had another standout season with a .310 average, 35 doubles, and a 20-game hit streak. The Jury Box crowd so adored him that when Tommy swapped positions with left fielder Johnny Barrett for one day that year, fans showered Barrett with so many boos and insults that he claimed at game’s end, “I’ll never go out there again.” There was one problem, however. “The owners had doubled my salary to around $30,000 [after ’45],” Holmes recalled later, “but then they went and moved the fences back out!” Despite Tommy’s 28 home runs and teammate Chuck Workman’s 25 during 1945, team statisticians saw that more opponents than Braves sluggers had been taking advantage of the closer right-field target.

 

Everything came together for the Braves in 1948, and Holmes was a big factor as leadoff man for the NL champions. He placed third in the league with a .325 average (his fifth straight year in the top 10), was second with 190 hits, and made his second All-Star team. The Three Troubadours, a trio of musicians who serenaded players at Braves Field on trombone, trumpet, and clarinet, played the Irish tune “Has Anybody Here Seen Kelly?” when Holmes stepped to the plate. The answer was more folks than ever, as the Braves set an all-time attendance mark of 1,455,439 that summer even as the Red Sox were drawing 1,558,798 of their own while battling for an American League pennant down the road.

 

And although Holmes batted just .192 in the World Series against Cleveland, he had arguably the biggest hit of the fall classic. With Johnny Sain and Bob Feller locked up in a scoreless pitchers’ duel in the eighth inning of Game One at Braves Field, Tommy’s roommate, Phil Masi, appeared to be caught snoozing off second base when Feller and Cleveland shortstop Lou Boudreau pulled a pickoff play they had been practicing. It was clear in still photographs taken at a variety of angles that Boudreau had indeed tagged Masi on the shoulder before he could slide back into the bag, but umpire Bill Stewart (a Fitchburg, Mass., native) saw it differently and called Masi safe. Sain lined out, but then Holmes hit a ball past Ken Keltner at third to drive in Masi with the game’s only run and send the chilly home crowd of 40,135 into a frenzy. Feller wound up a 1-0 loser despite his two-hitter, and the Braves had a quick edge in the World Series. It was a heady time for the underdogs, but it was short-lived. Boston went on to drop four of the next five games and the series, with Holmes ending the 4-3, Game Six finale at Braves Field with a fly out. As if this wasn’t bad enough, Tommy had to head to the hospital the next day for an appendectomy. Then it was back to Brooklyn for his newest offseason job — selling televisions.

 

Braves management was confident that their team could contend for years to come, but in 1949 the Braves quickly fell back to fourth place. Talk of dissension rocked the club starting in spring training, as players reportedly grumbled about Southworth driving them too hard and seeking too much credit for the previous year’s accomplishments. Players later said the disharmony was largely a figment of the press, but there was no denying the dramatic decline in performance by many on the club. Holmes was among them; he batted less than .300 for the first time in six years (dropping all the way to .266), and began getting platooned on a semi-regular basis. He got his average back up to .298 in 1950, when the Braves again contended much of the season, but by then Tommy was practically splitting time with Willard Marshall. Even though Holmes showed a bit of his 1945 pop with nine homers in just 322 at-bats, his playing career was winding down. The organization had other things in mind for him.

 

As a player Holmes was popular with his teammates, the coaching staff, fans, and reporters, so it seemed only natural that he might make a success as a manager. He was asked to take over the Braves’ farm club at Hartford as player-manager for the 1951 season, and he enthusiastically accepted the challenge. By midway through the year Billy Southworth’s health and the big league team’s record were both floundering, and with Southworth’s stunning resignation on June 19, another request came Holmes’ way: How would he like to manage in Boston? He had likely thought it would be years before such an opportunity came, so it was no surprise that Tommy again said yes.

 

In many ways, his appointment — which also cost Hartford Holmes’ .319 bat — was an experiment doomed to fail. Suddenly the youngest skipper in the big leagues at just 34, Tommy took over an underachieving club mixed with veterans like Elliott, Spahn, and Earl Torgeson who had been his teammates the previous year, and raw youngsters like Johnny Logan and Chet Nichols who were getting their first taste of the majors. It was hard for him to establish authority under such circumstances, and his mild-mannered approach and lack of training didn’t help. While there were some high points, including a 9-0 victory by Spahn over the Cubs in Holmes’ managerial debut and a midsummer stretch in which the club won 14 of 18 games, by year’s end his record was a mediocre 48-47 for a team that finished 76-78 overall.

 

The worst was yet to come. In 1952 the Braves got off to a poor start, and Tommy (cover boy on the first edition of the team scorebook that season) became a convenient scapegoat. On May 31st, with the club in seventh place at 13-22, he was fired in favor of Charlie Grimm — whose managerial résumé already included 13 big-league seasons and three pennants. General manager John Quinn said Holmes simply needed more experience to be a successful skipper, an odd comment considering that he now had a year more of it than when they had given him the job. Perhaps more than any other player, Holmes personified the underdog, determined Boston Braves. And despite how his career with the team ended, his numbers still shine through. He averaged 185 hits, 36 doubles, and 86 runs scored during his nine seasons as a regular, and ranked among baseball’s Top 10 during the 1940s in hits and doubles.

 

His playing career in the majors now finished once and for all, Holmes embarked on a minor-league managerial odyssey during the next several seasons. His travels finally stopped in 1959. He was named director of the New York Journal-American’s sandlot baseball program, which was later renamed the New York Sandlot Baseball Alliance.

 

Starting in 1973, Holmes took on an additional role as director of amateur baseball relations for the New York Mets. He became a familiar figure around Shea Stadium during three decades on the job, but likely never would have risen from relative obscurity outside Flushing Meadows had not Pete Rose gotten on a hot streak during the summer of 1978. Once Rose had hit in 30 straight games and was nearing Holmes’s record 37-game skein, Tommy’s name started appearing in newspaper stories throughout the country for the first time in a quarter-century. “I wish [Rose] luck,” Holmes joked to a reporter. “Heck, until two weeks ago nobody knew I was alive.”

 

As fate would have it, the Reds were playing at Shea against the Mets when Rose reached game No. 38 of his streak on July 25. The game was stopped momentarily to honor the achievement, and a teary-eyed Holmes stepped on the field to shake the new record-holder’s hand. The gesture impressed Rose, who said of his predecessor, “I only hope I show as much class as Tommy Holmes did when somebody breaks my record. He thanked me for making him a big leaguer again.” (Rose eventually made it to 44 games before he was stopped, ironically, by the Atlanta Braves.)

 

Ten years later, when the ’48 Braves were invited back to Boston for a 40th reunion, one of the most popular guests was a still-trim Holmes — sporting his 1986 World Series championship ring earned with the Mets at the expense of the Red Sox. He and his beloved Lillian also made the drive up from their home in Woodbury, Long Island, each year throughout the 1990s to attend the annual events hosted by the Boston Braves Historical Association.

 

When ill health prompted Tommy’s retirement from the Mets and stopped his pilgrimages to the Hub around 2002, it was if the Braves diehards who remained were losing their hero all over again. Holmes no doubt felt the same way. He always said it was not the batting streak or his hit off Feller that provided him with his greatest Boston memories; those were reserved for his love affair with the 1,500 bleacherites in right field. “Williams, DiMaggio, Musial — they never had what I did,” he often recounted proudly. “The other 29,000 fans, if they wanted to give me a boo or two, go ahead. But not if you sat behind me in the Jury Box, I’ll tell you that. They were always hollering at me, ‘Keep your eye on the ball, Tommy!’ ‘Try and wait for a good one, Tommy!’ Tommy this, and Tommy that.

 

The Pride of the Jury Box still had his original Boston Braves uniform, socks, and cap when he died of natural causes on April 14, 2008, at the age of 91. His passing in Boca Raton, Florida, left Al Dark as the last regular from the 1948 National League championship club still alive, as fellow teammates Sain, Spahn, Eddie Stanky, and Bill Voiselle had all died in recent years. Tommy had also been the last living Boston Braves manager for quite some time, owing to the young age at which he held the position.

 

Holmes retired with a .302 lifetime batting average with 88 home runs and 581 RBIs in his 1,320-game, eleven-year major league career. He posted a fine .989 fielding percentage in the majors, executing more double plays (37) than errors (33).

 

 

 

[Yankee4Life]

Alejandro Carrasquel

 

 

Alejandro Carrasquel was the first native Venezuelan to play in the major leagues. When the 27-year-old trailblazer joined the Washington Senators in 1939 he was already a seasoned veteran, having pitched for years in countries throughout the Caribbean basin. The Senators that spring were housing an international contingent of players never quite seen before in major league baseball. The camp had three Cuban players and a French Canadian–born pitcher named Joe Krakauskas. Senators owner Clark Griffith partially assessed his team, after a walk around camp, by saying, “The way things are now we sound like a row in the League of Nations."

 

Carrasquel had gained the Senators’ notice with his pitching over the previous winter in Cuba, when the right-hander had been named MVP of the Cuban winter league season. Team Cuba’s manager José Rodríguez, former major league player with the New York Giants, alerted Washington to the pitching prospect. The Senators sent scout Joe Cambria to investigate. Cambria, in an often retold account, “trailed him from the Havana park one day and got his name on a Washington contract while they were sitting on a park bench, with an interpreter between.”

 

From the mound, Carrasquel showed right off that he was a polished pitcher. He could field his position, hold runners on, and commanded a variety of pitches. Carrasquel easily made the Washington staff. There was an imposed proviso with it, however. The Senators modified Carrasquel’s name to a more fan friendly–sounding “Alex Alexandra.” Alejandro was nicknamed “Patón” [“big-footed”] in Venezuela for his purported size 18 shoes. Former teammate José Zardón said it began one day when Carrasquel accidentally grabbed one of Zardón’s shoes. “Hey, this shoe doesn’t fit. I think it must be yours,” Carrasquel said. “Of course it’s mine,” Zardón replied. “How do you expect my shoe to fit that patón you have?”

 

Carrasquel made his first appearance on April 23, 1939, against the New York Yankees at Griffith Stadium. He relieved starter Ken Chase with two outs in the fourth inning and a man on first base. The first three batters he faced were future Hall of Famers Joe DiMaggio, Lou Gehrig, and Bill Dickey. He retired them all, but the Yankees, ahead 6–3 when Carrasquel entered the game, won 7–4.

 

The game marked the first appearance in the major leagues by a native of Venezuela. Alejandro Eloy Carrasquel was born in Parroquia La Candelaria, a municipality of Caracas, on July 24, 1912. He was the youngest of four children born to Alejo Carrasquero and Emilia María Aparicio, following two brothers and a sister. (Emilia María was not related to the ball-playing Aparicio family eventually rooted in Maracaibo.)

 

Alejandro was signed as an 18-year-old by his country’s Royal Criollos team in 1930 and pitched his first professional game for the club the following spring. Over the next few years, Carrasquel played for several other teams in his homeland, and traveled to pitch in other baseball countries as he gained experience on the mound. Invited by Cuban great Martín Dihigo to join the Cuban winter league in 1938, he made the most of the opportunity, sporting an 11–6 record, with 10 complete games, and caught the eye of the Senators.

 

In his second major league game, on April 30, Carrasquel picked up his first save. At Yankee Stadium he was called in to relieve in the eighth inning, with two outs and the bases loaded, and Washington clinging to a 3–2 lead. Staying composed, the pitcher coaxed a fly out from Yankees second baseman Joe Gordon, and then retired the side in order in the ninth to preserve the victory.

 

Three days later, May 3, in another relief role, Carrasquel picked up his first win and the first by a Venezuelan pitcher in the major leagues. The historic victory occurred over the St. Louis Browns at Sportsman’s Park. The Senators rallied from a six-run deficit, scoring seven runs over the final three innings of the game, to pull out an 11–10 road triumph. Hurling scoreless eighth and ninth innings, Carrasquel secured the special win.

 

The solid relief pitching of the rookie earned him his first big league start on May 14. It came at home against Lefty Grove and the Boston Red Sox. Carrasquel came out on the losing end of a 5–4 score in a strenuous 12-inning battle. Tied at two after nine innings, the Red Sox reached the Washington hurler for three runs in the 12th, and the Nationals’ rally in the bottom of the inning against Grove and two relievers fell one run short. Earlier in the game, Carrasquel recorded the first hit by a Venezuelan player in the major leagues when he singled off Grove. In absorbing his first pitching loss, Carrasquel hung an 0-for-5 on heralded Red Sox rookie left fielder Ted Williams. Incidentally, the Red Sox starting lineup that day had five future Hall of Famers: Grove, Jimmie Foxx, Joe Cronin, Bobby Doerr, and Williams.

 

Four years later Shirley Povich recalled Carrasquel’s amazing composure as a rookie. “I don’t know where he learned it,” Senators manager Bucky Harris told him back in 1939, “but this big fellow is smoother than any rookie who ever broke in under me.” The impressed Harris gave the “big fellow,” who was 6’1” tall — and weighed somewhat more than his listed 182 pounds — three successive starts after the locked-horns effort against Grove. Carrasquel won two of them. All three starts were complete game endeavors.

 

On May 25, Carrasquel three-hit the Browns, 4–1, at Griffith Stadium. The pitcher gained high praise from Povich with the effort. “Certainly, Alex Alexandra is the most sensational rookie to flash across the big league scene since Bobby Feller appeared in 1936,” wrote the Washington Post’s best-known sportswriter. “That he is no flash in the pan is well established. One only has to look at his past three performances.”

 

Not long afterwards, Senators owner Clark Griffith stepped in and ended the name charade. Stripping Carrasquel of his foisted-upon Alexandra alias, Griffin announced to the press that “when a fellow comes that far, I think it’s no more than right that he get all the credit that’s coming to him under his own name.”

 

The sole loss in that three-game span for Carrasquel was a 3–1 defeat to the Philadelphia Athletics on May 30. Allowing only four hits and two earned runs, the Caracas-born pitcher supplied his team’s only run with a long ball. At Griffith Stadium, Carrasquel tagged Athletics starter Nels Potter to register the first home run hit by a Venezuelan player in the major leagues. Following the 3–1 loss to the A’s, Carrasquel plodded through several rough outings, winning only once in six more starting appearances.

 

Carrasquel was honored by a delegation of Venezuelans between games of a doubleheader at Yankee Stadium on the Fourth of July. Dr. Tomás Pacanins, consul general of Venezuela, introduced him and presented several gifts and a diploma from the Venezuelan Baseball Association. Alex made a speech – in Spanish – but his part in the occasion has been lost in history because the vast majority of the 61,808 fans had turned out for “Lou Gehrig Appreciation Day,” and Gehrig’s speech and its immortal line, “Today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of this earth,” overshadowed everything else.

 

Carrasquel started the second game of the doubleheader, but lasted only three innings, giving up six hits and five earned runs in the Yankees 11–1 victory. His record had been 3–2, with a 2.64 ERA, following the loss to the Athletics on May 30, but his performance declined the rest of the season. He finished with a record of 5–9 and an ERA of 4.69 in 40 games. His 159 1/3 innings pitched, 17 starts, and seven complete games would prove to be career highs, and it was his only losing record in eight major-league seasons.

 

As a result of his second half decline, Carrasquel needed to prove himself again to the Senators in 1940. His job wasn’t made easier when he reported late to training camp. “Alejandro explained that as steamship service from South America to Cuba is irregular, because of the war, he had to take a boat from his native Venezuela to New York, a longer journey.” He made the opening day roster, but faltered in early relief appearances and was optioned to Jersey City of the International League on May 25. He was recalled in the first week of July, and turned things around over the second half of the season. Used exclusively in relief, he pitched only 48 innings in 28 games, and posted an overall 6–2 record, with a 4.88 ERA.

 

The Washington team Carrasquel reported to in 1941 was distinctively different to the one he had encountered two years earlier. On the year, Carrasquel duplicated his 6–2 record from the prior season and was an overall steady force working primarily out of the Senators’ bullpen. His 3.44 ERA was the best of any of the club’s bullpen specialists, in 96 2/3 innings of work. He started five games late in the season, his first since 1939.

 

In 1942, Carrasquel’s fourth year in the league, he had a 7–7 record in 35 appearances. Bucky Harris increased his workload and gave him 15 starts. He finished with a 3.43 ERA in 152 1/3 innings of work. On July 18, the husky pitcher tossed his first major league shutout – the first in the majors by a Venezuelan — blanking the St. Louis Browns 3–0 on five hits and no walks at Griffith Stadium. The pride of Caracas also registered two ten-inning complete game victories during the campaign: a 3–2 win against Detroit at Briggs Stadium on June 21, and a 4–3 home win against Cleveland on September 1.

 

The Senators made a startling improvement under Bluege, finishing in second place with an 84–69 record – 13 ½ games behind the Yankees – compared to seventh place and 62–89 in 1942. The improvement began, as it usually does, with the pitching staff. Carrasquel was one of five hurlers with 11 or more wins. He started 13 games, compiling an 11–7 record, with a 3.68 ERA in 144 1/3 innings pitched. He led the team with 39 appearances, and his 11 wins were a career best. His best performance came early in the year, with a two-hit, 5–0, shutout over the Athletics on April 25.

 

In 1944, Bluege’s team lost 90 games and dropped all the way down to the cellar of the American League. Carrasquel managed a respectable 8–7 record — though limited to only seven starts – with a 3.43 ERA in 134 innings pitched, and once again led all team hurlers with 43 appearances. His best performance as a starter came on September 10 when he pitched a complete game to defeat the Athletics 8–2, at Griffith Stadium.

 

Washington was back in a pennant race once again in 1945. At the end of July the Senators were in third place at 45–41, 5 ½ games behind Detroit and only 1 ½ games behind the second-place Yankees. Carrasquel had been used sparingly, pitching only 49 1/3 innings in 20 appearances, and had lost his only start back on May 13. His record stood at 2–3, but he had a fine 2.10 ERA.

 

However, Carrasquel’s pitching gave Washington a much-needed boost in the final two months of the pennant race. He started six games and relieved in nine others during this stretch. The first four starts were complete-game wins, including two shutouts. He lost to St. Louis 4–3 in a 10-inning complete-game start on September 5, giving up a game-tying homerun to the Browns’ Lou Finney with two outs in the top of the ninth. His final start was a seven-inning no-decision against the White Sox on September 9. Carrasquel finished the season with 7–5 record and a 2.71 ERA in 122 2/3 innings pitched.

 

Carrasquel was sold to the White Sox on January 2, 1946 for the $7,500 waiver price. It is probable that Griffith saw 1945 as his last best chance to win a pennant since all drafted players would be returning from the war in time for the 1946 season, and viewed the Carrasquel-Finney game as one particularly squandered. But it is difficult to see how Griffith could really blame Carrasquel for losing the pennant. The club went 14–8 after the September 5 game, to finish 11/2 games behind Detroit, who were 14–10 over the same span. Actually, the Senators really blew their chances when they lost three of five games to the Tigers in Washington from September 15-18, and followed up by losing three of five games to the Yankees and Athletics to close out the season.

 

On January 12, 1946 –less than two weeks after his waiver sale — Alejandro was pitching in Caracas for the Magallanes Navigators. He defeated Cervecería Caracas, 5–2, in the inaugural game of the Venezuelan winter league.

 

In mid-February he signed a three-year deal to play in Mexico for Jorge Pasquel’s upstart Mexican League. “Pasquel paid me $3,000 cash [bonus], to sign a three-year contract calling for $10,000 a year,” Carrasquel said, in an interview three years later. “I took it, for in addition to the $33,000 I was to receive in Mexico, I also was free to pitch winter baseball.” However, Carrasquel and others who cast their lot with Mexico at that time, were punished with lifetime suspensions by Major League Baseball, and were not permitted to play in Organized Baseball–backed winter leagues.

 

The league in Mexico had the option of moving a player from team to team for attempted parity purposes, and Carrasquel wound up pitching for several squads over the next three summers. From 1946–48, he pitched for Veracruz, Mexico City, and Monterrey, respectively, with an overall 44–27 record.

 

When the “jumpers” ban was lifted in the summer of 1949 by Major League Commissioner Happy Chandler, Carrasquel reported to the Chicago White Sox in early July, but the veteran’s return to the big time was a short one. On August 5, after seeing action in only three games out of the bullpen, Alex was traded to the Detroit Tigers for pitcher Luis Aloma. The next day Detroit optioned the 37-year-old to the Buffalo Bisons of the International League. The move ended his eight-year major league career. The vanguard pitcher compiled a lifetime record of 50–39 with a 3.73 ERA in 861 innings pitched. He appeared in 258 games, recording 30 complete games in 64 starts, along with 16 saves.

 

With the lifting of his organized baseball suspension, Carrasquel was able to return to the Venezuelan winter league for the 1949–50 season. After pitching two seasons for Cerveceria Caracas, the 40-year-old moundsman rejoined his original club, Magallanes, but pitched very sparingly. In 1953–54, the fading hurler made two appearances with Gavilanes of Venezuela’s Occidental league. These efforts closed out his post–Major League winter pitching career in his homeland. His record of 12–20 in those five years reflected a pitcher past his prime.

 

Carrasquel bounced around in the minor leagues in the early 1950s and stretched out his pitching tenure until 1956. After his final season with Mexico City in the Class AA Mexican League, Carrasquel returned to the Venezuelan winter league and became a coach with the Caracas Lions. In 1958–59 he was appointed manager of the Pampero Juicers. While guiding the Pampero club to lackluster results during the 1959–60 campaign, he was involved in a serious fight with a team executive. “League officials voted a two-year suspension against Alex Carrasquel who started the season as manager of Pampero,” read the winter league report of the incident. “The ban was imposed because Carrasquel allegedly slugged Eddy Moncada, breaking his jaw in two places, in a dispute which followed Carrasquel’s ouster as pilot.”17 The suspension led to a players’ strike, which caused a shutdown of the entire league. (The vacated season forced Venezuelan officials to send the Occidental league champion as the country’s representative to the Caribbean Series for the first time.)

 

Carrasquel never managed in the winter league again. However, he had a personal relationship with Rómulo Betancourt, president of Venezuela, and Carrsaquel returned to the diamond in the 1960s when Betancourt asked him to become the manager of the Vigilantes de Tránsito, an amateur league team. He managed the Tránsito club until shortly before his death.

 

The first Venezuelan major leaguer to win a game, throw a shutout, record a save, hit safely, and stroke a homerun, died from diabetic complications in Caracas in 1969 at the relatively young age of 57. Two years later, the major league trailblazer was inducted into the Venezuelan Sports Hall of Fame. In 2003 Alejandro was among a group of 14 – 11 players, one owner, one umpire, and one sportswriter – selected in the inaugural class for the newly-created Venezuelan Baseball Hall of Fame.

 

[Yankee4Life]

Dave Concepcion

 

 

It’s called the fall classic, and the 1975 World Series was indeed a “classic.” The Series waged between the Cincinnati Reds and the Boston Red Sox was one of the more memorable championship battles, as a single run decided five of the seven games. Cincinnati shortstop Dave Concepcion entered the Series hoping that the old saying “third time is a charm” would prove true. He had been to two other World Series, losing out both times: first to Baltimore in 1970 and then to Oakland in 1972.

 

In 1975 Boston won Game One at Fenway Park, shutting out the Reds by a 6-0 score, and the Reds were looking to balance the ledger before the Series headed to the Queen City. It was a rainy day in Boston on October 12 for Game Two. But the inclement weather did not hinder Boston starter Bill Lee. He held the Reds to one run and was clinging to a 2-1 lead entering the ninth inning. But after Johnny Bench’s leadoff double chased Lee from the game, Dick Drago and his blazing fastball moved to the hill.

 

After Drago retired Tony Perez on a groundout to shortstop with Bench taking third and George Foster flied to short left field, Concepcion came to bat with two outs and the tying run 90 feet away. Concepcion hit a 1-and-1 fastball into the dirt and the ball bounced high toward second base. Boston’s Denny Doyle raced to his right and backhanded the ball, but it was too late for the second baseman to make a play. Bench scored the tying run, and Concepcion was on first. Red Sox fans in the Fenway Park crowd fell silent. Concepcion stole second base, sliding past the bag but getting back safely. Ken Griffey then doubled him home, and the Reds won 3-2 to even the Series. “I was just looking to make contact,” Concepcion said later. “That’s all you can do in a situation like that against a fastball pitcher like Drago. I knew it was a hit once I got it past the pitcher.”

 

David Ismael (Benitez) Concepcion was born on June 17, 1948, Ocumare de la Costa, Aragua, Venezuela. His father, a truck driver, was against young Dave’s pursuing a career in baseball, instead hoping that he would make a living as perhaps a lawyer, banker, or doctor. After attending Agustin Codazzi High School, Dave worked as a bank teller and played for a local amateur baseball team. His coach, Wilfredo Calvino, was a scout for the Reds, and despite his father’s wishes, young Concepcion signed a contract with Calvino in September 1967 and joined Tampa in the Class-A Florida State League in 1968.

 

Concepcion’s time in the Reds’ minor-league chain was brief; by the end of the 1969 season he was playing for Triple-A Indianapolis. The 21-year-old hit .341 for the Indians in 167 at-bats, and showed a high aptitude on the basepaths. “Concepcion has the best baserunning instincts I’ve ever seen in a youngster,” said Indians manager Vern Rapp. “He stole 11 bases in 12 attempts and he was only with us about a month.”

 

Concepcion was promoted to the Reds for the 1970 season, but he faced veteran competition at shortstop in Woody Woodward and Darrel Chaney. When Concepcion showed up at camp, standing 6-feet-2 and weighing just 155 pounds, Pete Rose joked that he wouldn’t be in danger of pulling a muscle in his legs, that instead it would have to be a pulled bone. But Rose also acknowledged, “They tell me that the kid can play shortstop with a pair of pliers.”

 

Reds rookie manager Sparky Anderson took a liking to the youngster, as did hitting instructor Ted Kluszewski. Anderson made Concepcion the starter, mostly for his defensive ability. Anderson didn’t expect much offense from his young shortstop. But when Concepcion’s batting average rose to .270 in May, Kluszewski commented, “I’ve been saying all along that the kid’s gonna be a pretty good hitter.”

 

Concepcion’s unexpectedly good hitting could not keep him in the starting lineup. He made 14 errors through mid-June, and Anderson replaced him with the dependable Woodward. Woodward was a valuable commodity for the Reds, able to play every infield position and play them well. He solidified the position for a while, but by the time the second half of the season began, Concepcion was back in the lineup. He made only eight more errors and batted a respectable .260 for the season. The Reds steamrolled through the National League West Division and had little trouble sweeping Pittsburgh in the NLCS, holding the Pirates to three runs in the three games. They were not as fortunate in the World Series, losing in five games to the Baltimore Orioles.

 

Concepcion missed most of the 1971 exhibition season with a badly sprained right thumb, and when he returned to the team in late April, he was used as a utilityman, playing second base, third base, and the outfield. He got his shortstop job back in early May but struggled at the plate that season and in 1972 with .205 and .209 batting averages.

 

Concepcion was his own worst critic, and at times his being hard on himself caused subpar play to further spiral downward. Sparky Anderson decided that he needed a big-brother influence, and asked veteran Tony Perez to room with the youngster and mentor him. “He cannot stand 0-4 day. It kill him. I tell him very simple thing. ‘Don’t get your head down.’… ‘If you don’t hit now, you will next time.’… Things like this. Always I try to pick him up.” Perez also felt that marriage helped Concepcion settle down. (Dave and his bride, Delia, were married in 1972.)

 

Whatever the reason, Concepcion emerged as a top-flight player in 1973. He was named to the All-Star team for the first time. He batted.287 and provided some punch at the bottom of the Reds’ lineup. He posted the first five-hit performance of his career against San Francisco on July 5 – hit number five, in the bottom of the ninth inning, driving in the winning run.

 

Unfortunately for Concepcion and the Reds, his season was curtailed by an injury. On July 22 the Reds were breezing to a 6-0 victory over Montreal at home. Concepcion was having a fine afternoon with three hits and two runs scored. On first base in the seventh inning, he took off as Denis Menke hit a smash to Expos shortstop Larry Lintz. As Lintz threw Menke out at first base, Concepcion never stopped and raced to third base. As he slid into the base his left leg folded underneath him. The fibula, a long bone between the knee and ankle, was broken and his ankle was dislocated. His season was over. “It probably cost us the league championship,” said Rose. The Reds won the NL West, but lost to the New York Mets in the NLCS without their All-Star shortstop.

 

Concepcion rehabbed while playing winter ball in Venezuela. He came back healthy and began a string of four years (1974-77) in which he won a Gold Glove. In 1974 he had his first big offensive season, smacking 14 home runs and driving in 82 runs, while batting mostly sixth or seventh in the lineup. Concepcion brought another dimension to the Reds in addition to his offensive and defensive skills. Beginning in 1973 he stole 20 or more bases in six consecutive seasons, pilfering 41 in 1974.

 

The Reds finally reached the summit in 1975 and 1976, winning back-to-back World Series. In 1975 Concepcion hit .455 in the NLCS against the Pirates but, only .179 in the tense and gripping World Series against the Red Sox. The next year he hit .357 in the Series against the Yankees with a triple and three RBIs. On a team filled with All-Stars and future Hall of Famers, Concepcion was playing at a high level at the apex of his career. Former Brooklyn Dodgers great Pee Wee Reese, a Hall of Fame shortstop himself, offered a synthesis of Concepcion as a shortstop: “Mark Belanger may be a little smoother then Concepcion. Larry Bowa is very quick. Rick Burleson is a leader type. Bill Russell has an accurate arm. But no one does everything as well as Concepcion. It’s possible that no one ever has.”

 

Reds third-base coach Alex Grammas agreed with Reese’s assessment. Grammas had worked with Concepcion since Dave was a rookie, helping him to hone his craft. “There are some mighty good shortstops in the league today,” said Grammas. “But Concepcion is a notch ahead of them all in all-around ability because his bat is stronger and his range in the field is greater.”

 

Concepcion also famously used Riverfront Stadium’s artificial surface to his advantage. He started to develop a pain in his throwing arm, and perfected the art of throwing the ball on a bounce off the artificial turf to the first baseman. It was extremely helpful to him on groundballs hit in the hole between shortstop and third base. “I didn’t invent that throw,” Concepcion said. “I saw another fellow do it. I saw Brooks Robinson do it to Lee May here in 1970. Then when my arm hurt, I decided, ‘Why not try it?’”

 

After a couple of second-place finishes, in 1979 the Reds won the NL West to cap off the decade of the 1970s, but lost the NLCS in a three game sweep to Pittsburgh. By that time, many of the cogs in the Big Red Machine had moved on. “The other people move away, and all of a sudden you notice the antique work of art in the corner,” Bench said of Concepcion. Concepcion posted career highs in home runs (16) and RBIs (84) in 1979. He also claimed his fifth and final Gold Glove Award.

 

Concepcion remained the Reds’ regular shortstop through the 1985 season and made the last of his eight All-Star teams in 1982. In that season’s All-Star Game, in Montreal’s Olympic Stadium, he hit a two-run homer off Boston’s Dennis Eckersley, and was named the game’s Most Valuable Player. Before he hit his second-inning homer, he spoke with All-Star teammate and fellow Venezuelan Manny Trillo of the Philadelphia Phillies, “I told Manny, ‘I got a feeling I’m going to hit one out of the ballpark.’ He kidded me, but I said, ‘I’m gonna do it.’” And he did.

 

Concepcion retired after the 1988 season, having played his entire major-league career with the Reds. His successor at shortstop, Barry Larkin, began his own 19-year career in 1986, and eventually was voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Concepcion was inducted into the Cincinnati Reds’ Hall of Fame in 2000, and his number 13 was retired by the Reds on August 25, 2007. Said Joe Morgan, “He’s the greatest shortstop I’ve ever played with or I’ve ever seen.” His final totals showed a .267 lifetime average with 2, 326 hits, 101 home runs, 950 runs batted in and 321 stolen bases.

 

In retirement, Concepcion returned to his native Venezuela, and later managed his hometown Aragua Tigers. Later, he became an executive in a trucking business.

 

Concepcion continued a fine lineage of shortstops from Venezuela. He grew up idolizing Chico Carrasquel and Luis Aparicio and trying to emulate them in the field. Later, countrymen Ozzie Guillen and Omar Vizquel grew up fantasizing about playing baseball in the major leagues like their hero, Dave Concepcion. Vizquel paid homage to his boyhood icon by wearing the number 13, saying Concepcion was “the one that I liked, the one that I looked up to.”

 

[laroquece]

Thanks Y4L, as a Venezuelan I thank you for reviewing Aparicio, Carrasquel and Concepción 👍🏻

[Yankee4Life]

4 hours ago, laroquece said:

Thanks Y4L, as a Venezuelan I thank you for reviewing Aparicio, Carrasquel and Concepción 👍🏻

 

You are welcome but it to be completely truthful with you it is me who should be thanking you because I learned about a guy (Alejandro Carrasquel) that I never heard of and I learned that he had an impressive career. And while I was familiar with Aparicio and Concepcion I certainly learned a lot from reading about them. Thank you again for telling me about these great Venezuelan ballplayers. I am sure that all the fans down there hold them in high regard.