The '64 Phillies Finale: The Perils of Mauch's Genius

The 1964 World Series began on October 7 ... without the Philadelphia Phillies. But it should be noted that the 1964 Phillies probably would not even have been in position to win the pennant without Gene Mauch as their manager. After taking over in Philadelphia in 1960, Mauch quickly earned a reputation for being a thinking, hands-on manager who was masterful in his direction of the game, getting the most out of his roster and outmaneuvering the manager in the opposite dugout.  But managerial brilliance can be a tricky thing. Managers are both strategists and tacticians in the dugout. They must navigate a delicate line between managing too much and managing too little. The question remains whether Mauch's constant maneuvers to try to wrest competitive advantages--both big and small--may have caught up with him in the final weeks of the season and cost his team what proved to be their one best chance to get to the World Series. 

The '64 Phillies Finale: The Perils of Mauch's Genius

When it was over, Gene Mauch blamed himself for the debacle. This was telling not so much because he attempted to remove the stigma of the collapse from his players but because, in the final weeks, he may have put on himself too much of the burden to win games instead of allowing the games to play out with less urgency. Baseball can be unforgiving, quick to smack down those who think they can master the flow of the game. Mauch's intensity and overwhelming desire to maintain tight control over each game--(perhaps for fear of the second-guessing that comes with losing?)--became counterproductive as the Phillies' losses began mounting. His trying hard to force the action began to convey panic with the result that his players became increasingly tight in pressure situations. This was a criticism that Dick Allen in particular made, and in various accounts of what happened.

While Mauch arguably made any number of questionable tactical in-game decisions discussed in this series, his primary miscalculation was strategic, with ultimately unforgiving cascading effects. His big mistake was quite likely beginning to prepare for the World Series prematurely when on September 16, with a six-game lead, he started his ace Jim Bunning on short rest, probably so he would be aligned to start Game 1 of the Series. This mistake was compounded the very next day by his rush to clinch the pennant, manifested by his using two pitchers--Rick Wise and Bobby Shantz--as effectively one starter in LA even though his starting rotation was in disarray because of injuries to Ray Culp and Dennis Bennett. This made Shantz unavailable two days later when Mauch desperately needed a seasoned southpaw--as opposed to an untested rookie lefty--to try to prevent the Dodgers from winning a game already in the 16th inning.

Then he overreacted to a string of defeats, especially to the Reds, that still left the Phillies in control of the pennant race with fewer than 10 games remaining, even if no longer in commanding control. Then, as the defeats piled on, Mauch panicked as he tried desperately to pick up wins by starting his two best pitchers--Bunning and Chris Short--twice consecutively on short rest, when they, and especially Bunning, would have been more effective with normal rest. In particular, starting both pitchers on short rest against Milwaukee, when Philadelphia still had the lead, was arguably a mistake that ultimately forced him to resort to doing so a second time in St. Louis as the Phillies' lead was now gone.

The Phillies lost the pennant by one game. Even if they had lost all of the games where Mauch had no obvious starting pitcher, Culp being unable to pitch because of his elbow and Bennett badly hampered by a bum shoulder, Bunning and Short would have been more likely to pitch effectively and gain a victory on normal rest--as Bunning proved in both of his stretch drive victories, against the Dodgers on September 20 (the usual four days after his short-rest start in Houston ended badly) and on the final day of the season (four days after his third start on short rest also ended badly). Just one additional win by both Bunning and Short, or two by either, could have changed the outcome of the pennant race. In effect, it may be that Mauch turned possible wins into losses by panicking rather than accepting losses for the sake of maximizing the odds of winning when his two best pitchers started.

If Mauch made his decision to start Bunning on September 16 in Houston on only two days' rest in order to line up his ace's remaining starts on normal rest with Game 1 of the World Series--and this seems to be the only plausible explanation, if you study the calendar--it suggests that at that point he took the pennant for granted. Mauch was apparently willing to risk a loss by Bunning on short rest for the purpose of setting him up for the Series even though the National League pennant had not yet been clinched. With a six-game lead at this point, there probably still would have been time enough for Mauch to arrange his rotation for Bunning to start Game 1 of the Series with the appropriate rest between his final regular season starts had he waited for the Phillies to officially cinch the pennant.

While the impact of his starting Bunning in Houston on September 16 could still have been mitigated had Mauch thereafter kept his ace on the normal schedule he apparently had planned, his decision had a cascading effect as the Phillies went into their 10-game losing streak because Bunning turned out not to be available to start against one of the remaining contending clubs, the Reds. In trying to prepare for the World Series, Gene Mauch outsmarted himself and forgot the importance of starting his best pitchers in their appropriate turns to keep them in rhythm.

Baseball has a way of punishing hubris.

This concludes Baseball Historical Insight's series on what happened in the epic collapse of the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies ... fifty years ago.

Last Chance for the 1964 Phillies in Their Epic Collapse: Force A Three-Way Tie

After having lost 10 in a row to see their 6-1/2 game lead with 12 remaining go to a 2-1/2 game deficit with only two left, the Phillies began their final series of the season--two games in Cincinnati, who trailed St. Louis by half-a-game--needing a perfect storm in their favor. They could still finish the 162-game schedule tied for first if they won both their games against the Reds and the Cardinals lost all three of their remaining games, which happened to be against the lowly Mets. This would create a three-way tie.

Last Chance for the Phillies: Force a Three-Way Tie

You read right, Philadelphia's only possibility of making the World Series--which 10 consecutive losses and 10 days ago seemed like such a sure thing--would be to win a never-before three-way playoff series with Cincinnati and St. Louis to determine the pennant winner. It could have even been a four-way tie for first, but only if the Giants, who were now three games back, won all three of their remaining games against the Cubs in San Francisco, and if the Cardinals were swept by the Mets, and if the Phillies won both of their games against the Reds.

Blessedly for the Philadelphia Phillies, on October 1 came their first day of rest since August 31. They had played 31 games in the first 30 days of September. And the fact that there was another off day on Saturday--between their Friday and Sunday games in Cincinnati--meant that Mauch could start his two best pitchers, Chris Short and Jim Bunning, on their normal three of days rest in the final two games of the season.

As it happened, the Phillies did their part by beating the Reds in both teams' final games of the season, and the Cardinals did their part by losing the first two of their three games with the Mets. After Bunning pitched a shutout in game # 162, the Phillies and Reds were tied, awaiting the outcome of the Cardinals finale with the Mets. The Mets had a   3-2 lead in the fifth, but that score was deceiving. Bob Gibson came on in relief to shut down the Mets. The Cardinals scored three times in the fifth, sixth and eighth innings to blow out the Mets and secure the National League pennant with no need for any playoff.

For good measure, St. Louis went on to win the World Series that Philadelphia had seemed sure was theirs to play.

Epic Collapse: The Final Days--Bunning and Short in Desperation Starts

Their once formidable lead reduced to a half-game on September 27 with six games left to go, now was truly desperation time for manager Gene Mauch and his Phillies. With Dennis Bennett suffering from a sore shoulder, and Ray Culp out of action, and Art Mahaffey having just pitched, and not wanting to trust just-turned-19 year old rookie Rick Wise in what was now a very heated pennant race, Mauch started Jim Bunning twice and Chris Short once more on only two days of rest--with predictable losing results.

The Final Days: Bunning and Short in Desperation Starts

Despite having pitched poorly and losing the first of the four-game series with Milwaukee, Jim Bunning volunteered to start the final game of that series on September 27. This was his second start on short rest, but remember, the first was on September 16 against Houston when Philadelphia was not in a pennant-race dogfight and there was no obvious reason to do so. Now there was very good reason, but the script followed an arc similar to his start in Houston. Bunning departed in the fourth inning and the Phillies, 14-8 losers, had now lost seven straight and were down one game in the standings to Cincinnati and just barely ahead--by half-a-game--of the third-place Cardinals of St. Louis--their next destination.

The unintended consequence of his having started both Short and Bunning out of turn on two days of rest against the Braves was that Mauch was now forced to use his two best pitchers once again on short rest against the Cardinals--who were now a team they (the Phillies) had to beat to keep from falling behind yet another suddenly emergent pennant contender, let alone keep pace with the Reds, against whom they would play their final two games of the season. Had they pitched in turn in the rotation, Short and Bunning would have been available to pitch on their normal three-days rest in the season series that now mattered the most--against the Cardinals with the pennant at stake.

Both did start on short rest--each making three starts in the space of seven days--and both lost. As had become commonplace during their horrendous slide, the Phillies squandered numerous scoring opportunities, having great difficulty with runners in scoring position. By the time they left St. Louis, having been swept in the three-game series, the Phillies had lost 10 straight and were now in third place, 2-1/2 games behind, on life support with only two games left for them to play, in Cincinnati, who they trailed by two games. Both the Reds and Cardinals had three games remaining.

Now it was they--the Philadelphia Phillies--who needed a perfect storm in their favor.

Epic Collapse: Sept 26, 1964--Reckless Endangerment of Lead

For Philadelphia, losing had become contagious. After Bunning, pitching on normal rest, lost at home to the Milwaukee Braves in the first of a four-game series, manager Gene Mauch--feeling the sure-thing pennant was slipping away--acted in desperation by starting Chris Short on only two days of rest. Didn't work; the Phillies' losing streak was now five, and their lead down to 1-1/2.  The next day, however--September 26--the Phillies held a one-run lead going into the ninth ... which Mauch recklessly endangered by leaving southpaw reliever Bobby Shantz in to pitch against right-handed slugger Hank Aaron, due up first for the Braves.

Sept 26,1964:  Reckless Endangerment of Lead

The Phillies had an early 4-0 lead in the third game of their series with the Braves, only to once again go cold at the plate when they had additional opportunities to score runs. Milwaukee had whittled the lead down 4-3 with a run in the eighth, an inning in which Mauch made two pitching changes to control the damage. Relief ace Jack Baldschun was brought on after starting pitcher Art Mahaffey allowed back-to-back singles at the start of the inning. Baldschun got only one out and left with the bases loaded when Mauch called upon Bobby Shantz to pitch to left-handed batting catcher Ed Bailey. A passed ball allowed a run to score, but Shantz prevented further damage.

With the dangerous Hank Aaron (in his prime) leading off the ninth and capable of tying the game on one swing, and having already used Baldschun (his premier reliever) in the game, Mauch's best right-handed option was Ed Roebuck. Instead of Roebuck, however, Mauch chose to stay with the lefty Shantz even with Aaron at the plate. Aaron singled.

Mauch still stayed with Shantz against another dangerous Milwaukee hitter, Eddie Mathews, but this made sense because Mathews was a left-handed power hitter. Mathews singled, and the right-handed Frank Bolling was announced as a pinch hitter. Still, Mauch stayed with Shantz. This maybe also made sense since Bolling, the Braves' mostly-regular second baseman, was hardly a dangerous hitter, his average hovering slightly above .200. Bolling reached on an error, loading the bases.

The Phillies had a one-run lead with the bases loaded and had yet to secure an out here in the ninth inning. Coming up was the right-handed Rico Carty, himself a dangerous hitter with a .325 batting average, 20 home runs and 80 RBI. Still, Mauch stayed with the southpaw Bobby Shantz, when he had the right-hander Ed Roebuck warmed up and waiting in the bullpen. Why not turn to Roebuck?

In a month when Mauch's bullpen was stressed--Baldschun had lost four games already in September and allowed 37 of the 106 batters he had faced so far in the month to reach base--Roebuck had been pitching well. In fact, Ed Roebuck had allowed only four earned runs in his previous 14 appearances dating back to August 18. Two of those, however, came on a three-run home run he surrendered to Vada Pinson that made him the losing pitcher in the final game of the Reds series. But that was three days ago. Presumably, Mauch no longer had much trust in Roebuck because he stayed with Shantz in a situation where he desperately needed an out. 

Carty tripled. The Phillies' lead was gone. Shantz was removed from the game. And Mauch finally brought in Roebuck, who pitched to two batters and got three outs (including a double play). The Phillies went down quietly in their half of the ninth.

Gene Mauch had now watched his team lose six straight games, eight of their last nine dating to September 18, and nine of eleven dating back to when he decided to start Bunning on short rest against Houston even though his Phillies had a comfortable lead in the pennant race. With the Reds having extended their winning streak to seven straight games, the Phillies' advantage was down to half-a-game. The Cardinals, having won five of their last six, had closed to within a game-and-a-half. There were still six games to play. Philadelphia's situation was ... desperate.

Epic Collapse: Sept. 21, 1964--Bunting Dick Allen ... Bunting Dick Allen?

When the Phillies took the field against the second-place Cincinnati Reds at home in Connie Mack Stadium on September 21, they held a comfortable 6-1/2 game lead in the standings with 12 remaining. They lost 1-0, victimized for the second time in three days by the winning run against them scoring on a steal of home plate. All accounts of this game mention that both managers--Gene Mauch and Dick Sisler of the Reds--were shocked (shocked!) that Chico Ruiz stole home with Frank Robinson (Frank Robinson!), one of baseball's most accomplished and feared batsmen, at the plate. What they don't mention is that the Phillies' best chance for a run came in the very first inning with a runner on first and nobody out--and Mauch chose to have Dick Allen, his most dangerous and productive hitter, lay down a sacrifice bunt (Dick Allen! Bunt!?!) instead of trying to drive in the run.

Sept. 21, 1964: Bunting Dick Allen ... Bunting Dick Allen?

After Art Mahaffey, back in the starting rotation, retired the Reds in the top of the first, Tony Gonzalez led off for the Phillies with a single, bringing up Dick (then known as "Richie") Allen. As discussed in a previous post (see link at the end of this article), Allen was back to hitting second in Mauch's batting order against right-handed starting pitchers instead of in a power slot. The Phillies had all 27 outs remaining, but rather than have Allen hit away with the possibility of setting up a big first inning, Mauch asked him to lay down a sacrifice bunt. If Allen had failed to advance the runner by swinging away, Mauch would still have had two outs left in the inning (or there might have been a double play), and still eight more innings to go.  Allen's sacrifice was good, but Gonzalez wound up stranded on third--the closest any Phillie would come to scoring all evening.

This was actually the second time in three days that Mauch called for Allen to sacrifice himself for the Phillies' cause rather than use his most potent weapon in the way the baseball gods intended. In that 16-inning loss to the Dodgers on September 19 (see the previous post in this series, "Sending a Rook to do a Vet's Job"), the Phillies had the opportunity to win the game in the 14th inning when Johnny Callison led off with a single and Dick Allen--batting clean-up that day because a lefty started--was next up to bat. After Allen was the pitcher's spot (the result of an earlier double-switch). And, this being a long game in which he had already used seven position players off the bench, Mauch had limited options for a pinch hitter.  Specifically,he had the light-hitting Bobby Wine, who was batting .209 with only 4 home runs and 33 RBI and hadn't played in five days except in the field as a defensive replacement at shortstop.

In his three most recent previous trips to the plate in the game, Allen had two singles and been intentionally walked. Notwithstanding that it was the 14th inning in a tie game and knowing that Wine was to bat next, Mauch opted to play for one run rather than let the most dangerous batter in his line-up hit away with the possibility of driving in the could-be winning run. Allen was successful in his sacrifice attempt but that left Mauch with only two outs to work with and two weak hitters--Wine, followed by .238-hitting catcher Clay Dalrymple--to try to drive in Callison from second base. Trying to get a good jump, Callison was picked off. Wine flied out. The Phillies failed to score. And Willie Davis ultimately stole home on Morrie Steevens.

With Dick Allen on his way to 201 hits--29 of them home runs--an OPS of .939 (fifth best in the league) and 352 total bases, more than anyone else in the league (Willie Mays had 351), Mauch's decision to have him lay down a sacrifice bunt is open to legitimate question. Few other managers used their most powerful hitters to lay one down for lesser lights to try to drive the runner home. The two best hitters in the Phillies' lineup--Allen and Callison--who hit a combined total of 60 home runs in 1964--both laid down, during the course of the season, six sacrifice bunts with nobody out  to move a base runner into scoring position. In calling for them to do so in the interest of playing for one run, Mauch gave up as outs his two most likely batters to drive in runs. Of the NL's other premier hitters who also hit for power, Mays had one sac bunt for the Giants in 1964, Orlando Cepeda and Willie McCovey none; Frank Robinson did not have a sacrifice all year for the Reds; neither did Ken Boyer for the Cardinals; nor did Hank Aaron or Eddie Mathews for the Braves.

It is worth considering that Dick Allen batted .464 with runners on base during the 17 days of their epic collapse (dating back to Bunning's first start on short rest in Houston).  .464!  Had Allen been allowed to swing away in either of those plate appearances against the Dodgers and Reds, the outcome of either game, or of both games, might have been different. One more win at that point in the season, with so few games remaining, might have been all it would have taken to permanently deflate the hopes of the Reds and Cardinals before they began their surge upward.

Following their dispiriting 1-0 loss on September 21, Chris Short was roughed up the next day and the Reds completed a three-game sweep the day after that.  Of no small significance, Jim Bunning's regular turn in the rotation would have had him start the first game of this series, but because of Mauch's decision to start him on short rest in Houston when there was no compelling pennant-race reason for doing so (other than setting up Bunning to start Game 1 of the World Series, as I argued in a previous post), Bunning did not pitch against Cincinnati.

The failure to take even one game from the Reds (at home) cost the Phillies three games in the standings in three days. Had the Phillies won even just one, they would have had a 5-1/2 game lead over Cincinnati and been six ahead of both St. Louis and San Francisco. Instead, the Reds were now 3-1/2 games out, the Cardinals and Giants five back. With nine games remaining, it still seemed time was on Philadelphia's side. But the end of the season could not come soon enough.

See also, (August 7): Where Should Dick Allen Have Hit?: http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/08/august-7-64-phillies-continued-where.html

and (June 29): Mauch Loved to Sacrifice:  http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/06/50-years-ago-64-phillies-mauch-loved-to.html

Epic Collapse: September 20--The '64 Phillies Face the Perfect Storm

When the Phillies boarded their plane to return to Philadelphia for their final homestand of the season after Bunning, back on three days of rest, beat the Dodgers 3-2 on September 20, they had a 6-1/2 game lead over both the Reds and the Cardinals and were seven games ahead of the Giants. With twelve games remaining, it would take a nearly perfect storm for the Phillies not to win the pennant. As fate would have it, the remaining schedule conspired to make that perfect storm plausible.

The '64 Phillies Face the Perfect Storm

We are now where most accounts of the '64 Phillies' historic collapse begin. When the Phillies took the field at home against the Reds on September 21, their lead was so strong that even if the Reds or Cardinals won all of their remaining games, the Phillies needed to win only seven of their last twelve to win the pennant outright. If the Cardinals or Reds won 10 of their last 13 games--which, in fact, St. Louis did--the Phillies could have finished the season 4-8 and still gone to the World Series.

Despite their long-shot chances, the remaining schedule favored both Cincinnati and St. Louis. The Reds had five of their 13 games remaining against the Phillies and the Cardinals had three left against them, giving both teams the opportunity to make up significant ground against the first-place team they had to overtake. Also playing in the Cards' and Reds' favor: Cincinnati had five games against the awful Mets and three against the sixth-place Pirates, who were 10-8 so far in September, and St. Louis had five games each against both those teams. The Giants, who really should not have been in the discussion at this point as any combination of six Phillies' wins or six losses of their own would eliminate them from contention, had the advantage of playing all 12 of their remaining games against the eighth-place Cubs and ninth-place Colts.

The Phillies, however, did not have any of the National League's worst teams on their remaining schedule. In eight of their final twelve games they had to contend against their two closest competitors--the Reds and Cardinals--meaning they would lose ground in any game they lost. And Philadelphia's four other games were against the Milwaukee Braves, who may have been in fifth place but whose potent line-up was well able to do serious damage to Mauch's worn out pitching staff. With Ray Culp out of action with his painful elbow and Dennis Bennett pitching against a painful shoulder ... and with Art Mahaffey having for the most part struggled in his starts since the beginning of August ... and with Rick Wise just turned 19 years old and failing to pitch beyond the first inning in either of his last two starts ... Jim Bunning and Chris Short were the only pitchers Mauch had faith in.

Philadelphia was scheduled to close the season with three games in St. Louis and two in Cincinnati. But at this point, the dawn of play on September 21, the pennant chances were dim for both those teams, and Mauch had reason to hope--even to expect--that neither would be a pennant threat by then.

To put their remaining schedules in a different perspective: even including the first-place Phillies as their opponents, the Reds and Cardinals were playing teams with a combined .483 winning percentage, while the Phillies were going against teams (the Reds, Braves and Cardinals) with a combined winning percentage of .544--a very significant difference. (The Cubs and Colts, whom the Giants were up against, had a combined .433 winning percentage.) Philadelphia had a far tougher schedule, but still ... a 6-1/2 game lead with only 12 remaining should have been safe, almost impossible to lose. And the Phillies seemed to have the advantage of the first seven of their final games being at home.

With a 46-28 record at Connie Mack Stadium, the Phillies at this point had the best home record in the National League. Their first three games were against the Reds, who really needed to sweep the series to have any realistic chance to catch the Phillies. While there was nothing at the moment the Phillies could do about the Cardinals and Giants, just one win in the three games would leave the Reds 5-1/2 back--a gap that would be virtually impossible for Cincinnati to close with only 10 games left after that. How important would just one win at home against Cincinnati have been? Even if the Cardinals swept their upcoming two-game series against the Mets in New York, one Phillies win against the Reds would have left St. Louis five behind with 11 remaining, and with not very much hope.

But for a perfect storm ...

Epic Collapse: Sept. 19, 1964--Sending a Rook to do a Vet's Job

After Bobby Shantz's brilliant 7.2 innings of relief to salvage Rick Wise's start on September 17, the 1964 Phillies' unraveling began the next two days with consecutive   4-3 losses in Los Angeles, the second of which was a 16-inning affair that ended on a walk-off steal of home plate with a rookie reliever just called in to make his very first major league appearance of the season. That outcome was the unanticipated (and certainly unintended) consequence of manager Gene Mauch using, in effect, two pitchers in one start just two days before, which made Shantz unavailable when he was badly needed to try to get the Phillies out of the 16th inning.   

Sept. 19, 1964:  Sending a Rook to do a Vet's Job

The Shantz victory in relief of Wise had boosted Philadelphia's lead to 6-1/2 games over second-place St. Louis. In third and fourth place were Cincinnati, 7-1/2 behind, and San Francisco, eight back. The next day--September 18--Chris Short, starting on normal rest, took a 3-0 lead into the last of the seventh, but surrendered a three-run home run to Frank Howard (still not the "Capital" Punisher, he having yet to play for Washington). The Dodgers went on to win, 4-3, on a walk-off two-out single off Phillies' relief ace Jack Baldschun.

Baldschun was back on the mound, out of the bullpen, the following day in the 16th inning of a game tied at 3-3. Having already worked two innings in the game, and six innings in the previous four days, Baldschun retired the first two Dodgers to bat as the game went past 5 hours, but then gave up a single to Willie Davis, intentionally walked Tommy Davis after Willie stole second, and unleashed a wild pitch that advanced Willie Davis to third.  The left-handed batting Ron Fairly, 2-for-4 on the day (having entered the game defensively in the eighth inning), was at the plate.

With the winning run now on third base, but with two outs, Mauch chose this moment to replace his relief ace with rookie southpaw Morrie Steevens, who was not only pitching in his first major league game of the season but had only 12 appearances in the Big Time before this. Mauch had only one other left-handed option available--the crafty veteran Bobby Shantz. But having pitched 7.2 innings two days before in first-inning relief of Rick Wise, Shantz was not sufficiently rested, apparently not even to face one batter to get the one out needed to end the inning.  Of course, that would have meant somebody on the Phillies having to pitch the seventeenth inning. But, remember, the Phillies still had a 6-game lead (even after the previous day's loss) with 13 games to go, pending the outcome of this one.

Instead of staying with Baldschun to get one more out to escape the inning, Mauch went with Steevens. To recap: there were two out and the would-be winning run edged off third in the person of Willie Davis. As a left-hander, whether pitching from the stretch or a full windup, Steevens on his delivery would have had his back to the runner at third. Steevens was apparently so focused on Fairly, as well he should have been, that he was inattentive to Davis, which he should not have been.  Willie Davis took advantage and stole home, scoring the winning run.

The Phillies' lead was now 5-1/2 games--large enough that it would still take a perfect storm for them not to win the pennant, and that is the subject of my next post.

Epic Collapse: Sept. 17, 1964--Quick Hook, Unintended Consequences

The Phillies lost Bunning's first game on short rest, but won the next day in the first of four games in LA, beating Don Drysdale, against whom Bunning would have pitched on normal rest.  The win bumped their lead up to 6-1/2 games with 15 remaining, but manager Gene Mauch made another pitching decision that would have unanticipated bad consequences down the road: burning two pitchers in one start at a time when his starting rotation was hurt by injuries to Ray Culp and Dennis Bennett and his team had a comfortable lead in the standings.

Sept. 17, 1964--Quick Hook, Unintended Consequences

It was Art Mahaffey's turn to take the mound, but his two previous starts had gone badly. Mahaffey had given up three runs while getting only two outs in the first inning before being summarily removed by Mauch against these very same Dodgers in a 3-2 loss in Philadelphia on September 8, and lasted only two innings (giving up two runs) in his next start on September 12 in a 9-1 loss to the Giants in San Francisco.

Having lost confidence in Mahaffey, Mauch decided to start rookie Rick Wise in his stead in the first of a four-game series in Los Angeles. Having turned all of 19 just days before, Wise was making only the eighth start of his career. In August, Wise had pitched effectively into the eighth inning in back-to-back starts, but he had not pitched well in his two previous starts.  In his most recent start, ten days earlier in Philadelphia against these same Dodgers, Mauch yanked him out after he surrendered two walks and a single to the first three batters he faced; all three scored as Wise's successors on the mound had to get all of the requisite 27 outs.

So here was Wise again against the Dodgers, and he already had a 3-0 lead when he took the mound for the bottom of the first, but his day began much the same as his last start. Two singles, a walk and ground out resulting in two runs convinced Mauch he had seen enough of the young rookie. With left-handed batters Johnny Roseboro and Ron Fairly up next for LA, Mauch called on veteran southpaw Bobby Shantz to get out of the inning rather than let Wise try to work his way out of trouble and see if he might settle down. Managing every game to win, it appears not to have mattered to Mauch that he had a depleted starting rotation, but also still the lead in the game and a six-game lead in the middle of the final month that had most people thinking--1964 World Series in Philadelphia.

It seemed like a brilliant move at the time. Shantz pitched into the eighth inning and gave up only one run of his own while the Phillies held on for the win. However, with Bunning and Chris Short his only two healthy starting pitchers, Mauch had no pitchers to spare. Instead of showing commitment to the decision he made to start a young rookie in a late-season game during a pennant drive, Mauch replaced him in the very first inning--in effect, using two pitchers in one "starting role" that day.

The unintended bad consequence was that Bobby Shantz, who faced 25 batters in relief of Wise, was unavailable to pitch in dire circumstances two days later--the subject of my next post on the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies.

Epic Collapse of the '64 Phillies (Sept 16): Was Mauch's Greatest Blunder Looking Ahead to the World Series?

The standard narrative of the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies' epic collapse always begins on September 21, when the Phillies had a seemingly safe 6-1/2 game lead with only 12 remaining on their schedule. On that day began a 10-game losing streak that famously included  manager Gene Mauch starting his two best pitchers--Jim Bunning and Chris Short--twice each on only two days of rest in desperation to salvage the pennant. This Insight makes the case that the unraveling actually began five days earlier--on September 16 in Houston--when Mauch decided to start Bunning for the first time on short rest, a decision the Baseball Prospectus pennant race book, It Ain't Over 'Til Its Over, calls "inexplicable." An examination of the calendar suggests Mauch's decision was hardly that. It seems quite likely instead that he was trying to line up Bunning, his ace, to start Game 1 of the World Series that seemed a certainty to include Philadelphia as the National League participant.

Was Mauch's Greatest Blunder Looking Ahead to the World Series?

At the start of day on September 16, 1964, the Phillies had a six-game lead over the second-place Cardinals with only 17 games remaining; the Giants were 7-1/2 games back and the Reds 8-1/2 back. Despite such a commanding lead, manager Gene Mauch made his biggest strategic blunder of the season: he decided to start Jim Bunning, his ace, in Houston on only two days' rest. But why? The ninth-place Colts (as the team in Houston was than called) were certainly not contenders. Moreover, in his previous start--just three days before--Bunning had pitched and won a 10-inning complete game. Pitch counts were not much (if at all) in managers' minds back then and were not recorded for posterity, but clearly with nine strikeouts and having surrendered two walks and seven hits, Bunning threw well over 100 pitches in his 10-inning effort. So, why?

A look at the calendar suggests that the most plausible reason is that Mauch was trying to set up Bunning--whose record was now 17-4 with an excellent 2.13 ERA--to start the first game of the World Series, for which the Phillies were beginning to print tickets, scheduled to start on Wednesday, October 7. Ironically, Bunning would have been perfectly lined up to start the World Series by making his last five regular-season starts on normal rest except for one thing: a quirk of the schedule had the Phillies and Reds concluding the season in Cincinnati with games on Friday, October 2, and Sunday, October 4, but with an off-day on Saturday, between the two games.

This scheduling presented Mauch with a fraught dilemma. If Bunning continued to pitch on his normal schedule--every fourth day, which was the standard at the time--his last start before the World Series would have been on Tuesday, September 29, giving him a full week off before the Fall Classic began. Starting pitchers establish a rhythm for pitching during the season, and Mauch probably assumed (rightly) that seven days between starts was too long for a workhorse like Bunning, who might lose his edge with so much downtime.

Mauch could have decided to pitch his ace every fifth day for the rest of the season, which would have had Bunning making his final start on Friday, October 2, giving him another four days of rest before taking the mound for Game 1 of the Series. But this would not have been a viable solution for Mauch even if he had been willing to buck the then-conventional practice of three days of rest between starts for top pitchers. With Ray Culp out because of his chronically sore elbow and Dennis Bennett pitching in pain with a bad shoulder, Mauch really had no option to go to a five-man rotation until the start of the World Series.

Instead, if this analysis is correct, Mauch appears to have decided that keeping to the rhythm of three days between starts was preferable and took the gamble of starting Bunning--presumably just this once--on short rest against a very bad team in order to set him up to have proper rest before his final start of the regular season, which would now be on Friday, October 2. That would have given Bunning an extra fourth day off before pitching in Game 1 of the World Series.

At least, that seems likely to have been the plan. With such a comfortable lead, what could go wrong?

It probably didn't matter to Mauch that Bunning on short rest surrendered six runs to the Colts in less than five innings. But the decision ultimately had huge implications for the Phillies' historic unraveling of 1964. For one thing, it meant Bunning was no longer in line to pitch in any of the three games from September 21 to 23 when the Reds came to town; of course, with 8-1/2 games separating the two teams on September 16, who would think any of those games would be important ... but, the Cincinnati Reds were still in play in the pennant chase--even if with virtually no margin to spare.

For an earlier post on the Phillies' pitching problems, see "Pitching Problems on the Horizon" (May 29); http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/05/back-to-64-phillies-pitching-problems.html

The following is a link to the previous post in this series on the 1964 Phillies, which includes links to those before that: http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/09/the-64-phillies-and-whiz-kids-precedent.html

The '64 Phillies and the Whiz Kids Precedent: Beware the Big Mid-September Lead

The 1964 Philadelphia Phillies are, of course, famous for blowing a 6-1/2 game lead with only 12 games remaining. Fourteen years earlier, the 1950 Philadelphia Phillies--known as the "Whiz Kids" because of their relative youth and inexperience at the big league level--held an even bigger 7-1/2 game advantage with only 11 games remaining and wound up facing the prospect on the final day of the season of squandering the entirety of that lead. 

The '64 Phillies and the Whiz Kids Precedent: Beware the Big Mid-September Lead

When the 1964 season turned to September, the Philadelphia Phillies had a 5-1/2 game lead in the standings over the second-place Reds, 6-1/2 over the third-place Giants and 7 over the fourth-place Cardinals. With a 78-51 record, this was a comfortable lead that was widely assumed sufficient for them to nurse to the City of Brotherly Love's first pennant since 1950. It was not a commanding lead because they still had 33 games to play--and a lot can happen in 33 games. However, even if they went 16-17 down the stretch, the Reds would have needed to go 22-10 to beat out the Phillies. So, commanding?--perhaps not--but certainly pretty darn comfortable.

Back in 1950, the Phillies' Whiz Kids had a similarly comfortable lead when they began the month of September, up by six games over the defending NL-champion Brooklyn Dodgers. They were the surprise team in major league baseball. After having finished a distant third in 1949, the Phillies were no longer a team that for most of three decades was the doormat of the National League. But neither were they assumed to be ready to compete with the powerhouse Dodgers, or even the Cardinals or Braves, for top of the heap. What the '50 Phillies had was the best pitching in the league--paced by 23-year-old Robin Roberts in only his third season, 21-year-old Curt Simmons also in his third season and Jim Konstanty in the bullpen--and a core of youthful gamers, including 23-year-old center fielder Richie Ashburn (a future Hall of Fame guy) in his third season; 23-year-old Granny Hamner in his third season at shortstop; 24-year-old third baseman Willie Jones in only his second full season; and power-hitting right fielder Del Ennis, who was only 25 but an established big league veteran with five years on his resume.

Having just completed a 20-8 month of August that seemed to have broken open the pennant race, the '50 Phillies with a 78-47 record had 29 games remaining. Their 6-1/2 game advantage at the start of September may not have been commanding, but it should have been reasonably comfortable. The Dodgers, however, owing to rainouts earlier in the season, still had 35 games left to play and--with the likes of Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Don Newcombe, Pee Wee Reese, Duke Snider, Gil Hodges and Carl Furillo--a far more formidable team. Making a statement that this thing ain't over yet, the Dodgers came into town for four games on September 6 and won the first three, which extended a Phillies losing streak to five games--equaling their longest of the season to that point. Still, after salvaging the final game of the series, Philadelphia's lead in the standings had diminished by only half-a-game since the start of the month. And the Phillies won five of their next six to up their lead to 7-1/2 games--their largest margin of the season, with time rapidly running out on Brooklyn.

The Phillies' lead was still 7-1/2 games over both the Dodgers and the Braves after they beat the Cubs on September 20. With only 11 games left on their schedule, now their lead did seem commanding if not outright secure. But four of their remaining games were against Brooklyn, three against Boston and the other four against the New York Giants, who had the best record in the National League since the Fourth of July. And their last nine games of the season would all be on the road. Plus, the United States was again at war--this time in Korea--which called into duty the National Guard unit on which Curt Simmons served.

While Roberts posted the first of six straight 20-win seasons in 1950, the southpaw Simmons was on his own way to 20 with a 17-8 record and 3.40 earned run average when he was called into service. His three starts in September gave no indication that having already pitched over 40 innings more than his previous career high was diminishing his effectiveness; he allowed only 4 earned runs in 24 September innings--the last of which, sadly for Philadelphia--was on September 9.

 Rookie right-hander Bob Miller, who had not been a regular in the starting rotation since early August, and veteran right-hander Ken Heintzelman, who had not started a game since July, essentially took Simmons' spot in the rotation alongside Roberts (20-11 on the season), Russ Meyer (9-11) and Bubba Church (8-6) for the final weeks of the schedule. Miller lost two of his three starts after Simmons answered his call to duty, surrendering 9 earned runs in 17 innings, and Heintzelman won one and lost one of his two starts. Jim Konstanty, who at the end of the season became the first reliever in history to win the MVP on the strength of a 16-7 record and 16 saves, was overworked and ineffective as the season drew to a close. Pitching in six of the final 11 games--four times working at least 2 innings and twice at least 3--Konstanty lost twice, blew a save, allowed three of five inherited runners to score after he came in, and had a 6.23 ERA in 13 innings.

The Dodgers came into town, a two-day stand, on September 23 and 24, won both and sent the Phillies on the road with their lead down to five games. Philadelphia's first stop was Boston, where winning two of three eliminated the Braves from the pennant race. Only the Dodgers had a chance, and the Phillies played their part by losing all four of their next games in New York at the Polo Grounds.

When the Phillies came into Ebbets Field to close out the season, however, the Dodgers were the team with momentum, having won 12 of their last 15 games. But being up by two games, all the Phillies needed was one win to escape Brooklyn with the pennant. One win. In the first game, Miller failed to make it out of the fifth; Jim Konstanty in relief was ineffective; the Dodgers won; and the two teams went into the final game of the season one game apart. Should Philadelphia lose, the National League pennant would be decided in a best-of-three playoff.

Game 154 for both teams was a classic. Ten innings, both team's aces--Roberts and Don Newcombe--going the distance; Richie Ashburn cutting down the would-be walk-off winning run at the plate trying to score from second on a single up the middle in the bottom of the ninth; Dick Sisler hitting a three-run home run off Newk in the tenth to send the Phillies to their first World Series since 1915. And thus did the Phillies avert what would have been, at the time, the most epic collapse in history: losing a 7-1/2 game lead with only 11 left on the schedule. They would leave it to a later Phillies team to have that distinction.

The '50 Phillies went on to lose the Series in four straight to the Yankees, thus ending their season by losing nine of the last ten games they played (September stretch and post-season included). Despite two Hall of Famers on their roster--Robin Roberts and Richie Ashburn--and their pennant, the 1950 Philadelphia Phillies were a tease. They were not in the same competitive class as the Dodgers and the up-and-coming Giants (who would add Willie Mays in 1951), and Philadelphia did not factor into any pennant race until 1964. If the Whiz Kids were going to win, 1950 was going to have to be their year. The same could be said of the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies.

The remaining posts of this extended series on the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies will focus on key managerial decisions by Gene Mauch in the final weeks of September that resonate even now ... fifty years later.

The following is a link to the previous post in this series, which includes links to those before that--going back to pre-season prognostications: http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/08/august-7-64-phillies-continued-where.html

August 7: The '64 Phillies Continued: Where Should Dick Allen Have Hit?

It seems manager Gene Mauch never decided definitively where the appropriate place in the batting order was for his rookie phenom, Dick (then known as"Richie") Allen in 1964. He changed his mind about that at least three times. The August 7 trade with the Mets for Frank Thomas to fill the Phillies' glaring weakness at first base resulted in Mauch reverting to the batting order platoon he used for most of the first two months of the season by moving his young slugger out of the cleanup spot to bat second or third, depending on the opposing starter.

The '64 Phillies Continued: Where Should Dick Allen Have Hit?

As noted in the second post of this series on the Philadelphia Phillies' season of 50 years ago, "Mauch the Platoonmeister" (see link below), Mauch started the season by platooning rookie right-handed batting third baseman Dick Allen with left-handed batting right fielder Johnny Callison between second and third in the Phillies' batting order. Both were everyday players, but Mauch had Allen batting second and Callison third when a right-hander started against Philadelphia, and Callison second and Allen third when a southpaw took the mound. So it was in the first 45 games of the season, through June 6, during which time Allen hit .290 with 10 home runs and 28 RBIs; Callison hit .280 with 4 home runs and 20 RBIs; and the Phillies were more often than not hanging close in second place, typically about a game behind, and sometimes in first. The Phillies had never trailed by more than two games (on May 5 and 12) and never led by more than two games (on May 1).

Allen got off to a red-hot start, batting .426 in April, but had hit only .252 in May. On June 7 and in both games of a doubleheader two days later, Mauch tried Allen in the cleanup spot for the first time; Allen went 5-for-11 with a home run and three RBIs, but was back hitting second against right-handed starters the next two games. By this point in the season--June 12--Allen was leading the Phillies in all three triple-crown categories with a .294 batting average, 12 home runs, and 32 runs batted in.

Seeing what his emerging young slugger could do, Mauch started batting Allen fourth in the line-up on a daily basis on June 13, where he stayed for 53 of the Phillies' next 55 games (twice batting second) regardless of who was pitching. Allen hit .327 over those 55 games with 9 home runs and 26 RBIs and by August 6 his batting average was .311 and he had a .913 OPS with 19 home runs and 56 RBIs. His power and prowess at the plate contributed to the Phillies' .600 winning percentage and 33-22 record during that time, which vaulted Philadelphia into first place on July 16, where they had since stayed.

The arrival of Frank Thomas to take over first base, where the lefty-righty platoon of John Hernsteinn and Roy Sievers had proved ineffective (as had several others who Mauch also tried at the position), caused Mauch to go back to alternating Allen and Callison second and third in the line-up, again depending on the whether the opposing starter was right-handed or left-handed. When he was healthy and in the starting line-up with the bottom-dwelling Mets, the right-handed power-hitting Thomas typically hit fourth or third. Thomas, in fact, had batted fourth or fifth in the line-up for most of his career. Even though he had homered only three times and driven in only 19 runs in his 60 games with the Mets--(they were the offensively-challenged Mets, after all)--Mauch began platooning Thomas (who played against all pitching) with left-handed batting outfielder Wes Covington (who did not start against southpaws) in the fourth and fifth spots in the Phillies' line-up, which lasted until September 8 when Thomas injured his thumb.

In the 33 games where Allen was back to hitting either second or third, his batting average was .333 and he had 8 home runs and 23 RBIs, while the Phillies went 21-13 (.618) and built up a six-game lead. The trade from New York to Philadelphia, meanwhile, rejuvenated Thomas, who hit .302 with 7 home runs and 26 RBIs in 33 games before he was injured. Covington batted .333 with 5 homers and 22 RBIs in 27 games, including those into which he was inserted after a lefty starter was replaced by a right-handed reliever.

For most of the remainder of the season after Thomas was sidelined with his injury, Mauch stayed with his Allen-Callison batting order platoon with Allen second, Callison third and Covington batting fourth when a right-hander took the mound, except against southpaw starting pitchers when he put Allen fourth and sat Covington with Callison still batting third. In the final 24 games of the season after the Thomas injury, Dick Allen batted second in 11 games (with HR / RBI / BA slash lines of 3 / 8 / .356 ), third in 3 games ( 0 / 2 / .167), and fourth in 10 games ( 1 / 6 / .350). Allen finished the season with a .318 batting average (fifth in the league), 201 hits (tied for third), 29 home runs (tied for seventh), and 79 runs batted in.

Would it have made a difference had Mauch kept Dick Allen in the cleanup spot of his batting order for the rest of the season after moving him there on June 13, even after Frank Thomas came over to Philadelphia?

Aside from power numbers suggesting that the third, fourth, or even fifth slots in the batting order were the more logical fit for him than batting second, Allen also had a propensity to strike out a lot--not a good thing for a number-two hitter, and seemingly certainly not when Mauch liked so much to manufacture runs (see my previous post on the '64 Phillies, link below). Allen led the league in strikeouts in 1964 with 138, and averaged one K for every five at bats when he hit second. Almost exactly half (33) of Allen's 67 walks, however, were in the 41 percent of games he batted fourth with few potent bats behind him, a factor which may have figured into Mauch's decision to move him further up in the order.

For the season, Dick Allen hit only .270 but had 12 home runs and 36 RBIs in the 64 games he batted second in the order--all against right-handers; batted .363 with 8 homers and 32 RBIs in the 32 games he started batting third--all but two against southpaws; and .345 with 9 home runs and 24 RBIs in the 66 games he batted cleanup, 35 times against left-handed starters and 31 against righties. Against right-handed pitchers Allen's slash lines were 18 / 60 / .287 with an OPS of .856 in 450 plate appearances; against southpaws, they were 11 / 31 / .372 with an OPS of 1.081 in 259 plate appearances. His strikeout ratio per plate appearance was 18 percent against lefties, 20 percent against righties.

Would it have made a difference had Mauch batted Allen fourth in the final weeks, particularly when the games became desperate as the Phillies' lead evaporated? During the Phillies' 10-game losing streak that began with them holding a 6-1/2 game lead with just 12 games remaining and which defined their epic collapse of historic proportions (rhetorical overkill intended), Allen continued to hit well even as the rest of his teammates did not. He batted .415; they batted .191. While the rest of the Phillies were terrible in the clutch with runners on base, Allen was ... well, clutch, hitting .421 with runners on base. And he had a sacrifice bunt--about which, more when that game comes up in September.

Previous Posts in This Series on the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies:

1.  "Introducing the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies" http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/03/fifty-years-ago-introducing-1964.html

2. "Mauch the Platoonmeister" http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/04/catching-up-with-64-phillies-mauch.html

3.  "Pitching Problems on the Horizon" http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/05/back-to-64-phillies-pitching-problems.html

4.  "The '64 Phillies' Perfect Father's Day" http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-64-phillies-perfect-fathers-day.html

5.  ""Mauch Loved to Sacrifice" http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/06/50-years-ago-64-phillies-mauch-loved-to.html

50 Years Ago: The '64 Phillies--Mauch Loved to Sacrifice

The '64 Phillies passed the first real test as to their competitive mettle on the Fourth of July weekend by sweeping three straight from the Giants with first place at stake. Their one-run victory in the concluding game showcased Gene Mauch's managerial proclivity to emphasize small ball tactics (sacrifice bunts, hit-and-run plays, productive outs) to work for one run at a time, even with a lead. This is the fifth article in a series on the 50th anniversary of the 1964 Phillies' epic collapse.

The '64 Phillies: Mauch Loved to Sacrifice

On July 3, the Philadelphia Phillies came into San Francisco's Candlestick Park for a three-game July 4th holiday showdown series with the Giants, the two teams seemingly the only two taking the National League pennant race seriously. A game-and-a-half separated the Giants and Phillies, with San Francisco having surged into first place with 12 wins in their last 14 games. The Phillies themselves had been playing quite well with an 18-12 record in June, having spent 18 of that month's 30 days on top of the heap, including a lead that reached 2-1/2 games on June 19, the day after which the Giants got hot to bring them to this moment at Candlestick.

(Of the other teams that would figure in September's drama, the Cincinnati Reds were third, 6-1/2 games behind, and the St. Louis Cardinals, now with Lou Brock in their outfield, were still trying to get traction, 9-1/2 games out in fifth place with an exactly .500 record. The defending World Champion Dodgers were out of the picture, trailing everybody but Houston and the New York Mets.)

The Giants could have put themselves in the driver’s seat of the pennant race sports car with a sweep because the season was approaching its mid-point and contenders were being separated from pretenders. That was still an open question for the Phillies: 31 of their 44 victories (70 percent) had been against teams that had losing records as of July 3. Their record against teams .500 or above was 13-15 and the Phillies had been swept when the Giants came to Philadelphia for three games in early June. But it was the Phillies who won the first game to move within half-a-game of the top; won the middle game on July 4 to flip-flop the top two in the standings; and took the series finale, 2-1, beating Giants' ace Juan Marichal—who entered the game with an 11-3 record—to leave San Francisco with a game-and-a-half lead.

Both runs in the third game were set up by intended sacrifice bunts. In a scoreless game, Johnny Callison led off the fourth inning with a single, bringing up the ever-dangerous power-hitting Dick (then known as "Richie") Allen, who had been batting clean-up in Gene Mauch's line-up since mid June. Notwithstanding Allen's .306 batting average and 16 home runs and 47 RBIs at the time, the rookie slugger was asked to lay down a sacrifice bunt to move Callison to second base. It was such a good bunt, Allen beat it out for an infield single. A strikeout and a groundout later, with both runners moving up a base, Callison scored on an infield hit. With two outs and starting from second base, Allen kept coming on the play but was thrown out at the plate for his base running aggressiveness.

The Phillies were still nursing that 1-0 lead when Marichal walked catcher Clay Dalrymple to start the seventh inning. Mauch ordered Tony Taylor, batting seventh with a .243 average, to lay down a sac bunt despite knowing that the next two hitters were the weakest bats in his line-up, but his decision paid immediate dividends when Ruben Amaro, hitting a mere .222 in only his 13th start at shortstop for the season, singled up the middle to score Dalrymple. That run proved critical because Jim Ray Hart, like Allen another power-hitting rookie third baseman to make his presence felt in 1964, hit his 10th of 31 home runs that season off Philadelphia starter Dennis Bennett in the bottom half of the seventh to make it a one-run game again—which was how the game ultimately end.

Gene Mauch was an aggressive manager who liked to force the action, in particular early in games to put the Phillies on the scoreboard first and in close games, whatever the inning. The Philadelphia Phillies in 1964 attempted more sacrifice bunts (156) than any other team in baseball except for the Los Angeles Dodgers (185) and were successful 62 percent of the time, compared to 65 percent for the Dodgers, to finish second to L.A. in sacrifices (97 to 120). The Phillies were also second to the Dodgers in percentage of productive outs to advance base runners, 36 percent for Philadelphia compared to 37 percent for L.A. And the Phillies had the highest percentage in the National League of scoring runners from third base with less than two out (56 percent) and from second base with nobody out (57 percent).

For Los Angeles, managed by Walt Alston, reliance on these strategies—along with the stolen base—was understandable and perhaps even necessary because the Dodgers struggled to score runs and generally lacked extra-base firepower, in part because of the vast expanses of Dodger Stadium. Even in their 1960s pennant-winning years, the Dodgers were below the league average in extra base hits and slugging percentage—substantially so in 1965 and 1966.

While small-ball strategies made sense for Alston, Mauch had much more capacity with his line-up to score runs, but often chose to sacrifice in a play for one run—even with his best hitters at the plate—instead of trusting in his firepower. The two best hitters in his line-up—Allen and Callison—combined for a total of 60 home runs in 1964, but both laid down six sacrifice bunts to move a base runner up with nobody out.

If John McGraw, the grand-daddy of master strategist managers, disdained the sacrifice bunt precisely because it “sacrificed” a precious out, Gene Mauch was more than willing to sacrifice in the interest of playing for one run, including giving up as outs the two batters most likely to drive in runs. Over the course of the full season, Mauch's willingness to sacrifice Allen and Callison as outs to advance a runner into scoring position for somebody else to drive in may seem insignificant. But as we shall later see in September, in the final weeks of the '64 season, sacrificing Dick Allen may have cost his team the pennant.

At the end of July, the two teams met again for a three-game series with first place on the line, this time in Philadelphia. The Giants came into Connie Mack Stadium trailing by a half-game; the Reds were three back in third and the Cardinals tied for fifth, seven games out. The top of the standings remained the same after they split the first two games, but in the series finale—on July 30—after having surrendered a run to the Giants in the top of the tenth inning, the Phillies won the game with the following sequence: a leadoff double and hit batter put runners on first and second; Allen, once again asked to bunt, reached on an infield single toward third to load the bases; a two-run double by Johnny Briggs won the game. Philadelphia now led by 1-1/2 games. It would be nearly two full months before their lead would be that narrow again. 

The following is the link to the previous Baseball Historical Insight on the 1964 Phillies: http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-64-phillies-perfect-fathers-day.html

The '64 Phillies' Perfect Father's Day

The Phillies' trade acquisition of Jim Bunning in December was expected to bolster their starting pitching and contribute to building towards a contending team--although competing for the pennant in 1964 was considered by most experts to be a bit premature. After a 118-87 record with the Detroit Tigers, and having been one of the American League's best pitchers the previous seven seasons, Bunning was certainly not disappointing expectations. His Father's Day start in 1964 was his 14th in a Phillies uniform. Bunning, of course, made history that day by twirling a perfect game--not only the first since Don Larsen's in the 1956 World Series, but only the seventh perfect game in major league history. This is the fourth in a series of the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies. Links to the first three are at the end of this post.

The '64 Phillies' Perfect Father's Day

When Jim Bunning completed his warm-up pitches to face the Mets in the bottom of the first inning in the first game of the Father's Day doubleheader on Sunday June 21st 1964, he was pitching in only the 31st game ever played at Shea Stadium, the Mets' brand-spanking-new home. That made him the 62nd starting pitcher to take the mound at the new stadium. Three of the previous 30 games in Shea's short history had been shutouts. Bunning pitched the fourth shutout, but his was PERFECT. He was now 7-2 on the season with 10 "quality starts," including three shutouts, and an excellent 2.07 ERA--a worthy addition (having come from the American League) to the ranks of outstanding National League pitchers at the time and future fellow Hall of Fame guys Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale, Juan Marichal and Bob Gibson.

Bunning's was only the third perfect game in National League history, and the first since the so-called "modern era" began in 1901 when the American League declared itself a major league and had the credibility to do so by virtue of so many NL stars having abandoned the league for better pay in the new league--including Cy Young, who in 1904 pitched the first perfect game of the 20th century. Bunning's perfect game was the first in the National League in 84 years; Monte Ward had been the last to be perfect way back on June 17, 1880, only five days after Lee Richmond pitched the first-ever recorded perfecto on June 12. That was so long ago that the four teams involved in those two perfect games were Worcester (for whom Richmond pitched), Cleveland, Providence (for whom Ward pitched) and Buffalo, none of which survived into the modern era. (Cleveland was downsized out of the National League after going 20-134 in 1899, before being invited to become a charter member of the American League in 1901.)

At the end of Bunning's perfect day, which included 18-year old Rick Wise earning his first-ever major league victory pitching six innings without surrendering an earned run in the second game of the twinbill, the Phillies held a 2-game lead over the second-place Giants. The Reds were third, 4-1/2 back, and the Cardinals were struggling in sixth place, having already endured two five-game losing streaks, and were 8 games behind with a losing 32-33 record with 40 percent of the 1964 season gone by.

The Cardinals' situation had become sufficiently troubling (if "desperate" is too strong a word) that just six days before they had traded with the Chicago Cubs for outfielder Lou Brock, whose career was so far a disappointment but who the Cardinals thought could shore up their struggling offense, which had been held to two runs or less in 15 of their previous 20 games before they cut the deal. To get Brock, St. Louis parted with one of their top starting pitchers--Ernie Broglio, whose 18-8 record in 1963 was the best on the team and a major reason why the Cardinals had finished second and seemed primed to make a move to displace the Dodgers in 1964. They also sent veteran left-handed reliever Bobby Shantz to Chicago, who two months later, after being hardly used and pitching poorly when he was, found himself in Philadelphia--where he would figure prominently in the Phillies' September fortunes.

It can perhaps be argued that the Phillies' 2-game advantage in the standings was somewhat deceptive since their 12 previous games were with the Mets--the worst team in baseball--against whom they went 7-2, and the Cubs--also a bad team--against whom they were 2-1 in that stretch. In fact, by this point in the season the Phillies had played 44 percent of their games against the three teams that ended the 1964 season at the bottom of the National League standings, going a combined 21-6 against them through Father's Day (9-2 vs. New York; 6-1 vs. Houston; and 6-3 vs. Chicago). Philadelphia was no better than .500 against the rest of the league at 17-17. Of the three other teams that would matter come September, the Phillies were 4-1 against Cincinnati, but only 1-5 against San Francisco and 1-4 against St. Louis.

The Giants, meanwhile, had played only 29 percent of their games as of June 21 against the Cubs, Colts and Mets; the Cardinals 32 percent; and the Reds 33 percent. As we shall see come the final weeks of the season, the Phillies having faced off against the league's bottom-dwellers so often at the beginning of the season would not be helpful to them at the end.

Personal Notes on Father's Day: The memories I will always cherish about my dad--and there were many centered around baseball (and many around other things)--was his coming home from work and, after an hour commute from The Big Apple on the Long Island Railroad, taking me out to the diamond and hitting me 100 ground balls at shortstop and second base every evening. Thank heavens for daylight savings time. He expected accurate return throws. If there was still daylight, then maybe some outfield fly balls and even a bit of batting practice. Helped me stay sharp, at least defensively, for afternoon pickup games with friends--usually five to a side. Anyway, if there is any one thing from my youth that I would really like to do again, because everything was so right with the world, it would be fielding those ground balls and listening to him talk about Phil Rizzuto, Joe Gordon and Jerry Coleman.

And among my fondest memories as a dad with my daughter--and throughout her childhood I kept thinking, it could never get any better than this, and it did--was one summer a game we played called 27 outs. Using a tennis ball and her without a glove, I'd throw her an assortment of ground balls and pop ups that she had to catch cleanly and throw back accurately or be charged with an error. We'd play maybe three or four of these every evening, usually on a lighted tennis court. Happily, she had a nice amount of perfect games: 27 chances, 27 clean fields, 27 accurate throws. Not exactly Jim Bunning's achievement of 50 years ago, but more meaningful--at least to me.

Earlier, on the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies:

http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/03/fifty-years-ago-introducing-1964.html

http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/04/catching-up-with-64-phillies-mauch.html

http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/05/back-to-64-phillies-pitching-problems.html

Back to the '64 Phillies: Pitching Problems on the Horizon

Fifty years ago, the 1964 Phillies ended the month of May with a 25-15 record. They were in first place, only half-a-game up on the Giants and 2-1/2 ahead of the third-place Cardinals. The Reds--the fourth team to figure in the drama to come--were in sixth, 6 games out. As predicted by many pre-season analysts, including in Sports Illustrated, pitching was a Phillies' strength: through the first 48 days of the season, they had given up the fewest runs in the league and their team 3.15 ERA was second-lowest in the league after San Francisco's 2.92. Before too much longer, however, a healthy starting rotation was to become very problematic for manager Gene Mauch, which would have significant ramifications in the final weeks of September. This is the third installment in this blog's continuing series on what happened with the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies.

The '64 Phillies: Pitching Problems on the Horizon

Gene Mauch began the season with a four-man rotation featuring right-handers Jim Bunning, Art Mahaffey and Ray Culp and southpaw Dennis Bennett. Already by mid-May, as happens all the time in baseball, an arm injury was disrupting the Phillies' rotation--specifically, the sore elbow bothering Culp. The 22-year old had had an excellent rookie season in 1963, making 30 starts, going 14-11 and making the All-Star team, but pitched poorly in his first six starts of the season. Having pitched as many as five innings only twice, Culp was 1-4 with a 5.81 ERA when Mauch replaced him in the rotation with lefty Chris Short, who would prove to be the second most-valuable pitcher on the staff after Bunning.

Meanwhile, Dennis Bennett--after failing to last five innings in his opening day start--was one of the best pitchers in baseball as the season turned to June.  He led the Phillies with 10 starts, had 5 complete games (one of them a loss), had thrown a shutout, and was 6-3 with a 2.54 ERA. (Bunning was 5-2 with a 2.14 ERA in nine starts through the end of May.) Perhaps of some consequence in light of his 1964 season arc, on May 23 Bennett pitched 13 innings, giving up only two runs to beat the Dodgers but throwing 159 pitches to 51 batters, according to his game log on the website, baseball-reference.com.

Bennett pitched well in his first two starts in June--giving up five runs in 15 innings against the Giants and Dodgers--but the rest of the month did not go so well. Although he was 2-1 in six starts that month, his earned run average in June was a far-less than elite 6.07. It is quite likely that the left shoulder problems that ended up diminishing his effectiveness and depleting Mauch's corps of reliable starting pitchers (Culp also being damaged goods) began surfacing this month. The genesis of Bennett's pained pitching shoulder stemmed from a car accident that sent him crashing through the windshield before the start of the 1963 season--his second year in the majors--in which he nonetheless went 9-5.

Both Bennett and Culp pitched through pain in July. Bennett started six games, relieved in three others and had a 3.98 EA in July, but lost four of his five decisions. The pitcher who was confident he would win 20 games in 1964 ended July with a 9-8 record and shoulder pain serious enough that he pitched only 24 innings in August, making only three starts with four stints out of the bullpen to an ERA of 4.88. Bennett lost two of his three starts, lost another game in relief, and twice went six days on ice as his shoulder made him unavailable to Mauch. His last three appearances in August were particularly concerning: Bennett faced 41 batters in 7.1 innings of work, meaning 19 (46 percent) got on base against him; his ERA in those three games--12.27.

As for Ray Culp, his sore elbow limited him to only 18 innings in the month after Mauch took him out of the starting rotation after his May 16 loss to Houston. The only game Culp started during this stretch was the second game of a doubleheader on June 9, which he lost 4-0 to the Pirates in less than five innings of work. The lowly New York Mets--the worst team in baseball--were the cure Culp needed to try to salvage his season. After pitching five innings of one-run relief against them in the first game of a twinbill on June 14 and getting his second win of the season, Culp started the second game of another doubleheader against them on June 19 and pitched a complete game for a 7-2 win. His next start, four days later, was also the back end of a doubleheader, this time against the not-very-good Cubs, in which Culp pitched a shutout and allowed only two to reach base, giving up a walk in the first and a single in the sixth.

Culp was back in the rotation on a regular basis all through July, pitching well with a 4-1 record and 2.42 ERA in six starts and two relief appearances. After another strong outing in his first start in August--six innings, giving up one run against Houston--Culp's next two starts were less than successful as his elbow pain became increasingly debilitating. Culp came out in the second inning of a start against the Mets on August 15, failing to get an out, and that was that. Culp did not make another start in 1964, appearing in only five more games as a reliever, just one during the September stretch, during which he gave up 19 hits, walked 6, and allowed 18 runs (12 earned) in only 9.2 pain-wracked innings.

Hurtful as it was, Ray Culp's elbow put him in his manager's doghouse; Gene Mauch thought Culp was unwilling to pitch through pain. Dennis Bennett, meanwhile, persevered. After his pained August, Bennett returned to the rotation at the beginning of September, making six straight starts on the norm of every four days, and his final start on five days' rest. By this time--when, as it turned out, the Phillies had become desperate for wins--shoulder pain made Bennett unable to deliver.  He gave up nine runs in his last nine innings of work as the Phillies' seemingly sure-thing pennant slipped away.

The physical travails of Culp and Bennett forced Mauch to improvise in his starting rotation, although Bennett did make 32 starts in 1964--the second-most on the team after Bunning, who was the undisputed ace and had a 19-8 record. Short, who at first replaced Culp, secured his place in the rotation with a 17-9 record, and his ERA of 2.20 turned out to be even better than Bunning's 2.63. Mahaffey, with a 12-9 record in 29 starts, was the fourth man in the rotation and a mostly-reliable pitcher until Mauch lost confidence in him at the worst possible time in the desperate final weeks of the season--about which this blog will be almost exclusively devoted to come September. Until then, this series will continue with period updates on the Philadelphia Phillies, 50 years ago.

Catching Up With the '64 Phillies: Mauch the Platoonmeister

Fifty years ago, at the end of play on May 1st, the Philadelphia Phillies had gotten off to a 10-2 start and were two games up on the competition.  (San Francisco was second, St. Louis third, half a game behind the Giants, and Cincinnati--off to a 7-7 start and having just lost a two-game set to the Phillies--was four back.) Rookie Dick Allen (then known as "Richie") was batting .431 and already had 6 home runs and 13 runs batted in. This second in a continuing series on the tale of the 1964 Phillies--(we all know how that ended)--focuses on manager Gene Mauch's platooning not only at four positions, but Allen and Johnny Callison in their position in the batting order.

Catching Up With the '64 Phillies:  Mauch the Platoonmeister

With perhaps not the strongest of teams, Mauch was very much an activist in configuring his daily line-up and batting order to best take on the opposing team's starting pitcher. After several decades of being not much practiced, platooning began making a comeback in post-World War II major league baseball and was headlined by the success of Casey Stengel's 1950s line-up machinations at the helm of the Yankees.  By the 1960s, probably about half the major league teams had a position player platoon at one position or another--particularly at catcher if, like the Dodgers with Johnny Roseboro, they had a quality backstop who happened to bat left-handed.

With the possible exception of Mr. Stengel, Mauch platooned his starting line-up to a historically unprecedented extent in 1964.  For most of the season he platooned at four positions: behind the plate with left-handed Clay Dalrymple and right-handed veteran Gus Triandos; at first base, the left-handed rookie John Herrnstein paired off with veteran right-handed Roy Sievers and, in September, with another veteran right-hander, Vic Power; in left field, left-handed journeyman Wes Covington shared time first with Danny Cater and then Alex Johnson, both right-handed batting rookies; and in center field, the lefty Tony Gonzalez with the righty Cookie Rojas.  Tony Taylor at second base, Allen at third, and Callison in right field were the only Phillies written into Mauch's line-up every day.  At shortstop, Bobby Wine began the season as the starter, but his .200 batting average by the end of July contributed to Mauch giving Ruben Amaro most of the playing time in August and September and using Wine extensively as a late-inning defensive replacement after pinch hitting for Amaro, who was not exactly causing angst in the hearts of opposing pitchers.

Mauch's first base platoon did not stand the test of time.  The 36-year old Sievers hit a three-run home run in his first at bat of the season, but the lifetime .267 hitter with 318 career home runs was a bust for the Phillies, with only 4 home runs and batting only .182 against southpaws.  He was dispatched to the Washington Senators in mid-July.  The 26-year old Herrnstein hit only .235 against right-handed pitchers, which helps to explain why two-thirds of his career at bats were in 1964.  The Phillies resolved their lack of first base offense when they acquired the veteran Frank Thomas from the Mets to be a regular in the line-up, but a broken thumb suffered in a takeout slide on September 8 sidelined him for the next two weeks, forcing Mauch to again platoon at first base, this time pairing Herrnstein with Vic Power.  Covington held up his part of Mauch's left field platoon with 13 round-trippers, 53 RBI and a .280 average against righties, and Cater did well with a .333 average against southpaws when he played, before a broken arm cost him all of the month of August and limited him to three starts and 23 plate appearances when he returned in September. Replacing Cater as the right-hander in Mauch's left field platoon, Alex Johnson hit .400 in August but only .220 in the crucial final month.  Behind the plate, 93 of Dalrymple's 110 starts were against righties, against whom he hit .242, while the 33-year old Triandos hit .248 against southpaws.

The unexpected position platoon was the one in center field, where Tony Gonzalez started out as an every day player.  A left-handed batter, Gonzalez had hit .306 as a full-time regular the previous year with an average better than .300 against both righties and lefties.  He had a horrible time of it against lefties from the beginning in 1964, however, going 4-for-31 in games started by southpaws before Mauch decided towards the end of May he had best platoon in center field, using Cookie Rojas as the right-handed batter. Gonzalez wound up hitting .278 on the season, and got on base 35 percent of the time, but batted only .157 against pitchers of the left-handed persuasion.  The versatile Rojas started 52 games against southpaws in center field, with a .267 average against them.

But the most interesting of Mauch's platoons was in his batting order between two of his core regulars who also happened to be the Phillies' most dangerous hitters--rookie sensation Dick ("Richie") Allen and star right fielder Johnny Callison.  From the very beginning of the season until early June, Mauch swapped the two between second and third in the order, depending on the starting pitcher.  He had right-handed Allen batting second and the left-handed Callison third when the Phillies faced off against a righty, and Callison second and Allen third when a southpaw took the mound. Having Callison bat second against southpaws was most effective if the lead-off batter, Tony Taylor, got on base because, with the first baseman having to hold him on, it opened up the right side of the infield for Callison to pull the ball, increasing the odds of his getting a hit and of runners on first and third if he singled into right field.  Through the first two months of the season with this platoon alignment in the batting order, Callison hit .299 with 4 home runs and 20 RBI and Allen, off to a great start, was leading the league with 10 home runs and had 24 RBI and a .301 average.  Unfortunately, Taylor was batting only .228, had an on-base percentage that was a mere .290, and had scored only 15 runs in 27 games by the time May turned to June.  (Taylor ended up the season with a .251 average, batting sixth or seventh in Mauch's batting order in 40 percent of the games he played, with Gonzalez or Rojas batting lead-off in virtually every game after mid-July.)

In June, presumably awestruck by Allen's power, Mauch moved his slugging third baseman into the clean-up spot and penciled Callison third in the batting order, where both remained on a daily basis (more or less) until mid-August, when Mauch went back to alternating the two for the rest of the season (more or less) between second and third in the order depending on the starting pitcher. Suffice it to say for now that Callison's HR / RBI / BA line for the season in the 42 games he batted second was 3 / 33 / .247, compared to 23 / 70 / .284 in the 114 games he hit third in the order.  Allen's numbers were 12 / 36 / .270 when he batted second (64 games); 8 / 23 / .363 when he batted third (32 games); and 9 / 32 / .345 in the 66 games he was in the clean-up spot.

There will be more to say about Allen's place in Gene Mauch's line-up in a post later this summer, and much to come to set the stage for the Phillies' epic collapse of  '64.

The following is the link to the first post of this series:  http://brysholm.blogspot.com/2014/03/fifty-years-ago-introducing-1964.html