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. 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.

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