:format(webp)/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_image/image/73356859/78935641.0.jpg)
Being a child raised on American League baseball, I’m more than fine with the universal DH and pitchers not hitting anymore. Sure, there were some fun moments over the years, but towards the end there, they were becoming even more of an automatic out than they had been in the decades prior — which is saying something.
While I can’t say I particularly miss pitchers hitting in total, they did provide some amusing moments, and I do miss those. The DH does strip us of chances to see pitchers play the hero in multiple aspects of the game, like two different Yankee pitchers did in one 1943 doubleheader.
The 1943 Yankees were well in control of the AL pennant race by the time September 12th came around. A victory over the Red Sox the previous day put them 11 games up with just a little under a month left to play. With 21 games remaining on the schedule, they hadn’t clinched anything, but they also weren’t too far away from doing so.
On the 12th, they were still in Boston, playing a doubleheader to wrap up a series against the Red Sox. In the opener, they sent Tiny Bonham to the hill. Bonham was in the midst of a stretch where he was one of the best pitchers in baseball, and he showed that on this day.
Bonham opened up his afternoon with seven scoreless innings. Only two of the handful of runners that did reach against him made it into scoring position — Skeeter Newsome and Johnny Lazor both recorded doubles before getting stranded on base. The only problem was, the Yankees’ offense was equally being held in check by Boston’s Joe Dobson. Thanks to a couple of the runners that did reach getting picked off/thrown out stealing, the Yankees hadn’t even gotten a runner within 180 feet of home.
That all changed in the eighth inning. Leading off the top of the eighth for the Yankees was Joe Gordon. He finally ended that run of no Yankee getting into scoring position with a double. Following a Johnny Lindell groundout, the pitcher’s spot and Bonham came to the plate. In the last couple decades of pitchers hitting, teams would have almost certainly used this spot to pinch-hit. However, with Bonham cruising, they elected to let him hit. After Gordon stole third, the pitcher presumably got tired of seeing his offense do nothing and took matters into his own hands. His single scored Gordon for the game’s first run.
With a lead for the first time, Bonham promptly mowed down the last six Red Sox hitters to finish off a 1-0 win. For the day, he allowed just four hits and two walks in a complete game shutout, and was responsible for plating more runs than he allowed.
The second game of the day featured a tad bit more offense than that. In a pitching matchup of Charles Wensloff for the Yankees and Pinky Woods for the Red Sox, neither would last past the sixth inning, which isn’t nothing in 1943.
Wensloff departed after four innings, having allowed four earned runs and five in total. While the Yankees scored first for him, he departed with them trailing 5-1. Atley Donald came in for Wensloff and got off to a bit of a rocky start, allowing a run in the fifth on a walk, a double, and then a run-scoring sacrifice bunt. However, he would follow that by retiring 13 of the next 14 batters he faced.
As that was happening, the offense started to get going again. The Yankees had evened things up in the fifth with a four-run inning, thanks in part to a two-run Billy Johnson homer. While Boston had retaken the lead on the aforementioned bunt, the Yankees tied the game again in the sixth when Woods threw a bases-loaded wild pitch in what ended up being his final inning.
With a brand new ball game, the Yankees took the lead in the eighth. Roy Weatherly singled home a run off the unaptly-named Red Sox reliever Yank Terry. In the top of the ninth, Ken Sears doubled, followed by an intentional walk to Gordon, likely to try and get to the bottom of the order, which included Donald in the pitcher’s spot. Donald did indeed come to the plate with two outs and two on. Once again, the Yankees just let a pitcher hit, and it worked just fine. Donald added an RBI single, as the Yankees ended up scoring another two runs in the inning.
With a three-run edge, Donald finished things off in the bottom of the ninth. For the day, he went five innings out of the bullpen, allowing just one run on one hit. Similar to Bonham in the first game, his put up just as much offense as he allowed.
Pitchers being the offensive heroes aren’t completely unheard of stories from the pre-DH era. However, there won’t be too many times you see a team helped greatly by them twice in one day.
Resources
https://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYY/1943.shtml
https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/b/bonhati01.shtml
https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS194309121.shtml
https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/BOS/BOS194309122.shtml
Loading comments...