Pitch by Pitch by Bob Gibson

Author:Bob Gibson
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781250060693
Publisher: Flatiron Books

Most Detroiters considered Al Kaline to be the second-greatest player in Tigers history, behind only Ty Cobb. At the age of thirty-three, he had already played in thirteen All-Star games, but this was his long-awaited first World Series. Kaline had missed much of the ’68 season with a broken arm, and to clear room for him in the Series lineup, manager Mayo Smith made the daring decision to move Gold Glove center fielder Mickey Stanley to shortstop.

Sixth Inning

IT WASN’T MATHEWS after all, which made perfect sense. They wouldn’t waste his left-handed power leading off the inning. Instead, the pinch hitter for McLain was a freckle-faced utility infielder named Tommy Matchick, the key words there—other than “pinch hitter for McLain,” which was a big thing but not unexpected—being “utility infielder.” That term triggered a specific response. He would see fastballs.

Growing up in Pennsylvania coal country, Matchick’s favorite player as a kid had in fact been the former Yankee shortstop Tony Kubek, who on this day was roaming the stands for NBC, conducting between-innings interviews with Sinatra, Musial, Casey Stengel, various dignitaries, and my wife and daughter. Turning down a basketball scholarship, Matchick had originally signed with the Cardinals; but due to a peculiar rule in place at the time, he played in the organization for just one season. For a brief period in the late fifties and early sixties, baseball operated a First-Year Player Draft by which clubs were able to select rookie minor leaguers from other teams for as little as $8,000, and in that way the Tigers purchased Matchick after the 1962 season, when he’d just turned nineteen. Around the same time, as a by-product of the same system, they snatched Denny McLain on waivers from the White Sox.

In ’68, his rookie year, Matchick had been an effective pinch hitter and also started more than a third of Detroit’s games at shortstop. Being a Tiger—it seemed to come with the territory—he had demonstrated a talent for the dramatic stroke, most notably in a mid-July game against the Baltimore Orioles, the Tigers’ principal challengers for the American League pennant. Detroit trailed 4–0, and didn’t have a hit, when McAuliffe smacked a two-run homer in the sixth inning, and still trailed 4–3 when Matchick, a left-handed batter, did the same with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, sending a pitch from Moe Drabowsky into the overhanging upper deck at Tiger Stadium.

Needless to say, that was the furthest thing from my mind when my first fastball stayed up and away.

The second one rode in on his hands. Matchick, choking up on the bat, fouled it straight back.

In spite of his big blow against Baltimore, Matchick, like most utility infielders, was not much of a home run threat, which was the main reason for feeding him fastballs. Another, though, was the combination of the heat and the stage of the game. I’d thrown 74 pitches, and although none of the first five innings would be described as unusually taxing or stressful—other

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