In Keeping With a
Theme...1973
1973 seemed
to be a season where no team wanted to win.
Okay.
that's not true.
The
National League East was the division that had the tightest race, going down to
the last day of the season, and then some, before crowning a winner.
The
American League races were pretty tame, with the Orioles and A's winning their
respective divisional crowns. The Orioles finding first place for good in early
August coasted to an eight game win over the Boston Red Sox; The defending World
Champion A's held off the charging young Kansas City Royals by six games,
leading the division from August 16th.
Over in the
National League, the Big Red Machine was getting into gear, but were still able
to repeat as NL West Champions, hitting first place on Labor Day, and holding
off the Dodgers to win by three and a half games.
Which
brings us to my beloved Mets. On August 30th, they were in last place in the
division, but just six and a half games back at that point. They had been as
far back as twelve games in July. The "Ya Gotta Believe" team, about
which manager Yogi Berra philosophized "It ain't over 'til its over"
went on a tear, winning twenty-one of their last thirty to claim the pennant on a rainy afternoon at Wrigley Field, where the Mets and Cubs were scheduled
to play a make up doubleheader. (The Mets won the first game negating the need
for the second game)
Led by Tom
Seaver in his Cy Young season, the Mets won eighty-two games that year, and
thanks to divisional play, made the playoffs and then the World Series. The
Mets, who coincidentally were the first ever National League East champions in
1969, would have finished in no better than fourth place if the divisional play
had not been instituted.
Pitching
was a bit more prevalent in the National League at the time, which led to the
American League's instituting the Designated Hitter rule for the 1973 season.
(Hello, Ron Blomberg) The pitcher's that dominated this year pretty much
dominated the entirety of the '70s. Jim Palmer, Steve Carlton, Nolan Ryan all
had very good seasons. No really substantial offensive numbers happened this
year. Rod Carew won the AL
batting title by hitting .350, forty-four points above the next runner-up
(George "Boomer" Scott and Tommy Davis both hit .306) No American
Leaguer scored more than one hundred runs that year, Reggie Jackson led with
ninety-nine. But the A's did have four players that scored eighty-nine or more.
Nolan Ryan
set the record for strikeouts, three hundred eighty-three, while pitching the
first two no-hitters of his career. There were eleven pitchers in the AL that won twenty or
more games, Wilbur Wood paced the league with twenty-four. But this isn't
uncommon. There were quite a few pitchers that were still able to pitch three
hundred or more innings.
The
National League did have a better year offensively.
The "Launching Pad" that was Atlanta 's Fulton County Stadium hosted the
first ever trio of forty home run teammates (Hank Aaron, Darrell Evans and
Davey Johnson. Evans would be the first to hit forty homers in both leagues
topping that mark with the Tigers in 1984 as well)
Willie (not
yet "Pops") Stargell collected a .646 Slugging Percentage while
hitting forty-four homers and driving in one hundred nineteen runs. In fact,
there were seven National Leaguers that scored one hundred runs or more. Two
unlikely players, from the same unlikely team, led the NL in On Base
Percentage. Ron Fairly was at .422 just behind Expo teammate Ken Singleton's
.425.
None of the
NL pitchers logged more than three hundred innings, and Cy Young Award winner
Tom Seaver led the league with a 2.08 ERA. Only lefty Ron Bryant of the Giants
was able to notch twenty wins that season.
As I
mentioned before, the Mets made it to the World Series, beating the Reds on the
National League Championship Series three games to two, in a Series that is
probably most remembered for the fight between Bud Harrelson and Pete Rose at
second base.
The A's
dispatched the Orioles handily in the American League Series three ganes to
two, setting up the Mets-A's Series and the last post-season appearance of the
great Willie Mays. The "Say Hey Kid' was at the end of his playing days,
and was relegated to just a handful of appearances in the post-season. His
final season numbers are nothing of note.
The other
thing that seems to have endured in memories from the 1973 World Series
involved A's second baseman Dick Green. <>
In
something that I will cover at a later date, I was able to meet and have a few
conversations with a baseball lifer named Vern Hoscheit. Among the many jobs
that Vern held in baseball was bullpen coach for the Oakland A's during the early 1970's.
Charley O.
Finley purchased the Athletics franchise while they were still in Kansas City . Through many
trials and tribulations, he moved the team to Oakland
for the 1968 season, prompting U.S. Senator Stuart Symington of Missouri in an appeal to AL President Joe Cronin, to
pronounce that "Oakland is the luckiest
city since Hiroshima ".
Charley Finley
wanted a winning team, and a winning situation, and despite his reputation as a
tightwad, could be very generous to his players. But Charley was Charley.
Vern told
me a story of the day in 1971 that the A's won their one-hundreth game of the
season, that Charley had placed a one hundred dollar bill in each and every
locker after the game. When they won the hundred and first game, there was a
one dollar bill in each locker.
The A's won
the World Series in 1972, beating the A's in a classic match-up of pitching,
power and strategy, including a phantom intentional walk to Johnny Bench. The
A's Championship ring was by all accounts, gorgeous. Standard gold with a kelly
green stone, diamond inlaid in the center, in the shape of a baseball diamond,
and Charley's famous equation etched on the side S+S=S. (Sweat + Sacrifice =
Success)
At the
beginning of the 1973 season, as Finley was distributing the rings, he said
something to the effect of 'win this year guys, and I'll make this ring look
like a dime store ring'.
After Dick
Green made two errors in the playoffs, he made his third of the post-season in
Game 4, Finley essentially tried to 'fire' Green and replace him on the roster
with rookie second baseman Manny Trillo. The Mets protested, rightly so, and the
A's tried to get Green to admit to a physical ailment. Commissioner Bowie Kuhn
got involved, as he often did with Finley and his antics, and decreed that
essentially, the roster was set before the series. If Green was injured, that
was unfortunate, but Trillo, or any other player could not be added to the
post-season roster.
As the Series
played out, and the A's won their second of three consecutive titles, the
bitterness that Finley had over the Dick Green situation, combined with several
other factors, including manager Dick Williams resigning at the conclusion of
the Series, the Yankees signing of Williams, and the maelstrom that created,
when World Series Ring time came around, the gaudiness was also gone. The 1973
A's World Series ring, while still impressive, was essentially a generic
championship ring.
He did make
up for it in 1974 though.
So, on to
the season's performances.
In the
official AL MVP Voting, the top vote getters were:
Reggie Jackson OAK 32HR 117RBI .293AVG
Jim Palmer BAL 22-9 2.40 ERA
Amos Otis KC 26 93 .300
Sal Bando OAK 29 98 .287
Rod Carew MIN 6 62 .350
John Hiller
DET 10-5 1.44 ERA 38 Saves
(new record)
Since the
voters were kind enough to vote for 2 pitchers in the top, I will include them
in one list as well. Again, comparing them to the league average performance,
the top 10 from the AL
in 1973 were:
Reggie
Jackson
Jim Palmer
Reggie
Smith
George
Scott
John Hiller
John
Mayberry
Thurman
Munson
Rod Carew
Carl
Yastrzemski
Amos Otis
So as far
as the best player in the league, the voters got it right.
The Cy
Young voting was a little different, as Hiller didn't get the same
consideration in that voting. Whether it was because no reliever had won the
award before or not, he didn't fare that well in the voting. But Jim palmer won
the first of his three awards:
Jim Palmer BAL 22-9 2.40
Nolan Ryan CAL 21-16 2.87
Catfish
Hunter OAK 21-5 3.34
John Hiller
DET 10-5 1.44 38 saves
Wilbur Wood CHI 24-20 3.46
And my
numbers were:
Jim Palmer
John Hiller
Bert
Blyleven MIN 20-17 2.52
Catfish
Hunter
Nolan Ryan
The MOST
VALUABLE PLAYER, the one that exceeded their team's performances, that were
truly VALUABLE for the American League that season were:
Thurman Munson NY
Frank
Robinson CAL 30 97 .266
George
Scott MIL 24 107 .306
Reggie
Jackson OAK 32 117 .293
Bobby Murcer NY
Munson
provided a solid catcher with some sneaky good offensive numbers as a young
catcher in 1973. He was still not yet reaching his 'prime', but I think this
shows that the offensive numbers had been there for a while, and the team needed
to build around him, which it eventually did.
And the
Most Valuable pitchers were:
Jim Bibby TEX 9-10 3.24
Gaylord
Perry CLE 19-19 3.38
John Hiller DET 10-5 1.44 38 saves
Bert
Blyleven MIN 20-17 2.52
Jim Colborn MIL 20-12 3.18
Bibby is
perplexing here, after coning over from St. Louis, his numbers on the face were
not that strong, but when you factor in the 9 wins for a team that only won
forty-eight more, they kinda make sense. Remember, these number are measured
against his team, and his performance above the team average.
Over in the
National League, their voting results were:
Pete Rose CIN 5 64 .338
Willie
Stargell PIT 44 119 .299
Bobby Bonds SF 39 96 .283 43 SB
Joe Morgan CIN 26 82 .290 67
SB
Mike
Marshall MON 14-11 2.66 31 Saves
Lou Brock STL 7 63 .297 70SB
Tony Perez CIN 27 101 .314
And the Cy
Young vote:
Tom Seaver NY
Mike
Marshall MON 14-11 2.66 31 saves
Ron Bryant SF 24-12 3.53
Jack
Billingham CIN 19-10 3.04
Don Sutton LA 18-10 2.42
Performance
wise, there were a few surprises, but the top performers by my calculations
were:
Willie
Stargell PIT 44 119 .299
Tom Seaver NY
Joe Ferguson LA
Bobby Bonds SF 39 96 .283 43SB
Darrell
Evans ATL 41 104 .281
Johnny
Bench CIN 25 104 .253
Ken
Singleton MON 23 103 .302
Joe Morgan CIN 26 82 .290 67
SB
So, without
further adieu, the MOST VALUABLE players in the NL in 1973:
Willie
Stargell PIT 44 119 .299
Joe Ferguson LA
Ken
Singleton MON 23 103 .302
Nate Colbert SD
Bob Watson HOU 16 94 .312
Stargell
was easily to most dominant player in the league, leading in homers and RBI. Remember
this was a Pirates team that was reeling from the loss of Roberto Clemente in
the off-season. This team was the the beginnings of the "We Are
Family" championship team of 1979.
And in
pitching:
Wayne
Twitchell PHI 13-9 2.50
Tom Seaver NY
Bill Greif SD
Ken Brett PHI 13-9 3.44
Steve Renko MON 15-11 2.81
Twitchell
is one that never really lived up to his promise As you can see from his low
ERA, he could really pitch. He was one that bounced around to a few
organization, but never really landing anywhere until he got to Philly. 1973
was his best season.
So there
you have it, the 1973 season review, or as I see it forty-two years later.
A Great Father's Day gift idea!
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