John Farrell finished his career with the Tigers in
1996. He was in two games for the Tiges
and lost both. His first game was a
brief 1.1 inning affair with him giving up 5 runs on 6 hits and 1 walk to the
White Sox. His last game in the majors
lasted 5 innings for him. He gave up 5
runs on 5 hits and 4 walks to the Royals.
Terry Humphrey was a backup catcher for the Tigers. He was drafted by the Montreal Expos in
1969. He signed because he wanted a
summer job. He really didn’t think he
would go anywhere in baseball. He was
an all star in rookie ball in 1969 and again when he was in AA in 1970. In 1971 he was already in AAA Winnipeg as was
named team MVP. That same year he made
his major league debut. He was a late season
call up for the Expos and got into 9 games.
In his debut he pinch hit for Ron Fairly and while facing Ramon Hernandez
of the Pirates, he K’d. He caught the 9th
inning and was solid. Defensively, Terry
was always considered solid. He was so
good that in his last two years at Montreal in 1973 and 1974 he was a backup
catcher and committed only 1 error in the two seasons. He also was solid throwing out base
runners. The problem for Terry in
Montreal was that the Expos had recently picked up a young catcher by the name
of Gary Carter. Terry was
expendable. He came to the Tigers from
Montreal with Tom Walker in the deal that sent Woodie Fryman to Montreal. Terry appeared in 18 games for the Tiges
hitting .244 with one RBI as back up catcher. However, he missed the last three
months of the season with a separated shoulder from a collision with George
Brett at the plate. It was in KC and Terry knew it was dislocated
when it happened. The team Doc told him it was just a bad bruise and kept
him in the game. The reason was the Tigers starting catcher, Bill Freehan
was on the DL. So they Tiges had no choice but to keep Terry in the
game. He could not swing the bat when he came up to bat 2 innings later
so he bunted and got a single! Two days later he had surgery to put a pin
in his shoulder that he has to this day.
He then went to the
Angels by way of Houston in the Leon Roberts, Mark Lemongello and Gene Pentz
deal that brought Milt May, Jim Crawford and Dave Roberts to Detroit. Terry was in California for four
seasons. Terry was the starting catcher
for the Angels in 1977. In those four
seasons he hit .227. This brought his
career batting average to .211. This
clearly was Terry’s weakness. While a
solid defensive catcher, he was weak at the plate. But he still played 9 years in the
majors. Not bad for a “summer time job”.
John Grubb ended his major league
career with the Tigers as one the guys who was on both the 1984 and 1987 Tiger
teams. He started his major league
career with the San Diego Padres. He had
come out of Florida State University. He
was an all-star as a Padre and was a starting outfielder hitting .286 over five
seasons in San Diego. He was traded to
Cleveland which he was happy with as he was able to play under manager Frank
Robinson. But that came to an end in
1978 when he was traded to the Rangers.
He knew a trade was coming as the traded deadline was approaching and
Cleveland was not going anywhere. He did
well in Texas hitting .272 over 5 seasons but again he knew he was going to be
traded. He was called into the
office. “Doug Rader called me into his office and he told me that they
had made a trade. He said, ‘Grubsteaks, you’re going to like where you’re
going.’ I said, ‘Where’s that?’ And he said ‘Detroit.’ And, of course, I looked
at him and kind of said ‘Yup. That would be a good team to go to.’ We knew they
were strong and getting better each year and right on the verge of being a
real, real good ballclub. So I was happy to go there.” (From SABR bio by
Mike McClary) He was a back up
outfielder. But in the post season he was great going 6
for 14 in the three series he played in.
Again from Mike McClary “With one out in
the top of the 11th, and with
Ruppert Jones on first and Darrell Evans at second, Grubb faced Dan Quisenberry,
who led the American League with 44 saves that season. The left-handed-hitting
Grubb was 0-for-1 against Quisenberry during the regular season and had just
two hits in 12 career at-bats against him. Grubb waited as the submariner and
his batterymate, John Wathan, discussed their pitching strategy. “He got two strikes on me and Wathan
went out to the mound. I was watching them when they were out there talking. I
thought I could read their lips and I thought I saw them saying ‘fastball.’ And
I thought, well, I can’t trust that, but I’m going to be ready for it.” Hitless in his previous three at-bats
in the game, Grubb was looking to change his luck and power his team to a 2-0
series lead. As Wathan got into his
crouch, Grubb dug in. On the next pitch, he ripped a two-run double to
right-center to put the Tigers up 5-3 in the game and leave them one win away
from the World Series. “He threw a fastball, and I’m sure [Royals center
fielder] Willie Wilson was cheating-in a little bit on me with two strikes. But
I happened to get a hold of one and drove it over his head. So I’m glad I came
through to help out. That was my turn, I guess, to do something to help the
team.” The Tigers clinched the pennant two days later, defeating the Royals 1-0
in Game Three. John played for the Tigers for 5 seasons and hit
.269 as a Tiger in the regular season.
In the post season John hit .429.
John’s last at bat in pro ball was a hit in the 1987 ALCS of form Tiger
Juan Berenguer who was pitching for the Twins in 1987. John is still happy of his time with the
Tigers and participates in Tiger Fantasy Camp.
He gave another nice quote for Mike McClary ““Early in the season in spring training,” Grubb said, “I
remember vividly one statement Sparky made here in Detroit. He said, ‘Look,
guys, if you go out there and give them your heart and soul, they’ll do the
same thing. But if you dog it on them one time, they won’t ever forget it.’ And
he was right. Those fans in Detroit – that was one of my best memories, and
still is the way the fans treated me and the players. You could tell they were
diehard fans. It wasn’t like that at the other places that I played. Detroit is
a special town. They loved their sports and loved their Tigers.”
Kevin Collins finished his major league career with the
Tigers in 1970 and 1971. He was pinch
hitter in 1970 with 25 plate appearances in 25 games. He hit a wopping .208 in 1970. He was a utility player in 1971 and improved
his hitting to .268. But he was still
done in the majors after 1971.
Ray Oyler was the Tigers shortstop in 1967 and 1968 for the
regular season. But in the World Series
he was taken out for Mickey Stanley.
That was so the Tigers could get Al Kalines bat in the line up. I always felt bad for Ray as he only got in 4
of the 7 1968 World Series games and only got one plate appearance in the whole
series. He did not get a hit. But it was that bat that kept him out. In his career Ray was a .175 hitter. And in 1968 he hit only .135. He was drafted by the Seattle Pilots (they
became the Milwaukee Brewers one year later.) in the 1968 expansion draft and was gone from
Detroit after the 1968 World Series.
Frank Kostro made his major league debut as a Tiger in 1962
as a September call up. He came in as a
pinch hitter and struck out. After that
auspicious beginning he went on to hit .268 in 16 games as a back up third
sacker. He stuck around in 1963 and was
used as a utility player but hit only .225 and was dealt to the Angels with
Paul Foytack for George Thomas. Frank
continued to play in the majors through 1969 with the Angels and Twins.
Don Kolloway was the starting first baseman for the Tigers
in 1950. This was after his 1949 season
as a utility player for the Tigers. In
four years with the tigers he hit .279.
He had come to the Tigers form the white Sox in a deal for Earl
Rapp. Before the 1953 season we traded
him to the Philadelphia Athletics for Billy Hitchcock. He was released by the Athletics in May of
that year and was done in the majors. He
did go on to play for the Portland Beavers in the PCL as his final team. A team that is no more.
Tuck Stainback was on the 1940 Tigers that won the AL
pennant. However, Tuck did not get to play in the series. In the season he had only played in 15 games
as a late call up so he was not eligible for the post season. In 1941 he got in 94 games with the Tiges as
an outfielder. After the 1941 season
Tuck was traded to the Yankees for the same Billy Hitchcock that Don Kolloway
was traded for.
George Caster was a member of the 1945 World Champion
Tigers. He was picked up off of waivers
from the St. Louis Browns in August of 1945 and pitched in 22 games for the
Tigers all in relief. He went 5-1 with a
3.86 ERA. He got into game six of the
1945 series replacing Virgil Trucks in the 5th and pitched 2 thirds
of an inning getting Andy Pafko to pop up and then striking out Bill “Swish”
Nicholson. George came back for one more
year with the Tigers in 1946 and went 2-1 before his major league career was
over.
Chick Galloway finished his 10 year career with one season
as a Tiger in 1928. He had played 9
years for the Philadelphia Athletics before coming to Detroit by way of the St.
Louis Browns and Milwaukee Brewers. The
Athletics traded him to the Brewers (American Association, not todays Brewers)
for Ossie Orwoll on December 2 1927.
Then on December 24 the Brewers sent him to the Browns for Spencer Adams
and Otto Miller. That same day the Browns
sent him to the Tigers with Harry Rice and Elam Van Gilder for Lu Blue and Heinie
Manush. In his one year for Detroit
Chick hit .264 as a utility player.
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