Pedro
Santana had a sip of coffee with the Tigers in 2001. Pedro came to the Tigers
organization in a trade with the Astros in 1996. The Tiges sent Greg Olson to
the Houston for Pedro and a minor leaguer. Pedro worked his way up in the
Tigers org and finally on July 16, the 24 year old Pedro came into a game in
the bottom of the 8th against the Reds with the Tigers trailing 1-9.
He replaced Damion Easley at second base. The first batter, Alex Ochoa, hit a
first pitch ground ball to short and was thrown out. The second batter, Kelly
Stinnett hit a first pitch fly ball to center for the second out. The third
batter hit a 2-1 pitch for pop fly and Pedro caught it for the out. In the top
of the ninth the Tigers were up and Pedro was in the second spot in the order.
The batters due up were in the 4-5-6 spots. Pedro did not get on deck. The
Tigers lost the game and Pedro’s time as a major leaguer was up. He was on the
field for 6 pitches and caught a pop fly.
Cecil
Fielder hit 245 homeruns for the Tigers over seven years. Cecil started his career with the Blue Jays
before taking a hiatus and playing ball in Japan for the Hanshin Tigers. He did not display the power in Toronto that
he showed upon his return to the States.
In 1990 he exploded on the scene here in Detroit hitting 51 homers to
become only the third batter since Roger Maris to hit 50 homers in a
season. I have always held his 1990
season as the fence between the non steroid and steroid eras. Prior to Cecil, the over hundred year history
of the major leagues, only 17 times had anyone hit 50 or more homers in a
season. It has been done now 24 times in
the 21 years since Cecil in 1990. What
side of the fence Cecil was on, I don’t know.
Cecil led the league in RBI’s and homers in both 1990 and 1991 yet he
did not earn an MVP award. Those went to
Rickey Henderson and Cal Ripken. Rickey
hit .325 with 28 homers and 61 RBI’s but stole 65 bases and scored 119
runs. Cecil hit .277 with 51 homers and
132 RBI’s. But Cecil did not steal a
base and scored 104 runs. If steals are
so important than should not total bases be even more? Rickey had 282 total bases to Cecil’s league
leading 339 total bases. In 1991 Cal hit
.323 with 34 homers and 114 RBI’s. He
stole 6 bases and scored 99 runs. Cecil
hit .261 with 44 homers and 133 RBI’s.
So it wasn’t steals. Cal,
however, led the league in total bases with 368 to Cecil’s 320. Hmmm.
I thought 1990 showed it wasn’t total bases that were important. Cecil was traded to the Yankees in what Randy
Smith called his all time greatest deal.
He got Ruben Sierra and the goal of our trade, Matt Drews. Matt Drews you say? Who else did we trade Cecil and Travis Fryman
for? Matt Drews! Matt never spent a day in the majors. When the Tigers left Matt unprotected in the
Arizona Diamondbacks expansion draft, they took him. We then promptly traded Travis to the
Diamondbacks for Gabe Alvarez, Joe Randa and Matt Drews. Randy was one smooth GM.
Frank
MacCormack pitched in 9 games for the Tigers in 1976. He was 0-5 in his 9 games with a 5.79
ERA. He pitched 32.2 innings and allowed
35 hits and 34 walks for WHIP of 2.112.
He was drafted by the Seattle Mariners in the Expansion draft and with
the Mariners in 1977 was in three games and pitched 7 innings. He gave up 4 hits and 12 walks for a WHIP of
2.286. Frank never pitched in the majors
again after 1977 with the Mariners.
Aurelio
Lopez was the Tigers crack set up man in the great year of 1984. Senor Smoke
started his career with the Royals in 1974 but was sold to the Mexico
City Reds prior to the 1975 season. He
was then purchased by the Cardinals from Mexico City at the end of the 1977
season. The Cardinals then made a deal
with the Tigers at the end of the 1978 season of Aurelio and Jerry Morales for
Jack Murphy (never made it to the majors) and Bob Sykes. Sykes was done in the majors after 1981. Aurelio was 30 when he started his first of
seven seasons with the Tigers and was the set up man for Willie Hernandez. In 1984, as long as the starter got us
through 6 or 7 innings, Aurelio and Willie would do the rest. Aurelio was released after the 1985 season
and was picked up by the Astros. He was
done in the majors after 1987. In 1990
he was elected Municipal President of his hometown in Mexico. In 1992 at the age of 44 he was killed in car
accident. There have been three players
in the majors with the name Aurelio and all three have died in car
accidents, Aurelio’s Lopez, Rodriguez
and Monteagudo.
Billy
Muffett coached for the Tigers from 1985 through 1994. He had been a pitcher for the Cardinals,
Giants and Red Sox from the late 1950’s into the early 1960’s. He became a coach for the Cardinals from 1967
through 1970 and then coached with the Angels from 1974 through 1977. He joined the Tigers in 1985 replacing Roger
Craig as pitching coach as Roger went to San Francisco to become their
manager. Billy survived cancer in 1987
and continued coaching. I know he had a
falling out with Sparky Anderson but I never understood what the issue
was. Billy was done with baseball after
he left the Tigers and died in 2008.
John
McHale was a Tiger in the mid and late 1940’s.
He attended Detroit Catholic Central and then went to Norte Dame. He came up to the Tiges in 1943 for 4 plate
appearances in 4 games. He did not get a
hit but he did get a walk. In 1944 his
playing time was cut to one plate appearance.
He did not get on base. 1945 saw
his career reach new heights when he made 16 plate appearances! He got a walk and two hits for a .143
average. Better than his .000 in 1943
and his .000 in 1944. He also got in the
World Series in 1945. But he did not get
a hit. However, 1946 still saw him in
the minors. The year in the minors was
just what John needed to have his breakout season of 1947. He had 103 plate appearances and got 20 hits! Unfortunately this was followed by his final
season as a player, 1948 when he got one plate appearance and did not reach
base. John was more successful in the
front office. He was the Tigers GM in
1957 at the age of 35. Soon he was in
Milwaukee with the Braves and was part of the move to Atlanta. In 1969 he became the Montreal Expos first
GM and President. His son John McHale
Jr., was the Tigers President from 1995 through 2001 and was the man who was
responsible for getting the Tigers out of Tiger Stadium.
Eldon
Auker was a submarine pitcher for the Tigers from 1933 through 1938. He was one of the keys for the 1934 and 1935
championship seasons. In the 1934 season he went 15-7 but in the
World Series he was the pitcher of game seven and unfortunately got hammered by
the Cardinals. He gave up 4 runs in 2.1
innings on six hits and one walk. He
came back in 1935 and went 18-7 and helped the Tigers to their first World
Series championship. He was traded to
the Red Sox at the end of the 1938 season with Chet Morgan and Jake Wade for
Pinky Higgins and Archie McKain. But Eldon
did not like pitching for player manager Joe Cronin and had the first losing
season of his career going 9-10. He had
been used to Mickey Cochrane allowing his pitchers to call their own game. But Joe kept coming in from shortstop and
telling him how to pitch. One day Eldon
had had enough and said “hey Joe, why don’t I go play short and you can
pitch?” At that point Joe was not a
happy guy. Eldon was ready to call it
quits for baseball rather than play another year for Joe. But Fred Haney of the St. Louis Browns talked
to him and they worked out a deal to buy Eldon from the Sox. As the Sox knew Eldon was going to quit
rather than play for them. They happily
sold him to the Browns. Eldon pitched
three more seasons with the Browns before calling it quits with baseball. In 1999 he was at the closing of Tiger
Stadium and spoke to the crowd and players representing all the Tigers from the
past. He published an interesting biography
called “Sleeper Cars and Flannel Uniforms”.
John
Bogart was a right handed pitcher for the Tigers in 1920. At 19, he was the fourth youngest player in
the leagues in 1920. In his major league
debut he started and pitched 6.2 innings against the Red Sox and left the game
with a 10-6 lead. However, Mutt Wilson
came in and gave up 5 runs and the lead.
But the Tiges came back and won the game in the 12 inning 14-13, but not
for John. A few days later John came in
to pitch the 8th and 9th against the Senators. He pitched two perfect innings and got the
win as the Tigers scored 4 in the bottom of the ninth to win 12-11. John got his second start against the Browns
and pitched 7 innings giving up only 2 runs on 2 hits and 2 walks. But he took that loss as the Tigers failed to
score any runs. John came in to face the
Indians a few days later behind 1-0 in the second and proceeded to pitch 8
innings of relief! He gave up 4 runs
on 6 hits and got the win. John would go
on to pitch until he was 28 years old but never pitched in the majors
again.
Frank
McManus played three seasons in the majors and had only one plate appearance
for the Tigers. He started his major
league experience in 1899 when he was a catcher with the Washington Senators of
the National League. He played in 7
games for them and got 8 hits.After a couple of seasons with the White Sox and
Kansas City Blues of the minor league American League, he showed up with the
Brooklyn Superbas of the National League.
He went to the plate 7 times and did not get a hit. The next year he was in Detroit after we
purchased him from Brooklyn. He got in
one game for the Tigers in 1904 and did not make a plate appearance. His record appears to show that he was a pinch
runner who did not advance. He ended up
with the Montreal Royals before being purchased by the New York Highlanders to
finish out the 1904 season and went 0 for 7 with the Highlanders. It is believed he was murdered in 1923 at the
age of 47 in Syracuse, New York.
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