Matt Young
Eric Munson
Tim Hyers
Junior Felix
Steve Foucault pitched relief for
the Tigers. He started his career in 1970 with the Washington Senators minors
as a third baseman and was being converted to a catcher when he hurt his knee
in spring training. With his strong arm he was switched to pitcher. He finally
made the parent club in 1973. However, the Senators had moved to Texas and
became the Rangers and Steve found himself in Texas . He became the Rangers
closer in 1974 and pitched very well with a team leading ERA of 2.24 and
recording all the saves for the Rangers with 12. He remained the closer for the
Rangers until the second week of the 1977 season when he was traded by the
Rangers to the Tigers for Willie Horton. He became the Tigers closer for 1977
and recorded 13 saves and posted a 7-7 record with a 3.15 ERA. But in 1978 he
was replaced as the closer by John Hiller. Steve was the oldest relief pitcher
the Tigers had at 28 and was 2-4 with a 3.13 ERA and 4 saves when he was waived
by the Tigers. The Kansas City Royals then signed him. He appeared in 3 games
for the Royals before his major league career came to an end. He played one
more year in professional baseball in the Houston Astros farm system in 1979
before his playing days ended. In 2009 Steve was still in the game coaching for
the Evansville team in the Frontier League.
Chuck Scrivener played his entire career as a Tiger. His dad John, played in the Washington
Senators minor league system. Chuck was
drafted and signed with the Tigers for the 1968 minor league campaign. He played in Lakeland in 1968 and started
working his way up the minor league farm system. He first reached AAA Toledo in 1971. He stayed in AAA hitting about .240 as a
shortstop. In 1975 he made his major
league debut as a late season call up.
In his debut he got the start and was the lead off batter playing short
in a game against the Indians at Tiger Stadium.
In his first plate appearance he faced Jim Bibby and K’d looking. Chuck would go 0 for 4 but make one put out
and one assist. He got in three more
games and got 4 hits without another K and he was perfect fielding. In 1976 he was a back up infielder splitting
time between second and short behind Pedro Garcia and Tom Veryzer. He proved to be an average fielder and hit
.221. In 1977 he had his first baseball
card. He was again a back up but while
he did get a couple games at second and now third, he was mainly a
shortstop. Playing 50 games at short he
showed he was actually a strong fielding shortstop fielding a .981 clip
compared to a league average of .963. But
his batting suffered. He hit .083
getting only 6 hits in 72 at bats. He
had his second baseball card made in 1978 but Chuck never played in the majors
in 1978. Instead he played the entire
season in the Tigers AAA farm team at Evansville. He hit .262 playing mainly short but a few
games at second. But in 1978 the Tigers
started a couple of rookie infielders by the names of Trammell and
Whitaker. Chuck was expendable and at
the end of the year, the Tigers released Chuck.
He signed with the two year old Toronto Blue Jays but did not leave
spring training with the team nor an assignment to the minors and Chuck’s
professional baseball career was over.
Joe Wood was a war time infielder for the Tigers. He started in pro ball in 1940, just before
the war, at class C ball in Henderson of the East Texas League. This was after his one year at Rice
University in 1939. He hit .345 that 1940
season and moved up to Beaumont of the Texas League in 1941 which was A1
level. His average dropped to .295 which
is to be expected for jump like that in level.
But 1942 found him still in Beaumont and he did not improve a whole lot
to a .296 average. But 1943 was a big
draw on baseball players in order to supply men to the military for the war
effort. Because of this depletion of
players, Joe Wood was called up to the Tigers in 1943. At the age of 23 he hit .323 in 60 games as a
second and third baseman. His fielding
was ok but as you will hear in any movie or cartoon of the time “there is a war
going on, ya’ know”. Joe dropped out of pro ball in 1944 and
1945. I have to assume he was called to
service. He came back to the Tigers in
1946 and with all the other major leaguers coming back, Joe found he was
released by the Tiges. He was picked up
by the Chicago White Sox but after 1947 was out of baseball altogether. Joe’s career is one that you have to say “the
war giveth and the war taketh away.” Joe
died in 1985 in a house fire at the age of 65 in his hometown of Houston,
TX.
Fred House spent his entire time in the majors in Detroit. He came out of Cabool, MO and signed with the
Kewanee Boilermakers of the Central Association in 1912 as a right handed
pitcher. (Kewanee is in IL.) It was D
level ball. He was 14-11 that season and
apparently it was enough that the Tigers under Hughie Jennings were interested
enough to bring him on the Tiger squad in 1913.
He made his major league debut against the White Sox in April but it is
unclear from the records if he got the win.
It is clear that he got in 19 games for the Tiges that season and was
1-2 with a 5.20 ERA. This was when the
team had a collective ERA of 3.38.
Obviously Fred was not long for the big leagues if he could not bring
his ER down. Sure enough he split time
with his old Boilermakers and was 17-17 back with Kewanee in 1913. But he was brought back to Detroit and
finished the season with the Tiges. He
pitched his last game in October in a Tiger loss to the Indians. The score was 8-1 Tribe and Fred was
basically done with baseball as best can be told. He died ten years later at the age of 33 in
1923 and is buried in Independence, MO.
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