Eric Eckenstahler spent his entire major league career as a
Tiger. The lefty relief pitcher came out
of Illinois State University, which also produced HOF’er Clark Griffith, and
Eric signed with the Tigers in 2000. He
went to the Tiger minors and spent 2000 moving from A- Oneonta to A West
Michigan. He had an 0-2 record and a
4.25 ERA. In 2001 he went from A+
Lakeland to AA Erie. He was 5-2 with a
3.69 ERA. Finally in 2002 things
happened for Eric. He had been in AAA
Toledo where he would finish the season at 2-4 with a 4.43 ERA. Now his stats take a strange turn here. His stats show 4 shut outs but no games
started. Hmmm. I will have to look into how that
happens. Regardless, the Tigers made
Eric a late season call up. On September
9, he made his major league debut. He
replaced Mike Maroth in a game the Tigers trailed the Twins 4-2 in the 7th. Mike had just given up 2 doubles and had no
outs. Eric got AJ Pierzinski to ground
out as his first batter faced and then K’d Luis Rivera. He gave up a single to future Tiger Jacque
Jones before ending the inning with a K.
In the 8th he got the side out 1-2-3 including 2 K’s. Not a bad debut with 2 innings pitched and 4
K’s and only 1 hit. The next game Eric
faced the KC Royals. He started the 10th
inning of a 2-2 tie and while he gave up 2 hits he also K’d 2 and did not give
up a run. The Tiges scored a run on
Bobby Higginson’s homer and Eric got his first major league win. Eric got in 5 more games that season and
ended up with a 1-0 record and a 5.63 with all his games in relief. IN 2003 he was 3-6 at Toledo with a 3.16 ERA
all in relief. The Tigers called him up
in July. With the Tigers at 28-75 on
July 27, Eric got in his first Tiger game of the season. He did not get an opportunity to get a save
and would not record a decision or a save in the 20 games he appeared. The Tigers would finish an abysmal
43-119. Eric had the lowest ERA on the
team at 2.87 but only pitched 15.2 innings.
His ERA was better than that of other lefties Wil Ledezma 5.79, Jamie
Walker 3.32 and Steve Avery, 5.63. But
Eric never pitched again in the majors.
Walker and Ledezma were back in 2004 but as the Tigers cleaned house
after 2003, they cleaned out Eric. In
2004 Eric was traded to the Cubs. He
ended his pro career in 2005 at the age of 28.
Brandon Villafuerte
Rudy Pemberton started his major league career as a
Tiger. He was signed out of high school
in the Dominican Republic in 1988. He
kept getting better as he moved up the farm chain until he finally made AAA
Toledo in 1994. He hit .303 that season
which was best on the team for starters.
That was the best season he had had to date. He also had 12 homers and 58 RBI’s which was
tied for third on the team. His weakness
was that he tended to K more than take a BB.
In 1994 he had 62 K’s to only 18 BB’s.
But that was enough to take him to spring training in 1995 where he made
the Tiger roster. He was the starting
left fielder for opening day and batted third.
In his first at bat in the first inning he got a line drive single off
of Chuck Finley of the Angels. In the 4th
inning he got a lead off double and scored the Tigers first run of the
game. He would eventually be replaced
for pinch runner Milt Cuyler in the 8th having gone 3 for 4 with the
run scored. Not a bad debut! But Rudy would not have another multi hit
game as a Tiger. He would get in a total
of 12 games in the first month of the season and hit .300. But the Tigers saw something in a young Bobby
Higginson and started playing him in left for 1995. By mid May Bobby was hitting only .200 but
the Tiges sent Rudy back to Toledo for the rest of the season where he hit .344
while Bobby hit .224 for the Tigers. At
the end of the season the Tigers kept Bobby and let Rudy go as a free
agent. Rudy was picked up by the Rangers
and then traded to the Red Sox for 1996.
He would get in 13 games for the Sox and go 21 for 41 as late season
call up. No, that is not a typo. He would make the opening day roster for the
Sox in 1997 but had a terrible start. He
was hitting only .238 by early June and sent back to the minors never to
return. Rudy would stick around baseball
for another 10 years playing in Korea, Japan, Mexico and the US. He was a career .296 hitter with 16 seasons
in the minors and those 12 games as a Tiger.
Curtis Pride was a very
interesting Tiger. He was
born deaf which 100 years ago would have given him the moniker of
“Dummy”. Historically it
seems every player who was deaf was called Dummy such as Dummy Hoy, Dummy
Taylor and even as late as the 1940’s Dummy Lynch. Dummy Taylor was probably the most
famous deaf player as he is the one that got the umpires calling balls and
strikes with hand signals. But
Curtis was no dummy. Curtis
went to the College of William and Mary It is often considered on par with the
Ivy League schools. He was
born deaf and after a few years in school with special auditory needs he was
put in the mainstream in 7th grade. While at William and Mary he played
college basketball while playing minor league baseball and was a member of the
US Junior National Soccer Team. After
coming out of college he continued to work in the minors for years before
making his major league debut with the Expos in 1993. He got into a pennant race that
September and while he only had 9 at bats he got a pinch hit double against the
rival Phillies and received a 5 minute standing ovation. He obviously could not hear it but
said he could feel Olympic Stadium vibrating and shaking. He was a non roster invitee to Tigers Spring
Training in 1996 and made the squad coming up north and the Tigers used
him in 95 games that year. He
was mainly a left fielder and hit .300 while driving in 31 runs with 10
homers. He was one of only two
Tigers to hit .300 that season. He
was a speedster and had 11 steals that season which was third best on the
team. But he did
have a penchant for striking out K’ing 63 times in 301 plate appearances. The next season he
struggled and his average dropped to .210 in 79 games. In August the Tigers released him and
he signed with the Red Sox and went 1 for 2. He would go on to
play with the Atlanta Braves, went back to Boston and Montreal before ending
his major league career with the Yankees and finally the Angels in 2006 at the
age of 37. He was a career
.250 hitter. He
never played even 100 games with any team other than the Tigers and other than
going 1-2 the one year for the Sox never hit .300 except for the Tigers. Today he is the
coach for the Gallaudet University baseball team which is the only deaf liberal
arts college in the US. He
also runs a foundation out of his home to help hearing impaired children and
was named to the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition in
2010.
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