Andy Allanson was a back up catcher as a Tiger. He had played four seasons as the Indians
starting back stop from 1986 thru 1989 with a reputation of a great defensive catcher
and a .246 hitter. But he was released
by the Indians in spring of 1990 as the Tribe was ready to give up and coming catcher
Sandy Alomar a try. Andy signed with the
Rangers but was in their farm system.
The Rangers never used him and he moved to the Royals who used him as
trade bait to the Tigers. The Tiges
picked up Andy in a trade for minor leaguer Jim Baxter in spring of 1991. Andy hit .232 as the back up to Mickey
Tettleton. Andy threw out more runners
than Mickey but his fielding was below that of Mickey. So at the end of the season the Tiges let
Andy go and went looking for another back up catcher. Andy would bounce around with Milwaukee, Sand
Fran and California before his career ended in 1995.
Glenn Wilson played a key role for the 1984 Tigers. He was born and raised in Texas and attended
San Houston State University before being drafted by the Tigers in the first
round of the 1980 draft. He signed and
was sent to AA Montgomery. He was their
starting third baseman. While he had a
solid bat hitting .264 he showed he had less than a solid glove committing
twice the number of errors as his back up.
In 1981 Montgomery moved to Birmingham and Glenn moved to the
outfield. He was their best starting
fielder defensively but they had a very poor defensive outfield. At the plate Glenn was again solid hitting
.306 and had good power hitting 18 homers with speed. He made the Tiger roster coming out of spring
training in 1982 and was playing center field for the first month hitting
.342. But the Tigers had a lot of money
invested in slightly older Kirk Gibson and as Kirk came around in May Glenn was
sent back down to AAA Evansville. Glenn
hit .279 in Evansville for 42 games. In
July Gibby went down with an intestinal parasite and Glenn was brought back up
to finish the season. Glenn did not
disappoint and ended the season hitting .292.
In 1983 Glenn was again a starting outfielder for the Tiges as Gibby was
moved to DH and Glenn took right with Larry Herndon taking left and Chet Lemon
taking center. Glenn hit .268 but did
not show the power or speed of Gibby. In
spring training of 1984 the Tigers made the trade that solidified their team
for 1984. The Tigers received Willie
Hernandez and Dave Bergman from the Phillies in exchange for Johnny B.
Wockenfuss and Glenn. Glenn went into
the Phillies outfield and was a .265 hitter and an all star. After four years he would bounce around with
the Pirates, Mariners and Astros until his career ended in 1993. He was managing in the minors as late as
2006.
Sheldon Burnside signed as an amateur free agent for the Tigers. It was in 1974 when he was 19. He was born in South Bend IN and was a US citizen
but went to high school in Toronto, ON. He
was assigned to Rookie ball in Bristol for 1975 where the lefty pitcher was 4-6
with a 3.81 ERA. He started 1976 in A
ball at Lakeland and was doing well with a 6-3 record and a 2.61 ERA in 10 starts. This got him promoted to AA Montgomery where
he promptly threw a 7 inning no hitter.
He ended his 1976 Montgomery campaign with a 6-5 record and a 2.73
ERA. In 1977 he was one of the top
pitchers for Montgomery again. He was
second in starts with 26 and completed a league leading 16 of those games for a
10-12 record and a 3.32 ERA. In 1978 he
was moved up to AAA Evansville and was the ace fo the staff with a 14-5 record
and a 3.52 ERA. The Tigers brought him
up in September and had a rough outing in his debut. It was against the mighty Yankees at Yankee
Stadium. Milt Wilcox had run out of luck
for the day and Bucky Dent had just hit a single to score Lou Piniella to make
the score 3-1 Yanks in the 7th with 1 out. Sheldon faced Mickey Rivers and got him to
hit a foul fly to third baseman Aurelio Rodriguez. Sheldon then gave up a walk, single, walk,
triple and single before being yanked from the mound for Dave Tobik. 9 days later he had to face those same
Yankees again in Tiger Stadium in his next appearance. He did much better this time. He replaced Jack Morris who had pitched in
relief with the score 7-2 in favor of those damned Yankees. With runners on first and second and only one
out he K’d Reggie Jackson looking. In
fact he K’d Reggie twice that game and pitched 3.2 innings of 1 hit ball. That was the end of his season for 1978. In 1979 he started the season in the Tiger
bull pen. On April 15 he was called in
to relieve Kip Young in the 5th against the Texas Rangers in Tiger
Stadium. He finished the game without
allowing a run on 5 hits in 5 innings and K’ing 3. Because Young did not last 5 innings Sheldon
became the pitcher of record and earned his first and only win as a Tiger. He appears to have been injured in May as he
never pitched for the Tiges or in the minors and was traded to the Reds in
October to complete the deal that was done May 25 of Champ Summers for a player
to be named later. Sheldon was the
player named. He pitched for Cincy in
1980 and was 1-0 in relief with a 1.93ERA.
That would be his last year in baseball.
He was a career 2-1 during three major league seasons and done in
baseball at the age of 25.
Tom Makowski spent his entire cup of coffee with the
Tigers. He was undrafted out of college
in Buffalo, NY, and signed as a free agent with the Tigers in 1972. The lefty fast ball pitcher was assigned to A
level Lakeland and was 4-0 with a 2.06 ERA.
The Tiger brass moved him up to AAA Toledo but he only got in 3 games
with the Mud Hens. He moved up to AA
Montgomery for 1973 and in 10 starts was 8-1 with a 3.04 ERA. He was again moved up to Toledo and made more
appearances in relief than starts but was still 6-6 with a 4.02 ERA. In 1974 he spent the full season in AAA
Evansville. He split time between
starting a relieving. He was 4-4 with a
4.04 ERA. In 1975 he got his
chance. He was brought up early in the
season and on May 1, made his major league debut. The Tigers were trailing the Brewers 8-3 in
Milwaukee. There were two outs and a
runner on third. Tom walked the first
batter he faced was Bob Coluccio whom he walked before getting Don Money to fly
out to right field to end the inning.
Tom got Robin Yount, Sixto Lezcano and George Scott out 1-2-3 in the 6th.
In the 7th he gave up
a lead off single to Hank Aaron and things went down hill from there. The inning was capped off by a Robin Yount
grand slam. The Brewers led 13-3. The final score was 17-3 with Tom pitching
the balance of the game. In 3.1 innings
he had given up 9 runs on 6 hits and 4 walks while K’ing no one. Less than 2 weeks later he got the call again
with the Tiges down 6-1 to the Royals in
the 4th with 2 outs and runners on first and second. He faced Tony Solaita who hit a single to
drive in George Brett making it 7-1. But
Tom calmed down and allowed only 1 run in 3 innings pitched and K’d 3 including
George Brett. 10 days later he came in
to face Bob Coluccio again. However, Bob
had been traded to the White Sox since Tom faced him last and the Sox were
leading the Tigers 5-1 in the 6th with 2 outs and runners on first
and second. This time Tom got Coluccio to
flyout to center to end the inning. Tom
pitched 2.1 innings and allowed only 1 run on 1 hit and 2 walks while not
getting a K. He never got in another
major league game. He ended the season
in AAA Evansville and played two more seasons in the minors at AAA level before
his career was over in 1977. His final
MLB record was a 0-0 record and a 4.82 ERA in 9.1 innings pitched with 3
K’s.
Johnny Bero made his major league debut as a Tiger. He was signed out of Western Michigan College
of Education, (Western Michigan University today.) in the war year of
1943. He finished 1943 with Buffalo of
the International League. There the
lefty hitting infielder hit .241. He was
out of baseball in 1944 and 1945 due to the war. He returned in 1946 to try and fight for a
third base spot with Buffalo. He made it
and hit .278 as a 23 year old returning from the war. He was back in 1947 but not doing as well
hitting only .226 but this can be accounted for by the fact that he moved over
to play second base. He continued as the
Bisons second baseman and seemed to be getting the hang of it in 1948 as his fielding
was decent and he hit .238. He was a late season call up in 1948 and made
his debut in a game against Cleveland’s Bob Feller. Thankfully for Johnny he was a pinch runner
for pitcher Fred Hutchinson in the bottom of the 8th and did not
have to face Feller at the plate. Two
days later he got a start at second base in a game in St. Louis against the
Browns. He went 0-4 but got a walk in
the third and scored the tying run in the third. Unfortunately the Tiges lost the game 5-3 in
spite of Johnny’s run. The next day Johnny go the start again and
again went 0-4 but this time without a walk.
Two days later he faced Bob Lemon of the Indians as a pinch hitter in
the 9th. He K’d. That was the extent of Johnny’s time as a
Tiger. In 1949 the Tigers moved their
AAA team to Toledo and Johnny moved to short.
He would stay in the minors for the Tigers until he was drafted by the
St. Louis Browns in the rule 5 draft in November of 1950. He was one of three players at short for the
Browns that season and got his first major league hit against the Indians
future Hall of Famer Early Wynn. After
July of 1951 Johnny was done in the majors and after a couple years in the Pacific
Coast League was done in baseball having never got a hit as a Tiger.
Tex Erwin started his major league experience with the
Tigers. Not surprisingly Ross Emil Erwin
was born and raised in Texas in 1885. He
was a lefty batting righty throwing catcher and first joined the professional
baseball ranks in 1905 at the age of 19 with the Texas League Fort Worth,
Panthers. He hit .293 that first year
and was back with Fort Worth in 1906 before moving up to St. Paul to end the
season. The Tigers selected him from
Forth Worth in the Rule 5 draft of 1906 and in 1907 he started the season with
Topeka where he hit .261. On August 26,
he got his chance and made his major league debut in a game between the
Senators and Tigers in Detroit. The
Tigers won 7-4 and moved to within a half game of first. I can not tell how he did that game. But he got in 3 more games for the Tiges that
season and got 1 hit in 5 at bats and a BB.
The hit or the walk also gave him an RBI. But as a back stop his play was a little
rough. He had 1 error, 2 passed balls
but did manage to throw out 2 of the 4 would be base stealers. The Tigers went on to win the AL flag that
season but Tex was not there in the World Series. He went back to the minors for a couple years
before returning to the majors as the back up to Bill Bergen for Brooklyn. Bill Bergen is considered by many to be the
worst all time starting catcher with a career batting average of .170 over 11
years and almost 1,000 games. As bad as
Bill was, Tex was his back up. Tex
continued to play for Brooklyn through most of 1914 when he was sold to
Cincinnati in July where he ended his major league career in 1914 as a .236
hitter with a below average arm and below average glove. He stuck around the minors for a few more
years catching and even umpiring before calling it quits in 1921. He then moved to Rochester, NY and sold
insurance and worked for the City Council.
He died in 1953.
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