Steve Dillard was a short lived insurance policy for the
Tigers. Steve started his major league
career in Boston in 1975 as the starting second baseman on the last game of the
season in which the Red Sox had already clinched the pennant. He went 2 for 5. As he stated after hitting .400 that first
season “Everything was down hill after that.”
In 1976 he was a utility infielder getting 57 games for the Sox playing
second, third and short and hitting .275.
1977 found Steve still in Boston and still a back up but his average had
dropped to .241. In Detroit in 1978 the
Tigers had a new rookie second baseman named Lou Whitaker who had backed up
Tito Fuentes in 1977 for only 11 games. So
Lou had not had much time in the majors and Tito was gone and the Tigers needed
another second baseman in case the young Whitaker did not pan out. So the Tigers sent two minor leaguers and
cash to Boston for Steve. According to a
quote in the SABR bio of Steve "It looked like I was going to get a real
good opportunity over there because they had a couple of young infielders and
they didn't know how much they were going to play or how well they were going
to do, and that was Alan Trammell and Lou Whitaker." Dillard platooned
with Whitaker for the first month or so, but Lou "was just wearing it out,
so I didn't play very much after that."
Steve got in 56 games for the Tigers in 1978 behind Lou Whitaker. Steve hit .223 and the young Whitaker hit
.285 and won Rookie of the Year honors.
Before the beginning of the next season Steve was deemed expendable to
the Tigers and sent to the Cubs for Ed Putnam.
He spent three years as a Cub back up before his final season in 1982 as
a back with the cross town White Sox. He
was managing in the minors as late as 2009 and his three sons played professional
ball with Tim playing with the Milwaukee Brewers last year.
Hoot Evers was an all-star outfielder for the Tigers. He started his professional career in 1941
and made his major league debut the same year as late season call up. He got in one game as the starting right
fielder and went 0-4 at the plate but was perfect in the field. He spent 1942 in the minors and then spent
the next three years in the military during the war. He came back home to resume his career as a
ball player in 1946 but broke his ankle half way through the season. Starting in 1947 he became the starting
center fielder for the Tiges. In 1948 he
hit .314 and was the starting center fielder in the All Star game. He hit a home run off of Brooklyn’s Ralph
Branca to deep left to make the score 2-1 NL and start the AL’s come back to
win the game 5-2. He stayed in the game
for all nine innings but did not get another hit. He moved over to left in 1949 and hit .303
and in 1950 he hit .323 and led the league in triples and started his second
all star game but this time in right. He
drew a walk off of Robin Roberts but was taken out in the ninth for Joe
Dimaggio. He fell hard in 1951 with his
average dropping 99 points all the way down to .224. After only one game in 1953 Hoot was traded
to the Red Sox in the seal that sent George Kell, Johnny Lipon and Dizzy Trout
to Boston for Walt Dropo, Fred Hatfield, Don Lenhardt, Johnny Pesky and Bill
Wight. Hoot hit .250 for Sox in three
years before heading back to Detroit partway through the 1954 season by way of
being waived by the Red Sox and then waived by the Giants before being picked
up by the Tiges. He hit .183 for the
Tiges in 1954 and spent 1955 and 1956 going back and forth between the Cleveland
Indians and the Baltimore Orioles before his playing career was over. He served as a coach and in the front office
for the Indians before coming back to Detroit to work in the front office for
the Tigers in 1971 and later as a scout.
Don Heffner played with Babe Ruth for
one season and also played with the Tigers for one season. Don started his
major league career with the Yankees in 1934 as a back up second baseman to
Hall of Famer Tony Lazzeri. He was Tony’s back up hitting .257 until 1938 when
he was traded to the St. Louis Browns with $10,000 for Bill Knickerbocker.
While the Browns were terrible it did give Don a chance to become a starter. He
was the Browns starting second baseman for the next four years with the
exception of 1939 when he was the starting shortstop. He was a .241 hitter with
the Browns but in 1942 he could no longer hold his starting job as his average
plummeted to .167. In 1943 while Don was hitting only .121 the Browns sold him
to the Philadelphia Athletics. He finished the season with ethe Athletics but
only hit .208. At the end of the season don was traded to the Tigers with Bob
Swift for Rip Radcliffe. Don got in six games with the Tigers and got only 4
hits in 19 at bats for a .211 average. However, he did get 5 walks for a on
base percentage of .375. Don was done in the majors as a player at that point.
He went back to the minors to learn how to coach. He managed for years in the
minors and returned to Detroit in 1961 as a coach. He would leave Detroit the
next year to manage in the Pacific Coast League and later became a major league
manager with the Reds in 1966.
No comments:
Post a Comment