May 12 Happy Birthday to Former Tigers or Detroit Wolverines

Lou Whitaker was a second baseman for the Tigers and is probably only second all time to Charlie Gehringer whose birthday was yesterday.  Lou was also an inspiration when we were picking names for my son Charlie.  One of the name suggestions I had was Alan Louis Ailsworth for Alan Trammell and Lou Whitaker.  That one didn’t pan out.  But Charlie is still a good name.  Lou was rookie of the year in 1978 taking 75% of the first place votes over second place Paul Molitor and fourth place Alan Trammell.  He is fourth all time for games played at second base yet only 71^st all time in errors for a second baseman.  The other top six all time for games played at second base are in the HOF, Eddie Collins, Joe Morgan, Roberto Alomar, Nellie Fox and Charlie Gehringer.   Alomar has 12 more games than Lou.  Alomar has career .300 BA, 210 homers and 1134 RBI’s.  Lou has a career .276 BA, 244 homers and 1084 RBI’s.  Lou belongs in the hall even Bill James says so.  But Lou got only 15 votes out of 515 ballets in his first year of eligibility.  Because that is less than 5% he was dropped from all future ballets.

Tom Timmermann was one of the two hot Tiger pitching prospects in 1969.  The other was Mike Kilkenney.  Tom played 4 and a half seasons with the Tigers and posted a career 26-27 mark for the Tigers with a 3.39 ERA.  We sent him to Cleveland during the 1973 season in the block buster trade of Tom and Kevin Collins for Ed Farmer.  Last I knew, Tom was in the Detroit area as a sales rep for packaging company.  I don’t recall which.

Dixie Parsons played part of three seasons with the Tigers as a back up catcher in 1939, 1942 and 1943.  He played 5 games in 1939 and recorded one BB and one K.  He stayed with the Tigers through the blood letting that Judge Landis did in January of 1940 and hit .264 at Beaumont in 1940.  In 1941 he only hit .223 at Buffalo and was brought up to the tigers in 1942 and 1943 where he hit .197 and 142.  He was absent from baseball in 1944 and 1945 and I can only guess he was in the service.   In 1946 he was managing in the minors for the Yankees which he did until 1950.  At that timehis career in baseball appears to have ended.

Hank Borowy was a Tiger but is probably best known for opposing the Tigers in the 1945 World Series where he was the ace of the Cubs pitching staff.  He beat Hal newhouser in game 1 going the full nine innings and blanking the Tigers on six hits.  He faced Hal again in game five and lost this time.  He pitched six inning and gave up 2 runs.  He came in in relief in the 9^th of game 6 and pitched to the end of inning 12 to get the win.  He then started game 7 but was pulled after giving up three opening singles.  My guess was he was a little tired at that point.  Hank would never again win as many games as he did in his first four years when he won 15, 14, 17 and 21(1945) games.  In 1950 he came to Detroit when we purchased him for $15,000 from the Pirates.  He made 39 appearances for the Tigers in 1950 and 1951 and posted a record of 3-3.  He pitched for Buffalo in 1952 for the Tigers but was done with baseball after that.

Archie McKain was a left handed pitcher for the Tigers in 1939, 40 and part of 41.  He was 12-7 with the Tigers.  He came to Detroit in the deal that brought Pinky Higgins (third baseman for the 1940 pennant winners) to Detroit for Eldon Auker and Chet Morgan and Jake Wade.  Archie’s best year would have been 1940 when he was 5-0 with a 2.82 ERA.  He got into game 4 of the 1940 fall classic but it was a game that was already lost to the Reds.  He allowed one run in three innings pitched.  In 1941 the Tigers sold him to the Browns. 

Joe Dugan  played one season for the Tigers in 1931.  This was after 13 seasons in the bigs with the Philadelphia Athletics, Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees and Boston Braves.  He played in over 1,400 games before coming to Detroit.  In Detroit he played 8 games.  In those 8 he had 17 at bats and 4 hits.  Joe is more famous for being the starting third baseman on the 1927 Yankees.  Yes, Joe was the starting third baseman for Murderer’s Row.  He played in five World Series for the Yanks winning three championships with them.  But when Joe put on the Tiger pin stripes in 1931 (Yes, the Tigers wore pin stripes.  It seems blasphemous now.) he was a far cry from his days with Ruth and Gehrig.