Who Can It Be Now?
David Leonard Edwards was born on February 24, 1954 in Los Angeles, California. Edwards was a product of the city of Los Angeles and attended the historic Thomas Jefferson High School, which produced such luminaries as Alvin Ailey, Ralph Bunche, Dexter Gordon, Art Farmer, and Etta James outside of sports and umpire Emmett Ashford, former Milwaukee Brave Lee Maye, and 5-time high jump national champion Otis Burrell.
Edwards was drafted in the 7th Round of the 1971 June Amateur Draft by the Minnesota Twins, and he was drafted as a catcher. I suppose he must have skipped a grade or started school early somehow since that meant that he was drafted in the year that he turned 17 years old.
He spent four full seasons in rookie and A ball -- from 1971 through 1975 -- before getting promoted to AA Orlando in 1976. The Twins promoted him immediately in 1977 to AAA. He spent two seasons in AAA -- one in Tacoma followed by one in Toledo -- with fairly decent results (.764 OPS and a .341 OBP).
As a result, Edwards was the one and only late season call up for the Twins in 1978 when rosters expanded in September. He made his debut against the White Sox and pitcher Ken Kravec, off whom Edwards got his first major league hit in his debut (a double).
Calvin Griffith -- much like Charlie Finley -- viewed free agency as financial ruination, though Griffith was known for, as the Star Tribune put it in June of 2020, running the team "in a discount style." Coincidentally, in September of 1978 when Edwards was making his debut, Griffith was spouting off as only an old white racist owner could, stating that he moved the Twins to Minnesota because he "found out that you only had 15,000 blacks here. . . . We came here because you've got good, hardworking, white people here."
Quite the welcome committee.
The offseason between 1978 and 1979 saw the Twins cheap out and traded one of their best players -- Dan Ford -- to the Angels for Danny Goodwin and Ron Jackson. The Sporting News on January 27, 1979, noted that the Twins intended to have Edwards split time with Willie Norwood in centerfield.
That changed a couple of months later on February 5, 1979, when the cheapo Twins traded the great Rod Carew to the Angels in exchange for Dave Engle, Paul Hartzell, Brad Havens, and Ken Landreaux. Landreaux became the starter in center and Edwards became an extra outfielder. Even so, 1979 was his best year -- 257 plate appearances with an OPS of .711 (OPS+ of 89, making him just 11% worse than league average).
Talk in the offseason before the 1980 season had the Twins considering a left field platoon between Edwards and Rick Sofield. The Sporting News on March 29, 1980, ran a story outlining the differences between the two players. Sofield was gregarious -- a football stud who was convinced to spurn the Michigan Wolverines to go to the minor leagues -- while Edwards described himself as "enjoy[ing] listening" and always wanting to be a baseball player.
This plan got tossed aside when Edwards suffered from an appendicitis in spring training. He fell out of the Twins plans and was traded to the Padres during the December 1980 winter meetings for reserve infielder Chuck Baker (who lasted all of 70 plate appearances in Minnesota).
The Padres turned Edwards basically into a pinch hitter and fourth outfielder in 1981 and, in 1982, really nothing more than a late inning defensive replacement. He appeared in 71 games in 1982, but started only 12. The Padres released him after the 1982 season. He went on to play in Mexico for two years before calling it a career.
Family Ties
Dave Edwards had two older brothers who were twins who played in the major leagues at the same time as Dave though at no point in time were all three in the majors at the same time. Mike Edwards beat Dave to the majors by a full season. He appeared in 317 games -- mostly with Oakland -- before leaving the U.S. to play in Mexico and Japan starting in 1982. Mike's twin Marshall Edwards will appear later in this set; Marshall was the Brewers' 5th OF for the 1982 World Series team -- even appearing in one game. Marshall debuted at the age of 28 in 1981 -- the year after Mike was let go by Oakland.
Trivial Pursuit
In his 1980 interview in The Sporting News, Dave Edwards pointed out that, with Marshall's debut, the Edwardses were the first African-American family to have three brothers all appear in the major leagues.
A Few Minutes with Tony
I honestly don't have much memory of Dave Edwards other than his ties to Marshall Edwards, of course. It appears that Edwards is pretty good about signing autographs through the mail, though, so maybe I'll take a stab at getting him to sign something.
Anyone have any good Dave Edwards stories?
Welcome back!
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