Card #138: Tony Pena

Who Can It Be Now?
Antonio Francesco (Padilla) Pena was born on June 4, 1957, in Monte Cristi, Dominican Republic. The almost-always excellent Joe Posnanski wrote a fantastic long-form story back in 2003 for the Kansas City Star recounting Pena's youth in the Dominican. Pena grew up in a poor neighborhood (Palo Verde), the son of Octaviano and Rosalia. His father worked 14-hour days to raise his family, and his mother taught school. His mother also taught Tony and his three brothers how to play baseball, as she had played softball herself as a youth.

In the last years before the Dominican academies -- which really started in the early 1980s after teams recognized the amount of (often cheaper) talent available on the island in the wake of the Latin baseball boom of the 1960s (Juan Marichal, the Alous, Manny Mota, and Julian Javier, to name just a few) , players being signed was hit or miss -- some great players probably got overlooked.  

Pena, though, was lucky: a scout from the Pittsburgh Pirates saw Pena playing among a group of fifty or so youths and thought he had promise. The scout, credited as Howie Haak on The Baseball Cube, came to Pena's parents' house to sign him, and surprisingly met resistance from Pena's mother. As Posnanski put it, "[s]he didn't consider baseball a career option for Tony. . . . Tony Pena's life was already laid out. His future wife, Amaris, lived three houses down. He was strong enough to work in the banana fields. He would have children and live his life in Palo Verde."

Eventually, though, Tony promised that he would come home in a year if he did not make it. So, Rosalia finally gave in and allowed Pena to sign. It did not go very well in that first year in the minors in 1976, however, as Pena struggled with hitting, hitting for power, and with getting on base. Granted, it was in a 47-game season, but with a slash line of .214/.260/.302 combined over two leagues (both of which hit far better than that and neither of which was that far away from Pena's age), it did not look good.

But the Pirates hung with Pena through 1977 and 1978. In both of those years, again, he struggled to hit and struggled with getting on base. I mean, even though in 1978 he was two years younger than the rest of the Texas League, he was still well below the rest of the league and the rest of his team in AVG, OBP, and SLG. As Posnanski's story tells it, Pena was told prior to his 1978 offseason that he needed to convince the Pirates he could play baseball. Now, Posnanski makes it sound like this was a Dominican epidemic -- not being able to "convince" the major league team that the players could play -- but looking at the stat line makes it pretty clear that the convincing would come with better results and not any sooner. 

As much as teams like high draft picks, there is a meritocratic side to player development. 

Pena took the words about showing something to the Pirates to heart. He ran the stairs at a church every day to build stamina. He swung a heavy bat to develop strength.  And, he developed his signature extended-leg crouch behind the plate. That crouch allowed him to give pitchers a lower target while still allowing Pena to throw out runners trying to steal.

It also didn't hurt that Pena was assigned to Buffalo in the Eastern League in 1979. At that time, the stadium in Buffalo had a short porch in right field, and Pena practiced directing fly balls to that short porch. It worked. He hit an entirely uncharacteristic thirty-four homers that season (he would never again hit more than 15 as a player and finished with 107 over his entire 18-season career) and started hitting for average as well. That led to being promoted to Triple-A Portland in 1980, where he against hit well and used the larger dimensions in the ballpark to run out 13 triples. 

After his strong 1980 Triple-A season, Pena was given a cup-of-coffee in 1980 with the Pirates. He never played in the minors again except for a two-game rehab assignment in 1987. 

In 1981, Pena made the Pirates out of spring training. As a rookie, all the usual questions about how he would perform and react to being in the major leagues were raised. To ease his transition, the Pirates had Pena splitting time with the slightly older veteran of four years, Steve Nicosia. While Pena did not walk much -- 8 times in 223 plate appearances -- he had a good AVG (.300). More importantly, Pena showed that he had great ability behind the plate to call games and throw out runners. Despite playing in just 64 games behind the plate out of 102 total, he finished third in the NL with 10 DP turned at catcher and third in caught stealing percentage with 42.6%.

Coming in to 1982, then, expectations for Pena were high. Local Pittsburgh journalists called Pena a "Rising Star" and made comparisons between Pena and the great Johnny Bench and Gary Carter. Indeed, Pena was named to the first of his five All-Star games in 1982 and, once again, hit fairly well (.296/.323/.435) but, as that slash line shows, Pena had very little plate patience. The old saw that "Dominicans don't walk off the island" certainly applied to Pena.

But to point that out in this context is a bit churlish. Pena's value as a catcher came more from his defense than his offense. In 1983, Pena won the first of four consecutive Gold Gloves in the National League (he would win one more in the American League in 1991). Indeed, in 1984, Tony Pena led all National League players (not just catchers) with 2.5 Defensive WAR. 

And yet, as Pena matured into a Gold Glover, the Pirates around him started boring downward in the National League East. After consecutive 84-78 seasons in 1982 and 1983 (the second of which was good enough for second place), the Pirates finished last in 1984, 1985, and 1986. 

Perhaps as a result of that terrible run or perhaps in an effort to signal to their young stars Bobby Bonilla and Barry Bonds that they were now the team's leaders, the Pirates traded Pena away on the eve of the 1987 season, sending him to division rival St. Louis in exchange for three players: pitcher Mike Dunne, catcher Mike LaValliere, and centerfielder Andy Van Slyke. As the excellent Cardinals history blog Retro Simba points out, the trade was considered to be incredibly lopsided in the Cardinals favor at the time. The Pittsburgh press hated the trade. Syd Thrift, the GM, was quoted as saying, "How am I going to explain to my 82-year-old mother when the fans boo me?"

In the end, the Cardinals made the World Series where they lost to the Minnesota Twins in 7 games. Pena hit extremely well that year in the postseason (17-for-43 with 6 walks), but it wasn't enough to overcome the Homer Hankies in the Metrodome.  

Still, the Pirates probably won the trade thanks to how well Spanky and Van Slyke played over the next 5 to 7 years while Pena left St. Louis after three seasons in which he totaled 19 HR, 132 RBI, and a .248/.303/.342 line in 1435 plate appearances (an OPS+ of just 79).

In 1990, Pena went to the American League by signing with the Boston Red Sox.  Pena again found himself in the post-season, and again found himself on the losing end of a playoff series when the Oakland A's beat the Red Sox in the ALCS. The end of Pena's Boston career in 1993 was also the end of his time as a starting catcher.  Yet, Pena was not done as a player. He signed on with the Cleveland Indians at the age of 37 in 1994, serving as Sandy Alomar's backup. That led to two more seasons in which Pena went to the postseason only to lose -- against the Braves in 1995 in the World Series and against the Orioles in 1996 in the ALDS.

After the 1996 season, Pena signed on with the Chicago White Sox. Now 40, he played sparingly as the third catcher behind Jorge Fabregas and Ron Karkovice. As the season progressed, the White Sox were scuffling along near .500, so they decided to give Pena one last shot at the postseason with the Astros. Pena played in just 6 regular season games in Houston after being traded there in August of 1997 to back up both Brad Ausmus and Tony Eusebio. And, as happened in all of his other postseason appearances, he ended his 1997 season -- and his playing career -- with a loss after the Astros lost in the NLDS to the Atlanta Braves.

Mustache Check: Tony Pena definitely has a mustache. Still has one today too.

Family Ties
Most baseball fans of recent vintage are aware that Tony's son Tony Pena, Jr. played shortstop for the Atlanta Braves and also the Kansas City Royals from 2006 to 2009. Another son, Francisco, made it to the major leagues in May of 2014, finishing out a 7-6 loss against the Chicago White Sox on May 20. Francisco had spent most of his career in the New York Mets organization before moving over to Kansas City before 2014.

Tony's younger brother Ramon also played in the major leagues, making 8 appearances for the Detroit Tigers in 1989 and getting lit up like a Roman candle (6.00 ERA, 13 runs/12 ER in 18 innings). In addition, Tony's nephew Rudy Pena made it to Double-A Altoona for 1 game in 2004 in the Pittsburgh organization.

Finally, Tony's daughter Jennifer Amaris is also a competitor of sorts: she is a self-described bikini competitor. Here's a photo of her with her father from October.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
In 1982, I knew who Tony Pena was because the baseball card world was chasing his 1981 Topps Rookie card. To a 10-year-old kid who did not pay attention to stats quite yet (that took until my teens, when I discovered the Bill James Baseball Abstracts), I bought into the "Tony Pena is the next Johnny Bench" hype. 

Also, I was a catcher in little league and found that Pena's catching style was a hell of a lot easier on my knees than the old-school crouch. So, I really did like Pena as a player. 

It's not difficult to find what Tony Pena has been up to since he retired as an active player after the 1997 season. He immediately became a minor league manager -- first in the White Sox system, and then in the Astros system. Then, in 2002, he spent part of the season as the Astros bench coach before being named as the Kansas City Royals manager on May 15 in the wake of the Royals' firing of Tony Muser.  

Pena and the Royals surprised baseball in 2003 by posting a winning record -- 83-79. That earned him the award as the American League Manager of the Year. The Royals handled their above-.500 season about as well as you would expect for them ten years ago, however, and flopped to a 58-104 record in 2004. After an 8-25 start to the 2005 season, Pena resigned, saying that he felt that at the time the team had not "played to the top of our abilities." He added (in a team press release) that "The Kansas City Royals are on the right track by committing to their young players, and I believe the Royals will be contenders for a long time if they don't change their direction."

Perhaps he meant, "the Royals will not be contenders for a long time" but Pena left with more class than I might have had.

After his resignation, Pena joined the New York Yankees organization in 2006. He served for three years as the team's first base coach before becoming the team's bench coach in 2009. He served in that position through the 2014 season.

And damn, his daughter is hot.

Card #106: Enrique Romo

Who Can It Be Now?
Enrique Romo Navarro was born on July 15, 1947, in Santa Rosalina in Baja California Sur, Mexico. Santa Rosalina is a beach town on the Gulf of California in the northern part of the southern state in Baja. Romo started playing baseball as a 12-year-old outfielder, and became a pitcher only when signed to a professional contract.

Romo started pitching professionally as a teenager in 1966. He spent two years with Puerto Mexico Portenos -- a club in the Mexican Southeast League which Baseball Reference puts as a Single-A club.  From there, Romo moved to Charros de Jalisco in Guadalajara. He spent four years there -- probably as a starter from what his statistics show -- and was pretty much a .500 pitcher. That Jalisco team won the Mexican League Series in 1971, defeating Saraperos de Saltillo four games to three.  

He then spent the 1972 season with Algodoneros de Gomez Palacio (the Cotton Dealers of Gomez Palace, known also as Algodoneros de Torreon), putting up some crazy numbers -- 11-8 record, but 2.03 ERA, 186 innings, 133 hits allowed, 42 ER (though 23 unearned), with 52 walks and 104 strikeouts.  

After the 1972 season, Romo -- now 25 years old -- moved on again.  This time, Romo went to one of the most successful and well-known teams in Mexican baseball -- the Mexico City Red Devils (alternately called the Mexico City Reds, but their name is Diablos Rojos...). Romo flourished in the nation's capital, posting 61 wins against just 30 losses in his four seasons there.  His 1976 season, however, is what caught a lot of attention.  At the age of 28, Romo went 20-4 with a 1.89 ERA. In 233 innings, he allowed just 169 hits and 56 walks while striking out 239 batters. I don't care where you are, that is a great season. 

Lou Gorman thought so too. Gorman was the first general manager for the Seattle Mariners. In his book High and Inside: My Life in the Front Offices of Baseball, Gorman recalled his first days on the job in Seattle. He had established a friendship with Angel Vasquez, the owner of Los Diablos Rojos, through past business dealings (purchasing Aurelio Lopez's contract a few years earlier). Gorman saw Romo's performance and, despite questions as to whether Romo really was about to turn 30 years old or not, he decided to purchase Romo's contract.  The deal was worked out and Romo became one of the first original Seattle Mariners.

At first, the Mariners tried Romo as a starter.  He started his first three games as a major leaguer -- including the second game the Seattle Mariners ever played -- and pitched fairly well. He went 7 innings in each of his first two starts and gave up 10 hits, 5 walks, 1 homer, 3 earned runs, and struck out 11. His third start ended early, however, when Romo pulled his hamstring.  He was placed on the disabled list and, when he returned, he became a reliever. In fact, after starting his first three U.S. professional games, he never again made a start.

Instead, Romo became the Mariners' closer. He finished his first year in the majors with an 8-10 record and 16 saves.  He followed that season with a similarly successful 1978 season for the Mariners -- 11-7, 3.69 ERA and 10 saves.  His strikeouts were way down in 1978, though everything else looked pretty good.

Apparently, the Pittsburgh Pirates agreed with that assessment. During the Winter Meetings that December of 1978, the Pirates sent Odell Jones, Mario Mendoza, and Rafael Vasquez to the Mariners in exchange for Rick Jones and Tom McMillan. Romo was excited for the trade, as he told the Washington (PA) Observer-Reporter in April of 1979:

There's just no comparison between the Mariners and the Pirates. I was very fortunate to leave a team going no place to join one which has a good chance to win a division title. I notice a big difference in the entire caliber of play in the two leagues but the thing I especially notice is that the batters as a whole are much more difficult to get out in the National League.

Romo pitched well for the World Champion Pirates in 1979, finishing 10-5 with a 2.99 ERA and 5 aves in 129-1/3 innings. Along with Grant Jackson and Jim Bibby, Romo provided a solid middle-relief corps to assist the Pirates in getting games to their spectacled closer Kent Tekulve. All seemed well.

But, as Romo revealed in an interview with the Beaver County Times in August of 1979, he was chomping at the bit to get out of the United States. Romo had to employ Rennie Stennett as his translator frequently for interviews -- both this one and the Observer-Reporter article mention that fact. Romo hated the fact that no one seemed to speak Spanish in Pittsburgh when he was there.  As the story put it:

"I'm not at home here in Pittsburgh," the Pirates' Mexican-born righthander said last night through translator Rennie Stennett. "It's a different kind of life. If they'd pay me the same money, I'd stay in Mexico and pitch there."

What we have here is an unhappy person. Romo is tired of Pittsburgh. He's tired of the United States.

He's tired of going to stores and pointing at items he wants because that's the only way he can communicate. He's tired of clipping movie advertisements to give to cab drivers everytime he wants to see a show because he can't speak English well enough to give an address.

Romo made it clear in that interview that he would stay in the U.S. to make enough money to return home and have a good life -- 5 years total was his plan.

Even more interestingly -- and something I've noticed before in these news stories about guys like John Urrea -- the U.S. in the 1970s stereotyped the living hell out of Mexicans. Let me let Romo say it, again quoting from that Beaver County Times story:

"I've always wanted to be a major league player here," the 32-year-old Romo said. "I wanted to prove people wrong. They think all Mexicans are bad, that they cause discipline problems or something like that. They always think of Mexicans as gangsters, as bandits."

Even Stennett had to laugh as he repeated those words. Maybe he did because Romo looks like a Mexican bandit. He looks like someone right out of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

"Everybody's bad, but they always use Mexicans," Stennett said. "Whenever people think of Mexicans, they think of violence and fighting. It isn't so."

I added the italics myself here to highlight what the reporter wrote. 

Adding insult to injury, The Pittsburgh Press mentions in a profile of Romo that Romo "looks like a Pancho Villa who would slit your throat [but despite that] Romo is really an intelligent, happy-go-lucky man who enjoys baseball." Really? Slit your throat?  Geez, no wonder Romo wanted to get back to Mexico.

It wasn't just the stereotypes, though -- the cold Pittsburgh weather got to Romo too, as he said to The Pittsburgh Press in April of 1980.  In that same article, Romo mentioned his desire to retire to Mexico and become a shopkeeper -- to own a 7-11 store in Coahuila.  

Romo's plan to stay in the United States for five years and then leave did not come to fruition. Instead, he stayed six years. Perhaps that was because he needed to make up for the lost wages from the 1981 season. At any rate, when the 1983 season came around, he never reported to Bradenton for spring training. He sent a "wire" to the front office telling them that he was going to retire, and the Pirates sat on it in hopes of trading Romo to someone else. That's real up-front work there.  At any rate, that made 1982 Romo's last season as a U.S. major leaguer.

Mustache check: Romo's here in full beard.  

Family Ties
Romo idolized his older brother Vicente Romo, who pitched for the Padres, Red Sox, White Sox, and Indians between 1968 and 1974 and for the Dodgers in 1982. Indeed, Vicente being a pitcher was crucial in Enrique choosing to be a pitcher.  

And, in keeping with the nicknaming traditions in Mexico, Vicente was known as "Huevo" while younger brother Enrique was "Huevito." That's "Egg" and "Little Egg" -- I'm guessing because both kept putting goose eggs on the scoreboard for the opposing team.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
I remember Enrique Romo from my childhood, but I believe that it was only due to his being on baseball cards. And, I think I thought that the name "Enrique Romo" rolled off the tongue well and sounded really cool. 

Both Enrique and Vicente Romo have been honored for their abilities by being inducted into the Mexican Baseball Hall of Fame -- the Salon de Fama. Vicente was inducted in 1992, while Enrique was added in 2003. Indeed, both Vicente and Enrique have had their numbers retired by the Yaquis de Obregon in their hometown of Santa Rosalia, where both played in the Mexican Winter League. 

Romo is a bit difficult to track these days. An interview he did when he was inducted into the Mexican Baseball Hall of Fame mentioned that he returned to Mexico for reasons that he kept to himself even then. Despite the money he made in baseball, the story notes that he moved to Torreon when he left baseball and, in 2003, was working in a lathe workshop as a mechanic to make money to live.

I hope he is doing well.

Card #73: Eddie (Buddy) Solomon

Who Can It Be Now?
Eddie Solomon Jr. a/k/a Buddy J Solomon was born on February 9, 1951 in Perry, Georgia. Eddie grew up in Warner Robins and graduated from Warner Robins High School in 1969. He played semi-pro baseball in his hometown after high school until a scout from the Los Angeles Dodgers saw him playing and signed him after the draft on July 1, 1969.  

He did not look to be a great acquisition immediately, struggling in his first season in professional baseball in Ogden, Utah.  No matter -- the Dodgers moved him up quickly to the Florida State League in 1970, where he pitched far better in many respects, finishing with a 2.37 ERA in 156 innings (against a league ERA for that league of 3.00, a number inflated by the independent DeLand Sun Caps putting up a 4.02 ERA).  

Still, that was a good enough season for Solomon to move up to then Double-A Albuquerque in the Dixie Association for 1971.  There, Solomon's results again were quite good generally, as he put up a 3.02 ERA against a league average of 3.24 and had a K/BB ratio of 2.32 versus a league average of 1.82.  

Solomon split 1972 between now Triple-A Albuquerque and Double-A El Paso, struggling mightily at both stops.  As a result, he spent most of 1973 and 1974 in Triple-A at Albuquerque.  He did receive a cup of coffee from the Dodgers in September of 1973, when he gave up 5 earned runs (3 homeruns) in 6-1/3 innings.  He was called up again by the Dodgers a couple of times in 1974 as well -- for one appearance on July 27 in a 10-0 blowout by the Braves, another on August 18 in a 10-3 loss to the Pirates, another on September 3 in a 9-5 loss to the Giants, and then again for his first major league save on October 2 (the last day of the season) for the eventual National League Champions.  He even made an appearance in the one game that the Dodgers lost in the NLCS, closing out a 7-0 loss against the Pirates with two scoreless innings.

In 1975, Solomon again failed to make the opening day roster for the Dodgers.  The Dodgers finally decided on May 2, 1975 to include Solomon in a trade to the Cubs along with Geoff Zahn in exchange for Burt Hooton.  It's pretty clear that the Dodgers got the better end of that deal, since Solomon lasted just 7 innings in Chicago and Zahn was released by the Cubs after the 1976 season while Hooton spent 10 years in Chavez Ravine, finishing with a 112-84 record.

As I said, Solomon lasted just 7 innings in Chicago.  That was because he spent just two-and-a-half months in the Cubs organization.  He was traded to the Cardinals on July 22, 1975, in exchange for pitcher Ken Crosby.  Crosby spent all of 20-1/3 innings with the Cubs (giving up 19 earned runs but winning 1 game), so the Cubs lost a trade again, and that is despite the fact that, by May of 1977, Solomon had been traded again -- this time to the Atlanta Braves.

When he came to the Braves in 1977, it was basically a homecoming for Solomon.  He treated it that way.  Part of homecoming was to ask everyone to call him "Buddy Jay."  Why?  As he put it in a news story, "That's what everybody called me when I was growing up in Perry. I figured the people back home would remember me if other people started calling me Buddy Jay."

The Braves gave Buddy Jay a chance to pitch in the major leagues without being yo-yoed back and forth between Triple-A and the majors.  1977 was a disaster in many respects, as Solomon finished with a 4.57 ERA that was deceptively low -- in 88-2/3 innings, Solomon allowed 64 runs to score, but fully one-third of those runs -- 21 of them -- were unearned. To be fair, that Braves team was horrible.  They finished 61-101 (which was deserved), had a 17-game losing streak, and had three managers -- Dave Bristol, Vern Benson, and then-crackpot club owner (now, apparently, well respected philanthropist) Ted Turner.

Things seemed to be going well for Solomon in Atlanta.  While the team was bad, Solomon was in his home state and in the starting rotation.  But, then the Braves sent him off to Pittsburgh only a few days before the end of spring training in exchange for a minor leaguer to be named later.  What happened?

The March 30, 1980, headline on The Pittsburgh Press said it all: "Solomon Trouble, Atlanta Admits". Atlanta's GM, John Mullen, sent Solomon to Pittsburgh, he said, because Solomon had engaged in what the newspaper called "a midnight foray of destruction" and called the trade one that the Braves had made "for Eddie's own good and for the good of the ball club." In another story in the same newspaper, Mullen said that "[t]his isn't the first incident, although the others weren't as serious."

What he did was going to the pool at the Sheraton Inn -- the team hotel -- at midnight and shattered a few of the custom-made lighting globes around the pool.  Let's let the newspaper tell the story:

Later, Solomon and his unidentified [male] friend were reported to have gunned their Continental through the hotel's parking lot, narrowly missing the hotel's general manager and a policeman as they departed.  

According to a report in the Palm Beach Post, the two men were later involved in other incidents of disorderly conduct around West Palm Beach and at Days Inn, where the team's minor league prospects are quartered.  

From other sources it was learned that Solomon had threatened one of the Braves' minor league prospects.  

So, that was probably a bad idea.  

Solomon's stay in the Steel City was not supposed to be a long one, as he only filling in for the Pirates while Rick Rhoden and Don Robinson were on the DL. Instead, he stayed on the Pirates the entire season.  Granted, he had one stretch where he did not pitch for three weeks, but he did not record any stats in the minor leagues that year or in 1981.  Indeed, 1981 was his best season in the majors, as Solomon finished 10th in pitcher Wins Above Replacement, tied with Rick Camp.

The Pirates kept Solomon on their team until June of 1982, when the opportunity to pick up utilityman Jim Morrison from the Chicago White Sox proved too great of a lure.  That, and Solomon's sudden inability to pitch did not help -- he finished his Pittsburgh career with a 2-6 record in 1982 with a 6.75 ERA and 9 home runs allowed in just 46-2/3 innings.   Indeed, just before the trade, Solomon was replaced in the starting rotation by reliever Enrique Romo.

Thus, Solomon packed his bags for Chicago.  The White Sox did not give him much of an opportunity to right his ship, either -- designating him for assignment for the team to make room for Richard Barnes in early July. 

After being DFA'd, Solomon never again saw the major leagues.  He stayed with the White Sox organization by reporting to Appleton in the Single-A Midwest League in 1982, pitching in four games there.  Then, in 1983, he hooked on with the Yankees' Triple-A affiliate at Columbus, where he appeared in 7 games.  Those were his last seven professional games.

Mustache Check? Solomon is sporting what appears to be the beginnings of a mustache on this card -- but I think that's just the lighting on this scan that makes it look thin.  He most definitely rocked the 'stache in '82.

Nanu Nanu
This card was Eddie Solomon's last Topps card.  Unlike Rick Auerbach on card #72 and off the strength of his 1981 season, Solomon appeared in all three of the major release American sets in 1982.  But, like Auerbach, Solomon has never appeared on a baseball card since 1982.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
Eddie Solomon was not a pitcher that made any impression on me as a kid in 1982, and frankly I knew nothing about Solomon even when I saw his card.  

Solomon did not stay long on this earth after his baseball career was over.  On January 12, 1986, Solomon was driving alone at about 3:45 AM in Macon, Georgia, when his car slammed into a utility pole, struck a chain link fence, and overturned.  Solomon was thrown from the car and was pronounced dead at the scene.  

A commenter on the Cardboard Gods blog, "boomkatte", apparently knew Mr. Solomon on a personal level. That commenter's words are reproduced here in full:

I knew Eddie on a more personal level.  Eddie had a sense of humour and enjoyed joking around.  A life out of balance? He had a wife and three children, whom he loved very much. Eddie participated in charitable causes. Eddie was concerned about what he would do after he no longer played baseball, he confided to me.  He was considering studying social work.  I was deeply saddened to hear of his tragic death, and will always miss his friendship[.] He was a true friend. 

And a second comment also from boomkatte:

Eddie was/is called “Buddy J” by some of his family. That’s more likely than not why he asked to be called “Buddy.” He was a warm man, and I remember how much he loved his children, and his then young son, “Mingo.” He was very proud of them, and it’s very sad he was unable to watch them grow into adults. Eddie had a lot of potential and was concerned about what he would do after he no longer was in the major leagues. He hadn’t gone to college, but wanted to pursue social work and working with underprivileged children. He was a kind man, and loved his “bunion” on his foot! Laughing here remembering that! Eddie didn’t go for the bling or the glitz himself. He was an insightful man, concerned for the future. No disrespect taken. We only sometimes know these people, as you mentioned, from a picture on a card. We forget that there is an entire person behind that face, an entire personality away from the public world. I was privileged to know THAT Eddie. He could be quiet in public, but his sense of humor was intact. His birthday is tomorrow, and in his new life, may he celebrate in light and happiness.

May he rest in peace.

Card #41: Dave Parker In Action

Who Can It Be Now?
It's still Dave Parker.  Perhaps it is a good question to pose to Topps as to why Dave Parker deserved "In Action" treatment -- or, for that matter, the question might be if there were any standards for the In Action subset.  It may have been just that Parker was one of the better hitters historically in the league, and that Topps had an "In Action" photo that it wanted to use.

Since I covered Parker's career in some detail yesterday, I won't rehash that information here.  One thing I want to cover, though, is that 1990 Pittsburgh story about how the City of Pittsburgh had turned on Parker in the early 1980s.

It wasn't a drug-driven act.  There was a lot of hatred for Parker around.  There was an article from Hal Bock of the AP, a well-respected journalist at the time, in July of 1980.  In the article, Bock notes that Pittsburgh really did not appreciate Parker and his big contract:

Here you are [Pittsburgh], blessed with one of the very best baseball players of our time in Dave Parker. But instead of sitting back and enjoying his home run swing, you boo him. Instead of marveling at his ability in the field, you throw things at him.  And instead of celebrating his considerable skills in this demanding, difficult game, you are driving him out of town.

Nice going, indeed. 

Pittsburgh likes to call itself the City of Champions.  But [the city] never really grew up from the mills and the blue collar, beer chaser image.  You live in a union town but you resent Dave Parker because he makes an outrageous salary, a salary which his own union and his own abilities have helped him achieve.

The article came in the wake of an incident on Willie Stargell Day when some yahoo threw a nine-volt radio battery at Parker and barely missed beaning him.  The article detailed further that it wasn't just Parker getting fat and playing badly -- this activity had started years earlier with Parker having his car vandalized and, later, having a bag of nuts and bolts thrown at him.

I guess I don't understand the anger, even in retrospect.

Certainly, by 1981, Parker had found cocaine and his results had suffered accordingly.  He got fat and out-of-shape after his knee injuries in 1980.  That seemingly led to an article from the Beaver County Times from August 18, 1981, by a sports staff writer there. The story's headline is "Dave Parker: A self-destructing fat cat."  It goes downhill from there.  The writer says that what Parker, 

really needs is a couple of months away from baseball.  He needs to spend one month at a fat farm and one month in a shrink's office getting his head together. 

That's the sad part of this story.  We're watching a great athlete destroy himself. Once the world's best baseball player and a nice guy to boot, Parker has let himself become an embarrassment to his team and the city of Pittsburgh.

His biggest problem is his weight.  His belly is as big as his head which, in the last few years, has become massive.  He's not the player he once was because of it.

Ouch. If the story stopped there, it would be bad enough and probably would have turned some of the people reading about Parker against him already (if that had not been done previously).  Then the writer points out that, frankly, Parker did not even bring anything positive to bear off the field either.

Parker's right.  It is personal.  The fans treat him badly because he asks for it. His personality practically screams, "Hate me.  I'm the biggest jerk in town."

What positive things does he do? He's always rubbed people the wrong way by boasting endlessly about how great he is.  He's always refused requests from the team to do promotions and public appearances.  And he's always played games with the media.

Even if true, the article borders on character assassination.  I can see why, in retrospect, that Parker was glad to get out of Pittsburgh. 

After he left Pittsburgh, though, Parker certainly egged on the fans there.  In a May 31, 1987 game, Parker was playing for the Cincinnati Reds against Pittsburgh in the old Three Rivers Stadium.  He connected on with a Doug Drabek pitch for tie-breaking home run. Parker knew it was a home run, and so did everyone else.  The fans started booing and, as the story says, "the louder the boos, the slower he ran."  

Parker took 26.96 seconds, according to one stopwatch, to take his leisurely stroll around the basepaths.

It appears that the 1989 Toronto Blue Jays had him covered on protecting baseball's "Unwritten Rules."  Oddly enough, though, both the Blue Jays own guys and noted baseball "protector" Peter Gammons seem to come down on the side of "hot dogging."  Blue Jays coach Mike Squires is quoted as saying that, "Back in the fifties and sixties, if you did that celebrating stuff to a Bob Gibson or a Don Drysdale, you risked having your head torn off.  But that was then, this is now, and more of our players were upset with Kelly [Gruber] for what he said than with Parker or [Rickey] Henderson."

Huh.  So baseball was more forgiving in 1989?  I wonder what Gerritt Cole would say about that.

Totally Gnarly
According to the PSA website, Dave Parker used a very heavy Louisville Slugger or Adirondack bat during his career.  They highlight the fact as well that, unlike many players both in the 1970s and 1980s and now, Parker used very little pine tar on his bat.  His number 39 would appear often -- but not always -- on the bat's knob.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
Yesterday I talked about whether Parker should be in the Hall of Fame.  If you missed it, my general response is that his career numbers fall short of the types of numbers necessary for induction into the Hall.  I closed my thoughts by saying, "So, I just can't see it happening. Then again, I couldn't see Jim Rice getting in either."

Unbeknownst to me when I wrote that yesterday, Sports Illustrated's Joe Posnanski thought the same thing. He compared Rice and Parker.  In that comparison, we start with the fact that both won their respective 1978 MVP award.  Rice was top 5 in MVP voting 6 times versus Parker's 5.  Both started 4 All-Star games.  Rice was a notoriously indifferent fielder and never won a Gold Glove, while Parker won three.

The comparison goes from there.  It's not saying whether Parker or Rice was more deserving, just that it was difficult to understand why Jim Rice made it to the Hall of Fame and Parker never got over 25% of the vote, generally.

Parker was considered again for induction into the Hall of Fame this past year by the "Expansion Era" ballot.  He was up along with Dave Concepcion, Steve Garvey, Tommy John, Dan Quisenberry, and Ted Simmons.  None of those guys were inducted into the Hall of Fame this past year.  I was actually intrigued by who was on that panel: Rod Carew, Carlton Fisk, Whitey Herzog, Tommy Lasorda, Joe Morgan, Paul Molitor, Phil Niekro, and Frank Robinson represented the on-field side of the discussion.   

I cringe at the thought of the idea of Joe Morgan making decisions on judging who should be inducted.

Card #40: Dave Parker

Who Can It Be Now?
David Gene Parker was born on June 9, 1951, in Grenada, Mississippi, according to Baseball Reference, or in Calhoun, Mississippi, according to Topps and Wikipedia.  The two cities aren't close -- they are three hours from one another; Calhoun is far closer to Hattiesburg, where the University of Southern Mississippi is located, and Grenada is about equidistant as the crow flies between Starkville (Mississippi State) and Oxford (Ole Miss).  Considering that even the Baseball Reference Bullpen says he was born in Calhoun City, I'm going with that as his birthplace.  

Despite his roots in the Deep South, Parker grew up in Cincinnati.  He attended Courter Technical High School -- which no longer exists, having been swallowed up by the Cincinnati State Technical and Community College.  He claimed later in life that his first love was football -- at tailback -- but that he tore up his knee his senior year.  That must have been a scary sight -- a 6'5", then 215 pound running back in 1969 coming at you?  In all seriousness, even with a knee injury, I would predict that in 2014, Dave Parker would be picking up a hat with a college football team's logo on it on national signing day.  

Instead, the only signed Parker did was with a baseball team.  The Pittsburgh Pirates drafted Parker in the Fourteenth Round of the 1970 June Amateur draft, and he stayed with the Pirates through the 1983 season.  He was drafted as a catcher, but the Pirates moved him to the outfield immediately (though he did pitch one game in the Gulf Coast League in 1970).  

Parker's bat moved him up the Pirates chain rapidly.  Outside of a .228/.305/.281 Double-A showing over 30 games in 1970, Parker never hit under .310, never had an OBP of under .350, and never had a SLG lower than his .448 showing in the Gulf Coast league.  Add it all up, and in 381 games from 1970 to 1973, Parker had a minor league slash line of .315/.358/.496 with 48 Home Runs and 69 Stolen Bases in 1577 Plate Appearances.  

That showing convinced the Pirates in 1973 to call Parker up to the major leagues on July 12. It took him a while to make an impression -- he went 0 for his first 11 at-bats before picking up his first major league hit against future Hall of Famer Don Sutton on July 16, 1973. 

Parker finally got his hitting on track that year with a 4-for-4 performance against St. Louis on September 3 of that year.  Before the game, his average was just .218, but by year's end, he finished at .288.  He struggled for playing time in 1974.  Though he was with the team the entire year, he was the fifth outfielder behind Willie Stargell, Al Oliver, Richie Zisk, and Gene Clines.  Still, It would have been a major reach to predict what happened in 1975 -- unless, again, you calculate what Parker's Major League Equivalents from his minor league days told you about him.

1975 was when Dave Parker really rose into prominence. The Pirates moved Stargell to first base to save his 35-year-old knees, and that freed up left field for Zisk.  Parker and his absolute cannon of an arm went into right field.  Add in a break-through at the plate, and you can see why Parker finished third -- a distant third, but third nonetheless -- to deserved NL MVP Joe Morgan that year; Morgan had the benefit of having his team win the National League, while Parker's Pirates "only" won the NL East and got swept in the NLCS with Parker taking the big donut himself -- 0-for-10 with only a walk to show for his troubles.  

The 1970s was probably the second-to-last "golden era" for the Pittsburgh Pirates -- the last being in the early 1990s, of course -- but the 1970s were a period of sustained excellent teams for the Pirates.  From 1970 through 1979, the Pirates had only one losing season -- an 80-82 record the year after Roberto Clemente's tragic death.  Otherwise, from 1970 through 1979, the Pirates won two World Series, won the NL East six times, and finished second three other times.  A major factor in that was Dave Parker's performance.

Parker was an All-Star in 1977, 1979, 1980, and 1981 and then again in 1985 and 1986 with Cincinnati, and in 1990 in his single year as a Milwaukee Brewer.  He won three Gold Gloves -- from 1977 through 1979.  He won back-to-back batting titles in 1977 and 1978, led the league in SLG, OPS, and Total Bases in 1978 and, of course, he was named the National League MVP in 1978.  He was the beneficiary of 23 intentional walks that year as well.  

To give a better perspective on what baseball was like back then, the Pirates finished second in the National League East in 1978.  Despite this, the Pirates drew less than one million people, and they were not the worst team in the NL -- the Braves were -- and four teams in the American League were worse as well.  For comparison's sake, the team that drew the fewest fans to the stadium in 2013 were the Tampa Bay Rays to that ghastly dome; their attendance was 1, 510,300 people.  

After the 1978 season, Parker was a free agent.  He ended up signing with Pittsburgh after that year to a five-year, $7.5 million contract that was structured where Parker received $2.2 million over the five years and, then, starting in 1988, he would be paid out the rest of the money until 2007 -- a $5.3-million, twenty-year annuity.  The price tag was high -- the highest in American team sports as of 1979, according to Sports Illustrated -- but with the Pirates winning the World Series in 1979, it seemed worth it.

Despite the excellent seasons and the commitment to staying in Pittsburgh, Dave Parker was not universally loved.  To be clear, a story from Sports Illustrated in early 1979 was titled, "A Loudmouth and His Loud Bat" and it went downhill from there despite the fact that, if you actually read the article, it makes it clear that Parker was a thoughtful person who took advice well and listened to those who were trying to help him.  Nonetheless, Parker described himself as a bit of a bully -- a talker...a guy who picked on his teammates in jest but also to make them better in some respects.  

That plays well when you're hitting 25 home runs, playing 158 games, and winning the World Series, as the Pirates did in 1979.  But, Parker's numbers started fading -- fast.  He had off-season knee surgery after 1980 and showed up in spring training overweight.  In 1981, Parker missed nearly 40 of Pittsburgh's games.  Then, in 1982, Parker played in only 73 games.  

These issues were compounded by the fact that Parker was on cocaine.  It is well known that he testified in September of 1985 in the infamous "Pittsburgh Drug Trials" against cocaine dealer Curtis Strong.  Parker admitted that he starting snorting cocaine in 1979 and knew strong so well that Strong was invited to the Pirates' team New Year's Eve party for 1981.  

All these issues -- the huge contract, his drug use, his perceived slacking, his growing waistline, and even several illegitimate children -- did not endear Parker to the Pirates' fans. As a June 1990 article in the Pittsburgh Press put it:

Pittsburgh's perception [of Parker] is of a louse, a loser, a drug abuser.  The image is of a spoiled, arrogant and militant black who tried to worm out of paternity suits and child-support suits, who got a five-year, $5 million contract and promptly got a fat head and a fatter belly.

Despite all this, Parker played another four seasons for his hometown Cincinnati Reds from 1984 through 1987 -- even finishing second to Willie McGee in the MVP race in 1985.  The Reds traded him after the 1987 season for Tim Birtsas and Jose Rijo.  

Parker played two years for Oakland before he signed as a free agent with the Milwaukee Brewers after the 1989 season.  Even though Parker was 38, his signing was seen as a way to entice then-reining American League MVP Robin Yount to re-sign with the Brewers. Obviously that worked, since Yount played the rest of his career in Milwaukee.  

After one season in Milwaukee, the Brewers traded Parker to the California Angels.  The Angels needed a designated hitter, and they had a logjam in the outfield.  So, they sent 27-year-old Dante Bichette to Milwaukee.  Parker was released near the end of 1991 by the Angels, and played the last two weeks of his career with the Toronto Blue Jays.

The Verdict 
After handing Parker the large contract in 1978, the Pirates didn't feel like they got their money's worth from the Cobra.  After the Pittsburgh Drug Trial, anti-Dave Parker sentiment in Pittsburgh was extremely high.  As a result and in 1986, the Pirates sued Parker for fraud and breach of contract in an effort to avoid some of the extended payments under the contract.  The suit was eventually settled about two months before trial in a confidential settlement.

A Few Minutes with Tony L.
Parker was the Cobra -- coiled in right field and ready to throw out any runner with the temerity to try to take an extra base against him.  By 1982, though, the knee problems and the weight problems made him seem washed up.  The fact that Parker came back from that and became a good player again can be chalked up in part to getting off cocaine and getting into shape and, probably, in part to being back home in Cincinnati.  

Two items dominate my thoughts today about Parker.  The first is whether Parker should be in the Hall of Fame.  He stayed the entire 15 years that a player can stay on the BBWAA ballot without being elected.  He never got more than 24.5% of the vote and never got less than 10.3% of the vote.  Parker's candidacy is one of peak, I would imagine.  

Parker scores well in the Black Ink with 26 (leading the league in batting stats, where the average HOFer is 27), the Gray Ink category at 145 (finishing in the top 10 in stats, where the average HOFer is 144), the Hall of Fame Monitor at 124 (likely Hall of Famer is around 100) and the Hall of Fame Standards measure at 42 (average HOFer is 50).  

Parker does not do well compared to the 24 RF already in the HOF.  Certainly, you're talking about a position played by Babe Ruth, whose presence alone skews statistics -- but you're also being compared to some of the best hitters the game has ever seen.  It's not just Ruth -- it's Aaron, Musial, Ott, Frank Robinson, Clemente, Kaline, and Reggie, to name just a few. For his career, Parker has just 39.9 WAR; for comparison, J.D. Drew is at 44.9.  Parker has a peak WAR (WAR7) of 37.2.  The Average HOFer in RF is at 42.9.  And, Parker's JAWS score is at 38.6...the average HOFer in RF is 58.1.  

I mean, it's tough to say that a guy whose stats are as good as Parker's doesn't get in because he's being compared to the best steroids money could buy in the 1990s.  And, simply put, that's not why he isn't in -- it's because he doesn't compare favorably to guys like Dwight Evans and Reggie Smith.  These are Parker's contemporaries, and their careers were far more productive -- by something like 25 wins above replacement MORE than Parker.  So, I just can't see it happening.  Then again, I couldn't see Jim Rice getting in either.

The other item that is more saddening to me is the fact that Parker announced last summer that he was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease in February of 2012. Parker's older sister also has the disease.  Certainly, it's a disease that one can live with.  As an aside, my mother has also been diagnosed with Parkinson's; it's not progressing quickly with her, thankfully, but it is a tough thing to see.  If you are inclined to give any thanks for this blog, please consider donating to The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research.

Finally, though, to close on a good note, Dave Parker and Pittsburgh have most certainly reconciled with one another.  Even though news stories still refer to his cocaine use during his last years in Pittsburgh, Parker has attended Pittsburgh Pirate "Heritage Days."  In the story about his Parkinson's diagnosis, Parker exclaimed to the interviewer, "Once a Buc, always a Buc.  And I'll always be a Buc."