Game Six: Cincinnati, Boston, and the 1975 World Series: The Triumph of America's Pastime

by Mark Frost

  Nolan missed way outside with a wayward curve to even the count at 1–1.

  When Rice and Lynn joined Evans in the Red Sox outfield at the start of the 1975 season, Boston reporters and fans woke to the idea this might be the best trio their team had fielded since the old glory days of Duffy Lewis, Tris Speaker, and Harry Hooper. Much is always made of the defensive challenges posed in Fenway’s left field by the Green Monster, but in truth that amounts largely to learning how to effectively play caroms off the wall, as the area one has to cover is greatly reduced by the shortened dimensions. The park’s vast right field, which with its own odd shapes and angles is equally if not obviously as quirky, demands much greater range and a far stronger throwing arm to properly defend. Evans had demonstrated superb range from the moment he arrived, and a sniper’s rifle for an arm. When Evans’s best friend on the team, Rico Petrocelli, missed a stretch of games early in the season, there had been some foolish talk about moving Evans back to his original position at third base. After Evans finished second in the American League in outfield assists in 1975, initiating eight double plays, that notion was laid to rest for good.

  Evans looked down to Don Zimmer for a sign, then dug in and chopped at a good Nolan changeup, fouling it into the dirt at his feet.

  Evans had struggled at the plate during the Division Series against the A’s, but during the first five games of his first World Series, despite suffering from the flu that had waylaid many of the Red Sox, Evans had broken through and emphatically answered the only question about him that remained: Could he produce under pressure in the postseason? His two-run homer in the top of the ninth in Game Three at Cincinnati had sent that one into extra innings, and his triple in Game Four had proved to be the decisive blow in a five-run fourth inning that sparked Tiant’s and the Red Sox’s second victory. Dwight Evans had hit .353 through the first five games of the Series, and his four RBIs led the team; he had virtually carried them at Riverfront Park, and this performance didn’t go unnoticed by the opposition. Pete Rose paid Evans his version of the ultimate compliment by comparing him to his favorite player: “He reminds me a lot of myself.” No slouch as a judge of talent himself, Sparky Anderson had remarked at Sunday’s press conference that he’d known about all the big-name talent on the Boston roster from Ray Shore’s extensive scouting reports, but from what he’d seen so far, Dwight Evans might be the Red Sox’s best all-around player. “This guy is a surprise package,” said Sparky. “He’s as good a young outfielder as there is in baseball and he’s just starting to touch his ability. He’s a future superstar.”

  Out in the Reds bullpen, Jack Billingham took a seat, as left-hander Freddie Norman continued to throw. Sparky had made up his mind about who he’d go to next, and once again, it wasn’t Billingham.

  When a reporter pointed out Sparky’s comments about him to Evans before Game Six, he responded in the way that would always endear him to Boston’s baseball purist fans: “It’s very nice of him to say such things, but let’s face it: I’m not the Fred Lynn, natural ability type. I don’t want to be a star, I just want to be a winner.”

  Johnny Bench, liking the way Evans had flailed at that last pitch, signaled for another changeup, and again Evans hacked the off-speed offering into the dirt, dribbling foul down the third base line to Rose. Evans dug in and guessed a fastball must be in the offing, but Bench won the chess match when he called for a third off-speed pitch in a row, a big curve that Satch Davidson thought nicked the outside corner, and he called Evans out on strikes. Evans put a hand on his hip, silently protesting Davidson’s call, then stalked back to the dugout.

  Evans was followed to the plate by his former minor-league teammate, shortstop Rick Burleson. Like Lynn and Evans another Southern California native and prospect, Burleson had initially been the most highly touted of the three, the Red Sox’s first-round—and fifth overall—pick of the 1970 draft. He had also played for manager Darrell Johnson in the minors, and won his confidence just as Lynn and Evans had, but that’s where Burleson’s similarity to the two laid-back outfielders ended; the slight, taut, fiery infielder burned with an arclight intensity on and off the field that should have reminded Pete Rose even more of his favorite player. After three grinding seasons in the minors, Burleson battled his way onto the Boston roster in 1974 as a utility infielder, then made the most of an opportunity created when second baseman Doug Griffin went down with another in a series of serious injuries. Burleson hit over .300 in his absence and played such solid defense that when Griffin returned, the team couldn’t afford to take Burleson out of the lineup, so they installed him as their starter at short, where he showed consistent toughness and determination, and one of the strongest throwing arms in the league. He finished the season batting .284 and ended up second in the voting behind the Yankees’ Bucky Dent as the best rookie shortstop in baseball. Reservations about his range at the more demanding defensive position persisted through the off-season, however, so Burleson had to battle for the starting job all over again in spring training of 1975, when he not only won the starting nod but the blessings of fifty-six-year-old Johnny Pesky.

  Born John Michael Paveskovich, former manager and broadcaster for the team, Pesky, now a member of Boston’s coaching staff, was one of Red Sox Nation’s sage tribal elders. A hustling overachiever who by the end of his career had become the most celebrated shortstop in Red Sox history, he had been a mainstay of the squad during Ted Williams’s prime years in the 1940s. The short right field foul pole in Fenway, only 302 feet from home plate, had for years been unofficially called “Pesky’s Pole,” supposedly for a walk-off, game-winning home run he hit there in support of Sox left-hander Mel Parnell in 1948. Although the record shows Pesky hit only one of his six career home runs in Fenway when Parnell was pitching—and it came in the first inning—the story had passed into legend during the 1960s, when both Pesky and Parnell worked on the Red Sox broadcast team. Pesky was also remembered for something less celebratory. With two outs in the eighth inning of Game Seven in the 1946 World Series against St. Louis, Cardinals outfielder Enos Slaughter scored all the way from first with what turned out to be the Series’ winning run on a double by Harry “The Hat” Walker. After catching the throw-in from Red Sox center fielder Leon Culberson, Johnny Pesky made the relay from short left field to home but not in time to catch the speedy Slaughter, who never broke stride all the way around the bases. Pesky, unfairly as film of the moment confirms, was accused in some accounts of “holding the ball” in a moment of indecision before throwing to the plate. The real culprit was probably Culberson, who wasn’t expecting Slaughter to keep running and half-lobbed the ball in to his shortstop, but the goat horns ended up on Johnny Pesky, blamed for the first of what would become a lavishly documented Red Sox tradition of blown World Series chances.

  “Burleson comes to the ballpark mad, and he goes home mad,” said Pesky. “I always played as if somebody better might come along, and that’s the way Burleson plays. He’s never satisfied, and I don’t think that’s a bad thing.”

  Burleson watched a Nolan fastball catch the inside corner for a called first strike.

  During fielding practice before a game in 1974, Pesky’s fellow Red Sox coach Don Zimmer—another former major-league infielder known for his short fuse—hit a succession of tough grounders at Burleson that he had trouble handling. The hotter the shot, the more he struggled, and the angrier he got at himself, until Zimmer noticed that Burleson’s neck had turned a radioactive red, and when he ripped off his cap and tossed it to the ground in disgust at himself his hair stood straight up in a comblike tuft.

  “Look at that little bugger out there,” said Zimmer, admiringly. “He looks like a bantam rooster.”

  That’s how nicknames are born in the big leagues. The “Rooster” had hit .252 and led the Red Sox in thrown bats, umpire confrontations, and slammed doors in 1975, bringing a street fighter’s scrappiness to the team that it had been missing for years and sorely needed. Johnny Pesky ha
d offered the ultimate compliment to their new shortstop before the Series: “We wouldn’t be here without him.” Burleson had more than backed up those words during the World Series, playing errorless ball in the field, and leading the team in hitting at .389, another performance that had earned the praise of the Reds.

  Burleson fouled Nolan’s next pitch—a roundhouse curve—wide of third, into the face of the left field grandstand that jutted out sharply to meet the third base line about halfway between third base and the Monster. He resisted the next one, a fastball that missed just outside, and the count was 1–2.

  Burleson’s gritty performance in the Series against the Reds had also drawn frequent comparisons to Billy Martin, the blustery, troubled manager—who had recently been hired by their new owner George Steinbrenner to manage the Yankees; the first of Martin’s five tempestuous tenures with the team—who had played mid-infield with similar intensity for the great 1950s Yankees teams. A career .257 hitter, Martin had capped his playing career with three outstanding World Series performances, winning the Series’ MVP award in 1953. Burleson possessed the same kind of red-hot nuclear core, but, unlike the tragic Martin, confined it to the field, living quietly with his wife in suburban Boston.

  Burleson went into his crouch and lined another outside fastball pitch sharply toward first base, where Tony Perez deftly picked it up and trotted over to touch the bag. Out by twenty feet, Burleson continued digging down the line, hitting the bag at full speed even after Perez had begun to toss the ball around the infield.

  The crowd rose to its feet again as Luis Tiant came to the plate; Kubek remarked that Luis was leading the World Series in standing ovations, and nobody was going to catch him. Since the American League’s adoption of the designated hitter rule in 1973, Tiant had recorded only one official at bat in a game until this World Series, but prior to that, since his sandlot days, he had always prided himself on his hitting. Blessed with exceptional hand-eye coordination, he had hit five home runs in the bigs while knocking in forty runs, and during his season with the Twins in 1969, albeit in only thirty-two at bats, had hit for an amazing .406 average. He had also surprised the Reds in this Series, going 2–6 while drawing a couple of walks, for an on-base percentage of .500. Tiant had singled and come around to record the first, and what turned out to be the game-winning, run of a tense, scoreless Game One, when the Red Sox exploded for six runs in the seventh inning, then went back out to finish nailing down the complete-game shutout.

  Eager to get the inning over with, Nolan threw a fastball down the middle that Tiant watched for a strike. Nolan came back with a big bender that started inside and gave Tiant a serious case of jelly leg; he stepped halfway out of the box and waved at it for a second strike.

  After recording another single in the fourth inning of Game Four, Tiant again scored what turned out to be the game-winning run of that game. Given Tiant’s success at the plate so far, Bench had decided not to show him too many fastballs, and he took Nolan’s next bender low and outside for a ball, as NBC cut to the field-level view from their camera inside the left field scoreboard. Bench signaled curveball again, and Nolan whisked the outside corner for a called third strike, his second punch-out of a sharp and effective 1–2-3 inning. Tiant turned and trotted back to the dugout, to another big hand from the crowd.

  Gary Nolan had started six World Series games for Sparky Anderson and the Reds since 1970, but had yet to win one. He had bounced back effectively after a shaky first inning, but wouldn’t win this one either; Nolan had just thrown his last pitch of Game Six.

  EIGHT

  When the chips are on the line, he’s the greatest competitor I’ve ever seen. Luis Tiant is “The Man.”

  HALL OF FAME PITCHER JIM PALMER

  AFTER EACH OF THE FIRST TWO SEASONS HE PITCHED FOR the Mexico City Tigers, Luis Tiant returned home to Cuba for the off-season. He had established himself as a rising star during his second year, in 1960, going 17–7 and leading the Tigers to the Mexican League championship. That summer at a coed softball game he also met Maria del Refugio Navarro, a young beauty who worked for the Social Security office and was playing left field that night, the start of a traditional yearlong courtship that would lead to their marriage. During the winter of 1960–61, as young Tony Perez prepared to spend his first season on a Reds farm team in upstate New York, Luis pitched in the Cuban League. One of the oldest and most storied baseball organizations in the Western Hemisphere, the Cuban League had developed dozens of players who went on to play in either the majors or the Negro Leagues. Since 1900, the Cuban League had also been baseball’s only fully integrated league, where white American players were regularly sent by their major-league owners for seasoning against top competition from around the Caribbean. But the anti-American policies of Cuba’s newly installed leader Fidel Castro ended that arrangement before the 1960–61 season; when President Eisenhower broke off diplomatic relations, major-league baseball was told that players from the United States were no longer welcome. Luis Tiant went 10–8 for “Habana” that year, a famous franchise that had been founded during the league’s first year, in 1878, and the same team his father had starred on more than twenty years earlier. “Lefty” Tiant watched all of his son’s starts with pride, and Luis was named the Cuban League’s Rookie of the Year.

  Luis returned to Mexico City for his third season with the Tigers in May of 1961, just as Castro put into place the rigid anti-emigration policy many Cubans had feared was coming. More than a million people—10 percent of the country’s population, many from the middle and upper classes—had fled the country since Castro took power, and he now imposed a three-year waiting period for anyone else who wished to leave; during the wait they would have to forfeit their jobs and all personal property, and would be treated as enemies of the state. Whether anyone would actually be allowed to leave at the end of that purgatorial ordeal remained to be seen. The policy had the desired effect: The flood of people legally leaving Cuba came to a sudden halt. Castro also announced that there would be no more “professional” baseball in their country; the ninety-year-old Cuban League had played its last game. Cuban-born players would now enjoy the privilege of playing baseball only for the glory of the state, in a new league that Castro organized personally.

  Luis Tiant’s third straight winning season for the Mexico City Tigers in 1961 led directly to his first minor-league deal with the Cleveland Indians, who purchased his contract outright and told Tiant they planned to bring him to spring training the following year. Luis and Maria married that summer, but put off their honeymoon until after the season ended in September. To celebrate both their marriage and his new opportunity in baseball, he had planned to introduce Maria to his parents and spend a week together with them at an island resort off Cuba’s southern coast. When he called his father to finalize the arrangements, Luis received the shock of his life.

  The Old Man told him not to come home. The United States’ newly elected president, John F. Kennedy, had taken office in January, and an ill-fated, CIA-backed invasion at the Bay of Pigs by Cuban exiles had failed miserably in April; hundreds died and thousands of suspected sympathizers had been thrown into Cuban prisons, pushing Castro ever closer to socialism. Life in Havana had grown more oppressive ever since, and under no circumstances was Luis to return now, not if he had any hope of ever leaving again and fulfilling his dreams.

  Stay in Mexico, his father said. Make a good life for your family now.

  But when will I see you again? Luis asked.

  The Old Man hesitated. I will let you know.

  Less than three months later, Fidel Castro officially announced to the world that he was an avowed Marxist-Leninist and that Cuba would become a client state of the Soviet Union and a communist country.

  Luis Tiant would not see his father again, and the Old Man wouldn’t set eyes on his three grandchildren, for the next fourteen years.

  REDS CENTER FIELDER Cesar Geronimo faced Tiant to begin the top of the third inning. The
twenty-seven-year-old native of the Dominican Republic had enjoyed the most success of any Reds regular against Tiant in his first two outings, going 3–5 with two walks. The left-hand-hitting Geronimo had come over to the Reds from the Houston Astros before the 1972 season, as part of the blockbuster Joe Morgan trade. The Reds had lost their starting center fielder Bobby Tolan the season before to a torn Achilles tendon; Sparky had been forced to use seven different men in center after Tolan went down, and the team desperately needed a long-term replacement. Geronimo’s last-minute inclusion in the Morgan deal, which seemed like an afterthought to Houston at the time, was actually a key component for the Reds, and a tribute to the due diligence of their GM, Bob Howsam, and his super-scout Ray Shore, and manager Sparky Anderson’s ongoing commitment to speed and defense.