I’m working my way through Jane Leavy’s memoir/biography of slugger Mickey Mantle, tilted “The Last Boy: Mickey Mantle and the end of America’s childhood.”
I enjoyed her book on pitcher Sandy Koufax, so I thought I would give this a try, although Koufax as a person is much more to my liking than Mantle ever was, and as a longtime Twins fan I must admit that taking a deep dive on the Yankees is hard, given the extremely lopsided nature of the rivalry between those two teams.
Nevertheless, here I am. Although Mantle was preceded in baseball by a long line of sluggers (Babe Ruth, anyone?), he certainly developed a quick reputation for hitting the tape-measure home run, according to the book, including a blast against the Washington Nationals/Senators at Griffith Stadium on April 17, 1953.
Wayne “Twig” Terwilliger, a former first-base coach for the Twins, was the Nats’ second baseman.
“The ball was hit so high that Mantle was at second base by the time it came down,” he said.
The (Washington, D.C.) Evening Star ran a photo of Mantle holding the homer-damaged ball.
“Wind or no wind,” (Nats’ owner Clark) Griffith told the newspaper, “nobody ever hit a ball that hard here before. I don’t know if it would have cleared the bleachers without the wind, but let’s put it this way — nobody ever hit one that would have come closer to clearing the bleachers under any circumstances. It’s simply remarkable.”
“Mantle’s unforgettable blow hit about 6 feet up on the center field side of the beer sign — The Star’s football scoreboard during the fall.
“The ball struck at the end of the sign and caromed out of the park. Estimates of its distance varied from 565 to 595 feet, with the most conservative having the ball hit the sign at a point 481 feet from the plate before it left the park.”
Senators/Twins pitchers Camilo Pascual and Pedro Ramos, like Twig, also were familiar with Mantle’s work. The two served up 23 of the Mick’s 536 career home runs, according to Leavy’s book.
Anyone pitching for Washington experienced some lean years on the mound, but by 1959 Camilo had turned a corner and went 17-10 with a 2.64 ERA, along with 17 complete games and six shutouts.
Neither he nor Ramos had a lot of success against the Yankees, but on July 5, 1959, Pascual blanked the Bombers on four hits with a walk and 10 strikeouts in a 7-0 win.
“Camilo struck out 10, matching his season high,” the Evening Star reported. “He now has won as many games as he’s ever compiled in other years with the Senators and is demonstrating that he has arrived as one of the league’s top pitchers. With his effort against the Yankees he reduced his earned-run average to 2.39. He hasn’t allowed an earned run in 18 innings.”
Ramos was a tough-luck pitcher for most of his career — 160 career losses despite a 4.08 ERA — yet he, too, had his moments, including one of the biggest after Washington moved to Minnesota for the 1961 season. In Game 1 of that season, Ramos shut out the Yanks on three hits and fanned Mantle twice.
“So, the Twins from Minnesota were born into the bright new world of major league baseball in a happy and blessed event,” wrote reporter Joe Trimble of the New York Daily News. “They showed lusty power, kicking Whitey Ford out of sight in the seventh inning and biting Ralph Terry and Jim Coates on the fingers as they scored all their runs in the last three innings.”
Extra innings…
–Pascual’s career numbers versus the Yankees: 20-27, 3.98 ERA, 296 strikeouts across 391-plus innings.
–Ramos’ career numbers against the Yankees: 10-20, 4.08 ERA, 163 strikeouts across 293-plus innings.
–Portland, Oregon, native and fellow Lincoln High School alum Mickey Lolich, who won 217 games over a 16-season career spent mostly with the Detroit Tigers, died Feb. 4. He was 85.
Lolich is probably best known for pitching three complete-game victories in the 1968 World Series to secure the title for Detroit over the St. Louis Cardinals, including a Game 7 win over Bob Gibson.
His career numbers against the Twins were fairly pedestrian: 12-16, with a 4.37 ERA and 238 strikeouts across 284-plus innings.
Sources: Newspapers.com, Baseball-Reference.com