So much has been collected about baseball that I decided to split the baseball section into three installments. This first one concerns the junior circuit.
The information used here was obtained free of charge from and is copyrighted by Retrosheet. Interested parties may contact Retrosheet at "www.retrosheet.org".
The Oakland A's win their third World Series
championship in a row despite their lack of .300 hitters and the resignation of
manager Dick Williams. The Los Angeles Dodgers are on the losing
side of this series, winning one game; the '73 New York Mets and '72 Cincinnati
Reds each won three games against the A's. Rollie Fingers is the MVP
of this Fall Classic.
Nolan Ryan pitches his third
no-hitter Sept. 28; it is a 4-0 victory against the Minnesota Twins at
Anaheim Stadium. Ryan's 367 strikeouts are his second-best mark for a season;
he had a record 383 the year before. He now has 1,572 career K's, including
1,079 in three years with the California Angels. Ryan also allows 202
walks this season, so far second only to Bob Feller's 208 in 1938. He
breaks one of Feller's records when his fastball is clocked on the radar at
100.9 miles per hour.
In other no-hitters of '74, Steve Busby of the Kansas
City Royals blanks the hosting Milwaukee Brewers in a 2-0 victory
June 19, and Dick Bosman of the Cleveland Indians manages to
silence the A's 4-0 at Cleveland Stadium July 19.
Yankee Stadium is closed for renovations, so the New
York Yankees play this season and the next at Shea Stadium.
Both divisions see some tight races. The Baltimore
Orioles finish two games ahead of the Yankees in the East, but only after a
28-6 run to finish. In the West, the Texas Rangers end up just five
behind the A's. Oakland defeats Baltimore three games to one in the American
League Championship Series to earn manager Al Dark his first and only
pennant.
The A's are not confident in Dark's abilities; he takes
instructions from owner Charles O. Finley by telephone. Sal Bando
says Dark "couldn't manage a meat market."
Rod Carew of the Twins is the
American League batting champion with a .364 average, and this is his third in
a string of four times with that distinction.
RBI leader Jeff Burroughs of the Rangers (with 118)
is the junior circuit's MVP. Teammate Mike Hargrove is Rookie of the
Year.
Dick Allen of the Chicago
White Sox, despite leading the league with 32 home runs,
"retires." He will be back next season, going from the Sox to the
N.L.'s Atlanta Braves Dec. 3.
The infamous 10-cent Beer Night promotion June 4 in
Cleveland results in fans going onto the field, throwing things, streaking, and
assaulting the visiting Rangers. The potential winning run for the Indians is
on base when umpire Nestor Chylak declares the Rangers winners by
forfeit. This is one of four major-league games to be forfeited in the '70s.
Oakland's Catfish Hunter wins the Cy Young Award for
the A.L.; he has the best ERA in the league with 2.49, and his record is 25-12.
Harmon Killebrew plays
with the Twins for one more year before spending the last season of his career
with the Royals. His 13 homers in '74 bring his all-time total to 559, making
him the fifth player to get to 550.
The fourth, Frank Robinson, is traded from the
Angels to the Indians Sept. 12. On Oct. 3, Robinson signs a contract to manage
the team in '75. It will make for a historic first that makes him a future
Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient. "We needed somebody to wake up the
city," says executive vice president Ted Broda.
Brooks Robinson of
the Orioles wins the 15th in his string of 16 Gold Gloves.
Yankees pitcher Tommy John gets the unprecedented
tendon transplant surgery that will come to bear his name Sept. 25.
Herb Washington,
"designated runner," steals 29 bases in 92 games for the A's but gets
picked off in Game 2 of the World Series, contributing to the team's only loss
in that Fall Classic. Washington, the AAU indoor 60-meter dash champion who
didn't play baseball at Michigan State, is also caught stealing twice against
Baltimore in the ALCS.
Another Oakland player, Bill North, leads the junior
circuit in stolen bases with 54.
Al Kaline of the Detroit
Tigers plays his final season, and he finishes his career with 3007 hits
(his 3000th comes Sept. 24) and 399 home runs.
Kaline is the ninth player to wind up a career of 20 years
or more while never once playing with a different team.
George Brett of the Royals is
starting on making that list. While Brett plays his rookie season with Kansas
City, Robin Yount plays his with the Milwaukee Brewers.
Hitting a home run in his first at-bat Sept. 1 is Reggie
Sanders of the Tigers, the second of three MLB players in a short span to make
such a debut.
Speaking of dingers, Bobby Grich of the Orioles
wallops three of them consecutively June 18.
Fergie Jenkins of
the Rangers leads the major leagues in complete games with 29, which after
Hunter's 30 in 1975 will be a feat unreached by any pitcher.
From April 12 to July 3, Gaylord Perry of the
Indians wins 15 games in 17 starts, not being involved in the decision for two
of them. He's denied a share of the A.L. record when he loses the July 8 game
to the A's. Gaylord Perry fails to win again until August 15, first not being
the pitcher of record in an Indians loss July 18, then losing five in a row
July 26-August 9.
Perry and Jim Kaat of the White Sox each have 21
wins. Kaat will also win 20 in 1975. Perry's brother Jim, who has just returned
to Cleveland, gets 17 wins.
One of Kaat's wins is June 7, when a popcorn machine fire at Comiskey Park that results in some 4,000 spectators going onto the field from the smoky stands in right is the reason for a delay of over an hour.
Carl Yastrzemski of
the Boston Red Sox has a batting average of .301, and this is his last
time batting .300 or better. He also hits his 300th home run and finishes the
season with 303. Yaz is the A.L. leader in runs scored with 93.
This year he has another future Hall of Fame teammate. The
Red Sox bought Juan Marichal of the N.L.'s San Francisco Giants
during the offseason Dec. 7, 1973. Marichal is released Oct. 24, but will be
picked up by the senior circuit's Dodgers in '75 for his final season.
Bill Virdon is the new manager of
the Yankees after Ralph Houk's resignation following the previous
season. This is the first of many manager changes under George Steinbrenner.
In his second year as the team's owner, Steinbrenner is suspended after the '74
season, having pleaded guilty for his illegal contributions to Richard Nixon's
'72 campaign.
The Rangers fall under the heady ownership of Brad
Corbett and his group May 29. Their manager is Billy Martin, who in
mid-July draws a fine and suspension for directing pitchers to bean the
Brewers.
Oakland catcher Ray Fosse tries to break up a fight
between teammates Reggie Jackson and Billy North during a June 5
game, and he winds up with a crushed disc.
Managers with new teams in '74: Houk is with the Tigers and
Dick Williams, manager of the A's in '72 and '73, now manages the Angels.
Home sweet home? The Angels lose 15 straight Anaheim
Stadium games June 30-July 28. The second game of the twinbill at Anaheim July
28, despite pinch-hit homers from the Twins' Killebrew and Carew, is a 12-9 win
for Ryan, who wins 22 games with a team that finishes last in the Western
Division.
The league is in the second year of what the 1974 World
Book Year Book calls a "three-year experiment" with the
designated hitter.
Future Hall of Famer Lee MacPhail begins his
ten-year service as A.L. president.
The first salary arbitration meetings are held Feb. 11. As
a result of his hearing, Dave Woodson gets $29,000 in salary as he
wanted and not just the $23,000 the Twins had offered.
Jackson is also one of sixteen players to win arbitration
hearings, and he's to be paid $135,000, not just $100,000.
An arbitration meeting in December grants Hunter free
agency, and the Yankees sign him for $750,000 a year on New Year's Eve. Up to
that point, the Mets' Tom Seaver has the biggest contract, signed Feb.
21 at $172,000 per year (some sources say $172,500).
The Yankees retire the number 16 in honor of new Hall of
Famer Whitey Ford Aug. 3.
The Indians' red jerseys make their debut. By '78, the team
will decide it's time for a new look.
The Tigers announce that they refuse to move to Pontiac,
whose Silverdome is under construction and will be finished for the NFL's Lions
in 1975. Tigers owner John Fetzer says the team "belongs to the
inner city of Detroit."
Outfielder Lou Piniella (with pitcher Ken Wright)
was traded from the Royals to the Yankees Dec. 7, 1973. In return, Kansas City
got pitcher Lindy McDaniel. Piniella bats .305 in 1974.
Since 1970, All-Star Game ballots have been prepared prior
to the start of the season, and one result of this practice is Luis Aparicio's
name appearing thereon in 1974. The Red Sox had released him (and Orlando
Cepeda) March 26, but some fans vote for him anyway.
Getting naked in public is all the rage this year. Some
attendees at a White Sox game on Opening Day, April 5, disrobe, with four being
arrested and more ejected.
Also in early April, A's pitcher Vida Blue first puts on what becomes his lucky cap. Starting this Opening Day, he will wear it game in and game out until sometime in '77.
Blue isn't the only A.L. hurler with a lucky cap. The Orioles' Mike Cuellar is separated from his by the distance between Baltimore and Cleveland when he is slated to take the mound Sept. 6. He won't pitch unless he has that particular hat on, so the team gets it to him at Cleveland Stadium in the nick of time. A five-hitter follows.
Yankees infielder Graig Nettles gets a hit Sept. 7
against the Tigers but loses the hit when he's found to have a corked bat. He
had socked a homer earlier that Saturday night in a 1-0 win at Shea Stadium,
and it's insinuated the same bat was used for the dinger.
That's what happened in the American League. A
mammoth milestone moment and a fully frustrated franchise are the highs and
lows of the National League. Celebrate this golden year March 22.
[EDIT 3/2/24 7:00-7:05 p.m. EST: I was going through Green Cathedrals and discovered the White Sox fire item I'd previously missed.]
[EDIT 3/27/24 10:17 p.m. EDT: Adjusted font size.]
