Yesterday morning I hopped on-line and caught up on the Giants news. I visited a handful of the usual sites, including The San Francisco Chronicle, ESPN and several Giants’ blogs. Afterwards, I began to think about the way I used to stay in touch with the Giants when I was a kid growing up in North Carolina. This was the mid to late 60s. Keeping up with baseball meant reading the morning and afternoon editions of the Greensboro Daily News
The most popular source of news for many baseball fans during this time was The Sporting News. I started buying “The Baseball Bible” off the newsstands in 1978, my first year in the Air Force. I remember sitting in my dormitory room and devouring all the stats, feature articles and news like a hungry lumberjack.
Realizing how much fun it would be to go back in time and see what I had missed in my first years as a follower of the orange and black, I decided to take a look at The Sporting News coverage of one of the Giants Hot Stove seasons. Using Paper of Record, I looked at TSN coverage of the Giants from November 1969 to March 1970.
Here’s a recap.
The Sporting News, published weekly, costs 50 cents. A typical issue was 40 to 50 pages. Coverage was given of the big four pro sports, plus college football and hoops, auto racing and golf.
The Giants’ articles during this time were written by Pat Frizzell. In mid-November, skipper Clyde King told Frizzell the team’s most pressing needs were at third and behind the plate. Jim Davenport, a staple at the hot spot and in the hole since 1958, was 35. Jim Ray Hart had a shoulder injury that wasn’t healing up properly. Due to injuries and illnesses, San Francisco had used four different catchers (Dick Dietz, Jack Hiatt, Bob Barton and John Stephenson) in ‘69.
In the outfield, Willie Mays (38) was an oldie but still goodie and Bobby Bonds was the rising star. Leftfield was a concern. A healthy Hart would have meant a Murderer’s Row outfield. But in ’69, the beefy slugger from Hookerton, North Carolina played in just 71 games (68 OF, 3 3B 129 OPS+). Ken Henderson had been the primary LF with (111 games, 81 OPS+). Frizzell noted the Giants used six different players at that position in the last 10 days of the ’69 season.
King had a busy off-season. He flew to Japan for a series of clinics in Tokyo and went on a scouting trip to Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republican and Venezuela.
On November 29, the senior circuit Gold Gloves were announced. Mays, for the first time since the awards were given out, was not selected. The picks were Parker, Millan, Boyer, Kessinger, Clemente, Flood, Rose, Bench and Gibson. In the same issue, Frizzell wrote, “King is certain the Giants can make some helpful trades at the winter meetings in Florida.” Normally, those deals would have been made by long time GM Chub Feeney. But he had just been named President of the National League so owner Horace Stoneham took over the duties. After selecting catcher Mike Sadek in the Rule V draft on December 1, the Giants long time owner consummated three trades.
December 5, 1969
Ron Herbel, Bob Barton, and Bobby Etheridge went to the San Diego Padres for Frank Reberger.
December 12, 1969
Ray Sadecki and Dave Marshall went to the New York Mets for Bob Heise and Jim Gosger.
Bobby Bolin to the Milwaukee Brewers for Steve Whitaker and Dick Simpson.
After seeing football, basketball and hockey dominate the cover spot, baseball fans were delighted to get the February 28, Spring Training issue. Baseball was back where it belonged, on the prominent front pages of the publication. Frizzell figured that Willie McCovey, Ron Hunt, Tito Fuentes and Dick Dietz were safe with their jobs. Alan Gallagher was mentioned as a hopeful at third. Heise and Mason would be the backup infielders. In the outfield, it looked like another season of Bonds, Mays and the H platoon in left. Whitaker and a young George Foster were back up hopes. Burda was slotted to pinch hit.
Juan Marichal, Gaylord Perry and Mike McCormick were the certain first three starters. With Bolin, Sadecki and Herbel gone, Robertson and Bryant were hopefuls to fill out the rotation. Reberger would help out in the pen and was also mentioned as a possible starter.
The March 7th and subsequent issues brought the intriguing story of the Giants trip to Japan. Frizzell noted that all 40 players on the roster would make the flight over and that it was the first ever trip to land of the rising sun by a major league club before the beginning of the season. (Chuck Nan has an excellent article on this story in the 2004 All-Star issue of Elysian Fields Quarterly). He also wrote that Stoneham had inked everyone except Marichal.
In other issues throughout the Hot Stove season, Frizzell wrote about other topics such as McCovey’s great MVP season, a ticket price increase, ($3.50 to $4 for box seats and $3 to $3.50 for reserved), plans for the installation of synthetic turf and increased capacity at Candlestick (45,000 to 60,000), Gaylord Perry’s winter job as a car salesman and the Giants Booster Club (1400 Members). Each weekly article was accompanied by a large photograph and most of the time, a concluding summary called “Giant Jottings.”
March brought the return of the coveted box scores. Then came the much anticipated picks for the upcoming season. The experts in Vegas peered into their crystal balls and saw orange and red birds flying high in October. The Giants were listed as 5-1 odds for the pennant. TSN tabbed them for yet another second place finish. Frizzell had reservations about the pitching and noted, “Second the past five seasons, the Giants may have to battle to finish that high this time.”
Concluding Thoughts:
1970 Giants broke their string of five straight second place finishes but it was in the wrong direction. With an 86 and 76 record, their worse since 1961, they finished third. Helped by a league leading on-base percentage of 347, they led the league in runs. Dietz became the regular receiver and had his best season by far with an OPS+ of 153. McCovey 182 OPS+, Mays 140, Bonds 135, Henderson 130 and Hunt 110 each contributed.
Gaylord Perry had a very good season (3.20 ERA) but the team ERA of 5.10 was last in the N.L. Mike McCormick hit a wall and was relegated to the pen. Marichal had a penicillin-induced spring from hell and suffered through his worse year since 1961. King gave Reberger some early starts but the tall ex-Padre never got it going. He pitched in 152 innings with a 5.57 ERA. Desperate for help, the Giants brought Skip Pitlock up from the farm and gave him 15 starts (4.66 ERA).
The somewhat good news for San Francisco was their 67 and 53 record under new skipper Charlie Fox. The bad news was their slow start under King. After the 42nd game, Stoneham gave him his marching orders.
I probably read about the firing in the paper the following day. Today, the latest news is a remote or mouse click away.
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