July 31, 2013
50th anniversary: Paul Foytack gives up four straight homers
Posted by Chris Jaffe
Fifty years ago today, Paul Foytack had his moment of infamy. He did something that no pitcher had ever done before, and no pitcher would ever do again for several decades. And it?s something that no pitcher ever wants to do.
On July 31, 1963, Foytack surrendered back-to-back-to-back-to-back home runs.
In 1963, Foytack was an aging pitcher nearing the end of his line. He'd had his moments as an innings-eating starting pitcher for the mid-to-late 1950s Tigers. Never a star, Foytack was a solid and dependable pitcher, the kind who could start 30-some times a year and win 15 games.
Foytack had some control problems when he first came up, walking a league leading 142 batters in 1956, his first full season. That?s still the second highest total in Tigers history. But he soon got it under control, walking half as many just two years later.
While he tamed his control, one problem continued to haunt Foytack?he gave up more than his share of home runs. In fact, by mid-1963, despite having thrown fewer than 1,500 innings in his career, Foytack had cracked the top 50 all-time in home runs allowed.
By 1963, the Tigers decided to dump him in the bullpen, and at midseason they traded him to the Angels, where he was primarily a mop-up man. So it came that 50 years ago today the Angels called on him to pitch the mid-innings of a game they were losing to the Indians, 5-1.
Foytack pitched an event-less fifth frame, and then retired the first pair of batters in the sixth. Then he met he date with destiny.
Up came Indians third baseman Woodie Held, A decent player with mid-range power, Held had hit 19 or more homers in five of the previous six seasons. And he showed off that power here, taking Foytack deep for a solo shot.
Eh, no matter. Held was batting eighth, and that meant up to the plate came Cleveland?s pitcher, Pedro Ramos. There?s an irony that Ramos would be a batter in this sequence, because he was a gopher-ball prone pitcher himself. Three times he?d led the league in homers allowed and he?d end the season ranked sixth all-time in dingers surrendered. Even better, Ramos holds an unusual record: most homers allowed to opposing pitchers, 15. Yet in this at bat Ramos would be the slugger, not the slugged. He took Foytack deep for the second straight homer.
That?s aggravating, but that?s life. Time to focus on the next batter: Tito Francona, father of the current Indians manager. Though not a slugger, Francona wasn?t a weakling either, as his 125 career homers attest. Well, career home run No. 91 happened right here.
Angels manager Bill Rigney opted to keep Foytack in the game. Maybe it was all happening too fast. Maybe it was just because Foytack still needed just one more out. Or maybe it?s because the next batter was a 23-year-old rookie named Larry Brown, playing in just his 25th game and still looking for his first home run.
He found that first homer. Four batters in a row had gone deep against Foytack. For years, Foytack would be the only pitcher to make that claim? until April 22, 2007 when it happened to Chase Wright. But Foytack did it first, and it happened 50 years ago today.
from the Hardball Times
