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1980 baseball

The 1980 Detroit Tigers Deal But Come Up Short

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The Tigers had spent two seasons putting a foundation in place for success. They called up Alan Trammell, Lou Whitaker, Jack Morris and Lance Parrish in 1978. They hired Sparky Anderson in 1979. In both cases, rebuilding didn’t mean compromising success, as they won 86 games both years. The 1980 Detroit Tigers, playing in a tough division, made a series of moves to try and take the next step. Unfortunately, the deals didn’t pan out and the Tigers suffered some modest regression.

Detroit’s big trade was shipping Ron LeFlore, a good centerfielder and base stealer to Montreal for pitcher Dan Schatzeder. The move had the right priority—pitching depth in both the rotation and the bullpen had been a Tiger problem. But the move didn’t pan out—while Schatzeder was respectable, with a 4.02 ERA in his 26 starts, it wasn’t worth giving up the lineup’s spark plug.

Another big deal came in May when Detroit dealt Jason Thompson, a good all-around first baseman to California for right fielder Al Cowens. Thompson continued to be productive. Cowens, the runner-up for the American League MVP in 1977, continued a career decline. His .339 on-base percentage was respectable—but not worth the price of Jason Thompson.

A deal with the Mets to get Richie Hebner at first base worked out better. Hebner posted a stat line of .360 OBP/.466 slugging percentage and the price of Phil Mankowski and Jerry Morales was neglible. But the net overall impact of the trades was a negative—and we haven’t even factored in the Tigers moving on from Rusty Staub at DH, Aurelio Lopez at third and Jack Billingham in the rotation. Age was a huge factor and the moves justifiable, but they still created a short-term void that was not immediately filled.

On top of all this, there was some regression from individual starting pitchers. Morris reliably took his turn, with a workmanlike 36 starts and 16 victories. But his ERA was a mediocre 4.18. Milt Wilcox’s ERA was 4.48. Dan Petry was a little better, with a 3.94 ERA in his 25 starts, but when that’s the best ERA in your rotation you have problems.

And those problems weren’t rectified in the bullpen. Aurelio Lopez saved 21 games and won 13 more, but the best reliever on staff still had an ERA of 3.77. Dave Rozema and Pat Underwood, who shuttled between the pen and the rotation, had ERAs in the high 3s.

All of which adds up to the Detroit staff finishing 10th in the 14-team American League for composite ERA. You aren’t going to make any kind run in an AL East that had baseball’s best teams with that kind of pitching.

In fact, you might even be wondering how the Tigers were competitive at all. The answer—this team could hit.

Trammell had the best season to date in his developing Hall of Fame career, batting .300. Even though Whitaker only batted .233, some excellent plate discipline and drawing walks helped Whitaker’s OBP clock in at a respectable .331. Detroit was the best in the American League when it came to taking free passes.

Steve Kemp, a good all-around hitter in left field, had a stat line of .376/.474, hit 21 homers and drove in 101 runs. Parrish popped 24 home runs of his own. Rick Peters took over for LeFlore in center and while Peters didn’t run like LeFlore did, the new centerfielder still finished with an OBP of .369.

Champ Summers handled the DH role and slugged .504 with 17 homers. Sparky used his bench well. John Wockenfuss hit 16 home runs in part-time duty. Jim Lentine’s OBP was .377. And Sparky started integrating another talented rookie into the lineup of this young team—23-year-old Kirk Gibson slugged .440 coming off the bench.

In an American League that was stacked with good lineups, no one scored more runs than the Detroit Tigers did in 1980.

Detroit faced an early schedule heavy on the Kansas City Royals, who were bound for the World Series this year. The Tigers lost eight of their first ten, but quickly rebounded to get close to .500. But when the schedule stiffened again—this time against the top two teams in the AL East, the Yankees and Orioles, Detroit lost eight of twelve. By the end of that schedule run, shortly after Memorial Day, Detroit’s record was 18-24 and they were eight games out of first place.

In the divisional alignment that existed from 1969-93, each league had only an East and West division and only the first-place team moved on to the playoffs. That meant that Detroit—along with Cleveland and Milwaukee (an American League team until 1998) were put in the AL East, along with New York, Baltimore, Boston and Toronto. This division—with the Yankees, Orioles and Red Sox all respected powers and the Brewers joining the Tigers as a rising force—was the gold standard for all of baseball.

When Detroit lost two of three in Milwaukee in early June, they were nine games off the pace. Then the Tigers caught fire and ripped off 19 wins in 25 games. The highlight came when the Brewers made the return trip to Tiger Stadium mid-month.

The series opened on Monday with a twilight doubleheader, a common scheduling thing at the time where a twinbill began around 5 PM, with twenty minutes between games. The Tigers fell behind in the opener 5-1, but rallied behind consecutive two-out RBI hits from Summers and Cowens. They pulled out a 6-5 win.

Milwaukee won the nightcap and set up Tuesday night’s rubber match between Morris and Milwaukee’s good lefthander, Mike Caldwell. Morris was brilliant, with a complete-game five-hitter and Detroit took the series with a 3-0 shutout.

So what did this run of strong play get Detroit? By the All-Star break they were 42-33 and tied for second place…but still 7 ½ games behind the Yankees, who were on a pace for 106 wins.

And the late summer would be cruel, as it often is to teams who struggle to find pitching. In late July, still in second place and eight games out, the Tigers lost three straight at home to California. Kansas City came into Tiger Stadium and won three straight. In mid-August, Detroit lost four straight to mediocre Texas.

By Labor Day, the Tigers were still above water, with a 67-61 record, but now in fourth place and 10 ½ games out. They basically held serve in September. There were seven games against the Orioles, who would win 100 games and have to settle for second place, where Detroit went 1-6. The Tigers made up for it by beating bad teams in the White Sox and the Blue Jays.

The final record came in at 84-78, fourth place and 19 games out. On the positive side, it was a third straight winning season and the quality of the division, meant it was fifth-best overall in the American League. On the negative side, it was two fewer wins than the year before and the 11th-best record in the major leagues overall. Whether it was a playoff season by the standards of today depends on how you want to do the math.

The Tigers had opened the season looking for more and come up short. But they wouldn’t stop coming and a breakthrough to real contention was just around the corner.

1980 Pittsburgh Pirates: The September Fade Of A Champion

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The Pittsburgh Pirates were the NL East’s flagship franchise of the 1970s. They won the division six times in that decade. Nine times they won at least 88 games. Two World Series trophies came to the Steel City—a pair of triumphs over the nearby Baltimore Orioles, including one to end the decade in 1979. The 1980 Pittsburgh Pirates made a strong run at replicating all of those feats. But a September fade foreshadowed a decade of non-contention ahead.

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Willie “Pops” Stargell had been the hero of ’79, but the first baseman was now 40-years-old. He was still good, posting a .351 on-base percentage and .485 slugging percentage. But that was in just 231 plate appearances. John Milner started getting more time at first base and while his .378 OBP was solid, Milner lacked Stargell’s power.

The rest of the infield didn’t hit at all. Shortstop Tim Foli was there for his defense and not expected to produce offensively, but the other spots were a disappointment. Phil Garner had pushed Rennie Stennett out at second base during the 1979 title run, but Garner had an off-year. More disappointing was third baseman Bill Madlock, one of the National League’s consistently best hitters, slipping to a stat line of .341 OBP/.399 slugging percentage.

Dave Parker played rightfield and had won the NL MVP award two years earlier. 1980 was a tough year. He was limited to 139 games and only hit 17 home runs. The RBI total slipped to 79. And while he batted .295, the lack of walks led to a meager OBP of .327.

So how did Pittsburgh manage to rank fifth in a 12-team National League in runs scored? The first answer is that Mike Easler had the best year of his career in left field. His batting average of .338 keyed a stat line of .396/.583. Omar Moreno in centerfield wasn’t a good hitter, but any time he got on base it was as good as a double—Moreno swiped 96 bags in 1980.

And the Pirates had depth. In addition to Stargell, Lee Lacy and Bill Robinson had really good years in limited playing time. Lacy’s stat line was .394/.511, while Robinson slugged .463. It was enough to keep the Pirate offense afloat.

The pitching staff was hurt by the loss of reliable starter Bruce Kison to free agency, but the rotation of 1980 was still steady. Jim Bibby, at age 35, won 19 games and finished with a 3.32 ERA. John Candelaria and Bert Blyleven each had sub-.500 records, but the ERAs were respectable and each went to the post over 30 times, making handling the rest of the staff easier for manager Chuck Tanner.

Don Robinson and Rick Rhoden were reliable at the back end of the rotation. So was Kent Tekulve, Enrique Romo and Grant Jackson in the bullpen. Eddie Solomon swung both ways and pitched well both starting and in relief.

What hurt the Pirate staff was that while a lot of people were respectable, no one was really outstanding. So they settled for sixth in the National League in staff ERA.

Pittsburgh came out of the gate looking the part of defending champs. They went to Montreal, whom they’d battled with to the very end in the 1979 NL East race (prior to the realignment of 1994, the East included the Pirates, Cardinals and Cubs, along with the Expos—today’s Washington Nationals, the Phillies and the Mets). The Buccos won two of three north of the border.

Montreal made a return visit to Pittsburgh in April. Parker drove in three runs in the opener and the game was tied 4-4 going into the 10th inning. Stargell singled and was pinch-run for by Matt Alexander. A double by Madlock won the game. Bibby threw a complete-game shutout the next night, while Garner hit two home runs. In the finale, the Pirates and Expos again went extra innings. Again, Stargell singled and was pinch-run for by Alexander. Again, Alexander scored on a walkoff double, this one from Bill Robinson.

Pittsburgh got off to a 12-5 start and their lead in the division grew as high as five games in the early part of May. A trip to face a contending Dodger team in Los Angeles brought them back to earth with three straight losses. But the Pirates still reached the Memorial Day turn with a record of 22-15. They were a game up on the Phillies and plus-2 ½ on the Expos.

In May it was time to match up with Philadelphia, who had taken the NL East title three straight years from 1976-78 before slipping back the year before. The Pirates and Phils split four in Philly and then reconvened in Pittsburgh for a three-game set.

The Pirates won the opener, but trailed the second game 3-2 in the eighth. Phils’ closer Tug McGraw was on the mound. Stargell tied with a home run. In the bottom of the ninth, with the bases loaded and two outs, catcher Ed Ott singled home the winning run. Pittsburgh lost the series finale, but their lead in the NL East still grew to four games in the early days of June.

But the arrival of summer produced the first serious slump of the season. The Pirates lost 14 of 21 and fell 3 ½ games off the pace. They won a series in Montreal to start a stretch of seven wins in 11 games. By the All-Star break, Pittsburgh’s record was 42-37. The division race was red-hot, with the Expos in the lead, the Phils a half-game back and the Pirates a mere game off the lead.

Pittsburgh came firing out of the All-Star break with a 13-5 stretch. They won two of three in Philly, scoring 31 runs in the process. They won three of four at home over Los Angeles. In that series finale, the nightcap of a Sunday doubleheader, the Pirates trailed 7-6 in the ninth. With one out and the bases loaded, Milner coaxed a walk that tied the game. Ott again delivered in the clutch with a base hit that won the game. Pittsburgh was back up top in the NL East by three games.

A wild ride through August ensued. The Pirates lost six straight. They won eight straight. They continued their mastery of the Expos, winning three of four over Montreal behind brilliant outings from Bibby, Blyleven and Rhoden.

But Pittsburgh then lost three in a row at eventual NL West champ Houston. The Pirates responded by winning three in a row over the contending Cincinnati Reds, an NL West team prior to the ’94 realignment. Pittsburgh was two games up in the NL East as the calendar neared Labor Day and they began a homestand with the lowly Atlanta Braves (also an NL West team according to the convoluted geography of the time) and the Reds.

The homestand, which led into the holiday, was an utter disaster. Seven straight losses. Neither the Phils or the Expos were hot either, so Pittsburgh maintained a half-game lead on both rivals. But with all of the Pirates’ losses being at home, this was a serious missed opportunity.

And it got worse. Pittsburgh paid a return visit to Atlanta and was swept again. The Pirates went to Philadelphia, hoping to reassert their mojo.

It was the city of Pittsburgh’s time in the sun. The Steelers had won the previous two Super Bowls and opened their season by beating the archrival Houston Oilers. Now the Pirates just had to take care of the Phils and the City of Champions could be back in business.

But the bullpen failed. Tuesday night’s opener was tied 2-2 in the eighth when Romo gave up four runs and lost 6-2. The Pirates led the Phils 4-2 in the eighth inning the next night. Tekulve gave up the lead and Pittsburgh lost 5-4 in extra innings.

The Pirates were 3 ½ back with the Phils and Expos running neck-and-neck. There was still time to turn the ship around, but the margin for error was slipping away. Pittsburgh went to Montreal for a weekend series. Pirate ownership of the Expos came to an end, with two losses in the three-game set, both by shutout. Pittsburgh was 4 ½ back.

On September 22 there were two weeks to go and a two-game set at home with Montreal had to represent the last stand. The Pirates won the opener 4-2, but Blyleven was hit the next night in a 7-1 loss.

Anyone who still harbored hope after this two-game set was quickly brought to reality when Pittsburgh lost six of their next eight. By the time the Phils and Expos began their epic weekend series to end the season, Pittsburgh was eight games out. The Pirates ended 83-79, and watched Philadelphia go on a dramatic ride through October to win the World Series.

The fade in September of 1980 was more than just an aberration. The Pirates slipped under. 500 in the strike year of 1981. They had winning seasons the two years following, but they were of the 84-78 variety and not ones that produced real pennant excitement. The bottom fell out for this franchise by the middle of the 1980s and they did not contend again until the division-winning year of 1990.

1980 Milwaukee Brewers: The Season-Long Narrative

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The 1980 Milwaukee Brewers came into the season as a team on the rise. They followed up a breakout year in 1978 with another strong year in 1979, in each case only the strength of their division keeping them out of the playoffs. By that standard, 1980 was a disappointment. The Brewers continued to play winning baseball, but injuries and bullpen problems led to regression in the won-loss column.

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The Milwaukee teams of this era were renowned for their ability to hit. The ‘80 edition finished third in the American League in runs scored, and excelled at most everything except drawing walks—which, in all fairness, was not emphasized the way it is in today’s game.

Cecil Cooper hit .352, second in the American League and the first baseman finished fifth in the MVP voting. Ben Oglivie’s 41 home runs tied for the league lead. Robin Yount played terrific all-around baseball, leading the league in doubles and scoring 121 runs. Gorman Thomas bashed 38 home runs. Charlie Moore and Jim Gantner weren’t feared hitters, but with batting averages of .291 and .282 respectively, they weren’t easy outs in a lineup like this.

But Molitor missed 50 games, and his penchant for getting on the disabled list eventually prompted a move to get him away from his second base spot. Sixto Lezcano, a rising star in rightfield, first missed 50 games of his own and had a bad year when he was healthy.

The starting pitching was good enough to compensate—Moose Haas came into his own at the age of 24 and won 16 games with a 3.10 ERA. Mike Caldwell, a reliable veteran lefty, logged 225 innings and won 13. Lary Sorensen, another reliable arm, churned out 12 wins and nearly 200 innings. Bill Travers was competent at the back end of the rotation and the Brewers got some respectable spot start work from Paul Mitchell and Reggie Cleveland.

But the bullpen was woefully lacking in depth. Bob McClure and Bill Castro were functionable arms, but at a time when the closer’s role was becoming ever-more popular—and also one that would be utilized as early as the seventh and eighth inning, the Brewers were woefully deficient.

And the division they were in was merciless. Milwaukee was an American League team prior to 1998 and in the baseball alignments that existed up through 1993, they were in the AL East. There were only two divisions per league and only the first-place teams advanced into postseason play. The previous two seasons had seen Milwaukee produce a team that was good enough to win other divisions—but not the one where any of the Yankees, Red Sox or Orioles were knocking on the door of 100 wins.

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The season started off in exciting fashion. Lezcano came up with the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth in a 5-5 tie against the Red Sox. He poked a grand slam down the rightfield line. The Brewers went on to take two of three in New York. But they were also swept three straight at home by lowly Toronto. At the Memorial Day turn, Milwaukee’s record was 19-18, four games off a pace being set by the Yanks.

An East Coast trip in June went well, as the Brewers went 5-2 on a run through Boston and Baltimore. They went 9-5 on a long road trip that included AL West power Kansas City and the West Coast. But the bullpen weakness was most evident by three walkoff losses. Milwaukee’s record was a solid 43-34 at the All-Star break, but New York was the best team in the majors and held a seven-game lead.

In the late part of July it became apparent that Baltimore, rather than Milwaukee, would be the one to make a run at New York in the second half. The Brewers lost five of six games to the Orioles. Milwaukee also dropped five of eight to New York. For good measure, they dumped three of four in Fenway.

There were some good moments—a four-game sweep in Cleveland saw the bats get unleashed and score 10-plus runs twice. But the problems against the league’s upper crust continued to be evident when Kansas City came to town in late August. The Royals won three straight, including one game where George Brett went 5-for-5 and lifted his average to .407. It was the highwater mark of Brett’s pursuit of .400, and he eventually “slipped” to .390.

During this long hot summer, manager George Bamberger, whose arrival in 1978 coincided with the arrival of winning baseball, stepped down. Buck Rodgers took his place. The Brewers showed life in September, even though they were miles off the pace of the Yankees and Orioles, who each hit the 100-win threshold.

Milwaukee went 17-12 down the stretch. They ended the season the way they had begun—with some walkoff drama for the home fans. Oglivie hit his 41st home run in the ninth to tie the game 4-4 and tie him with Reggie Jackson for the AL home run title. The Brewers eventually won in 15 innings and finished the season 86-76.

It was a fun ending, but did not overshadow the disappointment that Brewer fans felt. They were used to contention and wanted to see their team get over the hump. They wouldn’t have long to wait—by December, the biggest trade in franchise history was engineered to strengthen the bullpen with Hall of Fame closer Rollie Fingers. In 1981, they made the playoffs in the strike-shortened season. And in 1982, they won the American League pennant.

A Second Straight Heartbreak For The 1980 Montreal Expos

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The 1980 Montreal Expos were coming off a breakout year in 1979, when they franchise not only had its first winning season but competed to the final weekend before succumbing to eventual World Series champion Pittsburgh. The 1980 baseball season followed a similar path—Montreal validated their arrival, but again lost a crushing race to an eventual World Series champion, this time Philadelphia.

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Montreal was a young team and well-balanced. They ranked fourth in the National League in runs scored, keyed by drawing walks and stealing bases. The Expos were fifth in the NL in ERA, with a bullpen that was deep by the standards of the time.

The team’s most complete players were catcher Gary Carter and centerfielder Andre Dawson, both future Hall of Famers and both in their mid-20s. Carter hit 29 home runs and drove in 101 runs. Dawson posted a .358 on-base percentage/.492 slugging percentage. Another good young talent was 25-year-old rightfielder Ellis Valentine. Though he didn’t achieve the career heights of Carter and Dawson, Valentine might have been the best in 1980, with his .367/.524 numbers.

Left fielder Ron Leflore had been acquired before the season in a trade for lefty starter Dan Schatezeder. It was a risky move, with Schatzeder coming off a 10-5 season and 2.83 ERA in 1979, but it worked out. Leflore stole 97 bases in 1980 and Schatzeder didn’t pitch well until he returned to Montreal three years later.

The other big base-stealing threat was second baseman Rodney Scott, a wizard with the glove and who made the most of his meager .307 on-base percentage by swiping 63 bases. Other offensive contributors included first baseman Warren Cromartie and shortstop Chris Speier, who had respectable OBPS. Third baseman Larry Parrish had a little pop in his bat.

Steve Rogers anchored the pitching staff and the 30-year-old starter went to the post 37 times in 1980. He went 16-11 with a 2.98 ERA. Scott Sanderson, only 23-years-old, was the other key mainstay in the rotation, making 33 starts and also going 16-11. Sanderson finished with a 3.11 ERA.

Manager Dick Williams mixed and matched the get the rest of the pitching put together. Bill Gullickson and David Palmer were both good young starters, as was Charlie Lea. Veteran lefthander Bill Lee struggled in 1980, going just 4-6 with a 4.96 ERA.

Woodie Fryman was the man in the pen, and the 40-year-old showed he could still get it done, with 17 saves and a 2.25 ERA. Williams could also turn to Fred Norman, once a key starter for Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine championship teams of 1975-76, and still a reliable reliever in 1980. Elias Sosa had been a part of recent pennants with the Los Angeles Dodgers, and he gave Williams 93 innings of work and a 3.07 ERA. Stan Bahnsen, age 35, worked 91 innings with a 3.05 ERA.

The bullpen was the most experienced area of the team and having four good arms, along with a longer rotation than the norm, gave the Expos good depth for the long haul.

Montreal didn’t start well, losing eight of twelve games to the Pirates and Phillies in the early portion of the schedule. The Expos reached Memorial Day with a 19-17 record, but that was still within 2 ½ games of first-place Pittsburgh, with Philadelphia nestled in between.

It was June 2 that Montreal began to take off, starting an 11-3 stretch that took them from four games out to a half-game up in the NL East. Then they again had problems with their two main rivals, losing five of nine to the Pirates and Phils. The division race was red-hot at the All-Star break, with Montreal up a half-game on Philadelphia and by one game on Pittsburgh.

The Expos enjoyed a 9-3 homestand from July 28 to August 7, but the best teams in the National League continued to be a problem. They dropped three of four in Pittsburgh. And before August was over, Montreal would play seven games with the Los Angeles Dodgers, a strong contender in the NL West. The Expos lost all seven. But they were good enough against the teams they were supposed to be beat, that on Labor Day the race was still unaltered—Montreal was plus-one game on Philly and up two on Pittsburgh.

Immediately following the holiday weekend, Montreal finally beat Pittsburgh, taking two of three behind shutouts from Sanderson and Gullickson. It helped nudge the Pirates into the rearview mirror and gradually begin the narrowing of the race to two teams.

Some treading water then began at the top of the division. Montreal split six games with subpar teams in the Mets and Cardinals, split two more in Pittsburgh and Chicago and then went to Philadelphia for a big three-game weekend series trailing by a half-game with a week and a half left.

Palmer pitched well in the Friday night opener and the game was tied 1-1 in the eighth, but the offense only got four hits and a walkoff home run finally beat Palmer. Now Montreal had to take on Philadelphia’s Steve Carlton, a future Hall of Famer and the ultimate Cy Young winner this season.

Sanderson matched Carlton through six innings and the game was tied 2-2. Carter homered to give Montreal the lead and outfielder Jerry White later doubled in another run. Speier finished with three hits, with Dawson and White coming up with two more in a big 4-3 win. Carter erupted in Sunday’s finale, homering twice and driving in four runs. Dawson had three more hits, while Speier drove in a pair of runs in an 8-3 win.

Montreal was up by a half-game and they kept it going by sweeping St. Louis three straight. But Philadelphia answered, sweeping Chicago four straight. The race was dead even going into the final weekend and the Expos would host the Phillies for the final weekend. It was a simple best two-of-three for the NL East flag.

Sanderson pitched Friday’s opener and was excellent, but the offense was again absent. They only mustered four hits and lost 2-1. It was do-or-die on Saturday, and if they won that, another victory over Carlton would be required on Sunday.

White hit a two-run homer in the third inning, but Montreal trailed 3-2 in the seventh. An error opened the door for the Expos and Scott, who finished with three hits, ripped a double that gave his team a 4-3 lead. It stayed that way to the ninth, with Fryman looking to close it out.

The veteran closer walked Pete Rose to start the inning. Though Rose moved up on a productive out, Fryman still got the next two batters and was poised to get out of it. But he gave up a tying single and the game went extra innings.

Bahnsen was on the mound in the 10th inning and Rose was again leading off. Again, he caused problems, with a base hit. With one out, Mike Schmidt broke Expo hearts when he homered Montreal went quietly in the bottom of the inning and the 6-4 loss ended their pennant bid.

Montreal got over the NL East hump in 1981, reaching the League Championship Series for the only time in their history. But this young and talented team that seemed to have the world at its fingertips in 1980, never got the World Series. 1980 was an outstanding year, but the Schmidt home run at the end is still the memory of unredeemed heartbreak.

The Roller Coaster Season Of The 1980 Los Angeles Dodgers

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The 1980 Los Angeles Dodgers went through an up and down season that kept them in the race and their fans on the edge of their seats. It ended in a fitting way—after a surge to catch the Houston Astros, the Dodgers lost a one-game playoff that settled the NL West title.

 

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Los Angeles had won successive National League pennants in 1977-78, but took a step back in 1979 when they struggled to a 79-83 finish. Tom Lasorda’s team was aggressive in the free agent market.

They signed Dave Goltz, a recent 20-game winner with the Twins and the Dodgers added closer Don Stanhouse, fresh off a trip to the World Series in Baltimore. In the end though, the big money newcomers flamed out and it was the Old Guard that simply bounced back and got the franchise back on track.

While Goltz struggled to 7-11 and a 4.31 ERA, veteran lefty Jerry Reuss went 18-6 with a 2.51 ERA. Another vet, Don Sutton posted a 13-5 mark and a sparkling 2.20 ERA. Burt Hooton, a reliable pitcher during the recent pennant years, went 14-8 with a 3.66 ERA. And young Bob Welch, in his second full season, delivered 14 more wins and a 3.29 ERA. All four core starters worked over 200 innings.

The bullpen lacked depth, but in an era when complete games were much more common, this wasn’t a fatal flaw. And Lasorda had a solid closer in Steve Howe and a reliable middle man in Bobby Castillo. When all was said and done, the Los Angeles staff was second in the National League in ERA.

Dodger Stadium is a big park that favors the pitching staff, and that makes the achievement of the Los Angeles offense even more impressive. They led the league in home runs. First baseman Steve Garvey, third baseman Ron Cey and leftfielder Dusty Baker combined for 81 home runs, while rightfielder Reggie Smith finished with a slugging percentage of .508.

Other offensive contributors included 35-year-old second baseman Davey Lopes, who could still run and swiped 23 bases. Three quality veterans came off the bench in outfielders Jay Johnstone and Rick Monday, along with catcher Joe Ferguson. All finished with on-base percentages between .353 and .372. And 24-year-old Pedro Guerrero, soon to be a big-time player, got nearly 200 at-bats and put up a .359 OBP/.497 slugging percentage.

Los Angeles’ offense wasn’t always patient, finishing below the league average in walks. But the power was enough to place them sixth in the 12-team National League in runs scored and combined with the pitching staff that was more than enough to compete.

The season picked up where 1979 had ended, and that was playing poorly. The Dodgers lost six of seven to the Astros, the lowlight of a 3-7 start. Then Los Angeles turned around and won ten in a row. Which was immediately followed by losing five of six, which was subsequently followed by a 10-1 run.

By Memorial Day, the Dodgers had more ups and downs under their belt than most teams would have in a season. But they were in first place at 25-15. Cincinnati, who won the NL West in ’79, was three games back. Houston and San Diego were each 3 ½ games out.

The early summer was a little more stable, but there was still a 2-6 stretch in early June and the Dodgers slipped as many as three games back. They got on a little four-game win streak right before the All-Star break. The midseason festivities were held in Los Angeles this season and the Dodgers were in a virtual tie for first with the Astros. The Reds were 4 ½ out and the Padres had fallen off the map.

After two quick wins at home over Houston to start the second half, Los Angeles hit the skids hard again, dropping 11 of 16. They were 3 ½ games out and after treading water until August 19, got on their biggest hot streak of this streaky season. They ripped off 17 wins in 20 games, including a 7-0 mark against a good Montreal Expos team that fought to the final weekend in the NL East.

Los Angeles rolled into Labor Day back on top of the NL West, two games ahead of Houston and plus-five on Cincinnati. The Dodgers faced both rivals the week after the holiday. They gave away the lead with two straight losses in Houston, but responded with a three-game sweep in Cincinnati. Los Angeles was back in a first-place tie, but at least the race seemed to be finally narrowing to just two teams.

At least until the following week. The Dodgers hosted the Reds, who returned the favor by coming into LA and delivering a road sweep. Los Angeles went 2-5 on the week. The good news was they were only a game back Houston, while Cincinnati had new life, within 3 ½ games of the lead.

Los Angeles then failed to take advantage of a soft schedule week, where they played seven games against the also-ran Braves, Giants and Padres. The Dodgers only went 3-4, slipping two games back of Houston. The Reds were still lurking at 3 ½ out when the final week began.

A series victory over San Francisco, two out of three, eliminated Cincinnati, because the final weekend saw the Dodgers and Astros going head-to-head. But Houston extended the lead to three games. If there was a tie for first, the one-game playoff would be in Los Angeles, so the stakes were very simple for the Dodgers—they had to win four straight home games over Houston, the three regular season games to tie and the playoff to finish the job.

Los Angeles was two outs from elimination on Friday night, trailing 2-1 and seemingly ready to waste a clutch outing from Sutton. With one out, Monday singled and then moved up on an error. With two outs, Cey was the last hope. He singled to tie the game and in the 10th inning, Ferguson homered to win it.

The Dodgers were also saved in that game by some clutch relief work from a Mexican kid who would not pitch enough innings in 1980 for it to qualify as his rookie year. Fernando Valenzuela tossed a couple shutout innings and laid the groundwork for what would be a dynamic rookie campaign and Cy Young season in 1981.

Reuss and Nolan Ryan hooked up in another pitcher’s duel on Saturday and Reuss got the better of it, winning 2-1 and extending the race one more day. On Sunday afternoon, Hooton got the ball and struggled. Los Angeles trailed 3-0 after four innings. Castillo, Valenzuela and Howe held down the fort and the Dodgers chipped back to within 3-2 in the eighth, but time was running out.

Again, they came back and again Cey was a hero. After Garvey reached on an error, Cey homered. The Astros put the tying run on third in the ninth, but Howe preserved the 4-3 win. This miracle push still had life and it would come down to one game on Monday afternoon.

The mistakes off the offseason finally bit the Dodgers here. Goltz was the only one left who could pitch and he had nothing, digging a quick 4-0 hole and this time there was no comeback. Los Angeles lost 7-1 and the season was over.

It was still a bounceback year for the 1980 Los Angeles Dodgers, as the organization showed its resiliency after 1979 and these individual players showed their toughness throughout the roller coaster ride of a season. And one year later that all paid off, when the Dodgers won the World Series.

The 1980 Baltimore Orioles: When 100 Wins Wasn’t Enough

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The 1980 Baltimore Orioles were coming off a season where they got within three innings of winning the World Series. They were even better in 1980, but it didn’t translate into a championship. It didn’t even add up to a postseason appearance. The Orioles won 100 games, but were outlasted in the AL East by the 103-win New York Yankees in the pre-1994 era when only first-place teams advanced to the playoffs.

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Baltimore was built on strong pitching under manager Earl Weaver and 1980 was no different. Even though Mike Flangan, the 1979 AL Cy Young Award winner slipped to a 4.12 ERA and 16-13 record, there was someone else ready to step up—Steve Stone won 25 games, posted a 3.23 ERA in 250 innings of work and kept the Cy Young in Baltimore.

The balanced rotation was filled out by lefty Scott McGregor, who used his pinpoint control to win 20 games with a 3.32 ERA. Veteran Jim Palmer won 16 games with a 3.98 ERA. Overall, these core four starting pitchers combined to start 143 games. The ERAs ranged from Stone’s 3.23 to Flanagan’s 4.12 and all four worked over 220 innings. That’s consistency.

Weaver lost closer Don Stanhouse to free agency, but Tim Stoddard stepped up with 26 saves (a good number for an era when complete games were in much greater abundance) and Sammy Stewart was a workhorse, with 118 innings and a respectable 3.56 ERA. Dennis Martinez made twelve spot starts, otherwise worked out of the pen and posted a 3.97 ERA.

The staff overall posted the third-best ERA in the American League. And the offense, which ranked fifth in runs scored, wasn’t far behind.

Eddie Murray, the future Hall of Fame first baseman and just 24-years-old in 1980 was the focal point of the attack. Murray batted .300, hit 32 home runs, finished with 116 RBI, scored 100 runs and delivered some stellar defensive work at first base. He finished sixth in the American League MVP voting.

Ken Singleton in right field was another good all-around player. Singleton batted .304, popped 24 home runs and drove in 104 runs. Murray and Singleton were the big guns of the attack and after that Weaver relied on steady depth.

Al Bumbry was a solid leadoff man, batting .318. Rick Dempsey and Rich Dauer were good defensive players at catcher and second base respectively and each finished with on-base percentages over .330, making them at least respectable with the bat.

The left side of the infield was more of a problem, with third baseman Doug DeCinces having an off-year at the plate and shortstop Mark Belanger having long been known as a defensive whiz, but an offensive liability. The difference was that this year, the normally good-hitting Kiko Garcia, who Belanger split time with at short, collapsed to a .199 batting average.

Weaver got good production from his left field platoon of young Gary Roenicke and veteran John Lowenstein. The latter in particular, who finished with a .403 OBP. Terry Crowley was a part-time DH and finished with a .364 OBP/.476 slugging percentage. Pat Kelly posted a .363 OBP in his own part-time role of DH and the outfield. With the manager using these moving parts in the lineup, built around Murray and Singleton, the Orioles produced runs.

Baltimore started slowly, although that wasn’t unusual in the Weaver era, when they often surged after the All-Star break. The Orioles lost four of five early games with the Yankees and also dropped three of four in Milwaukee, where the Brewers were then an AL East team and had finished second to Baltimore in 1979. By Memorial Day, the Orioles were still sub-.500 at 19-22, in fifth place and six games back of New York.

They lost two of three at home to Milwaukee in early June and didn’t clear .500 until June 17, in the midst of a 13-3 stretch that helped push Baltimore to 42-36 by the All-Star break. They were now up to fourth place, but nine games back of the Yankees.

A middling 6-5 start to the second half gave no signs of an impending surge and the Orioles were ten games back on July 21. Then they took off, winning 14 of 17 games, cutting the Yankee lead to 5 ½ games and going to New York for a  three-game weekend series on August 8.

Murray answered the bell in the opener with four hits, including a home run. Palmer worked into the eighth inning and beat 1978 Cy Young winner Ron Guidry 5-2. Saturday’s game was tied 2-2 in the eighth when Singelton delivered an RBI triple and Crowley tacked on a single for some insurance. Stone got the complete-game win.

In Sunday’s finale, Flanagan struggled and the Orioles trailed 5-4 in the ninth. Utility infielder Lenn Sakata led off with a triple. When May and Dauer failed to pick him up, it looked like a great opportunity might disappear and Baltimore would miss it’s chance for a knockout blow in the series. Dempsey hit a clutch single to tie the game and aftrer Singleton walked, a Murray double gave the Orioles a 6-5 win and cut the lead in the AL East to 2 ½ games.

New York nudged back out to 3 ½ games and a rare five-game series over five days between the two rivals was at hand in old Memorial Stadium.

Stone did what an ace is supposed to do and set the tone with a complete-game two-hitter in Thursday’s 6-1 win. Flanagan again struggled on Friday, giving up four early runs. Stewart pitched four-plus innings of shutout relief, but the early deficit was too much in a 4-3 loss. On Saturday, the Baltimore attack could only muster five hits off veteran Gaylord Perry. The 4-1 defeat left the Orioles in danger of letting their recent progress slip away.

The offense was no better on Sunday, but McGregor was clutch, with a  complete game six-hitter and a 1-0 win. In Monday evening’s final game, the Oriole offense unloaded for three runs apiece in the fourth and fifth innings. Bumbry finished with three hits, two RBIs and was in the middle of both rallies. New York rallied to cut the lead to 6-5 in the eighth, but Stoddard closed the door. The Birds were still within 2 ½ games and there was still a month and a half to finish the job.

Baltimore knocked the lead to a meager half-game and for five days between August 22-26, it stayed on that. But that was the high-water mark. The point at which the Oriole surge crested came on Labor Day weekend against an Oakland A’s team that was mediocre, but on the rise and under the leadership of an old enemy—Billy Martin, just two years earlier the Yankee manager.

Flanagan’s rough year continued in the Thursday opener against Oakland as he took a 7-1 loss. Baltimore then dug themselves a 6-2 hole on Friday before a three-run home run by reserve outfielder Bennie Ayala was the key to a rally for an 8-7 win. But Palmer took a hard-luck 3-2 loss on Saturday and Stone finally cracked on Sunday. The ace gave up three runs in the first and lost 5-2.

Baltimore played well after that, but New York was just setting the bar too high. The race never really got razor-tight again the rest of the season. The Orioles finished the season with the second-best record in baseball but got left out of the October party. Nonetheless, the 1980 Baltimore Orioles, with their 100 victories, deserve a place as one of the great teams in franchise history and Earl Weaver’s successful tenure.

The 1980 NLCS: The Best League Championship Series Ever Played

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When you hear “Phillies-Astros” as a playoff matchup, it doesn’t jump off the charts as a marquee possibility. But in the 1980 NLCS, these two teams staged a playoff battle that ranks at or near the top of the greatest postseason series ever played.

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You can read more about the regular season paths the Phillies and Astros took to reach the playoffs and the seasons enjoyed by their key players at the links below. This article will focus squarely on the games of the 1980 NLCS.

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READ MORE ABOUT THE 1980 HOUSTON ASTROS

Homefield advantage for the NLCS, which was then a best-of-five series, was set on a rotation basis. The first two games were scheduled for Philadelphia’s Veterans Stadium, with the final three over the weekend being at the Astrodome in Houston.

Philadelphia had gone to the season’s penultimate day to win the NL East, but the rotation worked out that their ace, Steve Carlton, was ready to go—Carlton had been scheduled to start the season finale, but was able to be held back by virtue of the clinching.

Houston missed the same opportunity for their ace Joe Niekro, missing three chances to clinch before finally turning to Niekro to win a one-game playoff on Monday. The Astros arrived in Philly for Tuesday’s game and would start Ken Forsch.

Forsch stepped up and pitched well, and the Astros scored first, on a two-out RBI single from Gary Woods in the third inning. But Forsch had been victimized all year by poor run support and that trend continued. Houston never scored again. In the bottom of the sixth, Pete Rose led off with a single and then Greg Luzinski hit a two-run shot to give the Phils a 2-1 lead.

The Phillies got an insurance run in the seventh when Garry Maddox singled, was bunted over and scored on a two-out pinch-hit from Greg Gross. Philadelphia closer Tug McGraw nailed down the last six outs. The 3-1 win was a good game…but little did anyone know that it was actually the worst of the five games in the 1980 NLCS.

Houston turned to veteran fireballer Nolan Ryan for Game 2 on Wednesday night, while Philadelphia sent Dick Ruthven to the mound. Once again, the Astros scored first in the third. Craig Reynolds drew a walk, moved up on a bunt and scored on a base hit by Terry Puhl.

Philadelphia again countered with two runs, this time coming back in the fourth inning. Mike Schmidt and Luzinski hit consecutive doubles to start the inning, and Maddox later picked up Luzinski with an RBI single.

The 2-1 score held to the seventh when Ryan somehow worked a walk with two outs. Puhl ripped a double and Ryan booked it all the way around, to score the tying run. In the bottom of the inning it looked like Philly would get the lead right back, with runners on second and third with one out. Houston manager Bill Virdon first summoned lefty Joe Sambito, who struck out Bake McBride. Then Virdon called on his righty, Dave Smith, to strike out Schmidt.

Houston took the lead with a double by Joe Morgan, who came around on a single by Cruz, but Philadelphia immediately countered, with Luzinski singling, moving up on a bunt by Manny Trillo and scoring on a base hit from Maddox. The Phils were then poised to win it in the ninth, with three straight one-out singles to load the bases. Houston reliever Frank Lacorte struck out Trillo and escaped.

The Astros broke it open in the tenth. Puhl singled and was bunted over. After an intentional walk, Cruz drove in the lead run, and an error by McBride in the outfield left runners on second and third. A productive out by Cesar Cedeno added another run. Before it was over, a Dave Bergman triple added two more and Houston was up 7-3. But it turned out they needed that insurance.

Larry Bowa singled to start the bottom of the 10th, and Bob Boone drew a walk. With one out, Rose grounded into a force play, and an error on the double play turn brought in a run. McBride drew a walk. Houston fans watched nervously as the bases were loaded and Schmidt came to the plate as the lead run. He lifted a fly ball to right, but it stayed in the park. Houston had an exhausting 7-4 win.

The teams took a day off—certainly needed for the Astros, who had been playing high-intensity games without a break for six straight days and went to Houston for Friday afternoon’s Game 3. Niekro made his first appearance of the NLCS, and staged a big-time pitchers’ duel with Philadelphia’s Larry Christenson.

Through ten innings, the only remote threat came in the third inning, when Rose was thrown out trying to score from third on an infield groundout. In the bottom of the 11th, Morgan came to the plate. Both Morgan and Rose had been integral parts of the Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine of the 1970s, which won four pennants and the World Series in 1975 and 1976. Their return to the postseason on opposite teams was one of the big storylines of this NLCS.

Rose played better during the series, but Morgan struck the biggest blow—he tripled to start the 1th and scored on Denny Walling’s sac fly. Houston was one game from the pennant. And a series that was already tense, full of back-and-forth, was about to go to a new level.

Carlton came back on three days’ rest with his team’s season on the line, while Houston gave the start to Vern Ruhle, a good young pitcher who had already beaten future Hall of Famer Tom Seaver in a key game down the stretch. Ruhle was again the equal of a future Hall of Famer in Carlton.

The game was scoreless through three, and the fourth inning got eventful. After consecutive singles to start the inning, Maddox hit a soft, low liner to the mound that Ruhle either caught or trapped, and threw to first. The ruling on the field was “no catch”, which would have meant Maddox was out, and runners were on second and third. Seems simple enough, doesn’t it?

Only Houston had gone ahead and doubled off each runner just in case. The umpires conferred and determined Ruhle had caught the ball. They declared the runner at first to be doubled off, infuriating the Phillies, who put the game under protest. The also decided to leave the runner at second base, infuriating the Astros, who put the game under protest. It was a completely illogical solution and sounds like the kind of thing you come up with in a backyard game to split the difference.

In the bottom of the inning, Houston scored, with a leadoff double from Enos Cabell, who eventually came around to score on a sac fly from Art Howe. On that play, Woods, who had drawn a walk, was thrown out trying to take third and the game stayed at 1-0. Houston added another run in the fifth when Luis Pujols tripled and Rafael Landestoy singled him in.

Houston was ready to add a third run in the sixth. The bases were loaded with one out. Woods was on third and when Pujols flied to right, Woods tagged and scored. Only he left third base too soon, and the Philadelphia appeal was upheld. It was a double play, and quite unnecessary—there was no reason to think Woods wouldn’t have scored had he waited.

The game stayed 2-0 into the eighth, when the Phillies made the mistake hurt. Gross and Lonnie Smith singled to start the inning, and Rose cut the lead in half with an RBI single. The throw foolishly went home, and allowed Smith to go to third and Rose to take second. Schmidt singled to tie the game. Sambito came in with no one out and again struck out McBride in a big situation.

Trillo hit a sac fly to give the Phils the lead, but again a runner—this time Schmidt—was thrown out elsewhere on the bases to end the inning. To call this game “weird” understates the case.

But to call it “exciting” understates the case too. Landestoy drew a ninth-inning walk, was bunted over and Puhl singled in the tying run. We were going extras again.

Rose singled with one out in the top of the 10th. With two outs, Luzinski and Trillo each doubled and the score was 5-3. McGraw closed the deal and we were going to a Game 5 in prime-time on Sunday night.

Now it was the Phillies’ turn to have a staff running on empty and they were left with unproven Marty Bystrom to go up against Ryan in the decisive game. Houston got on Bystrom early. Puhl singled to start the home half of the first, stole second and scored on a two-out hit from Cruz. The lead didn’t last though—Trillo singled with one out in the second, and after a walk, and a productive out moving both runners up, Philly got their own two-out hit, from Bob Boone and it was 2-1.

Houston was poised to tie it right back up in the second, as Pujols drew a one-out walk. He looked to score on a double by Craig Reynolds, but a McBride-to-Trillo relay gunned Pujols at the plate. More of the same happened in the fifth—Cabell, on second base, tried to score on an error by Trillo, but Rose threw out Cabell at the plate. The 2-1 score held into the sixth.

The Astros finally tied the game when Luzinski committed a two-base error, and Alan Ashby picked up the run with a base hit. One inning later, Houston opened up offensively.

Puhl hit a leadoff single, and Cabell bunted the runner up. With two outs, Jose Cruz drew a walk. Walling delivered a single that put the Astros in front. Cruz moved to third and scored on a wild pitch. Then Howe ripped a triple and it was 5-2, and for the second straight game, Philadelphia was down to their last six outs and trailing my multiple runs.

Bowa, Boone and Gross hit successive singles off Ryan to load the bases and Rose worked a walk to make it a 5-3 game, the bases still loaded and no one out. Sambito was summoned. A groundball force play made it 5-4. Forsch was summoned to face Schmidt.
Forsch’s strikeout of the MVP third baseman looked like it might be a pennant-saving K. But Del Unser delivered the two-out RBI single to the game and Trillo then slashed a triple. In a matter of two batters, the Phillies had gone from elimination to a 7-5 lead.

Houston didn’t just roll over and die. They got consecutive singles with one out in the eighth, Puhl again at the heart of the action. The rightfielder hit .526 for the series, routinely hitting smooth line drives to both fields. With two outs, Landestoy and Cruz each singled and the game was again tied, this time at 7-7.

For the fourth and final time, the 1980 NLCS was going extra innings. Unser hit a one-out double, and with two outs, Maddox also doubled. The Phils had the lead. Ruthven had pitched a clean ninth, and now he did the same in the tenth. This incredible series was finally over and Philadelphia was going to the World Series.

Trillo was named NLCS MVP, going 8-for-21. He was the best choice of players on the winning team. I think this was a case where a choice from the losing team would have been appropriate. Puhl completely dominated this series from the leadoff spot, going 10-for-19, drawing three walks and constantly getting rallies started.

Philadelphia kept the momentum going all the way to the first World Series title in their long history, beating the Kansas City Royals in six games.

The Phils have since won another World Series, in 2008. The Astros finally reached the Fall Classic in 2005, though they have yet to win it all in a franchise history that dates to 1962. Both teams had reasons to be proud in 1980, staging the greatest League Championship Series ever played, and quite possibly the best postseason series at any round.

The 1980 Boston Red Sox: The Last Crash Of Unfulfilled Hope

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The late 1970s had been a time of unfulfilled hope for the Boston Red Sox. After reaching Game 7 of the World Series in 1975, the Red Sox seemed to be a rising dynasty in the making. But that was followed with underachievement in 1976, a close pennant race loss in 1977, a devastating loss in 1978, and modest slipback in 1979. The 1980 Boston Red Sox completed the decline, falling to mediocrity and ending a short era in franchise history.

1970s Red Sox

Don Zimmer had managed the Red Sox since the middle of the 1976 season and this would be his final year in Boston. The offense, long the strength of the team, was still good—sixth in the American League in runs scored—but it was no longer great. An inability to draw walks was the big reasons. Boston ranked in the top three in the AL for batting average doubles and home runs, but they were 10th in walks. It would take over two decades for Moneyball to arrive at Fenway Park.

Dave Stapleton was the poster child of the Red Sox offense—he batted .321 and slugged .463, excellent numbers for a second baseman. But he managed to draw only 13 walks all season, and his .338 on-base percentage was only above average as a result. Stapleton, like the Red Sox, was more glitter than substance when it came to offense.

This isn’t to say there weren’t good hitters, Stapleton included. Carlton Fisk had a solid stat line of .353 OBP/.467 slugging. Fred Lynn posted a .383/.480 year and Dwight Evans was at .358/.484. Jim Rice slugged .504, hit 24 home runs and produced 86 RBIs. Although Rice was almost as impatient as Stapleton, with the left fielder’s 30 walks being the second-lowest on the team.

Carl Yastrzemski was in the twilight of his career and now a DH, but he still produced, at .350/.462 and shortstop Rick Burleson had a .341 on-base percentage. The team also signed Tony Perez to play first base. Perez had been with the Cincinnati Reds, and Boston fans remembered him for hitting the home run that turned the momentum in that seventh game of the 1975 World Series. Now 38-years-old, Perez could still produce, hitting 25 home runs and his 105 RBIs led the team.

So while the offense was not as good as its batting average and home run numbers might have suggested, it was still not the problem. That honor belong to a pitching staff that ranked 12th in the American League in ERA.

Mike Torrez and Dennis Eckersley were the top two starters and they combined for a 21-30 record, and ERAs of 5.08 and 4.28 respectively. John Tudor was a nice young lefthander who had a 3.02 ERA, but he didn’t get enough starts to make an impact. The only positives were closer Tom Burgmeier, who saved 24 games with 2.00 ERA, and the all-purpose machine, Bob Stanley.

The “Steamer”, as he was known started 17 games, made 35 relief appearances, won 10, saved 14 and had an ERA of 3.39. On a staff with few bright spots, Stanley could do everything.

The first two games of the year at the Milwaukee Brewers were a foreshadowing. The Red Sox trailed the Brewers 5-3 in the ninth inning of Opening Day, when home runs by Yaz and third baseman Butch Hobson tied the game. Dick Drago, the now-aging hero of the 1975 ALCS, came on in the ninth. With the bases loaded and two outs, Drago gave up a grand slam to Brewer rightfielder Sixto Lezcano and the Red Sox lost 9-5.

Torrez pitched the second game and was battered 18-1. Later on in May, when the Brewers came to Fenway, Torrez started again and lost 19-8. By the end of May, Boston’s record was 22-23. They trailed the New York Yankees by 6 ½ games.

New York was on their way to a big year with 103 wins and while the Baltimore Orioles were amidst the pack in May, they would also catch fire and win 100 games. Boston wasn’t going to compete with that, though they did play good baseball throughout the month of August and their record got up to 70-56 when the month of September began. By the standards of today, the Red Sox would have been in the hunt for the second wild-card spot.

Late 1980s Boston Red Sox

But the standards of 1980 were quite different, and in either case, Boston’s September play marked the end of the Zimmer era. They lost four straight at home to New York, then went to the Bronx and lost two of three. To show they weren’t playing favorites in the AL East race, the Red Sox went to Baltimore and lost two of three and then lost four straight to the Orioles at home.

Zimmer was fired prior to the finale of the four-game set with Baltimore and Johnny Pesky managed out the string in Boston. They concluded the season by being swept at home by the Toronto Blue Jays, a last-place 67-95 team. The Red Sox finished 83-77, fifth in the seven-team AL East.

Big moves were made in the offseason. Burleson, Hobson and Lynn were all traded, while Fisk was allowed to leave via free agency for the Chicago White Sox. The latter two changes were particularly rattling. Lynn’s MVP season in his rookie year of 1975 made him the face of the presumed dynasty on the rise. Fisk was a local hero with New England roots and seen as the heart and soul of the team.

By parting company with both, the Red Sox left little doubt there were going in a new direction. It would take six years for that new direction to bear fruit and the Fenway Faithful entered the offseason following 1980 wondering when their team would be relevant again.

The 1980 Philadelphia Phillies Bring An End To Frustration

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The 1980 Philadelphia Phillies carried the banner for a franchise and a fan base that was marked with frustration, both short-term, long-term and even beyond the baseball diamond. The Phillies had never won the World Series. They had lost the National League Championship Series each year from 1976-78.

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And within the framework of 1980 in Philadelphia sports, the 76ers in the NBA and the Flyers in the NHL had each reached their respective Finals and come up short (and if we could look ahead, the Eagles were on their way to losing the Super Bowl). Somebody in Philadelphia had to win a title didn’t they?

It was up to the Phillies. They had moved aggressively prior to 1979, signing Pete Rose away from Cincinnati, but terrible pitching let Philadelphia down. They came back in 1980 with mostly the same cast, but a new manager in Dallas Green who had taken over for the final month of ’79 and gone 19-11.

Hitting was the Phils’ cornerstone, and they were second in the National League in runs scored, excelling equally at getting men on base and hitting for power. No one was better than third baseman Mike Schmidt who hit 48 home runs drove in 121 runs and won the NL MVP award.

Schmidt’s big numbers supported an array of other players who had various areas of strength, but no standout stars. Rose, now 39-years-old, finished with a .352 on-base percentage. Bake McBride posted respectable numbers of .342 OBP/.453 slugging. Greg Luzinski, the big leftfielder, saw his power dip, but still hit 19 home runs.

Philadelphia was very good defensively. Veteran catcher Bob Boone, standout centerfielder Garry Maddox, shortstop Larry Bowa and second baseman Manny Trillo made the Phillies the classic team that’s strong up the middle. None of them hit very well, though Trillo’s .334 OBP was respectable, but when you look back on how many close games the Phillies won it’s hard not to look at this consistent defense.

The pitching made a big leap forward, jumping from 11th in the National League in ERA in 1979 to 3rd in 1980. When you have one of the great pitchers of your generation, it goes a long way toward making improvement.

Steve Carlton was now 35-years-old, but the lefthander still had the nasty slider that ultimately took him to the Hall of Fame. And in 1980 he won 24 games, worked over 300 innings and posted a 2.34 ERA. It was good enough for the Cy Young Award, as the Phils swept the two major individual awards.

The back end of the bullpen was in the hands of another capable 35-year-old. Tug McGraw had the best year of his career, with a 1.46 ERA and saving 20 games.

With Carlton and McGraw as his anchors, Green was able to piece the rest of the staff together. Dick Ruthven was a reliable #2 starter, winning 17 games and finishing with a 3.55 ERA. The bullpen was aided by one young arm, Kevin Saucier and one veteran, Ron Reed.

The rotation was filled out by mostly mediocre performances from Bob Walk, Randy Lerch, Nino Espinosa and Larry Christenson. But the Phillies got a big lift from 21-year-old Marty Bystrom who came up late in the season, made six starts and went 5-0 with buck-fifty ERA.

It took a month and a half for the team to get untracked. Philadelphia was under .500 on May 13 when they won seven of nine games against the Cincinnati Reds and Houston Astros, each contenders in the NL West. By Memorial Day, the Phillies were 20-15 and just a game out of first place.

The pace in the NL East was being set by the defending World Series champion Pittsburgh Pirates and not far behind was the Montreal Expos, who had chased Pittsburgh to the final weekend in 1979.

Philadelphia then lost nine of sixteen games and fell four games back. A six-game win streak against NL West competition stabilized the Phils and they pulled into a first-place tie on June 18. They hovered within a game or two of first place and they reached the All-Star break with a pedestrian 41-35 record, but one that was only a half-game back of the Expos with the Pirates just one game out. The NL East race was red-hot.

The period right after the All-Star break was not kind to the Phillies. They had a 4-7 stretch against the Reds and a poor Atlanta Braves team. Philadelphia went to Pittsburgh for a four-game set and got it handed to them, losing all four games and by a combined score of 21-8. On August 10, the Phils were six games out before a 9-2 stretch—highlighted by a five-game sweep of the lowly Mets in old Shea Stadium pulled Philly back to within 1 ½ games.

On Labor Day, the basic dynamic of the race had not changed. Montreal was in first place, Philadelphia was one game out and Pittsburgh was in hot pursuit, only two back.

The Phillies beat the Pirates in a two-game set, the second a 14-inning walkoff. It started the fade of the defending champs and the race narrowed to Philadelphia and Montreal. They met in Philly on the season’s penultimate weekend for a three-game set, with the Phils up by a half-game.

Ruthven pitched the opener and went seven solid innings, departing with the game tied 1-1. McGraw held the fort for two innings and McBride won it with a walkoff blast. But the rest of the weekend didn’t go quite as well.

Carlton took the mound with a chance to put his team firmly in control of the race, but gave up four runs in seven innings, losing 4-3. And Walk was hit hard in the finale, with Saucier and Dickie Noles unable to stop the bleeding out of the bullpen. The 8-3 loss left Philadelphia a half-game back with a week to go.

The good news was that at least the Phillies controlled the half-game. So even though the Expos swept the Cardinals in a three-game sweep, the Phils were able to counter with a four-game sweep of the Cubs. The NL East race was tied, with Philadelphia and Montreal poised to settle it head-to-head with a three-game series north of the border.

Ruthven again pitched a Friday opener and again pitched well, though he came out in the sixth inning with a 2-1 lead, keyed by two hits from Rose and a home run by Schmidt. Sparky Lyle, a veteran lefty and former Cy Young winner with the Yankees in 1977 had been acquired in September for games like this.

Lyle got four big outs when the Expos were threatening, and McGraw threw two more shutout innings. The 2-1 lead stood up. Philadelphia needed just one more win and they had Carlton reserve for Sunday.

Christenson started on Saturday and pitched six good innings, though he trailed 2-1. In the top of the seventh, Rose, McBride and Schmidt all singled to load the bases with one out. Luzinski delivered a two-run single to give the Phils the lead, but in a bizarre baserunning circumstance, both he and Schmidt were thrown out on the bases on the same play.

The game stayed at 3-2 and it looked like that might be costly, because Ron Reed and Lyle gave the lead back in the bottom of the inning. Philadelphia still trailed 4-3 in the bottom of the ninth.

Rose drew a walk to start the inning and was replaced on the bases by McBride after a force out. McBride moved up to second on a groundball out, and with two down Boone singled in the tying run.

The game stretched to the 11th inning and one more time Rose was in the middle of things. He led off with a single. Schmidt came to the plate with one out and put the punctuation mark on his MVP campaign. He homered to left. McGraw slammed the door in the bottom of the inning and the Phillies were NL East champs.

The drama was just beginning for the Phillies. They met the Houston Astros and the National League Championship Series ended up being arguably the greatest postseason ever played. What was then a best-of-five series went the full five games. The last four games went to extra innings. In Games 4 & 5, the lead changed hands in the last two innings. It was an epic and the Phillies survived.

It was fitting that the Kansas City Royals were the opponent in the World Series. The Royals were partners in frustration with the Phils through the late 1970s, with each team losing the LCS in 1976-78, then having a disappointing year in 1979. Each finally broke through to the Fall Classic in the game year.

The World Series wasn’t one for the ages, like the NLCS had been, but it was still pretty good. The Phillies won come-from-behind games at home in Games 1 & 2, and then won an exciting Game 5 in Kansas City to put themselves on the brink. A victory behind Carlton in Game 6 brought the long-awaited Series title to Philly.

Philadelphia continued to be good in the early part of the 1980s. They won the “second half” NL East title in 1981, when a players strike resulted in MLB using a system that took the first place teams before and after the strike and had them meet in the first-ever Division Series round. The Phils lost to the Expos.

The Phillies returned to the World Series in 1983 and 1993, but it would be 28 years before they won it all again. At least the 1980 Phils had provided enough memories to last a generation.