Phillies 1959: The Year of the Great Freese

The 1959 Philadelphia Phillies were a bad team. Perhaps even worse, they didn't offer a young fan much to root for. The stars of the Whiz Kid days were fast fading and the front office had failed to replace them with any significant, exciting talent. The top pitchers were Gene Conley, recently acquired from the Milwaukee Braves, and surly Jim Owens, perennial prospect finally having a decent season in the majors. The top hitters were Ed Bouchee, a year and a half past his conviction on a morals charge, and left fielder Harry Anderson, who had a breakout year in 1958, but who was about to experience a breakdown year in 1959. Into this void stepped an unlikely hero: 25-year-old, journeyman infielder, Eugene Lewis (Gene) Freese.

Freese was acquired from the St. Louis Cardinals at the end of the 1958 season for veteran infielder Solly Hemus. The Cardinals wanted Hemus to be their manager and so they sent Freese to the Phillies to obtain his rights. Freese had been in the majors for four years, having come up with Pittsburgh in 1955. He had shown some pop in his bat and some suspect defensive skills, but had never established himself as a regular. The Pirates dealt him to the Cardinals in June 1958 for Dick Schofield. Freese played all over the infield for the Cardinals, hitting .257 with six home runs. When the Cards decided to hire Hemus, Freese was thought very expendable.

In spring training with the Phillies, Freese was given the opportunity to win the third base job. Many pundits predicted he would be the opening day third baseman, but defensive concerns relegated him to the bench behind the incumbent, aging Whiz Kid Willie "Puddin' Head" Jones. In the second game of the season, Freese made his debut for the Phillies as a pinch runner for Jones in the ninth inning of a game at Milwaukee on April 14, and scored the game tying run on a triple by Wally Post.

In his next appearance the legend of Gene Freese began in earnest. On April 18, the Phillies were in Cincinnati to play the Reds. In the top of the third inning, with the Phillies leading 4-3, Freese was sent up to pinch hit for Phillies' starter Seth Morehead. It was Freese's first at bat as a Phillie. The bases were loaded. Left-handed rookie pitcher, Mike Cuellar, making his major league debut, was on the mound. Freese launched a Cuellar offering well over the left field wall at Crosley Field for a grand slam home run. The Phillies went on to win the game, 14-9.

Freese did not appear in a game again until five days later on April 23 at Connie Mack Stadium against the Milwaukee Braves. In the ninth inning of that game, with the Phillies down 3-1, Freese was sent up to pinch hit for Phillies' catcher Valmy Thomas. Joe Koppe was on first base. The Braves pitcher was lefty Juan Pizarro, who had held the Phillies to just one run and four hits to that point. Freese worked the count to 3 and 2 and then launched a deep fly ball into the seats in left to tie the game. Two outs later, Granny Hamner also homered and the Phillies had a walk off win.

The next day the newspapers had dubbed Freese, "Mr. Wonderful" for his pinch hitting heroics. Freese's performance earned him a couple of starts at third base, but he was still a bench player for the most part in this early part of the season. On May 11, Mr. Wonderful struck again, homering off Art Fowler of the Dodgers at the Los Angeles Coliseum in the eighth inning to tie the score at 10. The Phillies eventually lost the game 11-10. 

On May 22, Freese had a two-run pinch homer off the Braves’ Lew Burdette, in the seventh inning of a 10-5 Phillies loss. Then on May 31, his eighth-inning pinch home run off the Braves’ Warren Spahn, was the only run the Phillies could manage in a 2-1 loss. To sum up, by the end of May, Freese had batted just 29 times, but had clubbed five home runs and driven in 13 runs, all as a pinch hitter.

Young Phillies fans were learning to clasp their transistor radios closely to their ears whenever Gene Freese came to bat. Apparently the Phillies front office was learning what they had in Mr. Freese. On June 5, they traded Willie Jones to the Cleveland Indians for outfielder Jim Bolger and Gene Freese became the regular third baseman for the Phillies.

Inserted into the starting lineup, Freese continued to hit the long ball. On June 14 in the first game of a doubleheader, his three run home run capped a six run rally that helped the Phillies come back from a five run deficit to beat the San Francisco Giants, 7-5. In the second game, he drove in three more runs as the Phillies swept the Giants, 6-3. On July 2, he hit his second grand slam of the year, this time at home against the Reds Jim Brosnan to help the Phillies win 7-6. And then, incredibly, on July 9, he smacked his third grand slam of the year. This one was the big blow as the Phillies crushed the Cardinals 11-0 at Connie Mack Stadium.

For one summer Philly had Freese Fever. On a team going nowhere but to the bottom, the exploits of Mr. Freese gave everyone something to cheer about. Freese finished the year with solid numbers. Despite being limited to 400 at bats, seventh on the team, he led the team with 23 home runs, and his 70 RBIs trailed only Post and Bouchee on the team. His batting average for the year was .268. Freese was a defensive liability at third base, however, leading all third basemen with 22 errors in just 261 chances for a .916 fielding percentage.

In December of 1959, Phillies general manager John Quinn traded the popular Freese to the Chicago White Sox. Phillies fans were outraged. The Phillies top slugger, their pinch hitting hero, their Mr. Wonderful, had been traded for some untested 20-year-old rookie right fielder. Eventually, the furor would die down because that rookie was none other than Johnny Callison, the first building block of the very good  Phillies teams to come and one of the most popular Phillies players ever.

Gene Freese bounced from the White Sox to the Cincinnati Reds, where he was a key part of the Reds 1961 pennant winners, bashing 26 home runs and driving in 87. A severe ankle injury in spring training in 1962 limited his playing time thereafter. After 1961, he never played in 100 games in a season again. He journeyed from Cincinnati, back to Pittsburgh, and then back to the White Sox before concluding his major league career in Houston in 1966.

For one summer in Philadelphia, however, the big bat of Gene Freese was just about the only exciting baseball story in town.