Fregosi's Phillies 1991: The Unlikely 13 Game Winning Streak

On July 28, 1991, after the Phillies dropped a close 2-1 game to the San Francisco Giants at Candlestick Park, they were a last place team with a 40-58 record, 21.5 games behind the first-place Pittsburgh Pirates. It had already been a tumultuous year. Manager Nick Leyva was fired 13 games into the season and was replaced by former All-Star shortstop, twice failed manager, and close friend of General Manager Lee Thomas, Jim Fregosi. Despite Fregosi's promise of "better communication" and "rapport with the players", three months into his tenure, the results on the field had not improved much.

Starting on July 30 in San Diego, however, the Phillies went on a remarkable 13 game winning streak that dug them out of the cellar, and set them up for an improbable third place finish in the National League East Division. Heroes during the winning streak included many names that would be core members of the 1993 National League pennant winners and a few other names that have faded into obscurity. Here is how it happened. 

Game 1: The streak began with a tight 2-1 win over Tony Gwynn and the Padres. Jose de Jesus, a wild and inconsistent righthander who had been acquired from Kansas City a year earlier in a trade for Steve Jeltz, started and scattered eight hits and seven walks over eight innings. Mitch Williams earned the save. Doubles by Wes Chamberlain and John Kruk plated the Phillies two runs. 

Game 2: The next night, left fielder Chamberlain led a Phillies offensive onslaught as they beat the Padres by a 9-3 score. Chamberlain was four-for-four with two three-run home runs for six RBIs. Mickey Morandini was three-for-three. Lefty Bruce Ruffin picked up the win, with relief help from Roger McDowell and Joe Boever.

Game 3: On August 1, the Phillies travelled to Montreal to take on the Expos. Chamberlain was again the hero in a 4-1 Phillies win. Chamberlain hit his third three-run home run in two days as part of a four-run fourth inning. Terry Mulholland gave up a triple and a single to the first two batters he faced and then shut the Expos down on one hit the rest of the way.

Game 4: It took the Phillies 11 innings to win their fourth straight. Shortstop Dickie Thon played the hero with a top of the eleventh inning home run that gave the Phillies a 6-5 lead. It was Thon's second home run of the game and his sixth of the year. Mitch Williams got the win. Mike Hartley worked the bottom of the eleventh for his only save in a Phillies uniform.

Game 5: Right-hander Tomy Greene raised his season record to 8-4 by pitching seven shutout innings. Dale Murphy was the hitting star with a three-run home run. The Phillies defeat the Expos again, this time by a 7-1 score. 

Game 6: The streak continues with another extra inning nail-biter. Jose de Jesus pitches eight strong innings and the Phillies score two unearned runs to send the game into overtime. A Dale Murphy double scored Lenny Dykstra with the winning run in the ninth. Mitch Williams pitched two shutout innings for the win, striking out Tim Wallach to end it with a flourish.

Game 7: On August 6 the Phillies bring their winning streak home to Veterans Stadium to meet the Chicago Cubs. A crowd of 26,000+ is on hand. Those fans see an all-time classic. The game is tied at 1 after eight innings. Ruffin pitched a strong 7.1 innings, and Hartley bailed him out in the eighth by inducing a double play line drive from the Cubs George Bell. In the ninth, the Cubs take a 2-1 lead as reliever Boever struggled. Lefty Wally Ritchie got the dangerous Mark Grace out with two men on for the final out of the ninth. Dykstra erased the Cub lead with a leadoff home run in the bottom of the ninth off Cub lefty Paul Assenmacher. Ritchie retired the Cubs in the 10th and, after the Phils also fail to score, Mitch Williams got the Cubs out in the 11th. In the bottom of the eleventh, right-hander Les Lancaster came in to pitch for the Cubs. Dykstra led off with a walk and Darren Daulton singled him to third. Chamberlain strikes out swinging and the left-handed hitting Kruk is intentionally walked. That brings Murphy to the plate, and he sets off the fireworks and sends everyone home happy with a walk-off grand slam home run.

Game 8: It's more of the same the next night as another crowd of 26,000+ sees another 11-inning walk off win. At the end of regulation, the game is tied at four. The Phillies get a home run from Kruk and a triple from Chamberlain along the way. Mulholland works eight innings but struggles allowing four runs. Hartley keeps the score tied with two innings of shutout relief. Williams pitches the top of the 11th and is the winning pitcher for the third night in a row, as, in the bottom of the inning, a Chamberlain single with the bases loaded off the unfortunate Lancaster, brings home Randy Ready with the winning run.

Game 9: There is no drama the next night as the Phillies romp 11-1 behind a strong seven-inning outing from Danny Cox and four RBIs from third baseman Charlie Hayes. Right fielder Jim Lindeman contributes two hits, and an RBI and reliever Steve Searcy follows Cox with two shutout innings.

Game 10: The Expos visit the Vet, and it is time for first baseman Ricky Jordan to get into the act. Jordan's bases loaded double in the seventh scores three and gives the Phillies a 4-3 lead. The Cubs tie the game in the top of the eighth on a bases loaded walk by Williams, but a Dickie Thon sacrifice fly in the bottom of the eighth provides the margin for victory. Williams scores both a blown save and a win.

Game 11: Once again the pitching of Jose de Jesus is the story as the Phillies prevail 4-2. De Jesus goes seven strong innings while Hartley and Williams finish off the game. Chamberlain, Hayes, and Thon contribute RBIs. 

Game 12: Jim Lindeman is the hitting star as the Phillies use five pitchers to hold off the Expos in a 5-4 win. A Lindeman double plates two, while Ruffin, Boever, Ritchie, Hartley, and Wiliams all contribute on the mound. Williams records the save. The winning run scores on a wild pitch in the eighth.

Game 13: In this game the Phillies Terry Mulholland outpitches the Expos Dennis Martinez, 2-1. Both pitchers throw complete games. Hayes has two doubles for the Phillies and Dykstra and Murphy have the RBIs. Mulholland raised his record to 11-10 with another dominant effort over the Expos. 

The streak ended the next night in Pittsburgh as the Phillies fell 4-3 to Doug Drabek, but the 13-game winning streak was followed by continued improved play by the team. The streak included four extra-inning games and two walk-off wins. Mitch Williams racked up five wins and three saves during the streak. An on-fire Wes Chamberlain contributed 17 hits and 13 RBIs. Dale Murphy, with 11 hits and 11 RBIs, had perhaps his best run of games in his mostly disappointing tenure with the Phillies. The erratic Jose de Jesus pitched very well in his three starts during the streak, winning two.

The Phillies had one other 13 game winning streak in their modern history in August of 1977, a year they won 101 games. The 1887 Phillies, led by pitchers Don Casey and Charles Ferguson, won 16 in row at the end of the season.

In 1992 the Phillies would fall back to last place, but the building blocks that propelled the Phillies to a pennant in 1993 were at least partly in evidence as Jim Fregosi put his stamp on this team during this historic run of games. 

December 1917: The Phillies Get a Christmas Present from the Cubs

Most dedicated Phillies fans know that the team has a history of terrible, one-sided trades with the Chicago Cubs. This history of poor trades dates back to the fall of 1917 when Phils owner, William F. Baker, always, it seems, in need of cash, traded the great Grover Cleveland "Pete" Alexander and his starting catcher Bill Killefer for two marginal players, catcher Pickles Dillhoefer and pitcher Mike Prendergast, and $55,000. In the 1960s, the Phillies traded away future Hall of Famer Ferguson Jenkins for two over the hill Cubs pitchers, Bob Buhl and Larry Jackson. And then in 1982, of course, there was the trade that sent Larry Bowa and future Hall of Famer Ryne Sandberg to the Cubs for Ivan DeJesus. To add insult to injury, it was former Phillies pitcher and manager, Dallas Green, now working for the Cubs, who picked the Phillies pocket on that one.

Despite the sordid history, and despite the short-sighted ownership of William Baker, the Phillies did manage to pull off at least one trade with the Cubs that worked out very well for them. In late December 1917, the Phillies traded starting center fielder, Dode Paskert, to the Cubs for center fielder Fred "Cy" Williams. Paskert, a popular player with the home fans, was 37 years old and a veteran of 12 major league seasons. He was known as a fine defensive outfielder, and decent hitter with little power. Williams was 29, and though coming off a poor season, had shown great power potential and enough speed to be a fine outfielder.

Most baseball insiders thought the Phillies had gotten by far the best of the deal. Many believed that Williams could become one of the premiere power hitters in the game, especially in the friendly confines of Baker Bowl, with its short right field wall. The word was that Chicago Cubs manager, Fred Mitchell, had soured on the inconsistent Williams. While Williams was a superior "flychaser," he had a weak throwing arm, something Mitchell valued above all else in his outfielders. 

When the trade was first made, it was not met with universal approval in Philadelphia. Referring to the Phillies manager, Pat Moran, the headline in the Philadelphia Inquirer after the trade read, "Moran Gives Veteran Outfielder, Who Had Splendid Record This Year, For Man Who Played Erratically Last Season." The trade looked even worse when Williams, who was not pleased with the trade, informed the Phillies of his intention to retire rather than report to the Phillies.  Williams never did officially retire, however, and though he missed all of spring training and the first month of the season, he eventually reported and took his place in the Phillies starting lineup on May 29. He would be a fixture there for the next 13 seasons.

Cy Williams did indeed become the great power hitter that was predicted. A left-handed hitter he took full advantage of the Baker Bowl dimensions to become one of baseball's first great home run threats. As the Live Ball Era dawned, he led the league in home runs in 1920 (15), 1923 (41), and 1927 (30). He finished second or third six other times. During his years with the Phillies, he slashed .306/.380/.500. His 251 career home runs were the most in the National League, until Rogers Hornsby passed him in 1929. Williams ranks third on the all-time list of Phillies center fielders behind only Hall of Famer Richie Ashburn and turn of the century standout, Roy Thomas.

On August 5, 1927, Cy Williams became just the third Phillie to hit for the cycle. In a game against the Pittsburgh Pirates at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh, Williams tripled in the first, doubled in the second, walked in the fifth, homered in the seventh, and singled in the ninth as the Phillies won 9-6. Wiliams finished 4 for 4 with six RBIs in one of his finest days in the major leagues. In 1923, he hit three home runs and drove in seven in a game at the Baker Bowl against the St. Louis Cardinals that the Phillies won 20-14.

Dode Paskert, by the way, had a couple of solid seasons for the Cubs, but his skills were fading, and he was out of the major leagues by 1921. He did have the satisfaction of playing with the Cubs' 1918 pennant winners.

Cy Williams retired in 1930 at age 42. His 217 home runs in a Phillies uniform still ranks 8th on the Phillies all-time home run list. He hit 141 (65%) of those home runs in the friendly confines of Baker Bowl. 

Before he ever signed a professional baseball contract Williams had majored in architecture and starred in three sports at Notre Dame, where he was a teammate of Knute Rockne. In retirement he put his architecture degree to work in his native Wisconsin, where he designed what his biographer Cappy Gagnon calls, "some of the finest buildings on Wisconsin's Upper Peninsula." Many of those buildings are still standing. In 1966 the city of Three Lakes, Wisconsin dedicated Cy Williams Park, which is also still there. Cy Williams died in Eagle River, Wisconsin in 1974 at the age of 86. In 1986, Williams was enshrined on the Phillies' Wall of Fame. 

After all the Phillies franchise has done for the Cubs, they certainly owed us this long-ago Christmas present.

August 4, 1934: Pitcher Reggie Grabowski Sets a Record for the Ages

Pitcher Reggie Grabowski did little to distinguish himself in parts of three seasons in the Philadelphia Phillies uniform. He appeared in 51 games, including twelve starts, and compiled a 4-8 record with a 5.73 ERA. He was, however, only the second Reggie to play in the major leagues, after one Reggie Richter, and he did have a brother, Al Grabowski, who also pitched in the major leagues. Other than that, there was little to remember from his big-league career until near its end.

On August 4, 1934, Grabowski achieved a feat of pitching futility that has never been replicated and that carved his name into the record books forever. In the ninth inning of a game at Baker Bowl against the New York Giants, Grabowski allowed 11 hits and 11 runs. Here is how it happened.

Coming into an August 4^th doubleheader, the Giants were three games ahead of the Chicago Cubs in the National League pennant race. The Phillies were entrenched in seventh place, outpacing only the Cincinnati Reds. The Phillies won the first game, 5-4, behind their newfound ace, Curt Davis. Snipe Hansen started the second game and was knocked out of the box before you could say “snipe hunt.” * By the time reliever Cy Moore escaped the first, the Giants had established a 5-0 lead. 

The Phils scored two runs in both the first and third to narrow the score a bit, but the Giants responded behind two solo home runs by Mel Ott, his 27th and 28th of the season, and a two-run home run by shortstop Travis Jackson. By the end of the eighth inning the score stood at Giants 10, Phillies 4. Phillies manager, Jimmie Wilson, sent Grabowski to the mound to mop up in the ninth. Things immediately went from bad to disastrous.

Future Hall of Famer Bill Terry led off the inning for the Giants with a single. Fellow future Hall of Famer, Ott, singled for his fourth hit of the game.  Hank Leiber doubled, driving in Terry and sending Ott to third. Next up, Phil Weintraub singled driving home Ott and Leiber. Gus Mancuso and Johnny Vergez both singled, loading the bases. That brought up pitcher, Hal Schumacher, who promptly singled, scoring Weintraub. Lead-off hitter, Hughie Critz, followed with yet another base hit, the Giants' eighth in a row, scoring two more.

Finally, Jackson, grounded out, driving in a run, but giving Grabowski a most welcome first out of the inning. Terry then singled for his second hit of the inning. By this time Grabowski may have been growing a tad frustrated. His next pitch plunked the powerful Ott in the back, loading the bases. Leiber singled home Critz, bringing up Weintraub. What happened next has not been recorded for posterity. We know that Weintraub made the second out of the inning. We also know that Phillies right fielder, Johnny Moore, made an error on the play, allowing two unearned runs to score. That is all we know. We can only speculate that Moore caught a fly ball and then made a wild throw trying to get the runner at the plate, or perhaps at third, allowing two more runs to score. Weintraub was credited with one run batted in, but no sacrifice fly was credited. At any rate, the score now stood at 21-4 and the bases were empty with two outs.

Mancuso then singled for the 11th hit of the inning, before Grabowski finished off his record setting inning with a flourish, striking out Vergez. The Phillies went down tamely in the ninth and the final score was 21-4 in a game played in two hours and eighteen minutes. The final line for Grabowski: 1 IP, 11 H, 11 R, 9 ER, 0 BB, 1 K. Why did manager Wilson leave Grabowski in the game? Perhaps Wilson didn't want to use another pitcher in a blowout game, so he allowed Reggie to "take one for the team."

Grabowski did not pitch again until August 17, when he gave up four runs in 1 1/3 innings in a 12-2 Phillies loss to the St. Louis Cardinals. The final appearance of Reggie's major league career came on September 24, when he pitched 5 2/3 innings, giving up six runs in a 10-1 loss to the Brooklyn Dodgers. After that Grabowski carved out a decent career in the minor leagues, pitching mostly with Albany and his hometown Syracuse teams. He retired in 1945 at age 37 with an 84-81 minor league record.

Since Grabowski set the record for hits and runs allowed in one inning of a game, two pitchers have tied the hits record. Phil Niekro of the Atlanta Braves gave up 11 hits and seven runs to the Cubs in the second inning of a game on June 14, 1980, and Bronson Arroyo gave up 11 hits and 10 runs to the Toronto Blue Jays, also in the second inning, on June 24, 2008. Neither pitcher matched Grabowski's 11 runs allowed. Grabowski's record appears safe for now.

Reggie Grabowski stands second from right with Babe Ruth and
Lou Gehrig (standing center) on a barnstorming team from the early 1930s.

* Yes, as you no doubt guessed, Roy Emeril Frederick "Snipe" Hansen got his nickname because of a snipe hunting adventure. A story for another day.

Curt "Coonskin" Davis: The Phillies Fine Thirty-Year-Old Rookie Pitcher

Curt Davis, 30-year-old rookie pitcher for the 1934 Philadelphia Phillies, may have left his heart in San Francisco, but fortunately he took his sidearm fastball with him to Philadelphia. Davis may be the best Phillies pitcher you never heard of. Over 2+ seasons with the Phillies, Davis went 37-35 with a 3.42 ERA for the perennially undermanned Phillies of the mid 1930s. He was the best player on those teams, compiling a gaudy 16.3 WAR in that short span. Traded to the Chicago Cubs for cash and an aging Chuck Klein by the parsimonious Phillies owner William Baker, he went on to win an additional 131 games with the Cubs, Brooklyn Dodgers, and St. Louis Cardinals in a 13-year major league career. He pitched in the World Series for Dodgers in 1941 and was an All-Star in 1936, his best season, during which he won 22 games.

Curt Davis was born in 1903 in Greenfield, Missouri and grew up on a farm near Salem, Oregon. It was there he developed his side-armed throwing style, skimming rocks in the river near his home. He never gave much thought to baseball, however, until one day, while he was working as a logger in Cloverdale, California, he was sitting in the stands watching a semi-pro game and watching the pitcher get knocked around. "I could do better than that,” he loudly remarked. The manager of the team heard him and invited Davis to go ahead and try.  Davis marched out to the mound in his dungarees and work boots and pitched very well indeed. Thus discovered, he spent several seasons playing for semi-professional industrial league teams on the west coast before being offered a contract by the San Francisco Seals of the Pacific Coast League.

On that San Francisco team Davis was teammates with future Hall of Famer, Lefty Gomez. Davis could only watch as the younger Gomez was sold to the Yankees for $45,000. Many Major League teams were similarly interested in Davis, but the Seals ownership would not part with him unless they got money similar to what they got for Gomez. So Curt Davis remained stuck in the minor leagues for six seasons, compiling 92 wins. Finally, in 1934, Davis was eligible for the Rule 5 draft, and the pitching starved Phillies grabbed him for the bargain price of $7,500. 

Phillies manager, Jimmie Wilson, was enthusiastic about his new pitching recruit. He told the Inquirer's Stan Baumgartner that Davis, "has one of those fastballs that takes off and keeps going." Early in spring training, Wilson was thinking that Davis would make a great relief man. "And how I need one. He'll be as welcome as mustard to a hot dog. Do you know he led the Coast League in earned runs [last year]? [Phillies scout} Patsy O'Rourke has been after him for two years, but the Seals wanted too much for him. We were lucky to get him."

Lucky indeed. By the end of spring training, Wilson realized that Davis was the best pitcher he had. He used Davis as a starter and reliever and he used him often. Davis appeared in a league leading 51 games in 1934, including 31 starts and 274.1 innings. After a so-so start to the year. Davis found his stride and went 12-5 for the months of June and July. Only a six game slide in August and September, during which he often pitched well, but got little run support, prevented him from being the first Phillies pitcher to win 20 games since Pete Alexander won 30 in 1917. As it was, he finished 19-17 with a 2.45 ERA for a Phillies team that won only 58 games.

Davis, who got the nickname "Old Coonskin" because he was a crack shot with a rifle, reminding his teammates of the legendary frontiersman, Daniel Boone, pitched several remarkable games in his rookie season. On Thursday, May 25, he set the Cincinnati Reds down on three hits and no walks, striking out six, winning 5-0. Good control and low strikeout rates would be a hallmark of Davis' pitching throughout his career. He averaged fewer than two walks per game for his career. 

By the middle of July, Davis was garnering comparisons to the Great Alexander himself. In the story of Davis' July 17 shutout of those same Reds, the Inquirer's Baumgartner said, "Not since the days of Grover Cleveland Alexander have the Phillies had as promising a young hurler as Curt Davis. Yesterday, the tall. slim youngster, who resembles the immortal "Pete" of two decades ago in build as well as delivery, blanked the Reds by a score of 7-0." In this game Davis would also contribute his first major league home run. An above average hitter for a pitcher, he would hit 11 dingers in his career.

Davis pitched his third and final shutout of the season on September 26, four hitting the defending champion New York Giants and helping grease the skids on the Giants fading pennant hopes. Davis finished eighth in the Most Valuable Player voting that year. He was third in ERA in the league behind only Dizzy Dean (who was named MVP) and Carl Hubbell, very exclusive company indeed for the rookie.

In 1935, Davis was the opening day starter for the Phillies. He continued to pitch well, compiling a 16-14 record as the Phillies again finished in seventh place. Davis became a highly valued commodity in the National League and finally, at the beginning of the 1936 season, the Phillies traded away their best player and in return brought their fading former superstar, Chuck Klein, back to the Baker Bowl. Davis continued to find pitching success wherever he went, while the Phillies continued to founder in the bottom of the National League's second division. 

There seems little question that if Davis had not been forced to stay in the minor leagues by baseball's reserve clause, he would have been a 200 game winner in the major leagues. If he had, then, like his former San Francisco Seals teammate Lefty Gomez, "Old Coonskin" Curt Davis would have had a legitimate shot at being elected to the Hall of Fame.