June 17, 1963 - Sandy Koufax of the Los Angeles Dodgers, the man with the golden arm, stifled San Francisco, 2-0, on four singles today for his sixth shutout of the season and dropped the Giants from the National League lead to third place. St. Louis moved into first place by a half game ahead of the second-place Dodgers. The Giants and Dodgers are separated by two percentage points. Bill Skowron doubled home both Los Angeles runs off Billy O’Dell in the third inning. Koufax, winning his 10th game against three losses, yielded a second-inning hit to Joe Amalfitano, singles to Orlando Cepeda, and a ninth-inning hit to Jim Davenport. He struck out nine. A crowd of 36,818 at Candlestick Park, who wore their winter woolens in a brisk crosswind that kept the players’ uniforms flapping throughout the game, sat on their hands as Sandy shut down the Giant lineup. After the game, Koufax said he had “better stuff” than when he recently no-hitted the Giants in Los Angeles. “My control went in spurts,” he said. “But I threw much harder tonight than when I did not yield a hit. I was just lucky in that game.” Reminded that the last time he faced the Giants he was hammered out in a third of an inning after allowing five runs and five hits, Koufax shot back: “Sure they took me apart. But I’m entitled to beat them once in a while.” Giant manager Alvin Dark praised Koufax, stating simply: “When a guy pitches that good, there isn’t much you can do about it. We were overmatched.”
