Oct. 1, 1964 - This was 16 innings of baseball that tightened the guts. If it’s succumbing to the emotion of the moment to say that last night’s 1-0 victory by the Pirates over the pennant-driving Reds in 16 innings will stand as one of the dramatic ballgames of the era, then so be it. (Pictured below, cancer-stricken Fred Hutchinson meets before the game with understudy Dick Sisler.)
It was almost unbelievable. In situation after situation in this critical moment, the Reds couldn’t score, and the word “unbelievable” kept coming out of mouths as the reaction to the near unreality of a scoreless ballgame at a time when the pennant race can be determined by any swing of the bat, any pitch, any ball not handled cleanly.
The Reds have been hit with an offensive paralysis that, in its own way, almost matches the great collapse of the Phillies this past week. The Reds reached 33 scoreless innings last night, and it got to a point where a man got up and announced in the press box, “I was there the last time the Reds scored a run against the Mets last Sunday. I can attest to it truly. It’s in my scorebook.”
Here is the record of the game that might have cost them the pennant:
Fourth Inning — Man on third, one out.
Sixth Inning — Men on first and second, two out.
Ninth Inning — Men on first and third, one out.
Tenth Inning — Men on first and third, two out.
Eleventh Inning — Men on first and third, one out, then bases loaded, two out.
Thirteenth Inning — Man on second, none out, then bases loaded, one out.
Fourteenth Inning — Bases loaded, one out.
It had to be excruciating for the Reds. In the 14th, Pittsburgh’s Al McBean replaced starter Bob Veale to pitch to Leo Cardenas with the bases loaded and one out. McBean said Cardenas yelled to him in Spanish, “You have nothing to gain. Give me a fat pitch.”
McBean yelled back the classic expletive and proceeded to get Cardenas and pinch hitter Marty Keough on popups.
The Pirates’ run that ended the 4-hour-11-minute night’s journey toward the end of a pennant race came on a double by Donn Clendenon, a sacrifice, then a squeeze bunt by rookie Jerry May, a 20-year-old rookie of two weeks’ tenure in the bigs who never before in his life had bunted in a squeeze play.
Afterward, Cincinnati acting manager Dick Sisler launched into a summary of the game that was almost entirely a monologue.
“I never saw such hitting in my life,” said Sisler. “Thirty-three blanking innings without a run. My God, the chances we had to win the game. Time and time again. If we could just hit the ball, just hit the ball. We had chances. We could have won the game in nine innings. All we needed was for someone to make contact.”
Finally, he said: “When you go 33 innings and can’t score, you can’t win. That’s the statement of the year, I know. A real stupid statement.”
Being there and listening to him was like looking into the raw bloody flesh of a huge gaping wound. It was, for those privileged to be close to the center of a national passion, at once both the best and worst of times.
Meanwhile, in St. Louis, most of the Cardinals — who had just beaten the Phillies — left the clubhouse before the Red-Pirate game was over. Only Dick Groat, the former Pirate, remained.
“Those are my boys,” Groat said as he listened to the special radio broadcast from Cincinnati. “I called Maz [Bill Mazeroski] and [Bill] Virdon last night. They said they’d take care of the Reds for me.” At 12:30 a.m., the Pirates came through. “They promised,” Groat said.
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