On February 3, 1989, former Cardinals first baseman Bill White was named National League president, becoming the first black man to lead a major professional sports league in America and the first player to become NL president in more than 70 years. White’s hire came two years after Dodgers general manager Al Campanis was fired […]
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It was a strange twist of fate that in his final game as Cardinals manager, Solly Hemus watched two players whose careers he had mismanaged led his club to a 9-1 win over a Dodgers team that was chasing a National League pennant. Bill White hit three home runs and a double and Bob Gibson
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Just weeks ahead of the 1959 season, the Cardinals gambled on the potential of 25-year-old Bill White, dealing their ace, Sam Jones, to the Giants in a four-player trade that provided the Cardinals with a cornerstone of their 1964 World Series championship club. On March 25, 1959, Cardinals general manager Bing Devine dealt Jones and
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Ken Boyer had just returned from a quail-hunting trip in Hermann, Mo., when the phone rang. It was a reporter, calling to tell Boyer that he had just been named the 1964 National League MVP. “I guess 14 must be my lucky number,” Boyer said. “That’s my uniform number and that’s how many birds we
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On July 30, 1959, Bob Gibson formally introduced himself to the Cincinnati Reds and Major League Baseball, earning the first of 251 career victories in the first starting assignment of his career. That April, Gibson had made three appearances for the Cardinals, each in relief. On April 15, Gibson made his major league debut, pitching
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On June 23, 1961, Stan Musial hopped off the trainer’s table, took the field at Busch Stadium I and proceeded to hit two homers and drive in seven runs to lead the Cardinals to a 10-5 win over the San Francisco Giants. Just imagine what he could have accomplished if he had been fully healthy.
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Off to a slow start to the 1964 season, the Cardinals had to do something. For manager Bing Devine, that meant making one of the most famous deals in baseball history, trading Ernie Broglio, Bobby Shantz, and Doug Clemens to the Cubs for Lou Brock, Jack Spring, and Paul Toth. For Ken Boyer, that meant
Fourteen years after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, Bill White, a four-time all-star and the defending National League Gold Glove Award winner at first base, arrived in St. Petersburg, Florida, for spring training with the St. Louis Cardinals. While some of the Cardinals’ star players, such as Stan
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Heading into the Cardinals’ May 20, 1964, game against the Chicago Cubs, Bob Gibson knew he needed to do something different. So like the Karate Kid 20 years later, Gibson got to work polishing his car. “I threw well in spring training, but my shoulder has been stiff since then,” Gibson said. “I had to
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