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Hall
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The
Baby Bull Visits The Hall Of Fame
By Bruce Markusen
Orlando Cepeda has experienced one of the most storied lives in baseball history. During his six stops in the major leagues, he played with 16 Hall of Famers, a simply remarkable total. The lengthy list of legends included Hank Aaron and Willie Mays, arguably the two greatest players of the 1960s, and Bob Gibson and Juan Marichal, two of the era’s hallmark pitchers. So it’s only fitting that on Wednesday Cepeda paid a visit to Cooperstown, where he will soon be joining his former teammates as full-fledged members of the Hall of Fame.
While many Hall
of Famers played for only two or three teams during their careers, Cepeda
lived a far more diversified baseball life. In 1958, he made his major league
debut with the San Francisco Giants, the first of his half-dozen big league
teams. During his nine-year stay in the Bay Area, he played with future National
League president Bill White and four eventual members of the Hall of Fame:
Willie Mays, Willie McCovey Juan Marichal and Gaylord Perry. A trade in the
middle of the 1966 season sent him to the St. Louis Cardinals, where he played
with the Hall of Fame likes of Bob Gibson, Lou Brock and Steve Carlton, and
became friendly with such notables as Curt Flood, Roger Maris, and current
New York Yankees’ broadcaster Tim McCarver. After a short stint in St.
Louis that included two pennants and a world championship, the Cardinals
traded him to the Atlanta Braves for another well-known name—Joe Torre.
Cepeda batted behind Hank Aaron in a stacked Braves’ lineup, while also offering support to the team’s knuckleballing stalwarts, Phil Niekro and Hoyt Wilhelm. In 1972, chronic knee problems and a dispute with Atlanta management led to a trade to the Oakland A’s—this time in exchange for the talented but troubled Denny McLain. Although Cepeda came to bat only three times for the A’s, he did share roster space with three more legends of the game: Reggie Jackson, Catfish Hunter and Rollie Fingers. While in Oakland, he also played for one of the era’s most successful managers (Dick Williams) and perhaps its most controversial owner (Charlie Finley).
Just when his career
seemed at a standstill, the American League adopted the designated hitter
rule, made-to-order for Cepeda’s brittle knees. The Boston Red Sox signed
him specifically for DH duty, allowing him to play a full season with the
likes of Luis Aparicio, Carl Yastrzemski and Carlton Fisk. The following
year, a surprising spring training release led to his final major league
stop—the Kansas City Royals. Just as Cepeda was saying good-bye to the
game, he was also saying hello to a player named George Brett, a rookie third
baseman struggling to find his way with the Royals.
Given Cepeda’s
itinerant career, he’s likely to see many familiar faces in Cooperstown
this summer, when he returns to the area for his official induction into
the Hall of Fame. Cepeda, Brett, and the five other members of the highly
impressive class of 1999 will enter the Hall on Sunday, July 25. The Induction
Ceremonies will begin at 2:30 PM at the Clark Sports Center on Susquehanna
Avenue.
Bruce
Markusen is a Senior Researcher at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and
the author of a young adult book entitled
The
Orlando Cepeda Story, available from Arte Publico Press.
Catchers:
Carlton Fisk, Tim McCarver
Infielders:
Willie McCovey (1b), Julian Javier (2b), Luis Aparicio (ss), George
Brett
(3b)
Outfielders:
Lou Brock (lf), Willie Mays (cf), Hank Aaron (rf)
DH’s:
Reggie Jackson, Carl Yastrzemski
Starting
Steve Carlton, Bob Gibson, Catfish Hunter, Juan Marichal, Phil
Niekro,
Pitchers:
Gaylord Perry
Bruce Markusen is the author of
A
Baseball Dynasty: Charlie Finley’s Swingin’
A’s.
