#73 Ron Jackson

The 6'7" Ron Jackson was a basketball star in high school and continued his hoops prowess at Western Michigan University in his hometown of Kalamazoo MI.

Jackson was also a big enough baseball prospect to be signed as a 'bonus baby' by the Chicago White Sox in 1954. As such he was required to remain on the roster for two seasons and in his first year with the Sox he hit .280 in 40 games. In '55 he again played 40 games but his numbers were disappointing and  beginning in 1956 he was bouncing back and forth between the Sox and the minors through 1959.

Traded to the Red Sox he got into only ten games in '60 and spent most of that year and the next again in the minors. He retired at age 28 to go into the insurance business. He died of pancreatic cancer in 2008.

The Kalamazoo Gazette, Jackson's hometown newspaper, ran a tribute to Jackson after his death. It touches on his character, his two sport career and has memories from his family. It's a nice read.

This is another in a string of nicely preserved cards that I've been posting. Not exactly 'pack fresh', but pretty darn close. And there are those Yankee Stadium pennants again.

#72 Bill Renna

William "Big Bill" Renna was a 3-sport collegiate standout at Menlo College and Santa Clara in California when he was signed by the Yankees in 1949. He displayed plenty of power and a hit near or better than .300 in his four year stretch in the Yankee chain. In one game in 1952 playing for the Yanks' AAA club in Kansas city he was part of a 10 home run (six in one inning!), 53 total bases assault. Renna hit two of those homers in a game that set American Association records that stand today.

Renna played in New York in 1953 but, while he hit .314, he failed to show much of his expected power. He was dealt to the Athletics who held on to him until June of 1956 when the bosses in New York decided he might be useful and had the Athletics send him back. During his 2+ seasons with the A's he hit 26 homers but batted just .214. He spent the remainder of the 1956 season with the Yankee farm club and he again showed the bat he had earlier in the minors.

The Red Sox acquired him for the 1957 season and after another season in the minors he played sparingly in Boston through May of 1959. Renna worked in the concrete business after he retired. He tells much of his own story in an interview on the This Great Game site.

I found a couple of variations of this picture of Bill Renna in a couple of places. I like it a lot.

#335 Johnny Temple

Johnny Temple signed with the Reds in 1948. There is a bit of mystery concerning his short time at Catawba College in North Carolina, his Navy stint, his real hometown and his actual age when he signed.  The whole convoluted story is chronicled here.

Be that as it may, once he started in pro ball Temple charged through the Reds system hitting very well and displaying an outstanding glove. His minor league credentials earned him a shot with the Reds in 1952 but he struggled. Returned to the minors in June, Temple again showed a good bat and he was called back to the Reds later in the season. He had a bit more success in that stint and by 1953 he was the Reds' starting second-baseman, a spot he held for seven seasons.

Temple teamed up with Roy McMillan and the pair made a formidable DP combo for the club. Temple also found his bat and in seven years with the Reds he hit .291, made three All Star teams and annually ended up first or second in stolen base percentage. His time in Cincy was marked by some well publicized brawls. His spark was coveted by the Indians and after the '59 season they dealt for him.

He spent a bit more than 2 seasons in Cleveland, making the All Star squad in 1961. He bounced from Cleveland to Baltimore and finally back to the Reds as a player/coach in 1964. The end of his second term as a Red came when he got into a huge fight with a fellow coach.

His problems continued after his retirement as he faced the results of bad investments and several legal issues before he passed away in 1994. He's a member of the Reds' Hall of Fame.

#334 Glen Hobbie

Righty Glen Hobbie signed with the Cubs in 1955 out of tiny Witt, Illinois. After three so-so years in the minors he got a quick look at the bigs late in 1957 and took a pounding in two appearances. Nonetheless he made the club in '58 and did well going 10-6 in 55 games. Those 10 wins actually led the Cub staff. Among the starters only Moe Drabowsky had as many as 9 wins. He made 16 starts that year and was moved into the rotation for 1959.

He won 16 games in '59 including a pretty spectacular one hitter on April 21 in which he was perfect until, with two outs in the seventh, Stan Musial doubled. Hobbie won the game 1-0. He came back with another 16 win season in 1960 but suffered the indignity of losing 20. The fact that the Cubs were pretty terrible had a lot to do with that. Hobbie's ERA in his 16 win seasons was 3.69 and 3.97.

Hobbie's career went off the cliff beginning in '61 and he never again had a winning record. He went 21-47 through 1964, a season that saw him dealt to the Cardinals for Lew Burdette. Interestingly Hobbie's last big league win was a big one. In June of '64 the Cardinals were in San Francisco and Hobbie started the second game of a doubleheader. It was his second start for St. Louis after the trade. He allowed a run on a couple of hits to open the game before settling down to retire 25 of 26 batters to gain the win. As is pointed out in this blog post, the Cards won the '64 pennant by a single game so that one win by Hobbie has some real significance.

The Cards traded him to the Tigers but a bad shoulder limited him to some minor league action in 1965 and he then retired at the age of 28. Hobbie's short career could be traced to his being used as both a starter and reliever for the bulk of his time in Chicago.  I did some checking and found that in 1958 Hobbie pitched in 55 games which was second highest in the NL behind Johnny Klippstein, a pure reliever. In '59 he made 33 starts and pitched in a total of 46 games, second only to Sam Jones among regular starting pitchers. And in 1960 he made 36 starts and once again pitched in 46 games, the most of any pitcher with 25 starts.

Glen Hobbie died earlier this month at the age of 77 in his home state of Illinois.

#264 Chico Carrasquel

Shortstop Alfonso 'Chico' Carrasquel, one of the first Venezuelan players to play in the majors, was the first Hispanic player to start in an All Star game. That came in his second season, 1951 when he beat out Phil Rizzuto for the slot.

His rookie season of 1950 saw Carrasquel hit .282 and he was third in the Rookie of the Year voting. That average turned out to be a career high but he hit well enough to keep the White Sox shortstop job where he teamed with Nellie Fox to form a slick DP pairing for six seasons before his 1957 trade to the Indians. A trade prompted, at least in part, to open the job at starting shortstop for fellow Venezuelan Luis Aparicio.

Carrasquel had been signed by the Dodgers out his hometown of Caracas but was unlikely to supplant Pee Wee Reese with the Dodgers so he was sold to the Sox after a year in the Dodger train. In total he made four All Star squads with the Sox and consistently ranked at or near the top of the AL in fielding categories.

After his trade to the Indians Carrasquel played another three seasons as a regular (or close to it). As his numbers declined he played for the A's and finally the Orioles in his final year, 1959. He was signed in the following off season by the White Sox but was released prior to the opener. He signed with the Dodgers and spent the year with their AAA club in Montreal. The White Sox--->Dodgers ending to his career gives it a nice 'Bell Curve' sort of feel.

When his playing days ended he coached and managed in his native country and scouted for the White Sox. He later was their Spanish language broadcaster.

In this short Chicago Tribune interview Carrasquel discusses his career and his carjacking in Valenzuela in 2003. His 2005 New York Times obituary contains tributes from teammates and others that speak to Carrasquel's influence and talent.

I never like Oriole players depicted in anything other than the proud orange and black so here are a handful of Carrasquel photos from 1959, his only season in Charm City.

#75 Sam Jones

Sam Jones was signed by the Indians in 1950 and put up some very impressive minor league numbers for the next four seasons. But in his one extended trial in the bigs he was hit pretty hard. The Indians dealt him to the Cubs as the '54 season ended in a somewhat complicated trade that Baseball Reference tracks like this:

September 30, 1954: Traded by the Cleveland Indians with players to be named later to the Chicago Cubs for a player to be named later. The Chicago Cubs sent Ralph Kiner (November 16, 1954) to the Cleveland Indians to complete the trade. The Cleveland Indians sent $60,000 (November 16, 1954) and Gale Wade (November 30, 1954) to the Chicago Cubs to complete the trade.

Someone diagram that one for me, please.

The tall right-hander, known as 'Toothpick Sam' (see the card's cartoon) and 'Sad Sam' Jones, took a spot in the Cubs rotation in '55 and went on to lose 20 games for a sub-.500 club. Against the Pirates on May 12 of that year he became the first African-American pitcher to throw a major league no-hitter. He walked seven in that game and survived a crazy ninth inning in which he walked the bases loaded with a wild pitch sandwiched in and then proceeded to strike out Dick Groat, Roberto Clemente and Frank Thomas to end it. The next year the Cubs were horrendous and Jones went 9-14.

Traded to the Cardinals Jones found better support and won 26 games in two seasons. He had a fine '58 season winning 14 games with a 2.88 ERA and leading the league in strikeouts. Perhaps thinking they had wrung all they could out of the vet the Cards traded Jones to the Giants.

In San Francisco in '59 Jones won a career high 21 games and had a league leading ERA. He won 18 games in 1960 but slipped badly in 1961 and the Giants were transitioning him to the bullpen. He spent the next five seasons working for several organizations and bouncing between the majors and the minors. He was working as a pitching coach and player when he pitched his last game in 1967 in the Pirates chain. Jones died just four years after he retired,

During his career Jones developed a reputation as a headhunter but he denied it. He did lead the lead in hit batters in 1955. His hard breaking curve helped him with three strikeout crowns but his wildness meant he also led the league in walks four times. He was a veteran of both the Negro Leagues and several Caribbean Leagues as well.

A fascinating character, Sam Jones' story is told well on his SABR bio page. It chronicles his early life and how he came to get the name 'Samuel Jones' after being born as Daniel Pore Franklin.

BTW..he is the second 'Sad Sam' Jones to play in the majors. He was preceded by Samuel Pond 'Sad Sam' Jones who pitched for 22 seasons from 1914 thru 1935.

#218 Roman Mejias

Here is a cocktail party trivia winner (all of you go to cocktail parties don't you?). Who hit the first major league home run in the state of Texas?

The answer is Roman Mejias. In the bottom of the third inning in the first game played by the expansion Houston Colt 45s Mejias knocked a Don Caldwell pitch through the humid Houston air and made city history. He hit another homer in the eighth as part of a 3 for 5, 6 RBI game. His 45s won 11-2.

Mejias was signed by the Pirates out of Cuba where he had played high school ball and worked the sugar cane fields and became a winter ball star. He hit well during his minor league days. He spent several seasons trying to crack the Pirates outfield lineup but with Bill Virdon, Bob Skinner and some guy named Roberto Clemente ahead of him he was doomed to 4th outfielder and pinch hitting duties when he wasn't being shuttled to minors.

Being taken with the 11th pick of the expansion draft by Houston led to his one year as a major league regular. He was hitting .311 and had 19 homers at the All Star break in '62 but wasn't selected for the NL team. Supposedly he was pretty disappointed by that.

Despite (or because of) his '62 hitting exploits the Colts were able to trade him to the Red Sox for Pete Runnels. He played for the Sox as a semi-regular in '63, played sparingly in '64 and then found himself back in the minors and then he played a year in Japan before he left the game.

This is another pretty sweet card. Just one corner ding mars it. Mejias is posed in Seals Stadium with a glove that looks pretty big, especially for that time. There are a couple of informative and entertaining pages devoted to Mejias on the 'net. That second one has a ton of pictures. Always nice to see the great Colt 45s jersey.