Page 100 - 1975 BoSox

RICK WISE WON 188 MAJOR- league ballgames, was a two-time All-Star, threw a no-hitter (and barely missed
three others), and was the winning pitcher in what many still say was the greatest baseball game ever played, Game Six of the 1975 World Series.
He had a lot of support from his family growing up. Wise’s father, Cli , was a high-school history teacher, who took a teaching job in Oregon after World War II and moved the family from Michigan to Portland in 1948 or 1949. Rick was born on September 13, 1945, in Jackson, Michigan, but was raised in Portland. Rick’s father had been a pitcher under legendary baseball coach Ray Fisher at the University of Michigan (where he dueled Michigan State’s Robin Roberts). He also played football behind Heisman Trophy-winning halfback Tom Harmon. He had quite a sports background, and both he and Rick’s mother, Barbara, worked with their son as he developed as a ballplayer. Cli Wise also became a coach and athletic director at Benson High School.
Rick had two brothers and two sisters. His youngest brother, Tom, played in the Astros organization from 1970 to 1974. Tommy Wise was nearly seven years younger, and reached the Double-A level before his career was derailed by surgery on both knees.Tommy pitched some as an amateur player, but was primarily a rst baseman/third baseman in the minors. Rick and his wife, Susan, raised two children and had four grandchildren. None of them pursued
sports professionally.
Rick Wise began to rack up accomplish- ments early on. In 1958, when he was 12 years old, his Rose City team went to the Little League World Series. ree years later, with more or less the same team, Wise went to the Babe Ruth World Series and pitched the second no-hitter
in the history of that tournament. When he worked for the Red Sox in the 1975 World Series, it was his third Series.
Rick attended James Madison High School in Portland and helped lead the school to its rst baseball state championship in 1963. He excelled in other sports as well, and was all-city in football and basketball and all-city and all-state in baseball. In a 2009 retrospective article, Kerry Eggers of the Portland Tribune wrote, “ ere is little dispute that Wise is one of the greatest athletes in Portland history.”1 He was just 17 when he graduated and was promptly signed to a major-league contract by the Philadelphia Phillies.
Scouts began to show interest from very early on; Wise said he believed area scouts began to take note from the time he’d played in the Little League World Series. As he got deeper into his high-school years, he became more aware of scouts visiting the household and talking with his parents. As a minor, he never had much contact with the scouts themselves. ere was no doubt what Rick wanted, though. “I knew I wanted to play pro ball. I knew at a very early age. I knew when I was in Little League that I wanted to play pro ball. Of course, my dad, being an educator, wanted to make sure I got an education. I had scholarship o ers in all three sports, but I knew what I wanted to do from a very early age and it worked out just ne.”2 One big-league scout tried to intimidate his parents, urging them to sign on his behalf on the spot: “If Rich
has a bad game, his value will drop. Why not sign with us now?”3
Phillies scout Glenn Elliott signed the 17-year-old Wise, with a bonus of $12,000. is was enough at the time to de ne him as a “bonus baby”—a player who had to be protected by the parent club the next year or become subject to a draft in which he could be lost. Rick started
Rick Wise
By Bill Nowlin
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