Page 19 - 1975 BoSox

12 ’75—THE RED SOX TEAM THAT SAVED BASEBALL
used a lot of lineups, trying to divide playing time at rst base, left eld, and designated hitter among Cooper, Yastrzemski, Cater, Tommy Harper, and Bernie Carbo. Cooper ended up playing 74 games at rst and 41 more as the designated hitter, getting most of the starts when facing right-handed pitchers. He hit .275 in 414 at-bats.
Cooper did not have a good defensive reputation early in his career, which is why he spent a lot of time as a designated hitter. For 1975, the Red Sox had two rookie out elders ( Jim Rice and Fred Lynn), plus the come- backing Tony Conigliaro, who initially won the DH job. Cooper would have to beat out a lot of people in order to get a chance to play. At the end of May, he was the odd man out, getting just six hits in 24 at-bats. He persevered, and by late June he was platooning against right-handed pitchers. He ended up hitting .311 with 14 home runs in 305 at-bats.
One of the team’s hottest hitters in August and September, Cecil had a scary moment on September 7. In the second game of a doubleheader against the Milwaukee Brewers, he was hit in the face by future teammate Bill Travers. Cooper was carried o on a stretcher and was bleeding from his nose and mouth. e incident hampered his performance the rest of the season. With Jim Rice’s wrist injury requiring Carl Yastrzemski to play left eld, Cooper had rst base to himself for most of the postseason. He was 4-for-10 in the ALCS against Oakland but just 1-for-19 in the World Series against Cincinnati.
Playing in 123 games in 1976 while again splitting time between rst base and designated hitter, Cooper hit.282 with 15 homers and 78 RBIs. After the season manager Don Zimmer told Cooper that he would become Boston’s regular rst baseman. is was not to be the case, as on December 6, 1976, Cooper was traded to the Milwaukee Brewers for two former Red Sox, rst baseman George Scott and out elder Bernie Carbo.
e trade was not particularly popular in either Boston or Milwaukee. Brewers owner Bud Selig was told by other AL East clubs that if you “keep making trades like that you will be in last place forever.”3 In 1976 the
Brewers nished last in the American League East with a record of 66-95. e extremely popular Scott had rst played in a Red Sox uniform from 1966 to 1971 and had posted several good seasons for the Brewers. But neither Scott nor Carbo ever again had the kind of success they had achieved in earlier seasons. And Cecil Cooper would become a legend in Milwaukee.
Cooper was a clutch contact hitter who could hit for both average and power. He kept putting up such solidly consistent numbers year after year that it was easy to overlook his achievements. In his rst year in Milwaukee, he hit .300; in his second year he hit .312; and in 1979 Cooper hit .308. He had a league-leading 44 doubles in 1979. Former Milwaukee player-coach Sal Bando once said of him, “Cecil Cooper can beat you with a home run or a are to left or a bunt. And he can eld his position. You have guys who can hit home runs and guys who can hit singles. But not many can do both. Cecil can.”4
Playing for a small-market team in the Midwest allowed Cooper to thrive, and in 1980 he did just that. He hit better than .300 in every month of the season nishing with a.352 average, 25 home runs, 219 hits, and an American League-leading 122 RBIs. His season was largely overlooked because Kansas Royals third baseman George Brett irted with a .400 batting average, settling for.390. e unassuming Cooper said, “With Brett hitting close to .400 all year, I didn’t expect to get much publicity, and I didn’t have any trouble living with that.”5
Cooper was part of a record game in 1980. On April 12, in an 18-1 Brewers rout of the Red Sox, he and in elder/DH Don Money connected for two grand slams in the same inning. It was only the fourth time the feat had been accomplished in the major leagues. ( ere have been two since, most recently in 1999, when Fernando Tatis of the St. Cardinals hit two grand slams in one inning.) In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Brewers franchise was moving up in the standings, nishing with 93 wins in 1978 and 95 wins in 1979. In 1981, in a strike-shortened split season, the New York Yankees won the rst half in the AL East