Page 255 - 1975 BoSox

248 ’75—THE RED SOX TEAM THAT SAVED BASEBALL
overwhelmed by it. Carl Yastrzemski, who was no stranger to endorsements himself, o ered some helpful nancial advice: Hire Bob Woolf.18 Woolf, a Boston lawyer who had become one of the world’s most well-known sports agents when he negotiated Larry Bird’s contract with the Celtics in 1979, would manage e Hawk’s nances for the rest of his career and serve as a voice of reason in times of trouble.
In the early stages of the 1969 season, in a shocking transaction, the Red Sox dealt Harrelson to the Cleveland Indians along with Juan Pizarro and Dick Ellsworth in exchange for Sonny Siebert, Joe Azcue, and Vicente Romo. George Scott and Dalton Jones would split time at rst base, and Tony Conigliaro would try to making a comeback in right eld. e move came as a paralyzing blow to Harrelson, who loved Boston, and could not imagine leaving it. e previous season, Red Sox owner Tom Yawkey had announced in a newspaper article that he was thankful that the Red Sox had not traded Harrelson prior to spring training in 1968: “Often,” Yawkey said, “the best deals are the ones you don’t make.”19 Harrelson’s Red Sox teammates were distraught, and the Hawk himself was inconsolable. Angry fans picketed the front o ce protesting the trade. Despite Harrelson’s public displays of disappointment, when Harrelson announced that he would retire rather than play for another team, jaws dropped across the country, and chaos reigned.
How could e Hawk nest anywhere else but Boston? He was loved by the fans, loved by his teammates, loved by sponsors, endorsers, businessmen, and con- sumers. Harrelson simply could not leave Boston—he would rather not play. On the other hand, baseball meant too much to e Hawk to simply leave it behind. For Red Sox General Manager Dick O’Connell, Cleveland Indians president Gabe Paul, and Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, the situation was a night- mare. Azcue and Siebert had already said they would not go back to Cleveland, and the other three players involved in the transaction were caught in limbo— freshly dressed in their new uniforms but not eligible to play. Meanwhile, Harrelson waited, in the middle
of the frenzy, exhausted from lack of sleep and emo- tionally in shambles, e Hawk lay mostly dormant throughout the entire solemn ordeal, but shone through brie y when Harrelson met Kuhn for the rst time. ough the distressed Harrelson had a serious matter on his mind, his ashy alter-ego was distracted by the nely-dressed commissioner’s attire, and, unable to help himself, e Hawk commented extensively on the sartorial elegance of Kuhn’s suit.20 On April 21, Harrelson and his agent, Wol , met with the commissioner, AL President Joe Cronin, Paul, and O’Connell at the MLB o ces in New York, and resolved the situation. Harrelson loved baseball “too much to hurt it,” and he reported to Cleveland the next day, reunited with friend and former manager Alvin Dark.21
Despite Harrelson’s reluctance to leave Boston, he was pleasantly surprised to be welcomed with open arms in Cleveland, and business deals abounded. He again endorsed products, and while in Cleveland his auto- biography (written with Al Hirshberg) was published. e Hawk was huge again. But the style didn’t lack substance, as Harrelson hit 30 homers and drove in 92 runs, en route to another great year.
In 1970, tragedy struck in the form of a debilitating injury. Playing in a spring training game on March 19 against his former team, the Oakland Athletics, Hawk slid into second base and immediately felt a shooting pain in his leg. It was broken. Harrelson was laid up for a long time, and while he was injured, rookie Chris Chambliss took his place. After the 1971 season, having played only 69 games since his injury, e Hawk felt an emotion that was entirely new to him. “I just lost my desire to play baseball,” Harrelson said in his 2006 interview, “I was still a competitor, e Hawk was still there, but I didn’t want to play baseball anymore.” Harrelson sadly announced that he would quit the game he had loved for so long to pursue a professional gol ng career. at pursuit ended badly, and Harrelson turned back to baseball once more in 1975, coming back to Boston—this time as an announcer. Many Boston fans have fond memories of Harrelson’s work behind the mike.