Page 293 - 1975 BoSox

286 ’75—THE RED SOX TEAM THAT SAVED BASEBALL
propensity to deliver a variety of pitches at a variety of speeds from a variety of release points to a variety of locations, was o cially nearing his 35th birthday and was a veteran of 12 major-league seasons. He posted an 18-14 record during the regular season, with a 4.02 earned-run average, 18 complete games, and 142 strikeouts in 260 innings. On September 16, to the chants of “Loo-ee” from the Fenway Faithful, “El Tiante” outdueled Orioles ace Jim Palmer 2-0 behind home runs by Fisk and Petrocelli to increase the Red Sox lead in the AL East to 51⁄2 games and e ectively close out the pennant race. e Red Sox had led the division and faded in 1974; there would be no fading in 1975.
Righty Rick Wise, 31, was in his 11th big-league season after stints with the Phillies and Cardinals. He posted a 19-12 record with a 3.95 ERA, and struck out 141 in 2551⁄3 innings. e rest of Boston’s starting sta in- cluded 28-year old veteran Bill “Spaceman” Lee, who posted a 17-9 record with a 3.95 ERA, swingman Roger Moret, who turned 26 during the season and won 14 games, and Reggie Cleveland, a 27-year-old who won 13.
At the back end of Boston’s bullpen were Dick Drago, a 30-year-old, seven-year veteran who saved 15 games; Jim Willoughby, 26, who saved eight games; and Diego Segui, a 38-year-old, 14-year veteran, who saved six.
e veteran sta was superb for the Red Sox in the ALCS. Tiant set the stage for the Red Sox with a 7-1 complete Game One victory, allowing just three hits. Moret relieved Cleveland in Game Two and picked up the victory, and Wise won Game ree, with Drago collecting saves in the nal two contests.
e Red Sox sta limited the powerful Athletics to a .194 batting average and just one home run, by Jackson. Reggie collected ve hits in the series, Bando six, and the rest of the Athletics just eight total. Boston batted .316, with home runs by the two longtime Red Sox, Yastrzemski and Petrocelli. Yaz collected ve hits and batted .455 in the series, Fisk smacked ve and batted. 417, and Burleson, Cooper, and Lynn each knocked out four hits.
e ALCS win was the last for Boston owner Tom Yawkey. Gravely ill with leukemia during the 1975 postseason, he died on July 9, 1976, at the age of 73.
e Oakland Athletics
Charlie Finley’s Oakland Athletics entered the 1975 ALCS with a well-earned swagger. After winning their fth straight AL West title, the A’s were favored to advance to their fourth straight World Series, having dispatched the Cincinnati Reds, the New York Mets, and the Los Angeles Dodgers in the three previous fall classics.
e A’s were a talented but contentious crew. Clad in gaudy green and gold uniforms and white shoes, with most sporting mustaches, along with an array of lamb- chop sideburns and bushy beards, the Athletics were in constant turmoil. Most of that turbulence originated with Finley, the controversial, abrasive, and penurious Oakland owner, who acted as his own general manager. roughout the Athletics’ reign, there had been discord between the imperial Charlie and his subjects, as Finley battled them in contract negotiations and interfered with events on the eld, ring manager Dick Williams after the rst two world championships, and arbitrarily doling out nes and suspensions to players.
Even the mustaches had been a point of contention. Future Hall of Fame right elder Reggie Jackson, ordered by Finley to shave his facial hair during spring training in 1972, had refused. e Oakland owner, believing the egotistical Jackson was trying to call attention to himself, countered by o ering each of his other players $300 to grow a mustache, and after all but one (pitcher Vida Blue) accepted the o er, staged “Mustache Night”at the “Mausoleum,”as the spacious, often vacant Oakland County Coliseum was called. e event was wildly successful, helping to line Finley’s pockets. e players — partly to spite Finley and partly because they won the World Series later that year and were superstitious — continued to sport the facial hair for the rest of the A’s dynastic run.1