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Authors: Jimmy Breslin
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held for the new teams. There is an annual regular draft of players in baseball. This one takes in minor-league players. The parent team, to protect valued minor-leaguers from this draft, transfers the minor-leaguer to the major-league roster. This special American League expansion draft was conducted after the minor-leaguers had been brought up. Because of this, when each team was asked to supply a list of players eligible for the special draft, the managers writhed. They couldnât let go of their top veteran players. So they had to assign the young players, some of them with tremendous promise, to the list.
As a result, Fred Haney, general manager of the new Los Angeles Angels, sat down and picked a team which consisted of Deane Chance, a young pitcher you would give an arm for, Bob Rodgers, a catcher you can make a living with, and Jim Fregosi, now one of the best shortstops in the business. Last year, in their second year of existence, the Angels held the league lead for a time, were in the race until the last three weeks, and finished a fine third.
âIt was no freak,â Haney tells you. âThis is a club which is going to be causing trouble for a long time.â
The National League expanded a year after the American. This gave the general managers and owners of National League teams time to think. Their brain waves set off burglar alarms all over the nation.
These businessmen in baseball devised a scheme which ruled out all chances of the new teams getting anything but bad baseball players. National League President Warren Giles showed what was to happen when he announced that the special draft of players for the two new teams would be held a day after the 1961 World Series ended. Or before October 16. The latter date was, of course, the day on which all minor-league prospects who were draftable had to be brought up to the roster. On paper, it read like any other league announcement. But it really was robbery in the daytime. It meant that every National League club could look over the roster, select players they were going to release for nothing or send back to the minors anyway, and place them on the list of players available to the two new teams. For exorbitant prices, of course. Under the rules, the Mets and Houston each had to take sixteen players, at $75,000 apiece, and four premium players at $125,000 each. Almost none of the players on the list were young. They were mostly old guys who, in a week or so, would be around with free agentsâ papers in hand, looking to catch on with some club in a utility role. But here, under this great scheme, was a way to get money for them. Big money. And at the same time it could be made certain that Houston and the Mets would be in the second division for years to come.
It was Stengel who summed it up best.
âI want to thank all those generous owners for giving us those great players they did not want,â he says. âThose lovely, generous owners.â
It was an outright disgrace. On October 10, at a cost of $1,800,000, the Mets stocked their roster. The first player picked was Catcher Hobie Landrith. He was thirty-one, a lifetime .260 hitter, and had a record of being able to catch only two-thirds of a season at the most. For the small sum of $125,000 each, the Mets got Pitcher Bob Miller from the Cards, Pitcher Jay Hook from the Reds, Infielder Don Zimmer from the Cubsâ bench, and Infielder Lee Walls from the Philliesâ bench. Subsequently Walls was sent to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Charley Neal. It took Walls, plus a certified check for $125,000, to get Neal. This makes Neal a quarter-of-a-million-dollar baseball player. Charley showed up with a right hand that made it nearly impossible for him to pull a ball. Charley, everybody says, is the guy who caused the stock crash in May.
It was the kind of a scheme only some sneak businessman could come up with. Baseball has plenty of these. What makes it worse is that the scheme was
As a result, Fred Haney, general manager of the new Los Angeles Angels, sat down and picked a team which consisted of Deane Chance, a young pitcher you would give an arm for, Bob Rodgers, a catcher you can make a living with, and Jim Fregosi, now one of the best shortstops in the business. Last year, in their second year of existence, the Angels held the league lead for a time, were in the race until the last three weeks, and finished a fine third.
âIt was no freak,â Haney tells you. âThis is a club which is going to be causing trouble for a long time.â
The National League expanded a year after the American. This gave the general managers and owners of National League teams time to think. Their brain waves set off burglar alarms all over the nation.
These businessmen in baseball devised a scheme which ruled out all chances of the new teams getting anything but bad baseball players. National League President Warren Giles showed what was to happen when he announced that the special draft of players for the two new teams would be held a day after the 1961 World Series ended. Or before October 16. The latter date was, of course, the day on which all minor-league prospects who were draftable had to be brought up to the roster. On paper, it read like any other league announcement. But it really was robbery in the daytime. It meant that every National League club could look over the roster, select players they were going to release for nothing or send back to the minors anyway, and place them on the list of players available to the two new teams. For exorbitant prices, of course. Under the rules, the Mets and Houston each had to take sixteen players, at $75,000 apiece, and four premium players at $125,000 each. Almost none of the players on the list were young. They were mostly old guys who, in a week or so, would be around with free agentsâ papers in hand, looking to catch on with some club in a utility role. But here, under this great scheme, was a way to get money for them. Big money. And at the same time it could be made certain that Houston and the Mets would be in the second division for years to come.
It was Stengel who summed it up best.
âI want to thank all those generous owners for giving us those great players they did not want,â he says. âThose lovely, generous owners.â
It was an outright disgrace. On October 10, at a cost of $1,800,000, the Mets stocked their roster. The first player picked was Catcher Hobie Landrith. He was thirty-one, a lifetime .260 hitter, and had a record of being able to catch only two-thirds of a season at the most. For the small sum of $125,000 each, the Mets got Pitcher Bob Miller from the Cards, Pitcher Jay Hook from the Reds, Infielder Don Zimmer from the Cubsâ bench, and Infielder Lee Walls from the Philliesâ bench. Subsequently Walls was sent to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Charley Neal. It took Walls, plus a certified check for $125,000, to get Neal. This makes Neal a quarter-of-a-million-dollar baseball player. Charley showed up with a right hand that made it nearly impossible for him to pull a ball. Charley, everybody says, is the guy who caused the stock crash in May.
It was the kind of a scheme only some sneak businessman could come up with. Baseball has plenty of these. What makes it worse is that the scheme was
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