THE BEER AND THE BAR : The Case of the Spilled Drink in the ’59 World Series Still Stirs Encino Lawyer Essegian

From his penthouse law office in Encino, Chuck Essegian pleads a convincing case.

“I don’t miss baseball,” he said. “That experience is behind me now.”

There isn’t a trace of bitterness, or any hint of exageration, in his voice. He sounds like a man who is preoccupied with getting back to work.

Work for Essegian, 54, is law. He’s had his own practice for more than 10 years, spending his time in a courtroom instead of a stadium.

With his background, he could work with professional athletes. It is a lucrative trade but one he hasn’t sought.

“If somebody approached me with something, I might have some interests,” he said. “But that hasn’t happened.”

Essegian, it seems, has turned away from sports--baseball in particular--after being turned away as a player 22 years ago.

In a six-year major league career, Essegian never did approach the feats of his 1959 season with the Los Angeles Dodgers. He set a World Series record that year with two pinch-hit home runs as the Dodgers beat the Chicago White Sox in six games.

After that, Essegian was a journeyman. He played another season with the Dodgers, then played for Baltimore, Cleveland and Kansas City in 1961. He bounced from Cleveland in 1962 to Kansas City in 1963. He played his final season in Japan before retiring in 1964.

His involvement with baseball has been only occasional since. He plays in about one old-timers game a year--for fun, not honor.

There are memories but no regrets. Once a role player in search of a role, Essegian has found an opportunity in law that didn’t exist for him in baseball.

“It’s like anything,” he said. “You have to be in the right place at the right time and have the right things happen to you.”

There was a time when Essegian seemed to have that combination going for him in baseball.

As a 28-year-old second-year player with the Dodgers, Essegian showed promise as a clutch hitter off the bench during the World Series.

Pinch-hitting for Johnny Podres in Game 2, he homered off Bob Shaw to rally the Dodgers to a 4-3 victory that evened the Series.

In the sixth game, with the Dodgers comfortably ahead and destined for a championship, Essegian etched his name in the record books. But the memories mean more to him than the record.

“I can always tell whoever wants to listen that I pinch-hit for a Hall of Famer in the World Series,” he said.

It was the ninth inning of the deciding game. Duke Snider, who had played injured during the Series, was due up next, but Manager Walter Alston allowed him to sit out his last scheduled at-bat.

Essegian grabbed a bat.

“On my way up to the plate, I knew the pressure was really on,” he said. “Then I saw Duke.”

“I guess I’m pinch-hitting for you,” Essegian said to Snider.

“As long as you’re going to hit for me, you might as well hit another home run,” Snider replied.

Essegian took the advice, stroking a Ray Moore fastball over the left-field fence for his second pinch-hit homer of the Series.

It is a World Series record that has been equaled only once. Bernie Carbo had two pinch-hit home runs for the Boston Red Sox in the 1975 World Series against the Cincinnati Reds.

He had help from a bottle of beer.

“That ball had to have scraped the paint off the backside of the fence on its way down,” Essegian said. “It barely got out.

“Al Smith was the left fielder for Chicago, and he had a play on the ball. But somebody had placed a bottle of beer on the top of the wall.

“When Al hit the fence, the beer spilled on his head and he couldn’t get the ball. I have a classic picture of that somewhere.”

Searching his office, Essegian couldn’t produce the snapshot that is draped in irony. It pictures the highlight--and turning point--of his career.

Other than another pinch home run on opening day the following season, an 11th-inning game-winning shot, Essegian was on his way out with the Dodgers. Even that day, his name was accidentally left off the opening day roster.

After the feats of second season in Los Angeles, when he batted .304 in 24 games after being acquired from St. Louis, Essegian was never again as spectacular. His luck changed. Opportunity’s knock went unanswered.

Three years later, he was through with baseball. Or baseball was through with him. In his final major league season with Kansas City, Essegian batted .225 in 101 games. The career .255 played in 404 major league games.

“Obviously, I was upset that I didn’t play more,” he said. “But every guy in the big leagues thinks he should be playing every day.

“I wasn’t bitter when I retired. I just thought it was time to move on to something else.”

Despite his relatively short baseball career, Eassegian wouldn’t second guess himself about choosing baseball over football. Essegian had that choice when he graduated from Fairfax High School.

Instead of making a quick decision, Essegian decided to attend Stanford University. He played both sports there, but most of his valuable work came in the classroom.

“I was always interested in getting an education--that’s why I went to Stanford,” he said.

He excelled athletically, too. In football, Stanford shared a practice field with the San Francisco 49ers. That made an impression on Essegian.

“People would ask me which sport I liked better, and I didn’t know,” he said. “In football season I liked football and in baseball season it was baseball.”

In 1952, Essegian played in the Rose Bowl as Stanford lost to the University of Illinois. That, he says, is more memorable than the World Series record.

Yet, when he graduated from Stanford, his choice was made. It was baseball. He never regretted it.

“I wouldn’t have changed anything,” he said. “Today, football salaries compare with baseball salaries, but that wouldn’t have changed anything.

“Every guy wants to play baseball.”

Essegian did. And he got a shot.

When the Dodgers rebounded from a seventh-place finish in their first year out of Brooklyn in 1958 to claim a world championship, Essegian’s future seemed bright. He was a big part of the chemistry that produced a title from ashes.

“Probably a bigger thrill than playing in the World Series was just playing on that ballclub that year with all those great ballplayers,” Essegian said. “Gil Hodges, Don Drysdale, Sandy Koufax, Pee Wee Reese, Duke Snider: I read about some of those guys when I was in school.

“By the time we won the pennant it got to be like we were supposed to win.”

And they did. For Essegian, however, it was a temporary victory in a short-lived career.

“Duke Snider used to always say he’d rather be lucky than good,” he said. “Coming from a person of his caliber, that says something for the thought.”

The well-worn phrase holds particular significance for Essegian. He was good, but not necessarily lucky in terms of a long career.

That is of little matter as he continues to build a law practice. Essegian finds a bit of a parellel between his past and present professions.

“You’re still competing against somebody,” he said. “Somebody wins and somebody loses.”

Chuck Essegian has seen both sides.