Cowboy Didn’t Send Stubing Off Into Sunset

Well, at least Gene Autry didn’t ask for Moose Stubing’s head. Remember George Steinbrenner demanding that Mike Ferraro be fired after a coaching decision he made in the American League championship series of 1980?

It was the second game between the New York Yankees and the Kansas City Royals, with the Royals leading the best-of-five series, one game to none. In the eighth inning, with Kansas City leading, 3-2, Willie Randolph was on first base for the Yankees with two out. Bob Watson doubled, and Randolph tried to score after being waved home by third base coach Ferraro. Randolph was thrown out to end the inning. The on-deck hitter was Reggie Jackson.

An angry Steinbrenner stormed into the clubhouse afterward and told newsmen, “The players didn’t lose this game. We got taken out of it. Jackson was up there and never got to hit.”

Dick Howser, the Yankee manager, defended Ferraro’s call. So did Jackson. Ferraro didn’t get fired, but after Kansas City won the series, Howser got the gate, even though he guided the Yankees to 103 victories that season.

The punch line: Earlier in the season, Ferraro had been criticized for being too conservative. The critic? George Steinbrenner.

Add coaches: In the 1950 National League pennant decider between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Philadelphia Phillies at Ebbets Field, the Dodgers had runners on first and second in the ninth inning with none out and the score 1-1.

Duke Snider singled to center, and Cal Abrams tried to score from second after getting the go-ahead from third base coach Milt Stock. Abrams was out by 20 feet on a throw from Philadelphia center fielder Richie Ashburn. Robin Roberts worked out of the inning, and in the 10th, Dick Sisler hit a three-run homer, giving Philadelphia the pennant, 4-1.

Stock said afterward: “That’s the way we played it all season. I’d do it again.”

Not in Brooklyn. The Dodgers fired him a month later.

Trivia Time: Why did pitcher Ralph Branca of the Brooklyn Dodgers change his uniform number to 12 in 1952? (Answer below.)

New York Mets catcher Gary Carter, who has accused Houston Astros pitcher Mike Scott of doctoring the baseball, said he was convinced of it when he caught Scott in the All-Star game.

“It looks like a cross-seam cutter-slider,” Carter said. “Jesse Barfield swung at one and missed by 2 1/2 feet. I caught it, otherwise it would have been a serious passed ball.”

The-defense-rests Dept.: Said Fresno State football Coach Jim Sweeney a month ago: “We have the best defensive football team probably in the history of the PCAA and certainly in the history of my coaching career.”

It its PCAA opener, Fresno State was beaten by San Jose State, 45-41.

Woody Hayes says that old-time rival Bo Schembechler, once his assistant at Ohio State, has always been a favorite of his wife, Anne.

“Her three favorite people are Cary Grant, Thomas Jefferson and Bo Schembechler,” Hayes says.

Says Bo: “Yes, she’s said that to me, too, but I’m a distant third.”

Trivia Answer: To change his luck. He wore No. 13 in 1951, when he gave up the fateful home run to Bobby Thomson.

Quotebook

Angel Don Sutton, on Game 2 of the AL playoffs: “It looked like a spring training game in Yuma in the wind and sand.”