Hall of Famers Fingers, Perry Were Great in ’78

If those crazy Hall of Fame voters do not come to their senses, the Padres will be needing to build their own wing (or at least closet) in Cooperstown.

First, there was Willie McCovey.

And then Gaylord Perry.

And now Rollie Fingers.

None of these guys likely considers the old brown, catsup and mustard uniforms to be their attire of choice, but all had legitimately decent years in Mission Valley.

McCovey probably put together the most modest of numbers hereabouts, hitting 22 home runs one year and 23 another while laboring for a couple of the worst of many very bad Padre teams back in those early years. What he did was give the Padres their first very big name, albeit a big name on the downward curve of his career.

Perry and Fingers?

They had one great year in San Diego. It just so happened to be the same year.

It was 1978.

Neither could have done what he did without the other.

Perry had a 21-6 record with a 2.72 earned run average. He won the Cy Young Award.

He could not have accomplished this but for . . .

Rollie Fingers had 37 saves, tops in the National League, and an earned run average of 2.52.

He could not have accomplished those 37 saves if Perry had not doggedly gotten into the late innings with a lead to protect. Not many others on that pitching staff could manage such heroics.

Early the next spring, when Perry won his 268th career game . . . with Fingers getting a save . . . Perry was talking about his dream of getting a 300th big league win.

“Why not go for Cy Young’s 511 wins?” Perry was asked.

“I’ll never make that,” Perry mused, “because Rollie won’t live that long.”

Neither had quite the year in 1979, though Perry led the Padres in wins and Fingers led the Padres in saves. Perry had 12 wins and Fingers had 13 saves.

Gaylord Perry left the Padres late in the 1979 season, but did go on and get 314 wins.

Fingers?

He stayed with the Padres through a troubled 1980 season, spending much of that year bickering with Manager Jerry Coleman and begging to be traded darned near anywhere. That was not a happy year for Fingers, whose upturned mustache could hardly disguise the down-turned scowl.

“They can trade me anywhere they like,” he said. “Just get me out of here. I’ve had all the crap I can take here.”

Jack McKeon, by then the general manager, was happy to accommodate. This was before McKeon became known as Trader Jack, but the Fingers deal probably went a long way toward establishing the nickname.

Fingers was one of 11 players involved in the deal, which McKeon might prefer to forget. He gave up Fingers, pitcher Bob Shirley, catcher/first baseman Gene Tenace and catcher Bob Geren to St. Louis for catcher Terry Kennedy and six nonentities whose collective baseball cards, if they have any, are not worth a nickel.

Freed of the agony of playing for the Padres, Fingers ended up with the Milwaukee Brewers--in another trade four days later by the Cardinals--for the 1981 season and won both the American League MVP and Cy Young awards.

Take that, Padres.

However, Fingers did not make the Hall of Fame because of a big year or two in Milwaukee or a big year or two with the Padres. He established himself along with Reggie Jackson and Joe Rudi and Vida Blue and all the other guys with the Charlie Finley A’s.

The World Series is like Carnegie Hall to a relief pitcher, or at least that was the way Fingers treated it. The ultimate drama is played out in the final innings, exactly when Fingers would stalk to the mound. The mound was his stage and so was the moment.

He had six saves and two wins in the three World Series the A’s won in the early 70s. The A’s needed only 12 wins and he had a hand in eight of them.

Like all of the other key players on those Oakland teams, Fingers fled when free agency allowed him out from under Finley’s penurious ownership. The Padres, at the time, had an owner whose pockets were not zipped and padlocked, as currently seems to be the case. Ray Kroc convinced him to head south to escape enslavement at Finley’s hands.

Like so many others who have come to San Diego to work or play, in Fingers’ case both, he stayed.

A year ago, when he was first eligible for election to the Hall of Fame, he had a little party. It made no difference that he did not make it, at least not that you could tell. He had a good time.

Eligible once again, the undaunted Fingers had a little party once again this year . . . and this time he made it.

It would have been nice if it might have happened a year ago, when Perry gained admittance. The acceptance speeches at Cooperstown might have been interesting.

You know, Rollie Fingers standing there and finishing all of Gaylord Perry’s sentences.