Sutton and Niekro Are a Winning Combo

It was a matchup 94 years in the making.

Not since 1892, when Tim Keefe and Pud Galvin met in a National League game, had two 300-game winners squared off.

It happened in Anaheim, 13 years ago tonight.

It was the Angels’ Don Sutton, 41, with 301 wins, against Cleveland’s Phil Niekro, 48, with 304. A crowd of 43,385 came to Anaheim Stadium, and wound up watching younger players decide it.

By the end of the seventh inning, when it was 3-3, both geezers were gone.

Niekro was the first to go. When Indian Manager Pat Corrales came to the mound to lift Niekro in the seventh, Niekro turned to the Angel dugout and pointed to Sutton, a gesture to mark the moment.

The Angels scored six times in the eighth inning against two Cleveland relief pitchers and won going away, 9-3.

And they were most happy to upend Niekro. He was 3-0 against them in recent outings and had run his scoreless streak against the Angels to 26 innings, or until Wally Joyner scored in the fourth inning on an infield ground ball.

After the antique show, Sutton talked about his and Niekro’s long careers, then prepared to go soak his right arm in a bucket of ice.

“It’s either that,” he quipped, “or formaldehyde.”

Footnote: Niekro retired in 1987 with 318 wins, Sutton in 1988 with 324.

Also on this date: In 1907, Branch Rickey, who later became a much better baseball executive than he was a catcher, allowed 13 stolen bases, still the American League record. . . . In 1963, Frank “Home Run” Baker, who in 13 seasons led the American League in home runs four times, died at 77. . . . In 1962, Hall of Fame catcher Mickey Cochrane died at 59.