Koufax, Drysdale Found Way Back to the Fold

“Peace at Last!” read the banner headline, the morning after “the great holdout” ended in Los Angeles. Dodger pitchers Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale formed a two-man union before spring training began and demanded three-year contracts that would pay each $166,666 a year.

They signed for much less, 33 years ago today--$120,000 for Koufax, $105,000 for Drysdale. Each had made $75,000 the previous season.

The holdout, a Page 1 story for weeks, dragged on interminably. It reached charade levels when both showed up for acting lessons at a movie studio, implying they were considering career changes.

After the two spurned club offers of $112,500 for Koufax and $97,500 for Drysdale shortly before the start of spring training, the Dodgers left for Florida without them, General Manager Buzzie Bavasi saying he had “no hope” of signing them.

Koufax’s salary was the largest paid to a pitcher, surpassing Warren Spahn’s $85,000.

Koufax went on to a 27-9 season with a 1.73 ERA. He struck out 323. Drysdale was 13-16 with a 3.42 ERA and 177 strikeouts.

It was Koufax’s last season. Plagued with arm problems, he retired afterward. Drysdale pitched for four more seasons before he too retired because of arm troubles. He died July 3, 1993.

Also on this date: In 1979, Luke Easter, one of major league baseball’s first black players, was shot and killed by two men outside a bank in Euclid, Ohio. Easter, 63, worked for an aircraft workers union and had just cashed about $40,000 in payroll checks for co-workers. He was without his normal police escort this day and didn’t know the men had been stalking him. They were captured, after a police chase and subsequent shootout.