Joaquin Andujar, who helped lead Cardinals to World Series title in 1982, dies at 62

The self-proclaimed “one tough Dominican,” former Cardinals star right-hander Joaquin Andujar also coined a word that will never be found in Webster’s but is one with which every St. Louisan over the age of 40 is familiar.

Andujar often would say his favorite word in the English language was “youneverknow.”

And that could be applied any number of ways. It could be that Andjuar meant that a baseball game was not over until there were 27 outs. Or more practically, the word could be to describe Andujar’s unpredictability as to what he would do or say.

Whatever the case, Andujar’s Cardinals statistics are there for all to see, most notably that he was the last St. Louis pitcher to have back-to-back 20-win seasons (1984 and 1985) and the only one other than Bob Gibson to achieve back-to-back 20s in nearly a half century.

Andujar, who died in the Dominican Republic on Tuesday at age 62 from diabetes complications, helped lead the Cardinals to the World Series title in 1982 when he won two games, the third and the seventh. In Game 3 in Milwaukee he took a Ted Simmons liner off his leg and, after thrashing around, had to be carted off the field.

“I thought he was dead,” manager Whitey Herzog said.

“But as we were taking him off the field, he kept telling us, ‘I’m one tough Dominican. I’ll be ready (for Game 7).’

“He was one tough Dominican.”

Hall of Fame shortstop Ozzie Smith, who, along with a few other teammates, would tease Andujar mercilessly. Andujar, delighted to be part of the clubhouse revelry, never complained although he would retaliate by calling Smith an “(expletive) midget.”

“We all have fond memories of him,” Smith said. “Some of the best times of our lives was having a chance to play with him.

“As goofy as he was, this probably was one of the only places he could play and be himself. It was like stabilization for him and he had his best years here.”

After arriving in mid-season 1981 from Houston for outfielder Tony Scott, Andujar went 6-1 the rest of that season and then 15-10 for the Cardinals in the 1982 World Series championship year. Then he was 6-16 in 1983.

As Andujar would have said, “Youneverknow.”

There followed the consecutive 20-win seasons as Andujar averaged 37 starts a year, something that isn’t done these days.

“Every time he took the mound, he was going to give you all he had,” Smith said.

Left-hander John Tudor, who like Andujar won 21 games in 1985, recalled Andujar as having “electric stuff” and for being one of the game’s first showmen on the mound.

“Flamboyant,” Tudor said. “That’s the word. He wanted to be the show and he had no problem being the show. Whatever it took, he was going to get the job done, but he was a showman.”

Andujar, after a strikeout, would “shoot” the hitter. “Now, you see a lot of pitchers pointing to the sky after they’ve done something,” Tudor said. “It may have started with Joaquin.”

Besides entertaining St. Louis fans with his pitching, and some of his eccentric ways, Andujar constantly kept his teammates loose. He was advertised as a switch-hitter but neither they, nor Herzog, not even Andujar himself, it appeared, knew which way he was going to hit until he actually got to the plate.

“He might hit left-handed against (left-hander John) Candelaria and right-handed against Nolan Ryan,” Tudor said. “Youneverknew.”

Andujar particularly cracked up his 1985 teammates by shouting, “We’ve only two power hitters. Jack Clark and me.”

Herzog said, “Well, he was half right.”

But then there was the May 15, 1984, night at Busch Stadium when Andujar, who struck out 315 times in 607 at-bats and batted just .127, called his shot. Batting left-handed, his “power side,” as he called he it, he hit a grand slam off Atlanta’s Jeff Dedmon.

“A miracle,” Herzog called it. Cardinals broadcaster Rick Horton, then a young left-hander on the club, recalls Andujar pointing to the outfield and then hitting the homer over the wagon gate in right field.

“It was a like a movie,” Horton said. “You could make a movie about Joaquin Andujar and it would certainly be an interesting thing to go see.”

Horton said he appreciated the fact that Andujar took interest in Horton the young player. “I remember him being really good to me,” Horton said.

“The stories about him ... you didn’t have to embellish them. They were already embellished. You felt like you had to issue a disclaimer.”

Smith said, “He definitely got us into a lot of fights and all that stuff. But that was all part of the journey. It was a fun ride.

“If you were on the other team, across the diamond you say, ‘Oh, I don’t like him.’ But you get him on your side and you say, ‘This guy’s a trooper. He’s a great guy to go into the trenches with.’ ”

Andujar always said he was afraid of no man, although he made sure he didn’t cross Clark, who, after one diatribe against a media member, finally said, “Joaquin, why don’t you just shut up?” Andujar immediately stopped.

But he was deathly afraid of snakes. “He should have never let us know that,” said Smith, who often, with relief ace Bruce Sutter, would put toy snakes in Andujar’s locker. On one occasion, a clubhouse man dropped a real snake from above the rafters and in Andujar’s direction in the Cardinals’ spring training facility in St. Petersburg, Fla.

Andujar, after trying to scale the wall much like a prisoner trying to escape, then fled the room.

“But, oddly,” Smith said, “Jack (his nickname for Andujar) didn’t like snakes, but he’d use snake oil on his arm, and he never had arm problems. That’s Jack.”

Herzog, capsulizing what Andujar meant to his teams, said, “He was a joy to have on your club but you were sitting on a firecracker every day.”

Youneverknew.

Once when Herzog yanked Andujar out in the fifth inning of a game in San Diego in which he had allowed a dozen or so runs, Andujar took a seat in the dugout between Herzog and pitching coach Mike Roarke. Normally, pitchers who are being replaced go to the end of the bench and then ultimately to the clubhouse.

When Herzog inquired as to what was wrong that day, Andujar said the Cardinals’ catcher “usually is a pretty good catcher but he sure had a lousy day today.”

“I said, ‘He never caught one of your fastballs. Every fastball you threw, my head ached because it was rattling off the wall.’ ”

Tudor actually was in town from Massachusetts on Tuesday night as it was John Tudor bobblehead night, the first such of his life, more than quarter century after he played here.

Several other members of that 1985 National League championship team have been so honored and Tudor said, “I know he had been having some health problems but I was hoping he could come back here this year. I wanted to see what a Joaquin Andujar bobblehead would look like.”

Horton said, “I miss him. I wished we’d stayed connected. The world was always a better place because of one tough Dominican.”

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