Posts Tagged ‘Gerry Burmeister’

Buff Biographies: Gerry Burmeister

May 26, 2013
Excerpt from "Your 1948 Houston Buffs, Dixie Champions: Brief Biographies By Morris Frank and Adie Marks (1948).

Excerpt from “Your 1948 Houston Buffs, Dixie Champions: Brief Biographies By Morris Frank and Adie Marks (1948).

Gerry Burmeister (BR/TR) (6’2″, 210 lbs,) was almost everything we always used to think a catcher should be. He was a good career hitter for average, as his .275 BA over 13 seasons (1937-44, 1946-50) showed, but his 66 HR over the long all-minor league haul also revealed his lack of power. He was slow afoot, but his strong throwing arm and mature leadership on defense guided both the Buff pitchers and field defense over the course of 5 seasons (1941, 1946-49) in the Bayou City. Burmeister played one more season after he left Houston and moved up to AAA Syracuse in the Cincinnati farm system after being dealt away by the Cardinals, and that was it. At age 32,  he retired and went back to his now permanent married life home in Houston as just one more pretty fair ballplayer of the reserve clause era. In spite of what it says in the Frank/Marks 1948 sketch above,  Gerry never got that proverbial cup of java in a big league game for so much as even a modest Moonlight Graham or Buddy Hancken one-inning in the field with no trips to the plate major league appearance. It simply didn’t happen.

Burmeister’s signature career stop was with the Houston Buffs, and Gerry’s ‘s best season as a Buff was 1948, when he hit .267 with 8 HR. Gerry did get into 93 games for the 1947 Dixie Series Champion Buffs, but he batted only .210 with a single homer that big team year.

Gerry Burmeister died about 20-25 years ago, but I am unable to confirm his specific date of death at this writing. He’s not showing up in the vital statistics records on-line for Harris County, Texas and I have no data of him passing away elsewhere. If any of you Ancestry.Com whiz kids know how to get it, please post the DOD as a comment on this article. For whatever help it may be, Gerald William Burmeister was born on August 11, 1917 in Harmony, Minnesota and I’m fairly sure he died in the Greater Houston area.

Baseball Reference.Com also mistakenly lists Burmeister as still alive at age 95:

http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/player.cgi?id=burmei001ger

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Gerry Burmeister: Five Times a Buff!

May 27, 2010

Gerry Burmeister, Catcher, Houston Buffs, 1941, 1946-49.

Gerry Burmeister was already in place as catcher of the Houston Buffs when I first plugged into paying attention to baseball back in 1947. He had joined the Buffs in 1941, returning after World War II to begin a four-season run as the main man with the mask in 1946. For the last three seasons of his Buffs tenure, I couldn’t imagine the day coming when some other guy would hold his spot. Gerry Burmeister was our man – the man who led and took good care of great Buff pitchers like Al Papai, Clarence Beers, Cloyd Boyer, Jack Creel, and Pete Mazar.

Burmeister was another of those talent-rich Cardinals farm hands of the post World War II era that never got so much as a single time at bat in the major leagues, but, as a catcher, he was extremely important to the parent club in bringing along mound talent for National League competition. A catcher with his field accomplishments in 2010 would surely be expecting a direct shot in the big leagues, but, as we always ending saying in some form – that was then and this is now.

The 6’2″, 205 lb. Gerry Burmeister was born on August 11, 1917. He’s been dead for several years now, but I simply do not hand that specific data on hand or accessible at this writing.

In his 13-season minor league career (1937-44, 1956-50), and all but the last year spent in the Cardinal organization, Gerry Burmeister (BR/TR) batted .275 with 66 career home runs. Those were pretty good stats for that era. Heck. They are pretty good production for a catcher from any era, especially one who managed pitchers well and also exercised pretty good control over runaway baserunner wannabes. Burmeister was a winner of the first order as a performer in the higher levels of minor league baseball back in the most popular period of public attention to professional baseball at every level of play.

Gerry Burmeister retired to life in the Houston area following his baseball career and he was a regular at old-timer games and Houston Buff reunions through the remaining period of his life. He was well liked and highly respected by all the former Buffs I know.

Caps are off to your memory this morning. Mr. Burmeister. As a kid who grew up watching you play as I tried to learn all I could about our wonderful game of baseball, I just want to say, “Thanks for the memories!”  And thanks for the lessons too!

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