The Pecan Park Eagle

1996: I was lucky to meet Stan Musial at the annual banquet of the st. Louis Browns Fans Club.

In The Beginning, September 17, 1941: Stan Musial broke into the big leagues at the age of 20 as the third-batting left fielder of the St. Louis Cardinals in the second game of  a doubleheader against the Boston Braves at Braves Field in Boston on September 17, 1941. The Cardinals won, 3-2, for a DH sweep and a 91-51 record that proved good enough at season’s end for for a close-of-day mark of 97-56, .634 second place finish behind the Brooklyn Dodgers by 2.5 games. Young Musial would go 2 for 4 in his debut game. His production included a double and two runs batted in.

2002: The next time I got a picture with Stan was the year following the 2011 tragedy. Fewer people flew to St. Louis that year.

At Journey’s End, September 29, 1963: At age 42, Stan Musial is playing the last game of his career on the final day of the 1963 season. He hasn’t tasted a World Series victory since 1946, but he has been a St. Louis Cardinal for all of his 23 MLB seasons. The date was September 29, 1963 and the Cardinals were hosting the Cincinnati Reds at Busch Stadium I (Sportsman’s Park III) in the last game of the season and the long reign of the Stan Musial era. In another of life’s ironies, Stan would go out the way he came in.  The Man’s 2 hits and 1 RBI would help the Cards to another 3-2 win, the same score that registered in favor of St. Louis in Musial’s first MLB game back in 1941. The 1963 Cardinals finished with a record of 93-69, .574, good enough again, as in 1941, for a 2nd place finish in the NL behind the Dodgers,who now resided in Los Angeles, but this time, by 6 games. Stan finished where he started, playing left field and hitting third.

2003: That was the year of my first book, “A Kid From St. Louis,” Stan was quite aware of my story subject, the wonderful Jerry Witte. I was most comforted by Stan’s kind words.

The Sum of it: Stan Musial’s first and last games came 22 years apart, but they both opened and shut the case for his Hall of Fame greatness. Stan was 4 for 7 with a double and 3 RBI in those two games, and, if you’ve ever had a kid’s league season start that began with 4 for 7, you already know that, no matter how short-lived, holding onto the memory of a .571 batting average to us ordinary, but sometimes lucky-dog folks can be the thrill of a lifetime. I feel sure that Mr. Musial never spent any time dreaming of what his batting average should be. When you are a “see the ball/hit the ball” baseball hitting genius, like Stan Musial, you just go out there and do what you do – and the job of calculating your batting average and other records falls to the media and other geniuses of math and probability.

1954: Stan Musial and buddy Chuck Schmidt meet up at Spring Training in Florida.

My Regret, Not Stan’s: Stan left when it was time to go. Had he stayed another year, he might have been a member of that miraculous ’64 Cardinal team that overhauled the Phillies as though the Cardinals were the Kentucky Derby’s great Native Dancer, charging down the stretch, but it wasn’t meant to be. Who knows? Maybe Musial’s presence on the 1964 team might have kept Carl Warwick off the roster – and look at what Warwick contributed to the club down the stretch and as a pinch hitter in the 1964 World Series win over the Yankees. My regret was pure fan stuff. I wanted him to have the World Series ring as the crown on his career. But I finally came around. Stan Musial didn’t need that ring to go out a winner. He was a winner coming in, and going out, and on his own terms. Stan Musial didn’t need a great singular feat to be remembered for his greatness. He was just great for who he was and what he did most of the time by baseball accounting terms.

1941: We lost Stan Musial on January 19, 2013, but he will live on in our hearts and minds forever.- as will his deeds on and off the field as a great athlete and an even greater human being.

The Numbers Speak: Stan Musial finished with a  career batting average of .331, an on base percentage of .417, and a slugging average of ,559. He had 725 doubles, 177 triples, and 475 home runs. He won 7 batting titles and compiled 3,630 hits in his big league lifetime. The data and all his other honors and actions as a down-to-earth human being are simply true and immeasurable in math terms.

How I Met Stan Musial: I met Stan Musial for the first time n 1996, when I went to St. Louis for the annual banquet of the St. Louis Browns Fan Club. Stan showed up at the afternoon reception and I actually got to meet and talk with him as if we were old friends from some distant early life neighborhood. It blew me away that I got to repeat these annual contacts with “The Man” for about five additional times on my trips to St. Louis.

When I got back to Houston the first time, I couldn’t wait to tell our parish priest in Houston. My priest friend had just returned to Houston from Rome.

“Guess what, Father Joe?” I exclaimed, “While in St. Louis, I got to meet one of the most important Polish Catholics in the world!”

“Guess what, yourself,” Father Joe answered gleefully, “I got to meet the most important Polish Catholic in the world – Pope John Paul II himself!”

“Oh really? Most important, eh?” I asked half jokingly, “Well, what’s his batting average?” I asked, in an attempt to come across as sincere before I laid the name “Stan Musial” upon him.

Box Scores: Here are the box scores for Stan Musial’s first and last ball games as a big leaguer:

Stan Musial’s First MLB Game:

Baseball Almanac Box ScoresSt. Louis Cardinals 3 – Boston Braves 2
Game played on Wednesday, September 17, 1941 at Sportsman’s Park III
Boston Braves ab   r   h rbi Sisti 3b 4 0 0 0 Rowell lf 4 0 1 0 Dudra 1b 4 0 1 0 Demaree rf 4 1 0 0 Miller ss 3 1 1 1 Moore cf 3 0 1 1   Cooney cf 1 0 0 0 Roberge 2b 3 0 0 0 Berres c 3 0 0 0 Tobin p 3 0 1 0 Totals 32 2 5 2	St. Louis Cardinals ab   r   h rbi Brown 3b 4 0 1 0 Hopp cf 3 1 0 0 Musial rf 4 0 2 2 Mize 1b 4 0 0 0 Crabtree lf 4 1 1 1 Crespi 2b 3 0 1 0 Marion ss 2 0 0 0 Mancuso c 2 0 0 0 Lanier p 3 1 1 0 Totals 29 3 6 3
Boston 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 – 2 5 0 St. Louis 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 1 – 3 6 1   Boston Braves IP H R ER BB SO Tobin  L(12-10) 8.0 6 3 3 3 2 Totals 8.0 6 3 3 3 2   St. Louis Cardinals IP H R ER BB SO Lanier  W(9-8) 9.0 5 2 1 1 3 Totals 9.0 5 2 1 1 3 E–Crespi (29).  DP–Boston 1. Moore-Miller-Dudra, St. Louis 1. Marion-Mize.  2B–Boston Rowell (23), St. Louis Musial (1).  3B–Boston Miller (3).  HR–St. Louis Crabtree (4,9th inning off Tobin 0 on).  Team LOB–4.  Team–5.  U–Larry Goetz, Beans Reardon, Jocko Conlan.  T–1:37.  A–7,713.
Game played on Wednesday, September 17, 1941 at Sportsman’s Park III
Baseball Almanac Box Score |

Stan Musial’s Last Game:

Baseball Almanac Box ScoresSt. Louis Cardinals 3 – Cincinnati Reds 2
Game played on Sunday, September 29, 1963 at Busch Stadium I
Cincinnati Reds ab   r   h rbi Rose 2b,lf 6 0 3 0 Harper rf 6 0 0 0 Pinson cf 5 0 1 0   Neal 2b 0 0 0 0 Robinson lf,cf 6 0 0 0 Coleman 1b 5 1 2 0 Edwards c 2 0 0 0   Keough ph 1 0 0 0   Pavletich c 3 1 1 0 Cardenas ss 6 0 2 2 Kasko 3b 5 0 0 0 Maloney p 2 0 0 0   Skinner ph 1 0 1 0   O’Toole p 0 0 0 0   Green ph 1 0 0 0   Worthington p 0 0 0 0   Henry p 0 0 0 0   Walters ph 1 0 0 0   Jay p 1 0 0 0 Totals 51 2 10 2	St. Louis Cardinals ab   r   h rbi Flood cf 7 1 2 0 Groat ss 4 0 0 0   Maxvill ss,2b 3 0 1 1 Musial lf 3 0 2 1   Kolb pr,rf 1 1 0 0   Beauchamp ph 1 0 0 0   Shannon rf 1 0 0 0 Boyer 3b 6 0 4 0 White 1b 5 0 2 0 James rf,lf 5 0 0 1 McCarver c 5 0 0 0 Javier 2b 3 0 0 0   Altman ph 1 0 1 0   Buchek ss 2 0 1 0 Gibson p 2 0 0 0   Clemens ph 0 0 0 0   Taylor p 0 0 0 0   Sawatski ph 1 0 0 0   Broglio p 1 1 0 0 Totals 51 3 13 3
Cincinnati 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 – 2 10 0 St. Louis 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 – 3 13 2   Cincinnati Reds IP H R ER BB SO Maloney 7.0 5 2 2 2 11   O’Toole 1.0 1 0 0 0 0   Worthington 0.1 1 0 0 2 1   Henry 1.2 1 0 0 0 1   Jay  L (7-18) 3.1 5 1 1 0 3 Totals 13.1 13 3 3 4 16   St. Louis Cardinals IP H R ER BB SO Gibson 9.0 7 2 2 1 11   Taylor 2.0 1 0 0 2 1   Broglio  W (18-8) 3.0 2 0 0 1 2 Totals 14.0 10 2 2 4 14 E–Groat (26), Boyer (34).  DP–Cincinnati 1, St. Louis 2.  2B–Cincinnati Rose (25,off Taylor), St. Louis Flood (34,off Maloney); Maxvill (2,off Jay).  SH–Harper (8,off Taylor).  IBB–Pinson (3,by Taylor).  Team LOB–12.  SF–James (2,off Maloney).  Team–13.  CS–Rose (15,2nd base by Gibson/McCarver).  WP–Maloney (19), Gibson (7), Broglio 2 (13).  IBB–Taylor (6,Pinson).  U-HP–Al Barlick, 1B–Lee Weyer, 2B–Ed Vargo, 3B–Bill Williams.  T–3:45.  A–27,576.
Game played on Sunday, September 29, 1963 at Busch Stadium I
Baseball Almanac Box Score |