Don Larsen

Don Larsen
Don Larsen, 2013
Starting pitcher
Born: August 7, 1929 Michigan City , United States
Died on: January 1, 2020 Hayden , United States
Suggested: Right	Threw: Right
Debut in Major League Baseball
April 18,  1953  with the  St. Louis Browns
Last MLB assignment
July 7,  1967  with the  Chicago Cubs
MLB statistics (until end of career)
Win - Loss	81-91
ERA	3.78
Strikeouts	849
Teams
St. Louis Browns ( 1953 ) Baltimore Orioles ( 1954 ) New York Yankees ( 1955 - 1959 ) Kansas City Athletics ( 1960 - 1961 ) Chicago White Sox (1961) San Francisco Giants ( 1962 - 1964 ) Houston Colt .45s (1964) Houston Astros ( 1965 ) Baltimore Orioles (1965) Chicago Cubs ( 1967 )
Awards
2 × World Series winners ( 1956 , 1958 ) World Series MVP Award (1956) Babe Ruth Award (1956) Perfect Game in the 1956 World Series , game 5

Don James Larsen , nicknamed Gooney Bird , (* 7. August 1929 in Michigan City , Indiana ; † 1. January 2020 in Hayden , Idaho ) was an American baseball player of the Major League Baseball (MLB) on the position of the pitcher (bowler ). He won the World Series with the New York Yankees in 1956 and 1958 . Larsen is the only pitcher in MLB history who managed a perfect game in a final series , ie. This means that no opposing batsman reached first base during the entire game . For this historic achievement, he was named Most Valuable Player of the 1956 World Series .

biography

Don Larsen was hired as a free agent by the St. Louis Browns in 1947 and made his MLB debut in 1953. Larsen was not a remarkable pitcher with the Browns, which a year later became today's Baltimore Orioles. He won 10 games in two years but lost 33 and had a moderate Earned Run Average (ERA) of 4.2. Before the 1955 season he was hired by the New York Yankees as a reserve thrower behind Yankees star Whitey Ford and Tom Morgan and Tom Sturdivant . New York reached the World Series in 1956 against the Brooklyn Dodgers . After 4 games in which Ford had thrown twice and Morgan and Sturdivant each once, Larsen was surprisingly called up as the starting pitcher for game 5. Larsen was a historic achievement and took just 97 throws to eliminate the 27 batsmen around Dodgers star Jackie Robinson . He threw the first and to date only perfect game in a final series, i. H. no dodger reached 1st base by punch or walk. The Daily News later commented, "The imperfect man pitched a perfect game." When the Yankees won the World Series, Larsen was named Most Valuable Player of the final series.

In 1958 Larsen was again champion with the Yankees, before he was swapped for the later home run record holder Roger Maris and he was in the following years at the Kansas City Athletics, Chicago White Sox , San Francisco Giants , Houston Colt .45s, Houston Astros , again played the Baltimore Orioles and the Chicago Cubs before retiring in 1967 at the age of 37. He won 81 games, lost 91, and finished with a Career ERA of 3.78.

After his baseball career, Larsen moved to California with his wife Corrine and family and became a successful paper manufacturer in San José . In August 2002, he sold his jersey, baseball glove, and the last ball he threw of his perfect game for $ 300,000 to help fund his grandchildren's college. He always signed autograph requests with his name and the addition "PG 10-8-56" (Perfect Game on October 8, 1956).

The perfect game

Game 5 of the 1956 final series took place on October 8, 1956. The score was 2: 2, and Starpitcher Whitey Ford had started twice for the Yankees and Tom Morgen and Tom Sturdivant each started a game once. It was a surprise that reserve player Larsen should start the important game 5. But Yankees catcher Yogi Berra recognized early on that Larsen threw unusually well ("His stuff was good, good, good. Anything I put down, he put over."), And Larsen was also lucky: In the 2nd  inning he struck Dodger Jackie Robinson hit the ball flat and hard just inside the line, but Yankees center fielder Mickey Mantle dived for the ball and tossed it to 1st base before Robinson got there. The next batsman, Sandy Amoros, produced another of these “line drives”, but the stroke landed a finger's breadth off the out-line. The longer the three magic zeros were on the scoreboard (0  runs , 0  hits , 0  walks ), the less the players wanted to talk to Larsen: baseball superstition forbids talking about the possibility of a perfect game, because it is the game "to curse". After Larsen eliminated the last batsman, Yogi Berra jumped into Larsen's arms: this photo is one of the most famous in Yankees history.

death

Larsen died of esophageal cancer on January 1, 2020 at the age of 90 in a hospice in Hayden, Idaho, United States . He left behind his wife Corinne and a son.

Web links

Commons : Don Larsen  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Player information and statistics from MLB  or  Baseball Reference  or  Fangraphs  or  Baseball Reference (Minor League) (English)
• Wright Thompson: Fifty years later, Larsen's life still close to perfect. In: ESPN . October 23, 2006 (English). 
• Retrosheet Boxscore: New York Yankees 2, Brooklyn Dodgers 0. In: retrosheet.org. (English, statistics of Larsen's perfect game). 

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Larsen, who threw only perfect World Series game, this at 90. In: AP News. January 2, 2020, accessed on January 2, 2020 .