Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Bowa recalls Bunning as influence
PHILADELPHIA >> When Larry Bowa arrived on the major league baseball scene for a team that was barely playing like one, he was to soon experience something that has never left him since.
The guiding force of Jim Bunning.
“He said, ‘You’ve got to be accountable in this game, no one gives you anything in this game,’” Bowa said of his long-ago Phillies teammate. “I never had a pitcher mentor me like he did in one year. In spring training he told me, ‘Keep your mouth shut and your eyes and ears open.’ It was that simple. I said, ‘Yes sir.’”
James Paul David Bunning, most famous Father’s Day pitcher in Phillies history, Hall of Famer, hard-line U.S. Senator, passed away Saturday at the age of 85. The Phillies, in deference to one of their most famous players of another era, quickly made their bench coach available to tap into his prodigious baseball memory.
Bowa was a 24-year-old brash, unlikely big-league rookie in 1970, arriving in Clearwater in time to witness the Philadelphia return of Bunning, who had thrown a perfect game in a Philadelphia uniform just six years earlier and at age 38 had already logged more
than 200 victories.
But he still had some baseball left in him, and more than enough advice to dole out to a young guy eager to listen.
“Tremendous, tremendous person who taught me a lot about the game in one year,” Bowa said of Bunning. “I remember him coming up and saying, ‘Don’t ever, ever lose your energy.’ Or, ‘I don’t want to turn around and see your head dropping, because you’re 0-for-3 . ... I don’t ever want to see that.’”
Bunning, all 6-foot-3 of him, was known as intimidating on a mound and all business on and off it. He would give batters a high kick and pour every ounce of energy into a pitch, often spilling off the mound while doing so.
He would also never waver in his convictions.
U.S. District Judge David Bunning, one of nine children born to Bunning and his wife of 65 years Mary Catherine, tweeted Saturday: “Heaven got its No. 1 starter today. Our lives & the nation are better off because of your love & dedication to the family.”
Bunning’s baseball career began with stops and starts in Detroit for the 1955 and ‘56 seasons, but in his first full season as a Tigers starter in 1957 would win 20 games.
He would never do that again, but in four consecutive seasons (1964-67) with a Phillies team that went from should-be pennant winner to cellar dwellers, Bunning would somehow win 19, 19, 19 and 17 games. The highlight of that time came, appropriately, on Father’s Day, June 21, 1964. That’s when Bunning, a father of nine, would pitch the Phillies’ first perfect game against the Mets at Shea Stadium.
Bunning would go on to play in Pittsburgh and Los Angeles over two more seasons before that 1970 return to Philadelphia, and along the way would enlighten a lot of wide-eyed rookies with his talent and wisdom, and the high-and-hard way he brought it.
“He said, ‘You’ve got to be accountable. You’ve got to play with energy. You’ve got to play every inning of every game,’ Bowa said. “I made an error one day and he turned around - I didn’t ever want to make an error behind him.”
His simple, straightforward approach would serve Bunning well while representing his home state of Kentucky in both the House of Representatives (1987-99) and the U.S. Senate (19992011). Bunning, who had coached in the Phillies’ minor league system for five years after retiring as a player in 1971, later became a successful broker before breaking into politics. All along, he stayed true to his conservative values.
To Bowa, Bunning’s political approach was an extension of his baseball persona.
“He was as good of a competitor (as I saw) ... and I saw him at the end of his career,” Bowa said. “I don’t even want to think about what he was like in his prime. He was mean.
“I remember he hit Ron Hunt one day, a slow breaking ball. Hunt sort of (turned into it). He went down and said, ‘Ron, if you want to get hit, I’ll hit you next time and it won’t be a breaking ball.’ And he drilled him right in the ribs. That’s what kind of competitor he was. Because Hunt didn’t want to get out of the way of a breaking ball. He turned into it. He told him, ‘I’ll oblige you if you want to get hit, trust me.’
“Next time up, he drilled him.”
Bunning finished his career after 17 seasons with a 224-184 record, a 3.27 ERA and 2,855 strikeouts, 17th all-time. He was only the second pitcher to win 100 games and chalk up 1,000 strikeouts in both the National and American Leagues. He was inducted into the Phillies Wall of Fame in 1984 and finally into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1996 by vote of the Veterans Committee.
“He was all for energy and never quitting,” Bowa said of Bunning. “He said, ‘I’ve been out there, where I’ve given up six runs and I don’t quit. I don’t ever want to see you quit, because you bring a lot to the table with your energy and desire to play.’
“I got along with pitchers, but they never took the time to say something to me, and that was my first year. All that stuff stayed with me.”