‘Larger than life’ Rusty Staub, who began his career in Houston, dies at 73.
Rusty Staub, the well-liked, well-traveled major league veteran who began his career in Houston at age 18, was remembered Thursday as symbolic of a talented Astros squad that, absent front office miscues, could have borne a strong resemblance to the team that won the 2017 World Series.
Staub, who would have turned 74 on Sunday, died in a hospital in West Palm Beach, Fla. He was admitted with pneumonia, dehydration and an infection and had spent the last eight weeks in the hospital, the New York Daily News reported.
Known as “Le Grand Orange” for his flaming red hair, he had 2,716 hits and 292 home runs in 23 seasons as a first baseman, outfielder and designated hitter, totaling more than 500 hits for four of the five teams for which he played — the Tigers, Expos, Mets and, during his first six seasons in the majors (1963-68), the Colt .45s/Astros.
“He was a larger than life figure with the red hair and being as big as he was (6-2, 190 pounds),” said Larry Dierker, who, like Staub, came to the big leagues as a teenager in the first years of Major League Baseball in Houston. “He was a cornerstone of what we had here.”
Traded from the Astros by general manager Spec Richardson before the 1969 season after a 1968 contract dispute, Staub benefited from his travels. A native of New Orleans, he gained his colorful nickname in Montreal and after retirement was a successful restaurateur in New York after playing with the Mets, including a 1973 World Series appearance in which he had six RBIs against Oakland.
What might have been
Former teammates Dierker and Bob Aspromonte and former executive Tal Smith, though, still cluck their tongues over what the Astros could have accomplished had the team kept Staub and other future stars such as Jerry Grote, Joe Morgan and Mike Cuellar rather than losing them in ill-fated trades.
“We would have had Jerry Grote, who was an All-Star, catching and Bob Watson or Rusty at first, Joe Morgan and Sonny Jackson and Doug Rader in the infield, Jimmy Wynn, Cesar Cedeno and Jose Cruz in the outfield and myself, Jerry Reuss, Mike Cuellar and Don Wilson pitching,” Dierker said. ”It would have been formidable.”
Smith said Staub arrived in Houston in 1963, the Colt .45s’ second season.
“They were hungry for ways to market the team, which probably was a tough thing for him at the time,” Smith said. “He had a great career. I just wish that more of it could have been in Houston.”
Aspromonte, who broke in with the Dodgers as a teen in the mid-1950s, said he and Staub spoke often of the challenges of being a young major leaguer.
“I tried to pass on to him what I had learned, and we had a very close friendship and spent a lot of time together and communicated for years,” Aspromonte said. “To be with Rusty and Joe Morgan and Jimmy Wynn to open the Astrodome (in 1965) was just incredible.”
Staub’s best season in Houston was 1967, the year he made his first of six All-Star Game appearances. He led the National League with 44 doubles and hit .333 with 10 homers and 74 RBIswhile playing home games in the cavernous Astrodome.
“He choked up on the bat, which wasn’t fashionable during the time I played, and would stand as close to the plate as he could,” Dierker said. “He could hammer a fastball no matter where it was pitched.”
Returned to New York
He had 792 hits in a Houston uniform, the most for any team for which he played.
Staub never finished with more than 7.9 percent of the vote in any Hall of Fame election. Dierker, however, said Staub likely would have stronger numbers but for his decision in 1981 to return to the Mets.
“He probably would have had more than 3,000 hits and more than 300 homers (he totaled 292) and 1,600 RBIs (he totaled 1,466) and would be in the Hall of Fame,” Dierker said. “He was a tough out.”
After baseball, Staub became president of the Rusty Staub Foundation, which supportd emergency food pantries in New York. He also created the New York Police and Fire Widows’ and Children’s Benefit Fund.