Larsen’s perfect day lives on after death
North Jersey Record
NEW YORK – Don Larsen, author of the only World Series perfect game – an astonishing feat that forever emblazoned him in baseball history – died last week. He was 90.
Larsen succumbed to esophageal cancer. He’d been at the Hospice of North Idaho in Hayden, Idaho, according to Andrew Levy, his longtime agent.
A Yankees pitcher for only four years, one who compiled just an 81-91 record over 15 major league seasons, Larsen attained an everlasting place in baseball annals on the afternoon of Oct. 8, 1956.
Pitching without a windup against the Brooklyn Dodgers in Game 5 of the Series at Yankee Stadium, Larsen used just 97 pitches to win 2-0, striking out pinch-hitter Dale Mitchell to complete his perfect game – a scene punctuated by catcher Yogi Berra’s spontaneous leap into Larsen’s arms.
Larsen would later say it was the best control he’d ever had in a ballgame, before or since.
“When it was over, I was so happy I felt like crying,” Larsen was quoted as saying afterward.
After blowing an early lead in a Game 2 loss at Ebbets Field, “I wanted to win this one for Casey (Stengel),” Larsen said. “After what I did in Brooklyn, he could have forgotten about me, and who could blame him? But he gave me another chance.”
In a statement, the Yankees organization expressed its sadness at Larsen’s passing and offered condolences to his family, while remembering “a welcome and familiar face” at Old-Timers’ Day celebrations in the Bronx:
“Don’s perfect game is a defining moment for our franchise, encapsulating a storied era of Yankees’ success and ranking among the greatest single-game performances in Major League Baseball history.
“The unmitigated joy reflected in his embrace with Yogi Berra after the game’s final out will forever hold a secure place in Yankees’ lore.
“It was the pinnacle of baseball success and a reminder of the incredible, unforgettable things that can take place on a baseball field.”
World Series legend
After posting an 11-5 record and 3.26 ERA in 38 games (20 starts) during the 1956 regular season, Larsen was chosen by Stengel to start Game 2. Despite being handed a 6-0 lead, Larsen
AP did not make it through the second inning of a 13-8 Dodgers win.
The World Series was tied at two games apiece when Larsen – who didn’t find out he was starting the game until that morning – opposed Brooklyn’s Sal Maglie in Game 5.
“The ball in your shoe meant you were going to start. I was very surprised,” Larsen said of first learning Stengel was trusting him to beat Brooklyn. “I looked at that damn thing and I said, ‘Oh geez. Don’t mess this one up.’ ”
Larsen, then 27, went to a three-ball count just once in the game – against Pee Wee Reese in the first inning.
Among the close calls were Jackie Robinson’s second-inning smash, which caromed off third baseman Andy Carey’s glove to shortstop Gil McDougald, who narrowly threw out Robinson at first base.
And in the sixth, Gil Hodges’ drive to left-center field was tracked down on the run by Mickey Mantle, who broke a scoreless tie with a homer in the fourth.
The Yankees would lose Game 6 1-0 in 10 innings before claiming a 9-0 win – and their 17th world championship – in Game 7 at Ebbets Field.
For his efforts, Larsen was named the World Series Most Valuable Player and earned the Babe Ruth award for outstanding achievement in a World Series from the New York Chapter of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America.
“The imperfect man pitched a perfect game,” wrote Joe Trimble in the next day’s New York Daily News, though the legend is that colleague Dick Young lent Trimble the lead.
But the inspiration for that line came from Larsen’s career – he’d lost an AL-high 21 games just two years earlier for the 1954 Orioles – and his afterhours interests in bars and nightclubs.
“The only thing he fears is sleep,” Stengel once said of Larsen.
Perfect connections
Born on Aug. 7, 1929, in Michigan City, Indiana, and nicknamed “Gooney Bird” by his teammates, Larsen pitched two more World Series for the Yankees – winning one game each in 1957 and 1958 – before being traded following the 1959 season in a seven-player deal with the Kansas City Athletics that sent Roger Maris to the Bronx.
“I played baseball because it was fun,” Larsen told author and sportswriter Maury Allen. “Nobody got rich playing ball in those days.
“You just enjoyed the game, enjoyed the competition and enjoyed hanging out with Mickey, Whitey (Ford) and the other guys.”
Larsen would pitch for five more teams, concluding his career with the Cubs in 1967.
As a key member of the Giants bullpen in 1962, Larsen won the deciding third game of a playoff series against the Dodgers, in relief of Juan Marichal.
And he would have one more October moment against the Yankees, making three relief appearances for the Giants in the ’62 World Series and winning Game 4; the Yankees would defeat San Francisco in a thrilling seventh game.
Larsen was also noted for his batting in those pre-designated hitter days, clubbing 14 career home runs and batting .306 with four homers in 1958.
A fixture at Yankees OldTimers’ Days for years, Larsen had a connection to both of the Yankees’ perfect games that came after his.
David Wells, who tossed a perfect game against the Twins in 1998, attended the same high school as Larsen, San Diego’s Point Loma High School.
And Larsen was at Yankee Stadium and threw the ceremonial first pitch to his old catcher on “Yogi Berra Day” in 1999 before David Cone went out and pitched a perfect game against the Expos – with Larsen watching and cheering from owner George Steinbrenner’s box.