The 1966 Indians and losing 2 of 3 from Cleveland
Of course we (Orioles fans) remember 1966 as the first World Championship. It was Frank Robinson’s first year in Baltimore and he naturally won the Triple Crown. So, with our first-place team losing two games in a row to the Indians, I looked back at 1966.
Does anyone recall (not me) that the ’66 Indians started the season winning 10 in a row? Cleveland looked to run away and hide standing at 14-1 in the first meeting of the season with Baltimore. By this time, the fabled Yankees from New York were 12 games out.
Luckily, the Orioles started 12-3 and were right in the hunt.
So what was going on in Cleveland anyway? It seems third baseman, Max Alvis, had a good start and Leon “Daddy Wags” Wagner joined in but it wasn’t like they were blowing folks out. Of course, the pitching staff had “Sudden Sam” McDowell on it.
So on May 6, Cleveland made its first visit to Baltimore and it was a good matchup of left-handers. McDowell would go for Cleveland and young Dave McNally for Baltimore. More than 30,000 showed up for the Friday night game and it would officially close play in a little more than 4 hours.
Luis Aparicio gave the Orioles a great start at the top of lineup. He tripled against McDowell and Brooks Robinson drove him home in the bottom of the first with a two-bagger.
Old Del Crandall homered for the Indians in the third and no one scored again until the 15th inning.
McNally pitched 10 innings and allowed 3 hits. McDowell completed 12 innings. Wagner drove in (what could have been) the winning run in the top half of the 15th.
Baltimore answered back right away. Rookie second baseman, Dave Johnson, homered to start the 15th and the game was again tied up (2-2). Another young Orioles hitter, John “Boog” Powell, pinch-hit and drove in the winning run with a single.
The Indians kept their winning record for most of the summer but were never really a factor as the Orioles ran away and hid.
So our first-place Orioles of 2014 took on this year’s Indians team this weekend and frankly, we didn’t hit the ball well at all. We ran into a tough customer in Corey Kluber and he shut us down until the 8th on Friday night. JJ Hardy knotted the game with an RBI single and Wei-Yin Chen pitched great for the Birds, but we lost it 2-1 when Mike Aviles homered.
On Saturday we didn’t hit at all. It was rather pathetic. We lost it 6-0. Ubaldo Jimenez didn’t have it. Time to send him back to Cleveland?
Sunday didn’t seem to be going our way either. Kevin Gausman pitched great but again the bats were asleep. That is…until the sixth inning. Steve Pearce doubled but looked to be stranded with two outs. And then Hardy came though again. Chris Davis hit his second double of the game and we were finally up. Pearce and Jon Schoop added homers and we left town with a 4-1 win.
Have tickets to tonight’s game in Chicago. The O’s have to go against Chris Sale and that won’t be fun. Also going to the Cubs-Orioles game come Saturday.
My book, “Tales from Orioles Nation” has stories from several decades of Orioles history
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