The Losing End

Johnnie LeMaster's Wild Ride

Is there such a thing as a lovable loser? The Cubs were forever known as lovable losers and I’m not so sure the players, coaches, management, or the fans enjoyed stinking up the joint in going 108 years between winning World Series titles. A future post examining heckling, boo-birds, and Lee Elia’s famous rant about Cubs fans may help dispel the myth about lovable losers. We root for the underdog, hate the perennial winner, and can’t tolerate losers. Really? People are fucking strange. We’re fans and fanatics.

Does the joy of just watching (or competing) trump victories? I’ve spent countless nights at the ballpark, listening on the radio, and watching games on tv knowing full well my Reds have been eliminated from playoff contention. I’m still rooting them on as if the game’s outcome means anything. Just taking in a ballgame is a joy for me. From 1996-98, my buddy Mike and I would routinely spend our last dollars on beer at Riverfront Stadium yelling until the last out for opposing fielders to “Boot it, throw it away” in meaningless Reds games those three seasons. Those games are filled with meaning for me. Great times with my buddies and family at the ballpark, getting to watch Barry Larkin night in and night out, Eric Davis winning Comeback Player of the Year, Aaron Boone getting ejected in his first big league game, Dmitri Young lining doubles from foul line to foul line…I could (and will in future posts) go on and on. Sometimes ad nauseam and ad infinitum can mean the same thing, right?

It’s also a helluva lot more fun when the Reds are winning…which they would do 96 times in 1999 (again…future posts!)

“If a tie is like kissing your sister, losing is like kissing your grandmother with her teeth out.” George Brett

Watching a team when there’s something on the line…there’s nothing better. Former big leaguer, Earl Wilson, described baseball as “…simply a nervous breakdown divided into nine innings.” That speaks more to me of the rollercoaster of watching a competing club in a pennant race than it does to the trials that accompany a losing team.

Clashing with reality is toxic folly. If I need my team to win every year, I’m going to be miserable. Baseball is the hardest game to play and general wisdom dictates every team will win 54 games and every club will lose 54 games, and its what they do with the other 54 that determines the overall success in the standings.

“Somebody’s gotta win and somebody’s gotta lose and I believe in letting the other guy lose.” Pete Rose

That right there is pure joy! Manny Sanguillen and Steve Blass celebrating the last out of the Bucs 1971 World Series win over the Orioles.

Here’s Tug McGraw and Mike Schmidt doing the same nine years later after the Phillies beat the Royals in the Series.

And here’s Johnnie LeMaster:

N.B.: He is not a loser.

“Fans don’t boo nobodies.” Reggie Jackson.

Johnnie LeMaster was selected sixth overall in the 1973 draft by the San Francisco Giants. I knew from an early age that he’d homered in his first big league at bat. I had baseball cards of him and read about him in The Sporting News and am sure I watched him at Riverfront Stadium any number of times as a kid, but he didn’t really register on my radar until 1981. I attended a Pirates-Giants game that summer at Candlestick Park and the giveaway was, as I remember it, an 8x10 pencil drawing of LeMaster in numerous baseball poses. I grew up in Cincinnati during the Big Red Machine. The giveaways at Riverfront were cool. Huge color posters of Geronimo, Concepcion, Rose, Morgan, Bench, Griffey! These went up on my wall. The George Foster black bat (.320 52 149—if you know, you know!)giveaway in ‘78 commemorating his 1977 MVP campaign? There ain’t nothing as sweet as that. Why the hell would a black and white drawing of a no hit shortstop imprint? I probably didn’t even leave Candlestick that night with it!

“I’ve got nothing against LeMaster, but who is he?” Indians infielder Tony Bernazard upon being informed of Cleveland’s acquisition of Johnnie LeMaster

My brain, at 54, is about 80% filled with baseball, and that’s been a slow, lamentable decline. I am kind of pissed I can only identify 5 current members of the Rockies’s pitching staff. A long ago online friend from Baseball Think Factory had a winning line related to this. It went something like, “If I ever wanted to commit a murder and get away with it, I’d join the Rockies bullpen.” Wholesome witness protection, toiling in obscurity joke, right? Back then, I laughed, but at that point I could still name about 98% of everyone in the big leagues.

LeMaster stuck. He stuck long enough for me to do some digging in the late 1990’s about him when I was introduced to BaseballReference.com. If you’ve got a few lifetimes to spare (or to make the most out of this one!), I encourage you to check that website out. What jumped out at me was his 1985 campaign. He ended up playing for 75% of the last place teams in MLB that season.

“How ‘bout that, folks” Mel Allen

LeMaster opened the year with the Giants. San Francisco had finished last in the NL West in 1984, and did not have a good team coming into ‘85. LeMaster was unseated as the starting shortstop very early in the season and in the 12 games he appeared in as a Giant that season, he went 0-16 with a walk and a run scored. Over his 11 years in San Francisco. LeMaster compiled a .222/.277/.289 slash line and negative 4.4 WAR.

There are few debuts as spectacular as LeMaster’s. His first game as a Giant came on 9/2/75, just 2 years out of high school. In front of 5098 fans, LeMaster entered the contest in the top of the 3rd to replace injured shortstop Chris Speier. His first big league at bat came in the bottom of the next inning. With Willie Montanez on 2nd and 1 out, drilled an inside-the-park homer off Hall of Famer Don Sutton. He would go on to hit 21 more homers before hanging ‘em up in 1987. His final at bat as a Giant was on 4/24/85 when he struck out against Ken Howell of the Dodgers. His last game as a Giant came on 4/30/85 at Wrigley Field as an 8th inning defensive replacement. Between his thrilling debut and that final appearance, LeMaster drew the ire of Giants fans for his anemic bat and defensive woes.

August 9th, 1979: Padres at Giants. 0-0 game going into the top of the 9th and LeMaster commits two errors leading to 4 unearned runs and a Giants loss.

From the San Francisco Examiner the next day:

“When LeMaster came to bat in the bottom of the ninth and was hit by a John D’Acquisto pitch, the disgruntled Candlestick fans cheered. Because they were glad to have a. baserunner?

“I don’t think that’s the reason.” LeMaster said, knowing it was not. “They probably wished I’d got hit in the head instead of the arm. And I don’t blame ‘em. They had a right to boo me today.”

It got so bad, that he cooked up the idea of changing his name to Boo, and for the first two innings of a game in July of 1979 wore the BOO jersey.

My next trip to Candlestick was 18 years later and I was telling my buddy from San Jose about getting the LeMaster drawing as a kid and he lost his mind. “Johnnie Disaster. That’s what we called him.”

LeMaster was well paid, earning $500,000 (according to BaseballReference.com)for his services in 1985. The Giants won 4 and lost 8 in LeMaster’s 12 appearances with them in ‘85 and would go on to finish in the NL West cellar for a second straight season with a record of 62-100. A week after his last game in a Giant uniform, on May 7th, he was shipped to Cleveland in exchange for Mike Jeffcoat and Luis Quiñones.

Things did not go well in Cleveland. In 11 games with the Indians, LeMaster went 3-20 with 2 rbi and was promptly dealt to the Pirates in exchange for Scott Bailey on May 30th. Cleveland won 4 and lost 7 in LeMaster’s 11 appearances with them in ‘85 and would go on to finish in the AL East cellar with a record of 60-102.

Johnnie debuted with the Pirates on May 31st and in 22 games with Pittsburgh, he went 9-58 with a homer and 6 rbi. The Bucs won 7 and lost 15 in LeMaster’s 22 appearances with them and finished the year in the NL East cellar for a second straight season with a 57-104 record.

Johnnie LeMaster was not some kind of bad luck charm. All three teams he played for in 1985 were terrible before he got there. He was spared from playing for all 4 last place clubs, missing out only on playing for the AL West bottom-dwelling Texas Rangers.

LeMaster did not play in the big leagues in 1986. He ended his career in 1987 as a member of the Oakland A’s the same way he started it….with a hit. An infield single on July 28th off Angels hurler Mike Witt at the Oakland Coliseum, just across the bay from Candlestick where it all began. He was released the next day. The starting pitcher for California on the 29th was none other than Don Sutton.