13dec Today is the birthday of Ferguson Jenkins, who had 19 years in the majors, 1965-1983, with 4 teams, including second hitches with 2 of them; the Rangers were his third…he was signed as an amateur free agent by Phila out of Chatham, Ontario, Canada, in 1962 and debuted in Sept 1965…he had a very nice 7-game turn out of the bullpen but prior to 1966 he, John Herrnstein, and Adolfo Phillips were traded to CC for Bob Buhl and Larry Jackson…he got into 61 games that year, 60 of which came after that trade; 12 were starts…here’s what they came out of this knowing: he didn’t give up many hits and didn’t walk many; a good number of the hits he did give up were HR, and though not overpowering, his location and movement and ability to make everything look different gave him big strikeout capabilities…that’s pretty much the script of his career…look at his page and you’ll see a ton of bold ink, which signifies leading the league in that category…in 1967 he began a streak of 6 straight seasons of 20 wins or more, going 20-13, 2.80/1.082, leading the league with 20 complete games and giving up a league-leading 30 HR in 289 1/3 innings; he made the All-Star team and finished tied for runner-up for the Cy Young with Jim Bunning, behind Mike McCormick…his signature year in this period was 1971: 24-13, 2.77, 1.049, leading the league in starts with 39, innings with 325, hits with 304, HR with 29, making the All-Star team and winning the Cy Young…in 1972 he went 20-12, 3.20 and made the All-Star team…but the next year he dipped to 14-16, 3.89 and CC thought all these innings and batters faced and pitches and starts were catching up with him…they had other issues, too…they’d won 77 games and their team was getting old…of their 8 position players, 6 were 30 or older and the 2 who weren’t were 27 and 29…they needed a younger bat and it so happened the Rangers had one on the way up that they liked…the Rangers knew what they had; they like him too, and it was going to take a big name—a big pitching name—to pry him loose…the name of Ferguson Jenkins did the trick and in late Oct the trade was made—Fergie to the Rangers for Bill Madlock and Vic Harris…this was a win for both sides….Fergie brought something the Rangers had not only not had, it was nowhere on the horizon…1974 was arguably the greatest year of his career as he and the fire and edge of Billy Martin and a few well-placed veterans and a couple of rookies who no one thought would be ready led the team to an amazing second place finish in the AL West, only 5 games behind first place Oak, which was in the waning years of its dynasty that won 3 straight World Series…Fergie was magic, working quickly with his pinpoint control, his businesslike approach and his 6-5 unflappable mound presence…he started 41 games and pitched a career high 328 1/3 innings, second in the league in both categories; he led the league in complete games with 29, tied Oak’s Catfish Hunter for the league lead in wins with 25, had 12 losses, an ERA of 2.82, a WHIP of 1.008, second to Hunter, led the league in W/9, was third in K/9, third in strikeouts behind Nolan and Blyleven; the 41 starts tied him with 6 others—one of whom was teammate Jim Bibby—for second, 1 behind Wilbur Wood, a knuckleballer who could pitch every 4th and sometimes even every 3rd day; he had 6 shutouts, tying him with Hunter for second behind Luis Tiant—you get the idea…it was astounding to watch and to this day I wonder if Ranger fans knew what we were seeing; that goes for me, too--I’d certainly not seen it before, except from afar …the next year things slowed down a tad…he went 17-18, 3.93/1.174 on a team that was not as good…and that’s the thing about Fergie—he would speak his mind and that rubbed some the wrong way…and you could say that after that year he went into decline and the Rangers knew when to trade him…but he stayed in the game as at the least a useful back of the rotation starter for another 8 years…1975 left the Rangers needing a CF in the worst way; Bos had one they liked, so they sent him to the Red Sox for Juan Beniquez and 2 pitchers, Steve Barr and Craig Skok…he stayed with the Red Sox for 2 years, then in 1978 they traded him back to the Rangers for John Poloni and cash, and whaddyaknow—he had one more really good year in him at the age of 35…he got into 34 games, 30 starts and went 18-8, 3.04/1.080…nobody was expecting anything like that from him…the next year he went 16-14, 4.07; he was 12-12, 3.07 in 1980 and 5-8, 4.50 in strike-torn 1981…after that year he became a free agent and went back to CC and in 1982 went 14-15, 3.12 on a team that won 73 games…he pitched one more year after that and called it a career, with 284 wins, a 3.34 ERA and a WHIP of 1.142…and he did the better part of this on teams that were average or more likely, below…he was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1991, the hallowed shrine’s first Canadian…in 1980, while with the Rangers, the team was returning from a series in Toronto and during a customs search, they found 3 grams of cocaine, 2.2 grams of hash and 1.75 grams of pot among his possessions….he was suspended indefinitely but the suspension lasted only two weeks before an independent arbiter re-instated him and he returned to action…MLB did not punish him further…today he is 72…
Posted on: Sat, 13 Dec 2014 06:12:08 +0000
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