I should add that the first major league game I actually saw in person involved the Phillies and Pirates at Three Rivers. I booed Pete Rose in person, and it felt good. Bought a “Lumber Company” shirt too. The area around my hometown was Pirates country due to our local minor league team in Salem, VA,, and I saw a lot of that “We Are Family” team come up through the ranks. Many of my high school buddies still root for the Buccos. I’m convinced that they’d rebound if they went back to the mustrad colored caps. And maybe got rid of Jim Tracy.

Ken

Andrew

Is that why you became a historian? Because the only good baseball with your city took place in the past? 🙂

Though a lifelong Tigers fan, one of my earliest boyhood sports memories involved the Phillies and their 60’s manager, Gene Mauch. I think it was ’64 or ’65 when they put together one of the great collapses in sports history, losing however many in a row at the end of the season which cost them the pennant. My poor father was a Phillies fan and I remember it being just sheer day-by-day torture for him as he listened to their games on the radio! 🙂

Paul

I remember the deal when the Phils got Carlton. They traded Rick Wise for him. In 1971, Wise won 20 games and may have had the finest single game of any pitcher in history. He pitched a no-hitter against the Reds at Riverfront Stadium and also hit two home runs that night. He was very popular in Philadelphia, as he was a rookie on that 1964 Fizz Kids team. Although Carlton had also won 20 and held the major league record with 19 strikeouts in a game, he was unknown.

In 1972, he probably had the finest year of any pitcher in the history of the game. He went 27-10 on a team that won 54 games that year. Ponder that–he won 50% of the team’s games that season. He won 15 straight, had 310 strikeouts, and an ERA under 2.0. It was truly an incredible year.

Lefty was a weird dude, and he hung on too long, but what a pitcher he was. Nobody before or since has had a nasaty slider as an out pitch like he did.

Eric

Schmidt used to strike out a lot early in his career, and he was streaky. He was also kind of aloof, so he made it easy for folks to be sort of cool toward him. However, one day, mired in the midst of a terrible slump, he showed up on the field wearing a wig, dark glasses and other pieces of a disguise. It was so ridiculous and so funny that the incident broke the ice, and from that moment forward, Schmidt was a much beloved figure in Philadelphia.

548 home runs and three MVP awards later, he should have been.

Eric

Will just add to what Ken posted, as I too could listen to Phillies games on the radion up here in Northern NJ. Harry Kalas and Richie Ashburn were a great duo, and very underrated during their many years together at the microphones.

Regards from the Garden State,

Steve Basic

Though raised to follow the true faith, Dodger Blue, I nonetheless have one shining Phillie memory. In 1972, when I was still in high school, a friend gave my mom a used transistor radio. Some oddity in this thing allowed me to pick up Phillie broadcasts all the way in southwest Virginia. What fun I had that summer, sitting in my room in the evenings listening to some guy acquired from the Cards named Steve Carlton mow down the National League. Every four days the Phils were magnificent. The radio went bad finally and I never could get Philadelphia again, but I’ve had a warm spot for them ever since.

Ken