What if the Dodgers overwhelmed the Yankees in a World Series the same way Sandy Koufax typically overwhelmed NL batters? It’s a question that Dodgers fans of either coast could hardly have dared ask.
But in 1963, it happened. The Dodgers not only beat the Yankees in the ’63 Series, they swept them. They not only swept them, they never trailed in any game. And of course, it had to start with Koufax.
The left-hander was 27 years old at the time and about to win his first Cy Young Award. He began the World Series by striking out the first five Yankees he faced: Tony Kubek, Bobby Richardson, Tom Tresh, Mickey Mantle, and Roger Maris. After five innings, he had 11 Ks, and when pinch-hitter Harry Bright went down in the bottom of the ninth, Koufax set a World Series record with his 15th.
A good sign for the Dodgers was that although Koufax was supreme in his success, he wasn’t alone. Johnny Roseboro hit a three-run homer off future Hall of Famer Whitey Ford to cap a four-run second inning, and second baseman Dick Tracewski knocked down a low liner by Clete Boyer to keep the Yankees from scoring in the fifth after two earlier singles broke up Koufax’s no-hit bid. Though the Yankees got a two-run homer from Tresh in the eighth and a single in the ninth, Koufax was resilient enough to put them away.
Oh, and by the way—Koufax didn’t feel good.
“I felt a little weak,” he told the press afterward. “I just felt a little tired in general early in the game. Then I felt a little weak in the middle of the game. Then I got some of my strength back, but I was a little weak again at the end.”
The celebration begins at Dodger Stadium after the Dodgers swept the New York Yankees in the 1963 World Series. Pitcher Sandy Koufax won two games in the four-game sweep, including the last game 2–1. Photo courtesy of Los Angeles Dodgers, Inc. All rights reserved.
Cautious in their optimism in the clubhouse after the initial victory, the Dodgers kept an all-business approach in Game 2. Willie Davis followed singles by Maury Wills and Jim Gilliam with a two-run double past a slipping Roger Maris in right field. Tommy Davis later added two triples, and Johnny Podres pitched 81/3 innings of shutout ball to send the Dodgers back to Los Angeles with a 4–1 victory and 2–0 series lead.
Despite getting only six hits in their next two games, the Dodgers closed out the series. Don Drysdale made a first-inning RBI single by Tommy Davis stand up for a 1–0 victory in Game 3. Then in Game 4, Frank Howard broke up a scoreless rematch between Koufax and Ford with the first-ever home run to the Loge level of Dodger Stadium. Mickey Mantle homered off Koufax in the seventh to give the Yankees their first tie of the postseason, but then came the final, fateful play of the Series. Gilliam grounded to Boyer at third base, but first baseman Joe Pepitone couldn’t pick up the throw and let it get past him.
“I didn’t see it,” Pepitone told John Hall of the Los Angeles Times. “It got lost in the shirts behind third base. It hit me on the side of the glove and the wrist and went on by.… Nothing like that happened to me all year.”
Gilliam zipped all the way to third base, and Willie Davis brought him home with a sacrifice fly for a 2–1 lead.
For those who didn’t think the Yankees could ever be disposed of so easily, one play in the ninth gave pause. After Richardson singled off Koufax to open the inning, Tresh and Mantle struck out looking. But Elston Howard reached base on what was ruled an error by Tracewski catching a throw from Maury Wills, and suddenly the tying run was in scoring position. However, Koufax again was up to the task, inducing a 6–3 groundout from Hector Lopez.
Just like that, the Yankees, 104-game winners in the regular season, were swept away like yesteryear’s dust, held to four runs in four games while striking out 37 times.
“For one of the few times since the electric light, the Bombers were forced to depart with a borrowed line that once belonged to the Dodgers,” Hall wrote. “Wait ‘til next year.”
Dick Nen
Dick Nen’s first major league at-bat came against St. Louis Cardinals ace Bob Gibson, which means that Dick Nen’s first major league at-bat resulted in an out. The product of Banning High and Long Beach State had joined the major league roster of his now-local team earlier in the day—September 18, 1963—although Nen made his debut far from home and comfort. The host Cardinals led the Los Angeles Dodgers 5–1 in the top of the eighth behind four-hit, no-walk pitching by Gibson, and were six outs away from cutting the Dodgers’ NL lead to two games with 11 days remaining in the regular season.
Nen did make solid contact against Gibson, lining out to center field, and if anything that might have been a sign that Gibson was tiring—letting a scrub get wood on him. Maury Wills and Jim Gilliam followed with singles, Wally Moon walked to load the bases, and then Tommy Davis singled to left field to cut the Cardinal lead in half. Bobby Shantz relieved Gibson and walked Frank Howard to load the bases, then gave up a sacrifice fly to Willie Davis. But a second reliever, Ron Taylor, retired Bill Skowron on a groundout, leaving the Dodgers down by a run. Nen stayed in the game at first as part of a triple switch, which meant that he would be due up again as the second batter of the ninth.
Dick Nen’s second major league at-bat is still going on. When you mention unsung heroes in Dodgers history, Nen is one of the first names to enter the conversation because against Taylor, the left-handed Nen slugged a long drive over the right-field wall to tie the game. Dick Nen. Dick Nen! The Dodgers then rode Ron Perranoski’s six innings of shutout relief to a 6–5, 13-inning victory, and ended up burying the Cardinals six games back.
Dick Nen’s second major league hit would come nearly 21 months later with another team in another league and before a crowd of 4,294—at Dodger Stadium of all places, but as a member of the Washington Senators in a road game against the California Angels. Nen, the father of major league reliever Robb Nen, never had another moment like he had in St. Louis in his first major league game. Then again, most of us have never had a moment like that, period.