In memory of a hometown hitter
The day shall live in baseball infamy: July 7, 1923. On that balmy evening at twilight, Francis “Lefty” O’Doul, playing for the Boston Red Sox, took the mound as a reliever in the first game of a doubleheader against the Cleveland Indians. O’Doul was up from the minors and that summer was his chance to scrawl his name on the walls of big-league heaven. But in that notorious sixth inning he set a record for the most runs given up by a relief pitcher in a single inning: 13. Earlier that season he set a record for the most batters faced in a single inning: 16. The final score was 27 to 3. Boston finished the season in last place in the American League and Lefty O’Doul went back down to the minors.
Lefty was converted into a power-hitting outfielder, and eventually returned to the majors in 1928. He was 31 and went on to become a two-time National League batting champion and was chosen for the Major-League Baseball All-Star Game in 1933. But there was more to come, a third act. When O’Doul retired as a player he became manager of the San Francisco Seals, helped develop Joe DiMaggio, and played a key role in popularizing baseball in Japan, where he’s in the Hall of Fame.
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Address 3rd Street at Mission Creek, San Francisco, CA, 94107 | Public Transport Light rail: T-Third (3rd St & 4th St stop) | Tip Take a stroll at nearby Cove Park. It is a well-maintained green space directly on the waterfront, with walking paths, lawns, and benches.
In his honor, there’s a pork-ribs restaurant and piano bar bearing his name just off Union Square. And then there’s the Lefty O’Doul Bridge, also known as the Third Street Bridge, a massive and very efficient apparatus, just by AT&T Park. Opened in May 1933, it’s one of four drawbridges in the city and was designed by Joseph Strauss, who also designed the Golden Gate Bridge (in fact, Charles A. Ellis designed the Golden Gate, but that’s another story). It still works as perfectly as it did when it was first built, and opens for even the smallest sailboat traveling in and out of Mission Bay.
A fun fact for 007 fans: the bridge was seen in an exciting but brief car-chase sequence in the James Bond film A View to Kill.
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