In many ways, this had been Sullivan’s most enjoyable year in baseball. He loved the challenge of being in charge, making the decisions that won or lost games—who to start, when to pinch-hit, how to motivate, where to position the outfielders. It was rewarding to see players improving and gaining in confidence. Riding on the bus or sitting in the dugout, he liked watching the players interact, and marveled at how well they all got along in a situation that the segregationists had insisted would lead to discord and disaster. There had been no drunken brawls or charging after hecklers to distract from the Barons’ accomplishments.
As a native Alabamian, Sullivan took pride in helping to bring to Birmingham something it desperately needed—a boost to its collective self-esteem, and a glimpse of how integration could work. He couldn’t count the times a stranger had stopped him at the ballpark or shopping at Piggly Wiggly to thank him for what he was doing.
But it hadn’t all been perfect. Maybe the hardest thing was being away from Pat and the kids, although they had visited several times. He loved having his son Marc come to the ballpark, and the way the players went out of their way to play with him, especially Hoss, Lindblad, and Reynolds. Maybe the favorite memory he’d take from the season was watching Reynolds and Hoss toss Marc into the laundry cart and wheel him around the clubhouse, the six-year-old squealing as if he were riding the Matterhorn at Disneyland. The thing Sullivan looked forward to the most after the season was going home and being a full-time dad again.
The other thing that had been hard on him was Finley. In some ways, he respected him, both for what he’d accomplished in business and as an owner. He appreciated that Finley had agreed to make Kansas City the parent club for Birmingham. If he hadn’t done that—when no other franchise would—none of this would have been possible. He also noted that Finley had not only hired him to be a manager but started him in AA.
Yet there was also a part of him that saw Finley as a pompous, meddling phony.
Sullivan’s biggest concern about his starting rotation was Ron Tompkins. He was still throwing as hard as ever, so it was either mechanics or in his head—he’d been wilder than spray paint in a strong breeze. Moving him to the bullpen was either a possible cure… or a way to seal defeat.
With the loss of Sanders, Sullivan was searching for the right combination of starters and relievers… even though it was late in the season to still be tinkering. He had promoted Rich Allen—the guy who’d taken a line drive to the head—from the bullpen to the starting rotation. Allen had won his last five decisions, and in the twenty-three games he’d pitched since May 22, he had given up only eight earned runs, a stretch of sixty-two and two-thirds innings, with an ERA of 1.13. On the other hand, Seitz, Jones, and Ken Knight had been delivering kerosene, which left Grzenda as the only choice as closer, even though he’d pitched lately as if he were still lost somewhere out on the highway from Kansas City.
Offensively, with only twenty games left to play, Sullivan still needed a reliable cleanup hitter. He’d used Meyer, Stahl, Reynolds, Rosario, Norton, and Tony Frulio in that spot, and none of them had shown the consistency to carry the team. Meyer had for a while, but as Sullivan had feared, his skinny frame had weakened in the heat and he was now out of the lineup with a strained knee. On the bright side, Larry Stahl had hit .560 in the last eight games, and Reynolds was hitting shots all over the yard. If only the Barons played all their games on the road.
With only three weeks left in the season, Sullivan and the Barons still led Lynchburg by five. As the Barons’ magic number—any combination of Baron wins and Lynchburg defeats—fell to nineteen, Albert Belcher dished out the praise for Sullivan: “He’s the best manager I’ve ever dealt with,” he said. “His method of handling young players is superior to any we’ve had. He and those boys have worked together so well. I’ve been close to the situation all the way and there has never been one ill feeling. He’s for them, and they’re for him, and that as much as anything is why we’re on top.”
Van Hoose thought Sullivan was not only a shoo-in for Southern League Manager of the Year, but barring a total collapse down the stretch, he also deserved to win the prestigious minor-league manager of the year award presented by the Sporting News.
“It’s nice to be considered,” Sullivan said. “But we need to win this thing first.”
Sullivan stared at his boss’s photo on the front page of the newspaper. Finley was wearing a Beatles wig and hamming it up with his attractive secretary. Sullivan almost choked on his cornflakes.
When the Beatles arrived in America for their first American tour, Finley thought it would be a grand idea to have them come to Kansas City and play at Municipal Stadium. He contacted their manager, Brian Epstein, in England and offered them $50,000. The response was one word: “No.” They were already booked solid. That didn’t deter Finley. A week later he upped the offer to $100,000. The response was the same. They were “too busy” was the explanation. But he tried Epstein again, this time at $150,000. “That was talk he wanted to hear,” Finley told the Birmingham News.
The Beatles accepted his $150,000 offer to play September 17 at Municipal Stadium in Kansas City. It would be the biggest venue of their tour, and the contract was the largest amount ever paid to musicians. The money was paid, in full, up front.
Finley had already begun the preparations. The stage would be at second base, and seats in the infield would go for $8.50, with box seats at $6.50 and grandstand seats for $4.50. Tickets would be printed in wedding-gown white, kelly green, and Fort Knox gold. On the back of each ticket would be the picture of Finley in his Beatles wig.
The part of the story that made Sullivan think, Okay, maybe this guy isn’t simply an egomaniac after all, was that Finley said he would donate all revenue for the event to his favorite charity, the National Tuberculosis Association, a legacy of his bout with the disease when he was younger.
“I won’t keep a nickel,” he declared. “I don’t want anybody saying I used kids to make money. I’m looking for friends. Some of these young Beatles fans have never seen the inside of a ballpark. Maybe they’ll come back. And who knows? Maybe Ringo can play shortstop.”
Wouldn’t that be nice, thought Sullivan. Then maybe he can send us back Campaneris.
Lindblad had taken to calling Sullivan “Einstein,” although not to his face. But in the second game of a doubleheader against Macon, the sobriquet would be put to its sternest test.
A few days earlier, Sullivan had demoted Tompkins to the bullpen. In his last start, he had walked six in five innings, his lofty 7–0 record back in May falling to 10–5, his confidence sulking toward its nadir. Sullivan hoped the change would not only get Tompkins’s pitching back on track but also shore up a bullpen that in the last two weeks had lost leads handed to it by Blue Moon, Lindblad, and Nicky Don Curtis. Sullivan knew that a good way for rancor and unrest to ferment on a pitching staff was to have relievers regularly snatch victories away from the starters. With Sanders, that hadn’t happened. Tompkins had said he understood the demotion and that he wanted to do whatever he could to help the team, although in the minor leagues, all of the rah-rah happy-team incantations were a delicate dance along the fragile fault line separating personal goals and glory from team success.
For the second game of a doubleheader, Sullivan had taken the risk of giving Shaky Joe Grzenda his first start. Grzenda responded, giving up only one run on seven hits, making a strong case to join the starting rotation for the last couple of weeks of the season. But the Barons’ bats gave him no support, and they trailed 1–0 going into their last at-bat.
With two out and nobody on, Rosario drilled a triple to right center, bringing up Hoss with a chance to tie the game. Sully called time-out. In his last twenty-three at-bats, Hoss had not gotten a hit. None. Not even a bloop single. His average had fallen twenty points; he looked like Casper the Ghost. If Sullivan had anybody else who could play second, he would have used him.
Sullivan motioned for Hoss to meet him halfway between third and home. Hoss eased toward him, fully expecting to be told he was being pinch-hit for.
“Just relax up there,” instructed Sully. “You’re due.”
Like everyone else, Hoss thought Sully was the best manager he’d ever had. The first pitch was a fastball on the outside part of the plate. Hoss took a rip, making the best contact he’d had in over two weeks, sending a line drive into the gap in right center. It was a stand-up triple, driving in Rosario, tying the game.
Sullivan now faced another decision. He’d moved Hoss to the eight spot because of his slump, so the next batter was Shaky Joe, who hadn’t gotten a hit since LBJ was a senator. Figuring Shaky Joe was tired after having pitched twice as many innings as he had in any game this season—a nine-cigarettes-between-innings performance—he decided to go with a pinch hitter and try to win the game right there.
He signaled toward the bench for a pinch hitter—pitcher Rich Allen—surprising everyone on the bench, including Allen. On the season, Allen had gotten only a couple of hits, although in pre-game batting practice for pitchers, which Sullivan sometimes pitched, he was Harmon Killebrew. Lots of line drives. Batting practice, however, was not the real thing.
Sullivan knew this was a risky move, and not just because there was no evidence that Allen was a clutch hitter. The riskier part was that he was sending up a pitcher to hit when he still had two position players on the bench—Woody Huyke and Bill Meyer—hitters who would not be happy to have a pitcher chosen to pinch-hit over them with the game on the line, even if they were nursing nagging injuries.
Allen struck out on three pitches.
Sullivan decided to roll the dice again, summoning the beleaguered Tompkins, who’d been warming up in the bullpen. Tompkins had never relieved before. Not at Chula Vista High, not in Legion ball, not in his two years in the minors. Star pitchers didn’t relieve. Now his whole mind-set had to be different. As a starter, he had four days to think about his next appearance. On this day, he had five minutes. Usually, he took fifteen minutes to warm up before a game; on this day, he was throwing full speed after only a minute. It had been only two days since his last ill-fated start, but he’d lasted only three innings in that one, so his arm felt fine.
He walked the first hitter on four pitches.
Glancing toward the dugout, he expected to see Sullivan racing out to yank him. But nobody was warming up.
The next batter, doing Tompkins a big favor, swung at the first pitch, hitting a sharp grounder over the mound. Chavarria raced to his left, swooped it up, stepped on second, and then threw to first for an easy double play.
The next batter flied out to center, ending the inning.
The Barons didn’t score in their half of the inning, but Tompkins also retired the side in order again, whiffing two.
With one out in the bottom of the ninth and nobody on, Ossie Chavarria lashed a shot into the gap in right center. As he steamed into third with a stand-up triple, the second baseman momentarily bobbled the relay.
“Go, go, go,” yelled Sully, waving him home.
Chavarria, whose churning legs looked like a hamster’s on an exercise wheel, shifted back into high gear, racing toward the plate. The catcher waited, crouched and ready. As Chavarria started his slide, the catcher reached out for the ball as it came in a little up the line toward first. At the same time, inexplicably, the pitcher also made a desperate lunge for the errant throw, his head colliding with the catcher’s head as Chavarria slid in safely.
“Barons win!” screamed the announcer.
The Barons players, led by Tompkins, rushed out of the dugout to mob Chavarria. As they danced and celebrated, the pitcher and catcher lay in the dirt nearby, both out cold. (They recovered.)
The Barons’ magic number was now fourteen.
The day after Blue Moon notched his fifth straight win—a 5–1 gem that would’ve been a shutout except for his own error on a throw to first—he was summoned to Sullivan’s office. In those five wins, all complete games, he’d walked fewer than two a game.
“What’s up, Skip?” asked Blue Moon, stifling another one of his lingering coughs.
“We want you to go back to the hospital and get checked out again,” answered Sullivan. “You need to be healthy.”
“When?”
“Right now.”
Blue Moon turned to leave.
“Before you go, I’ve got something else to tell you.”
“What’s that?”
Sullivan explained that he’d just gotten off the phone with Charlie Finley.
“You’re going to the big leagues,” said Sullivan.
“No, for real?”
Sullivan explained that the plan was to have Blue Moon pitch two more games for the Barons, and then as soon as they clinched the pennant, he’d leave to join the A’s, most likely for their series in Kansas City against the Yankees.
“You could be facing Mickey Mantle in your first game,” said Sullivan.
“It don’t bother me,” replied Blue Moon. “It don’t bother me t’all. The Yankees? They don’t scare me. They look just like any other club to me. You just go out there and throw strikes. My fastball been movin’ real good. They either hit it or they don’t.”
The Barons’ magic number was down to twelve.