1962 – The Colt .45s walk off with a 7-3 victory over Cincinnati, cut short due to fog. The Reds must have thought they’d entered some Biblical plague what with the heat, humidity, a blinding fog and those Texas-sized mosquitoes. A six-run rally puts Houston on top early. Manager Harry Craft has something else on his mind – the birth of his first grandchild is taking place at the same time.
Houston has no monopoly on problematic weather, it would seem; in St. Louis, a messy, muddy game features 36 hits, 22 of them collected by the visiting Pirates, en route to a 17 – 7 rout of the host Cardinals. Chief offenders among the ungracious guests are Smoky Burgess and Roberto Clemente with 3 home runs, 2 doubles and 12 RBI between them. Burgess pushes home 7 with his 3 extra-base blows while Clemente, for the second consecutive season, reaches the right field pavilion roof at Busch Stadium. “The Pirates, better than the Birds as mudders, added some power to the plodding in the 2nd inning and scored five times,” writes Ed Wilks in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. “Bob Skinner’s skimmer went through Julian Javier, but was ruled a hit, giving Julie the benefit of the doubt in the mud. Clemente gave the Cards no such benefit when he followed with a three-run drive to the pavilion roof. It was his seventh homer of the season and brought Bobby Shantz in from the bullpen. Clemente and Pittsburgh continued their streaks in the 4th. The Pirates scored for the fourth straight inning when Skinner walked, Dick Stuart grounded out and Clemente followed with a run-scoring single, his third consecutive hit.”
With the aid of 13 strikeouts and a Frank Howard home run, Sandy Koufax no-hits Bob Miller and the Mets, 5 – 0 in Los Angeles. Sandy starts off the game by fanning the side on nine pitches in the 1st inning, the first National League pitcher to strike out the side on nine pitches since Brooklyn’s Dazzy Vance, in 1924. It will be the first of four career no-hitters thrown by Koufax.
Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle break a scoreless tie in the 4th with back-to-back home runs to lead the Yanks to a 4 – 2 win over the Twins.
At Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles brings reliever Larry Sherry in to pitch in the 8th inning with brother Norm Sherry behind the plate. Larry goes two-thirds of an inning and is lifted, and the Dodgers top the Mets, 5 – 4, in 13 innings. The Sherrys are the first brother battery since the Baileys started for the Redlegs in 1959.
June 27, 1962 – Notorious head-hunter Don Drysdale, who hit 20 batters in 1961, had never been hit by a pitch. Bob Shaw filled that void, plunking him in a game in Dodger Stadium in the fifth inning. For good measure, releif pitcher Hank Fischer also drilled Drysdale in the seventh inning. Drysdale had the…
On June 27, 1962 Monroe High School standout Ed Kranepool, who was an Opening Day guest seated in the owners’ box with Mrs. Payson and Don Grant, signs a contract that includes a $85,000 bonus, as an amateur free agent with the New York Mets. The 17 year-old Bronx teenager will spend his entire 18-year…
On June 27, 1962 The Cards receive a pair of shutouts from Larry Jackson and Ray Sadecki to sweep the Cubs, 4 – 0 and 8 – 0. Jackson yields four hits in the first game and Sadecki allows five hits in the nitecap. Sadecki hits a 9th-inning home run and Julian Javier and Curt Flood hit back-to-back homers off Bob Anderson.
On June 26, 1962, Earl Wilson of the Boston Red Sox becomes the first black pitcher in American League history to hurl a no-hitter. Wilson also hits a 400-foot home run off loser Bo Belinsky, who pitched his no-hitter six weeks earlier, in the 2-0 victory over the Los Angeles Angels at Boston’s Fenway Park….
On June 25, 1962 The Tigers trade Charlie Maxwell to the White Sox for OF Bob Farley. Source Baseball Reference June 25
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