This card represents the last
one of Jose Cruz in an unadulterated Cardinals uniform. On his ’75 card he
would be air-brushed into an Astros cap with maybe the biggest star in Topps
history. Up until now, Jose had shown some skills – good defense, good hustle,
some nice stats in the minors – but nothing that really foreshadowed his years
of success in Houston.
His biggest moment in ’73 may have been when he and his two siblings – Hector and
Tommy – were reunited on the team in September although all three never played
in the same game. ’73 represented both a high and low for Jose’s time in St.
Louis: high because he asserted himself as the regular center fielder and set
most of his offensive personal highs with the team; low because he hit only
.227 and the late-season emergence of Bake McBride would push him to a reserve
role the following year. But a little-regarded transaction late in ’74 would
fix everything pretty quickly.
Jose “Cheo” Cruz and his
brothers – Jose was the oldest – grew up in Arroyo, Puerto
Rico from where Jose was signed shortly after graduating high
school by the Cards in ’67. He showed some speed that summer in A ball with
nine triples in just over 200 at bats and the next year upped his numbers
across the board at the same level. After a solid ’69 in Double A he took off
at that level in ’70 and recorded an OBA of .386 with a lifetime seasonal high
of 21 homers. He made his debut for the Cards in September and hit well in his
few games. After an even stronger start to his ’71 in Triple A he came up for
good halfway through that season.
When Cruz came up in mid-’71 he
got the starting job in center field, forcing the trade of incumbent Jose
Cardenal to the Brewers. This Jose did a
pretty good job his rookie year, posting a .377 OBA while homering nine times,
a rate he wouldn’t approach again until he moved to Houston. But in ’72 his
average fell 40 points as he and Luis Melendez, who was a couple years younger,
traded starts in center. Then in ’73 most of his offensive stats picked up
considerably but his average didn’t and when Bake McBride had a hot debut after
his call-up both Jose and Melendez were pushed to reserve roles in ’74, though
Jose had a nice rebound in his average. Shortly after the season he was sold to
Houston in a
deal that ended up being a steal for the Astros.
1975 was a totally crappy
year for the Astros as their pitching sort of blew up and they fell to the
bottom of their division. But the team was rife with young speedy outfielders
and his first season in Houston Cruz split time in right field with Wilbur
Howard. While Howard hit .283 to Jose’s .257 and stole 32 bases to Jose’s six,
Cruz was more efficient at the plate, recording a much higher OBA on way less
strikeouts. So in ’76 when the outfield was moved around a bit Jose became the
regular guy in left and rewarded everyone with the move by hitting .303 with 61
RBI’s and 28 stolen bases. In ’77 the average fell a couple points to .299 as
Jose moved across to right but just about every other stat moved up big with
ten triples, 17 homers, 87 RBI’s and 44 steals. From then on he was an
institution in Houston.
In ’78 he hit .315 followed by a .289 in ’79 with comparable other stats to his
’77. In ’80 he hit .302 with his first year of over 90 RBI’s and got his first
All-Star appearance as the rest of the baseball world finally caught on. He
finished third in NL MVP voting and got
his first playoff action, lighting up the Phillies with a .400 average and .609
OBA. In ’81 slumps at the beginning and end of the strike year bookended a
strong middle and his average fell to .267 as his stolen base totals tumbled. In
’82 he recovered to .275 and then in ’83 he had his best offensive year: an
NL-leading 189 hits to hit .318 with a .385 OBA, 14 homers, and 92 RBI’s and
his first Silver Slugger. ’84 was pretty much a repeat: .312, .381, twelve
homers, and 95 RBI’s for another Silver Slugger and another All-Star nod. In ‘85
he had his first significant injury with a dislocated toe in his left foot but
recovered to hit .300. The next year Houston
returned to the playoffs but Jose spent some time on the DL with a sprained
ligament in his knee, curtailing his numbers, though he had a strong finish,
hitting .278. After he slumped to .241 in ’87 he left Houston as the career Astros leader in most
offensive categories to sign as a free agent with the Yankees at age 40. With
NY he DH’d a few games before hanging them up. For his career Jose hit .284
with 2,251 hits, 165 homers, 1,077 RBI’s, 317 stolen bases (against only 136
times being caught), and a .354 OBA. He is currently 22nd in
all-time putouts in left field and 32nd in assists. In the
post-season he hit .279 with a .380 OBA and six RBI’s in 16 games.
After playing baseball Cruz
pretty much retired, occasionally coaching in Puerto Rico,
but mostly teaching his son Jose Jr. – who went on to have a twelve year career
of his own – to play ball. In ’95 he formally returned to baseball in the
States as manager of Laredo
in the new unaffiliated Texas-Louisiana league. After going 17-32 he took a
year off and when Larry Dierker was named manager of Houston in ’97 he asked Jose to be a coach. Cheo
lasted in that role for 13 seasons, as both a first base and hitting coach. In
2009 in a staff shake-up in the wake of Cecil Cooper’s release as manager, Jose
moved upstairs as an assistant to the GM and a community-relations person. He
is still in that position with the Astros.
Jose could be a streaky guy
as the first star bullet implies. Pretty much every season he had hitting
streaks of ten games or more. He may have the shortest name in the set that
includes the parenthetical name.
The St. Louis contribution to the ’76 baseball
centennial was not Bob Gibson’s
overpowering Series performances but another impressive personal achievement:
Lou Brock’s 105th stolen base in 1974. In the year that Brock went
on to establish his record of 118 steals, that one broke the record set in ’62 by
Maury Wills. He set the mark September 10th, in a game against the
Phillies. He stole his 104th in the first inning after a single off Dick
Ruthven of the Phillies and the record breaker in the seventh in pretty much
the same situation. The next night the Cards played the Mets in that 25-inning
marathon so Lou was a busy boy back then.
I can be a bit streaky myself
in this exercise and I’m going to use a guy from the last hook-up:
1. Cruz and Cliff Johnson ’75
to ’77 Astros;
2. Johnson and Chris
Chambliss ’77 to ’79 Yankees;
3. Chambliss and Pat Dobson ’74
to ’75 Yankees.
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