It’s 2013 and this set is
officially 39 years old and to kick off the new year we return to the regular
player cards and get thrown a bone with an action shot. It’s a pretty blurry
one of Willie Crawford, but that may just be my card. It’s also tough to
pinpoint the stadium and my guess is it’s either Philadelphia (strong) or Shea (not so strong)
because that’s where other Dodger action cards were shot. It’s also tough to
get a handle on this swing’s result since Willie looks pretty casual and may
have missed the pitch entirely or may even be taking a cut in the on deck
circle. Ah, for the absolutes of those Series shots. But one absolute here, for
sure, is that Willie is smack dab in the midst of one of his best seasons, one
in which he set personal bests in just about every major hitting category as he
finally took over right field for real, put up a nearly-.400 OBA, and got
rewarded with a “10” card. He’d been seeking that spot for almost ten years,
even though he was probably only 26 when this shot was taken. He had a torrid
May, hitting above .400 to finish the month at .321 when pretty much the whole
line-up was hitting over .300. Willie would then hold onto his position for a
couple seasons, more-or-less, although he could never completely escape the LA
platoon system. Once he finally did, his career ended pretty quickly which
would unfortunately be a barometer for things down the road. But right here he
looks pretty good, every bit the bonus baby he was a decade ago.
Willie Crawford was born and
raised in LA where he attended Fremont
High School and roamed
its diamond with future MLB guys Bobby Tolan and Bob Watson. Like just about
every other black kid from the area with serious skills, he also played for
Chet Brewer’s team in the summer. And he was a track star: a 9.7 burner in the
100-yard dash and a 25-foot long jumper. When he was a senior he was wooed by
every MLB team, especially Kansas City,
whose owner Charlie O Finley got Willie a tux and a limo for his prom and
offered him a fat bonus, including about $300 cash he gave Willie on prom
night. But the poor kid didn’t live in a neighborhood in which it was too wise
to carry that kind of bankroll so he hid it in his shoe and then nearly pulled
a hamstring trying to dance with it there. In the end Willie and his dad were
put off by Finley’s aggressiveness and instead signed with the more reserved
scout the Dodgers sent, a guy named Tommy Lasorda (I guess “reserved” is
relative) for a pretty big stake. That was in ’64, the final non-draft year,
and that meant Willie, who was all of 17, would have to spend at least some
time up top. But first he played some A ball where he hit .326 and showed off
his wheels. He then spent all of ’65 on the LA roster where he of course barely
played but got some Series work with a hit in his two at bats. After the season
he played in the Instructional League where he hit .317 in 35 games. In ’66 he
went to Double A where his average sank to .265 as he struck out a pretty
amazing 186 times in just over 500 at bats. Pretty scary, but his power numbers
upticked pretty good. In ’67 he did IL work again and between that and his
Double A time put up better numbers: 14 triples, 25 homers, 94 RBI’s, 21
steals, and a .293 average despite another pretty high – but better - K mark of
150. After hitting .295 with nine triples back in the top of the line-up in
just over half a Triple A season in ’68 he returned to LA for good.
In 1968 the Dodgers, though
just two seasons from a Series appearance, were not doing terribly well. There
was no regular player at three-quarters of the infield and there was zero power
in the outfield. So when Crawford put up his pretty pedestrian numbers –
although those 64 strikeouts must have been a bit scary – people were generally
excited. So in ’69 he became the fourth outfielder, putting in a bit more time
at each corner than in center. His offense improved for most stats but his K’s
stayed awfully high – 85 – even though most guys on the team enjoyed better
numbers after the mound was lowered. In ’70 he lost a bit of time to young guys
Bill Russell and Von Joshua, but not the K’s as he put up 88 in nearly 100 less
at bats. Then in ’71 after a lousy start something good happened: Willie’s
average climbed almost 50 points and his doubles doubled as his strikeouts came
down by half. According to some accounts Willie was helped with his hitting by
none other than Dick Allen, who stopped in LA for that season. In ’72 a hot
start to the season power-wise was arrested by a cold spring and summer and by
the end of July Willie was hitting near Mendoza
levels. A hot late August and September pulled his average back 25 points and
he was rewarded with the spot in right field vacated when Frank Robinson went
to California.
In 1974 Willie had a season
very comparable to ’73: same average, same power, and nearly the same OBA. He
got to enjoy his first playoff run in nearly ten years and got some post-season
work as LA juggled five guys in the outfield. In ’75 LA was beset by injuries
and Willie wasn’t immune as he was hit with a twisted ankle early on that
hindered his numbers a bit though it was the only season in which his walks
topped his strikeouts. He was also back to being platooned, now with Joe
Ferguson and John Hale, and that didn’t make him too happy so he asked to be
traded. He got his wish in spring training of ’76 when he went to St. Louis for Ted
Sizemore. With the Cards he took over right field most of the time and hit
.304, his highest average for a season. After that year Willie was part of a
deal that sent him, Vic Harris, and John Curtis to the Giants for John
D’Acquisto, Mike Caldwell, and Dave Rader and it was a San Francisco uniform into which he was
air-brushed on his ’77 card. But he never played for them since right before
that season he was sent to Houston
with Rob Sperring for Rob Andrews. For the Astros he played about half the
team’s games in left and in June went to Oakland
for Dennis Walling. With the A’s Willie played right and DH’d a bit but his
average fell a bunch to .184. Unsigned for the season, Oakland let him go after it, and Willie spent
most of spring training back in LA’s camp but didn’t make the cut. That was it
for him and he finished with a .268 average with 86 homers, 419 RBI’s, and a
.349 OBA. He hit .333 with a homer and two RBI’s in seven post-season games.
In ’78 and ’79 Crawford
played ball in Mexico
and when the Seventies ended so did his career. He returned to southern California, specifically Beverly Hills. There, his wife Dee became a
high-end real estate agent and his son, Willie Jr., a local high school
football star at running back and linebacker. Willie Jr. was a big deal recruit
in ’88 and ended up going to UCLA but before he played a game ran into some
troubles with assault and various other charges and never played for the
school. Our Willie, whose profession since he played seems to have gone
unrecorded, remained in the area – his wife is still at the real estate game –
where in 2004 he passed away, apparently from kidney failure. He was only 57.
There’s Willie’s big bonus
and the props for that ’66 Double A season. As for the cartoon, Willie was 17
when he signed but was 18 by the time of his debut in mid-September.
On September 9, 1965, right
before the team’s last big push to the pennant – shortly later they’d win 15 of
16 – the Dodgers were given a perfect game by their ace, Sandy Koufax. And Sandy pretty much had to be perfect because Cubs pitcher
Bob Hendley only gave up one hit and one walk himself. The only run of the game
was scored without the benefit of a hit: Lou Johnson walked, was sacrificed to
second by Ron Fairly, stole third, and then came home when catcher Chris Krug’s
throw to Ron Santo sailed into left field. Johnson also had the only hit that
day, a double in the seventh that ironically barely cleared the infield. He was
the only guy to safely reach base the whole game. Koufax gave up one scary
shot, a fly to deep center by Byron Browne in the second. There were only two
half-innings that didn’t go 1-2-3. And Sandy
got stronger as the game went along, striking out the side in the eighth and
ninth innings. He ended with 14 K’s to get his 22nd win and would
finish the year 26-8 with a 2.04 ERA and 382 strikeouts to win the Cy. It was
his second-to-last season and he was only 29. It was this game that LA offered
as its choice for the ’76 baseball centennial.
The Dodgers of course beat
the Twins in that ’65 Series and we have to hook up Willie to a Twin now:
1. Crawford and Don Kessinger
’76 Cards;
2. Kessinger and Joe Decker
’69 to ’72 Cubs.
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