In the Rubber Room, Whitey Herzog Made One Crazy Decision

MINNEAPOLIS —  Listen! Mistakes are a part of life. Each man is entitled to make one now and then.

Custer made one. The captain of the Titanic made one. Gary Hart made one. Happens to all of us.

And Whitey Herzog, the man many consider the greatest manager in baseball today made a beaut here Sunday night.

The Minnesota Twins, who won the World Series, owe him a full cut.

Here is the situation: It is the fifth inning of a game Whitey’s team is leading 2-1.

His pitcher, Joe Magrane, is breezing along. He has given up five measly little hits, two of them infield taps which should have been outs. He has struck out four and looks to everyone to be in complete command of the situation.

To everyone but the man who counts. Whitey. The Boss.

Whitey sees something not visible to ordinary mortals. He bounds out of the dugout to lift his pitcher who has just gotten a ground-out and missed a second one because he failed to touch first base. Hardly your basic big-inning rally.

Never mind. Whitey waves in his other pitcher, Danny Cox.

Now, no one ever mixed up Danny Cox with Walter Johnson or either of the Dean boys or even Bret Saberhagen. He’s an 11-9 pitcher, is what he is. With two complete games to his record this year.

He doesn’t get a man out. The first pitch he throws is hit off the right-center field wall. He retires the side without retiring a batter. He gives up a double, a walk, a single and a run and a pitch that gets by his catcher which had a chance to be wild except his catcher throws out the runner going to third on it. Then, his outfielder throws out a guy at the plate trying to score from second on a hit. Hardly, your vintage relief stint. In the mess, he gives up the tying run. He’s lucky, that’s all.

The next inning, this savior walks the first two batters. He walks the winning run on, is what he does. He has faced five batters, walked three and given the other two hits.

They call Herzog the White Rat. How about the White Goat?

Goats come in all shapes and sizes in the World Series. Guys drop fly balls, fail to touch second, muff grounders, strike out with the bases loaded, throw gophers with two on--lose the Series.

This one was lost in the dugout.

(“Hey, Whitey, you wanna tell us about why ya took Magrane out in that spot with one out and one on and on a chop hit? *%&!&%*!”) There’s an old axiom Whitey ignored: If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Joe Magrane was a long way from broke. From what you could see, all systems were go. The hard-hitting Minnesota Twins were hard put to get the ball out of the infield on him. You can bet they were glad to see him go.

He had been doing so well, the noise level in this hatbox had descended to merely deafening. You could hear an anvil drop.

When Cox got finished, you couldn’t have heard the Battle of Verdun.

Was Magrane tired? Well, he had thrown 68 pitches and he’s only 23 years old. If 68 pitches wears him out at age 23, he’ll be in an iron lung by the time he’s 30.

His relief (if that’s what you want to call what Cox did) got thrown out of the game by umpire Dave Phillips. But that was too late. That was after Whitey had taken him out. Both removals came too late for St. Louis fans.

So, the Off-Broadway World Series came to an end Sunday night. It closed out-of-town where it began. It didn’t have much of a second act.

Minnesota held serve. It’s the first time neither team has won a road game in a World Series. When they call Minnesota “homer-hitters” they don’t necessarily mean the four-base kind. Be it ever so humble--and, believe me, this rubber room with shower curtains for an outfield is humble--there’s no place like Homerdome.

The Cardinals came in here like a guy checking into the Bates Motel to take a shower. The Cardinals needed a 25-foot ring and they got a cattle pen.

Not even David would have won under these conditions. I mean, he got Goliath outdoors. The Cardinals got their Goliath in a coal bin with a rag roof. They’re lucky it was only baseball. Judge Bork had a better chance.

But, they lost all chance when Whitey decided a change was in order.

Oh, well, doctors, they say, bury their mistakes. Whitey has a whole press box of second guessers and a few million other people the world over. He’s lucky the TV ratings were down for this World Series.