June 24, 1962: The New York Yankees play the longest game in their history. And, having sat through a Yankee game that went 18 innings, I can honestly say that I hope this stays the record for the rest of my life.
They were playing the Detroit Tigers at Tiger Stadium. The starting pitchers were Bob Turley and Frank Lary. In 1958, Turley won the Cy Young Award, and 3 games in the World Series. But he had battled injuries since. In 1959 and '60, Lary won several games against the Yankees, and became known as "The Yankee Killer." But the Yankees hit him hard in 1961 (as well as hitting pretty much every other pitcher they faced hard), and the Tigers' best shot at an American League Pennant between 1946 and 1967 fell apart in large part because of it.
Anyway, neither of them lasted long in this game. The Yankees scored 6 runs in the top of the 1st inning, including a home run by Clete Boyer. Tiger manager Bob Scheffing left him in. In the bottom of the 1st, Turley walked the 1st 2 batters, gave up a home run to Purnal Goldy, got an out, and then walked another. Yankee manager Ralph Houk decided he'd seen enough, and took Turley out. Jim Coates pitched through the 3rd.
In the top of the 2nd, with the score 6-3 Yankees, Bobby Richardson singled, Roger Maris singled him over to 3rd, and Mickey Mantle got Richardson home on a groundout. The Tigers scored 2 runs in the bottom of the 3rd, to make it 7-6 New York.
Jerry Casale pitched the 4th and the 5th for the Tigers, and Ron Nischwitz pitched into the 7th. Bill Stafford pitched into the 6th for the Yankees, when Rocky Colavito singled home the tying run.
And 7-7 is where it stayed, seemingly forever. For the Yankees, Tex Clevenger pitched until the 13th, Bud Daley through the 15th, and then rookie fireballer Jim Bouton -- not yet injured and forced to rely on the knuckleball and the notepad -- pitched the rest of the way. For the Tigers, Ron Kline pitched into the 8th, Hank Aguirre into the 14th, and Terry Fox all the way through the 21st inning.
No "ghost runner" in those days. And yet, the game took 7 hours even, just a little over 19 minutes an inning. Contrast that with the game the Yankees played on June 23, 2022, a thriller in which they beat the Houston Astros in the bottom of the 9th: 3 hours and 24 minutes, or nearly 38 minutes an inning. Double.
Close calls for the Tigers: In the 10th, leadoff man on, erased on double play, then men on 1st and 2nd with 2 outs, stranded. In the 11th, Colavito led off with a triple, so Houk ordered back-to-back intentional walks, which worked, with a lineout and a double play. With 1 out in the 13th, Colavito singled, but was stranded. With 1 out in the 14th, they got men on 1st and 2nd, but a double play ended that. With 1 out in the 15th, they got men on 1st and 2nd, but the Yankees got out of it. With 1 out in the 18th, they got men on 1st and 2nd, but a double play ended the threat. With 2 out in the 20th, they got 2 hits, but couldn't finish the job. An error gave them a chance in the 21st, and a bunt got the runner to 2nd with 1 out, to no avail.
Close calls for the Yankees: With 2 out in the 12th, Clete Boyer reached on an error, but, this being the pre-1973 AL, there was no designated hitter, and Houk wanted to keep Clevenger in for as long as he could, and he batted for himself, and struck out. With 1 out in the 13th, Richardson doubled, but Roger Maris struck out. Phil Linz was intentionally walked, but Johnny Blanchard struck out.
They got the 1st 2 batters on in the 14th, but couldn't score them. Tom Tresh, who would be that season's AL Rookie of the Year, led off the 15th with a single, stole 2nd, and, with 2 outs, got to 3rd on a wild pitch, but couldn't score. With 2 outs in the 16th, they got 2 singles, but, again, the pitcher's spot in the order came up. This time, Houk sent up a pinch-hitter Bob Cerv, and he grounded out. Yogi Berra singled with 2 out in the 18th, and Tresh did the same in the 19th, but each was left there. The Yankees got 2 singles in the 21st, including Bouton beating out a bunt, but there were already 2 outs, and Tresh flew out to end the inning.
Cliché Alert: Walks can kill you. Maris drew a walk with 1 out in the top of the 22nd inning. Up to bat came Jack Reed. Here's how Reed got into the game. After going 1-for-3 with a walk and an RBI, Mantle, who was playing right field to ease his way back in after an injury, with Maris playing center field, was taken out, and replaced in right by Joe Pepitone. Linz was sent in to pinch-hit for Pepitone in the 13th, and Reed was subsequently sent in to play right field, and he played it the rest of the way.
John Burwell Reed was a 29-year-old Mississippi native, who was signed by the Yankees, but took 9 minor-league seasons to make his major league debut. Up until the previous day's game in Baltimore, in which he went 1-for-4, he had a grand total of 20 major league plate appearances, with just 3 hits. (He was mainly a defensive replacement: Just as Sammy Byrd had once been known as "Babe Ruth's Legs," Jack Reed was called "Mantle's Caddy."
But he was a good athlete. He played for the University of Mississippi, a.k.a. Ole Miss, in the 1953 Sugar Bowl. This makes him 1 of only 4 men to ever play in both a World Series and a major college bowl game. The other 3? Jackie Jensen (the Yankees and the University of California), Chuck Essegian (the Los Angeles Dodgers and Stanford) and Deion Sanders (the Atlanta Braves and Florida State). Reed's Yankee teammate and fellow Ole Miss graduate Jake Gibbs almost made it: He played in the 1960 Sugar Bowl and was eligible for the Yankees' 1962 World Series roster, but was not named to it. Reed also ran track in high school.
This time, batting against Phil Regan, Reed took advantage of Tiger Stadium's close left-center power alley, and hit a home run. It would be the only one of his major league career.
Bouton went back out for the bottom of the 22nd inning. He struck out Bill Bruton, who had previously played against the Yankees for the Milwaukee Braves in the 1957 and '58 World Series. He got Goldy to fly out to left. But Colavito, a Bronx native, whose powerful bat and strong right field right arm made him an All-Star in Cleveland and Detroit, kept the game alive with a single. And the next batter was Norm Cash. "Stormin' Norman" led the league in batting average the year before, and was a home run threat. But Bouton got him to fly to left. Finally, the Yankees had won, 9-7. Bouton had his 2nd career win.
It's worth noting that Al Kaline, the Tigers' best player, was injured, and did not play in this game. But Yogi caught the whole game. In response to a fan's letter in 2010, he wrote back, “It was long. We were supposed to eat at my cousin’s house in Detroit after the game. We were late.” How did it feel catching 22 innings, at age 37? “Tired.” Did you call most of the pitches? “Yes.” As for Reed’s homer, Yogi said, “Good timing. Glad he hit it.”
Pitcher Rollie Sheldon, who didn't get into the game but saw the whole thing, wrote, “Jack had to do it; HE was the only one who still had some strength!” (Capitals being Rollie's, not mine.)
Jack Reed would play 222 regular-season games in the major leagues, making 144 plate appearances, batting .233 with 6 RBIs and this lone home run -- all for the Yankees during the John F. Kennedy Administration, 1961 to 1963. Due to an injury to Mantle, he played 3 games in the 1961 World Series, each as a defensive replacement without coming to bat, and got a World Series ring. He didn't play in the 1962 World Series, but got another ring. He didn't play in the 1963 World Series, which the Yankees lost, and never played in the majors again. He remained in the Yankee organization as a minor league manager until 1967.
Then his father died, and he returned to run the family farm outside Silver City, Mississippi. As of June 24, 2022, he still lives there, and has returned to Yankee Stadium for a few Old-Timers' Days. (UPDATE: He died on November 10, 2022.)
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June 24, 1962 was a Sunday. Among the other baseball games played this day, there were 6 doubleheaders, but none of them had as many combined innings as this Yankees-Tigers game.
* A doubleheader was split at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia. The Philadelphia Phillies won the opener, 3-1. The St. Louis Cardinals won the 2nd game, 5-1. Over the 2 games, Stan Musial went 2-for-6 with an RBI.
* The Boston Red Sox swept the Baltimore Orioles at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, 3-2 and 8-5. Carl Yastrzemski went 3-for-8 with an RBI. Brooks Robinson went 0-for-8.
* The Chicago Cubs swept a doubleheader from the Pittsburgh Pirates at Forbes Field, 4-3 and 8-4. Ernie Banks went 3-for-9 with a home run and 3 RBIs. Roberto Clemente went 2-for-4 in the 1st game, and didn't play in the 2nd.
* A doubleheader was split at Cleveland Municipal Stadium. The Washington Senators won the 1st game, 3-1. The Cleveland Indians won the 2nd game, 4-2.
* A doubleheader was split at Comiskey Park in Chicago. The Chicago White Sox won the 1st game, 6-1. The Kansas City Athletics won the 2nd game, 5-2.
* The Los Angeles Angels swept a doubleheader from the Minnesota Twins at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota. They won the 1st game, 3-2 in 10 innings, on a sacrifice fly by Leon Wagner. They won the 2nd game, 7-6, with home runs in the 9th by Joe Koppe and Billy Moran. Harmon Killebrew went 1-for-7 with a walk.
* The Cincinnati Reds beat the Los Angeles Dodgers, 12-10 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. Frank Robinson hit 2 home runs.
* The San Francisco Giants beat the Milwaukee Braves, 3-1 at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. Juan Marichal outpitched Warren Spahn. Willie Mays went 1-for-4, his hit a 2-RBI double that made the difference. Hank Aaron went 1-for-4, and Joe Adcock hit a home run for the Braves' only run.
* And the New York Mets were supposed to host the other National League expansion team, the Houston Colt .45s, in a doubleheader at the Polo Grounds, but it got rained out. Each game was then rescheduled as part of a new doubleheader. On September 18, the Astros-to-be swept the Mets, 6-2 and 8-6. On September 20, they swept, 7-2 and 5-4. The last of these games took 12 innings -- still fewer innings on that day than the Yankees and Tigers played on June 24, 22 to 21 -- and Hal Smith's single won it for Houston.
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