I am the greatest pitcher to ever come out of a California high school...a high school that produced some of the greatest pitchers in MLB history. Four separate pitchers from my high school have thrown MLB no-hitters, myself included.
I was born in the Midwest and my dad moved to California to be an oil roustabout. I did the same job briefly and also learned to ride horses. I moved to Idaho, worked for the phone company, played on the phone company baseball team, where I was scouted and signed to a major league contract at age 19.
In spite of the fact that I threw sidearm, I was the premier power pitcher of my era. Shirley Povich said that I threw harder that Nolan Ryan and Robin Roberts. I still own a few MLB pitching records, and won the pitching Triple Crown three times (wins, strikeouts, and ERA). I hit .235 and have 547 career hits, most ever for a career pitcher, and I'm in the top 10 for career home runs by a pitcher. I hit 41 triples, 18 more than any pitcher. I held the record for most consecutive scoreless innings with 55 1/3rd, still the longest in the American League, and I have two streaks of 40+ consecutive scoreless innings, the only pitcher to do so. I won 38 games by a 1-0 score, which means I had more 1-0 shutout wins than Pedro Martinez and Curt Schilling combined had shutouts by any score. My career WHIP was 1.06, career ERA was 2.17.
At a time when many ballplayers were ruffians and drunks, I was never in a brawl and didn't patronize saloons. I never argued with umpires.
My last year in the majors, I planned to buy a team in the Pacific Coast League. But we won our first American League pennant, and played the Giants in the World Series. Like Madison Bumgarner in an earlier age, I pitched the last four innings of game seven against a Giants team with seven Hall of Fame starters (Lindstrom, Frisch, Youngs, Kelly, Terry, Hack Wilson, Travis Jackson) and we won in 12 innings in the wildest finish of any World Series ever.
On George Washington's 204th birthday, I threw a silver dollar across the Rappahannock River, as Washington had supposedly done, just to prove that it could actually be done. I was friendly with Presidents, Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb. Ogden Nash wrote a poem about me. Ring Lardner said "He's got a gun concealed on his person. They can't tell me he throws them baseballs with his arm."
I was the second oldest of six children and had five children myself. After baseball, I coached and was a radio announcer. My father in law was a member of Congress, and I ran for Congress, but I mixed up the speeches I was supposed to give...I gave the industrial speech to farmers and the farmers' speech to the businessmen. I lost that election.
Who am I?
I was born in the Midwest and my dad moved to California to be an oil roustabout. I did the same job briefly and also learned to ride horses. I moved to Idaho, worked for the phone company, played on the phone company baseball team, where I was scouted and signed to a major league contract at age 19.
In spite of the fact that I threw sidearm, I was the premier power pitcher of my era. Shirley Povich said that I threw harder that Nolan Ryan and Robin Roberts. I still own a few MLB pitching records, and won the pitching Triple Crown three times (wins, strikeouts, and ERA). I hit .235 and have 547 career hits, most ever for a career pitcher, and I'm in the top 10 for career home runs by a pitcher. I hit 41 triples, 18 more than any pitcher. I held the record for most consecutive scoreless innings with 55 1/3rd, still the longest in the American League, and I have two streaks of 40+ consecutive scoreless innings, the only pitcher to do so. I won 38 games by a 1-0 score, which means I had more 1-0 shutout wins than Pedro Martinez and Curt Schilling combined had shutouts by any score. My career WHIP was 1.06, career ERA was 2.17.
At a time when many ballplayers were ruffians and drunks, I was never in a brawl and didn't patronize saloons. I never argued with umpires.
My last year in the majors, I planned to buy a team in the Pacific Coast League. But we won our first American League pennant, and played the Giants in the World Series. Like Madison Bumgarner in an earlier age, I pitched the last four innings of game seven against a Giants team with seven Hall of Fame starters (Lindstrom, Frisch, Youngs, Kelly, Terry, Hack Wilson, Travis Jackson) and we won in 12 innings in the wildest finish of any World Series ever.
On George Washington's 204th birthday, I threw a silver dollar across the Rappahannock River, as Washington had supposedly done, just to prove that it could actually be done. I was friendly with Presidents, Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb. Ogden Nash wrote a poem about me. Ring Lardner said "He's got a gun concealed on his person. They can't tell me he throws them baseballs with his arm."
I was the second oldest of six children and had five children myself. After baseball, I coached and was a radio announcer. My father in law was a member of Congress, and I ran for Congress, but I mixed up the speeches I was supposed to give...I gave the industrial speech to farmers and the farmers' speech to the businessmen. I lost that election.
Who am I?
Audaces fortuna iuvat