Sipping Champagne

My girlfriend and I were relaxing in bed – post coital – sipping champagne – and watching TV.

We were watching the Apollo 11 landing on the Moon with U.S. astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin aboard. The date was July 20, 1969 – exactly 46 years ago tonight. The Space Race was a huge deal back then and we were celebrating our country’s victory over Russia with the successful Moon Landing.

By the way, my girlfriend was a former Miss Philadelphia.

We kept watching and, four hours or so later, Neil Armstrong descended a ladder leading from the spacecraft to the surface of the Moon and uttered historic words:

“One small step for a man – one giant step for mankind.”

And then he was prancing away from the spacecraft and planting an American flag on the Moon. By then, it was July 21st.

Rewinding the Clock

Rewinding the clock exactly five years to the 1964 baseball season, the Phillies were taking on the Reds at Crosley Field in Cincinnati in the rubber game of a rare five-game series.

Dennis Bennett (9-6) was taking the mound for the Phillies and Joe Nuxhall (7-4) was doing the same for the Reds.

Nuxhall already started three games against the Phillies, winning 2-of-3 that included a 2-0 shutout on May 10th.

Bennett already pitched against the Reds four times, going 2-1 ─ along with saving the first game of this series.

In the top of the first, Cookie Rojas walked and moved to second on a sacrifice bunt by Johnny Callison. With Rojas taking a big lead off second, Nuxhall wheeled and threw to second. But his throw was in the dirt, bounced away, and Rojas took third.

Rojas then scored on a sacrifice fly by Tony Taylor to put the Phillies on top 1-0.

Bennett and Nuxhall then traded zeroes through the bottom of the fourth.

In the top of the fifth, Cookie Rojas walked with one out and moved to second when Johnny Callison singled.

Tony Taylor then singled and Rojas scored to make it 2-0 Phillies.

In the bottom of the fifth, Steve Boros reached first when Danny Cater muffed his ground ball. Two outs later, Tommy Harper hit his second home run of the year to tie the score 2-2.

Nuxhall retired the Phils in the top of the sixth.

With two outs in the bottom of the sixth, Don Pavletich walked and scored when Chico Cardenas doubled to put the Reds on top 3-2.

Steve Boros followed with a triple and Cardenas scored to make it 4-2 Reds.

No scoring in the seventh inning.

In the top of the eighth, Joe Nuxhall got the first out, but he’d run out of gas. So Fred Hutchinson replaced him with Billy McCool (3-0) ─ making this McCool’s third outing in this series. He picked up the win in the first game.

McCool retired the next two batters, the latter being Gus Triandos, who was batting for Dennis Bennett ─ and the score remained 4-2 Reds.

In the bottom of the eighth, Ray Culp (7-7) replaced Bennett. Culp started the second game of the series and was routed 14-4 ─ and he didn’t have it tonight either.

Frank Robinson singled to center. One out later, Don Pavletich hit his third home run of the series to cap the scoring at 6-2 Reds. The rookie had an outstanding first series in the big leagues:Four hits in 13 at-bats.Three home runs.Knocking in six runs.

In the top of the ninth, McCool gave up a leadoff single to Cookie Rojas – but then he retired the next three batters to earn his fourth save.

Joe Nuxhall (8-4) picked up his third win over the Phillies, versus one loss, and Dennis Bennett (9-7) took the loss.

Giants Lose to Cubs

The Cubs scored four runs in the top of the ninth at Candlestick Park – thanks to a three-run homer by Ron Santo (#18) and a run-scoring single by pinch-hitter Leo Burke – to defeat the Giants 6-4.

Don Elston (1-1) picked up the win with two innings of two-hit relief. Bob Shaw (6-4), who gave up the homer to Santo, took the loss.

With both the Phillies and Giants losing, they remained in a virtual deadlock for first place. However, the Reds picked up a game to now trail by just 2½ games.

(Excerpted from 1964 – The Year the Phillies Blew the Pennant by Barry Bowe.)