San Francisco Giants And Los Angeles Dodgers Clear Benches

On August 22, 1965, Hall of Fame pitcher and San Francisco Giants great, Juan Marichal hits Los Angeles Dodgers’ catcher John Roseboro on the head with his bat causing a benches clearing brawl between the two rival teams.

Marichal is also remembered for a notorious incident that occurred on August 22, 1965, in a game played against the Giants' arch-rival, the Los Angeles Dodgers. Twice in the first three innings, Marichal had thrown near the head of Dodger leadoff batter Maury Wills.

As Marichal was batting against Sandy Koufax in the last of the third inning, Dodger catcher Johnny Roseboro's return throws to the mound flew too close to his head and one grazed his ear. Words were exchanged, and Roseboro, throwing off his catcher's helmet and mask, rose to continue the argument.

Marichal responded by repeatedly hitting Roseboro's unprotected head with his bat.

The benches cleared into a 14-minute brawl, while Giants captain Willie Mays escorted the bleeding Roseboro (who would require 14 stitches) back to the clubhouse.

Marichal was ejected, suspended for nine days and fined $1,750 (equivalent to $12,749 as of 2013). He was also barred from attending the Giants' final series with the Dodgers, in Los Angeles on September 6–7.

Photos of the incident (Official Baseball Guide 1966, Sporting News, p. 19) also show Tito Fuentes (who was in the on-deck circle) wielding a bat threateningly, but Fuentes did not actually hit Roseboro and was not ejected.

Roseboro sat out the next couple of games and returned to the lineup on August 25. Roseboro filed a lawsuit against Marichal, but eventually settled out of court, supposedly for $7,000 ($50,996 as of 2013), Marichal and Roseboro would eventually go on to become close friends, reconciling any personal animosity and even autographing photographs of the brawl.

Many people protested the apparently light punishment meted out, since it would cost Marichal only one or two starts. The Giants were in a tight pennant race with the Dodgers (as well as the Pirates, Reds, and Braves) and the race was decided with only two games to play.

The Giants, who ended up winning the August 22 game and were down only one-half game afterward, eventually losing the pennant by two games.

Ironically, the Giants went on a 14-game win streak that started during Marichal's absence and by then it was a two-team race as the Pirates, Reds, and Braves fell further behind.

But then the Dodgers won 15 of their final 16 games (after Marichal had returned) to win the pennant.

Marichal won in his first game back, 2–1 against the Astros on September 9, (the same day Koufax pitched his perfect game against the Cubs,) but lost his last three decisions as the Giants slumped in the season's final week.

Marichal would go on to enjoy another 10 years of baseball playing for the Giants before leaving to play with the Boston Red Sox and finally the Los Angeles Dodgers before he retired in 1975.

Marichal was a 10-time All-Star, including two appearances in 1962 when Major League Baseball hosted two All-Star Games. He was also part of the Summer Classic for eight consecutive years from 1962-1969. In 1965 Marichal was also named the MLB All-Star Game MVP. Although he never won an MVP or Cy Young Award, Marichal was in the MVP talk seven times during his career, being in the top 10 in voting three times. He was also in the top 10 in Cy Young voting once.

Marichal ended his career with 243 wins, 142 losses and two saves in 471 games with 457 starts. He compiled a 2.89 ERA with 2,303 strikeouts, and 791 walks, 82 intentional over 3,507 innings pitched. Marichal threw 244 complete games in his career with 52 shutouts.

Marichal led the league in wins twice, with his highest single season total coming in 1968 with 26. He also led the league in complete games twice, with his highest single season total also coming in 1968 with 30. Marichal also led the league in innings pitched twice, with his highest single season total also coming in 1968.

Marichal also led the league in shutouts twice, with his highest single season total coming in 1965 with 10. Marichal also led the league in ERA once, with his lowest single season ERA coming in 1969 with a mark of 2.10.

Marichal was inducted into Cooperstown Baseball Hall of Fame in 1983 with 83.7 percent of the vote on the third ballot in which he was nominated.

Although he had many memorable moments during his career, one the most memorable was his involvement in the brawl with the Dodgers.

Roseboro would go on to play five more years of baseball with the Dodgers, Minnesota Twins and Washington Senators before he retired.

Roseboro was a six-time All-Star selection , with two appearances in 1961 and 1962 when Major League Baseball hosted two All-Star Games. He was a three-time World Series Champion in 1959, 1963 and 1965, all with the Brooklyn-Los Angeles Dodgers. He was also a two-time Gold Glove winner, in 1961 and 1966 with the Dodgers.

Roseboro finished his 14-year career with a .249 batting average, with 1,206 hits, consisting of 190 doubles, 44 triples and 104 home runs in 1,585 games played. He also had 548 RBIs, 512 runs scored, 547 walks and 67 stolen bases. He struck out 677 times.

Although never an MVP Roseboro was in the MVP conversation three times with his highest voting reaching 13 in 1966 when he hit for .276 with 123 hits, 23 doubles, two triples and nine home runs. He had 53 RBIs and 47 runs scored that year with 44 walks and three stolen bases. He did win a Gold Glove that year.

After his playing career Roseboro served as a coach with the Washington Senators in 1971, and the California Angels from 1972-1974. Later, he served as a minor league batting instructor in 1977 and catching instructor in 1987 for the Dodgers.

Brooklyn Dodgers Play First Game At Ebbets Field

On April 5, 1913, the Brooklyn Dodgers play their first game at Ebbets Field, named after Dodgers owner Charles Ebbets. Besides being home to the Brooklyn Tigers of the NFL, Ebbets Field would hose the baseball team for their remaining time in Brooklyn.

Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, New York.

A total of 25,000 fans crammed inside to see the first exhibition game between the Dodgers and Yankees. With the help of an inside-the-park home run by Casey Stengel, the Dodgers would go on to win 3-2. Their first regular season game occurred four days later.

The design of Ebbets Field would go on to inspire the vaulted exterior of the New York Mets new park, Citi Field.

Ebbets Field was torn down in 1960 just four years after the Dodgers had moved west to Los Angeles.

Brooklyn Dodgers Announce Batting Helmets Are Mandatory

On March 10, 1941, that the Brooklyn Dodgers announced that all of their players would start wearing batting helmets permanently in the upcoming season.  It was not long after that many other teams would adopt this safety precaution as well.

General Manager Larry MacPhail was the man behind this innovation; he also introduced night games, plane travel between games, and the baseball players pension plan.  The previous year taking pitches to the head seriously injured a couple of MacPhail’s players.  As a result, Larry went to George Bennett, professor of orthopedic surgery at John Hopkins School of Medicine, and the two devised a protective helmet for players.

In 1960, Jim Lemon became the first player to wear the new Little League helmet in a Major League game. These helmets were made with earflaps on both sides and were capable of withstanding a ball traveling at up to 120 miles per hour. One month later, Jim Piersall became the second player to wear the helmet in the Major Leagues.

With the helmet now being worn league wide in Major League Baseball, alterations of the helmet began to rise to the surface in 1961.

Finally, in 1971, Major League Baseball made the use of the batting helmet mandatory for all batters in the game. Veteran players, however, had the option of choosing to wear a helmet or not, as they were grandfathered into the rule. The last Major League player who did not wear a helmet while batting was Bob Montgomery. He retired in 1979.

In 1978, the next helmet remodeling took place when the Pirates Dave Parker wore a hockey mask at the plate after he broke his cheek and jaw bones in a collision at home plate. This lasted only one game and Parker then tried to use a helmet with an attached two-bar facemask, usually used for football helmets, to his batting helmet.

He also tried a helmet with a Dungard 210 model facemask screwed into his helmet. Other notable players to utilize a modified batting helmet include Gary Roenicke (1979), Ellis Valentine (1980), Terry Steinbach, Charlie Hayes, David Justice, Kevin Seitzer, Terrence Long, and Tony Roth.

Although helmets with earflaps were common in amateur sports, they were slow to gain popularity at the professional level. Earl Battey appears to have worn the first improvised flap, in 1961. During the 1964 season, Tony Gonzalez was the first major league baseball player to wear a batting helmet with a pre-molded earflap. Gonzalez was in the league top-ten in hit by pitches and the special helmet was constructed for his use.

Ron Santo was an early pioneer of wearing earflap helmets at the major league level, upon returning to action after having his left cheekbone fractured by a pitch in 1966. The players adopted earflaps reluctantly. Some batters felt that seeing the earflap out of the corner of an eye was distracting.

In 1983, it was made mandatory for new players to use a helmet with at least one earflap. Players who were grandfathered in could choose to wear a helmet without earflaps. Players can choose to wear double earflap helmets in the major leagues; however, this is not mandatory. Tim Raines was the last player to wear a helmet without earflaps, during the 2002 season. His flap-less Florida Marlins helmet is currently at the Baseball Hall of Fame. Gary Gaetti, who retired in the year 2000, and Ozzie Smith, who retired in 1996, both wore flap-less helmets until they retired from the game. Julio Franco, who retired from baseball in May 2008, was the last active player eligible to wear a helmet without flaps, but he chose to wear a helmet with an earflap throughout his career. Some players, mostly switch hitters, also decided to wear double ear-flapped helmets while batting. Two notable players to do this were Orlando Hudson and Chuck Knoblauch.

On April 8, 2004, celebrated as "Hank Aaron Day" in Atlanta because it is the 30 anniversary of Hank Aaron's record-breaking 715 home run, Braves shortstop Rafael Furcal came to the plate in the sixth inning with a helmet without an ear flap, as a tribute to Hank Aaron, who played his entire career in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, and therefore did not wear a helmet with an ear flap during his playing career. Umpire Bill Welke made him get one with a flap before he could bat, despite the grand gesture.

In 2005, Major League Baseball test ran a new batting helmet for the first time in nearly three decades. At the All-Star Game in Detroit, players were seen wearing a new “molded crown” helmet that featured side vents, back vents and larger ear holes.

The no-flap helmet is still utilized in baseball. Catchers often wear a flapless helmet along with a facemask to protect the head when receiving pitches. Occasionally, players other than catchers will wear a batting helmet without earflaps while playing a defensive position in the field. A player who has a higher-than-normal risk of head injury usually does this. One notable example is former major-leaguer John Olerud, who started doing so after undergoing emergency surgery for a cerebral aneurysm while attending Washington State University. An earlier example was Richie Allen, who decided to wear a helmet in the field after at least one incident of being hit by objects thrown by fans.

In 2009, Major League Baseball decided to take action and protect players from the increasing number of concussions and head injuries. Rawlings came out with the S100 baseball helmet, named for its impact capabilities. It was able to withstand the impact of a baseball traveling at 100 mph from two feet away.

The other baseball helmets used are only required to withstand a 70 mph impact from 2 feet away. The first Major League Player to wear this helmet during a game was Ryan Dempster, pitcher for the Chicago Cubs.

In 2013, per the new MLB-MLBPA Collective Bargaining Agreement, MLB players will be required to wear the new Rawlings S100 Pro Comp.

Dodgers Sign Jackie Robinson

On Oct. 30, 1945, Branch Rickey signed Jackie Robinson to a deal with the Montreal Royals, an affiliate of the Brooklyn Dodgers. By 1947, Robinson was in the majors and on his way to winning the Rookie of the Year award. Robinson is most known for being the first African-American to play baseball in the major leagues.

Robinson would have a great Major League career batting .311, with 1,518 hits, 137 home runs, 734 RBI’s and 197 stolen bases in his 10 years in the Major Leagues. Some of the accolades Robinson collected during his tenure with the Dodgers were being named an All-Star six times, being named the 1947 Rookie of the Year, winning the 1949 National League batting title, also winning the 1949 National League MVP, he was also a two-time National League stolen bases champion in 1947 and 1949, and finally being crowned a World Series Champion in 1955.

Robinson was inducted into Cooperstown Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962 on the first ballot in which he appeared on with 77.5 percent of the vote. He was the first even African-American to be elected into Major League Baseball’s Hall of Fame.

Robinson's career is generally considered to mark the beginning of the post–"long ball" era in baseball, in which a reliance on raw power-hitting gave way to balanced offensive strategies that used foot speed to create runs through aggressive base running.

Robinson exhibited the combination of hitting ability and speed, which exemplified the new era. He scored more than 100 runs in six of his ten seasons (averaging more than 110 runs from 1947 to 1953), had a .311 career batting average, a .409 career on-base percentage, a .474 slugging percentage, and substantially more walks than strikeouts (740 to 291).

Robinson was one of only two players during the span of 1947–56 to accumulate at least 125 steals while registering a slugging percentage over .425 (Minnie Miñoso was the other).

In 1997, Major League Baseball "universally" retired his uniform number 42, across all major league teams; the first pro athlete in any sport to be so honored.

Since that time, Major League Baseball has adopted a new annual tradition, "Jackie Robinson Day," in which all players on all teams wear his number 42 jersey. Robinson was also named a member of the Major League Baseball All-Century Team in 1999.

Robinson was also known for his pursuits outside the baseball diamond. He was the first black television analyst in Major League Baseball, and the first black vice-president of a major American corporation. In the 1960s, he helped establish the Freedom National Bank, an African-American-owned financial institution based in Harlem, New York. In recognition of his achievements on and off the field, Robinson was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal.

Rickey Becomes General Manager Of Brooklyn Dodgers

On Oct. 29, 1942, Branch Rickey is named president and General Manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers.

He was perhaps best known for breaking Major League Baseball's color barrier by signing African American player Jackie Robinson, for drafting the first Afro-Hispanic superstar, Roberto Clemente, for creating the framework for the modern minor league farm system, for encouraging the Major Leagues to add new teams through his involvement in the proposed Continental League, and for introducing the batting helmet.

Rickey played in MLB for the St. Louis Browns and New York Highlanders from 1905 through 1907. After struggling as a player, Rickey returned to college, where he learned about administration from Philip Bartelme. Returning to MLB in 1913, Rickey embarked on a successful managing and executive career with the St.Louis Browns, the St. Louis Cardinals, New York Yankees, Brooklyn Dodgers and Pittsburgh Pirates.

During his playing career Rickey posted a career .239 batting average, with 82 hits and 39 RBIs.

As a manager Rickey had much more success winning the World Series in 1926, 1931, 1934, and 1942 with the St. Louis Cardinals.

His managerial record was 597-664.

In 1967 Rickey was inducted into Cooperstown Baseball Hall of Fame by the veterans committee.