Catching Up With Joey Jay

Joseph Richard Jay, born in 1935 in Middletown, Connecticut, should be a familiar name to anyone who followed National League baseball in the 1950s and 1960s. Better known as Joey Jay, he broke into the big leagues as a 17-year-old and pitched as a member of the Milwaukee Braves from 1953-1960. A trade sent him to the Cincinnati Reds, where he enjoyed success from 1961-1966. A 21-game winner in 1961 and 1962, Jay made his lone All-Star appearance in 1961, and started and won Game 2 of the World Series against the New York Yankees.

Just one win shy of 100 for his career, Jay retired in 1966 due to arm injuries after a brief stint with the Atlanta Braves. In 2008, he earned an induction into the Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame. A resident of the Tampa Bay area, Jay recently took some time to talk about his memorable playing career. The following is the first of a two-part interview with Joey Jay.

Q. You were signed by the Milwaukee Braves in 1953 for a $20,000 bonus (roughly $153,400 in today’s dollars). Was there a lot of pressure on you as a 17-year-old kid to come in and live up to that money?

A. It was an unfortunate situation and setup, really. The bonus rule made you stay with the team for two years. It probably took two productive years off my career, because the manager at that time (Charlie Grimm) didn’t think much of the rule or didn’t think much of having me on the team. I really didn’t get much of an opportunity. The first year I signed, I signed in June right after high school. I did get a chance to pitch after the pennant race had been decided. I can’t remember where we finished, but we didn’t win it. There was about a week left in the season, and the only game I started I won.

Those were a difficult two years. I wish the rule wasn’t in place, but I didn’t make it. I had to stay with the team for two years. They sent me to the minors in 1956 and most of 1957 for some seasoning. Really, I lost a couple of productive years because of that rule.

Q. You were playing with a group of All-Stars and some future Hall of Famers in Milwaukee, too.

A. That was another reason I didn’t get to play. I played with a group that included Warren Spahn, Lew Burdette, Bob Buhl. These were great pitchers and perennial 18-to-20-game winners. It was a great pitching staff and one of the reasons I didn’t get to pitch right away.

Q. Was there an opportunity to learn from these pitchers as you developed your own game, sort of an apprenticeship?

A. There were no apprenticeships in those days (laughs). The players kind of guarded their careers. The pitchers and most all players, really, played when they were hurt because they were afraid if someone took their place it might mean their job. So they weren’t too open as far as being teachers or anything. I learned from watching, and we had a great pitching coach in Bucky Walters. So an apprenticeship maybe in that sense, but I didn’t get a lot of teaching or help from the players.

Q. In 1957 and 1958, the Braves made two consecutive World Series appearances. What was your role on those teams?

A. Well, in 1957 I was only with the team briefly. We were world champions that year. I spent most of the time in the minor leagues, but they brought me up towards the end of the year and I saved a game in Chicago. I wasn’t on the World Series roster that year. In 1958, I had been scheduled to start the third game of the World Series. The last series we played in St. Louis, I got hit with a line-drive. It broke my finger and knocked me out of the Series.

Q. By 1961, you were traded to Cincinnati where your career was really able to get off the ground.

A. Correct, in December 1960 the Braves traded me to the Reds. Milwaukee felt they could continue their winning ways by bolstering the shortstop position. Johnny Logan was a great player for the Braves but he was getting old. They felt that Roy McMillan, who played for the Reds, would fill the gap for them. So they made the deal with me and Juan Pizzaro for McMillan.

That’s when I really got an opportunity. With Milwaukee in the later years – 1958, 1959 and so on – I was a spot starter. Mainly I took the place of Warren Spahn against teams he had trouble with like the Dodgers, and I took Bob Buhl’s place against Cincinnati because he had trouble with them. So I was a spot starter and a long reliever.

The Reds installed me immediately in the starting rotation and went on to have the best years of my career. I won 21 games in 1961, and of course my biggest accomplishment that year was beating Milwaukee six times. They actually finished 10 games back in fourth, so that was the difference between them being right there in the race.

Q. You also started and won Game 2 of the World Series at Yankee Stadium. What was it like being on that stage?

A. I grew up in Connecticut, about 100 miles from Yankee Stadium. So I got to see a number of games there as a kid, followed them on the radio, and we were big Yankee fans up in Connecticut. It was a big thrill to pitch against the Yankees in that arena. I had a good game (complete-game four-hitter with six strikeouts) and we won it, 6-2. It actually turned out to be the only game we’d win in that World Series.

Q. Any nerves having to face the likes of Mantle and Maris, particularly given their home run barrage that season?

A. They were highly publicized and great ballplayers. I had to pitch them carefully and had nothing but respect for them. I had faced Maris in the minors, and pitched against Mantle in Spring Training. Not quite the same thing, but I got a feel for them. It was exciting to pitch against them, though. Not just against Mantle and Maris and Berra, but you’re pitching against all the ghosts of the Yankees like Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, they’re all there (laughs).

Q. To top it off, you made the cover of Sports Illustrated that month. That had to be a huge thrill.

A. It was kind of unexpected, really. I can’t remember if they told me it was coming or not. Yeah, it was definitely a thrill. I think I still have a copy of it around here somewhere.

The Bob Graham Sham, 3/26/79

On March 26, 1979, the front lawn of the White House provided the setting as Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin signed a historic peace treaty brokered by President Jimmy Carter. Who could have imagined, however, that the presence of Florida’s governor, Bob Graham, would spark such controversy here in the Tampa Bay area?

Still, that is what happened when Graham decided to skip the 33rd Governor's Baseball Dinner in St. Petersburg in favor of attending the ceremony in Washington, D.C. The dinner, originally created in the 1940s as a way of thanking those associated with Spring Training for coming to Florida, had outlived its original purpose by 1979. Fewer and fewer "big-wigs" were attending the dinner, and as an event, it had lost most of its cache.

Due to negotiations in the on-going umpire's strike, Commissioner Bowie Kuhn, as well as American League and National League presidents Lee McPhail and Chub Feeney, were in Philadelphia and would have to miss the dinner as well. The news of Graham's no-show, in what would have been his debut as the dinner's host, sparked the most heated response from event organizers.

Earle Halstead, one of dinner's long-time sponsors, expressed disbelief that Graham would choose to be in Washington, D.C., rather than attend the dinner.

"He's neither the President of the United States, nor the governor of Israel or Egypt," Halstead said. "He's the governor of Florida. I still say it was a poor decision and a slap at baseball and his constituents."

In a statement explaining his decision telegrammed to team owners, Graham explained that a last-minute request by President Carter to attend the ceremony and state dinner, however, would force the alteration of his plans. Graham said that his decision to skip the dinner did not diminish his belief in the importance of baseball to Florida. As a sign of contrition, he invited all of the owners to attend a dinner at the Governor's Mansion in Tallahassee on April 11.

Up to that point, the only governor to miss the dinner had been Claude Kirk, who underwent surgery on the same day as the 1970 dinner, yet still arranged for a telephone hook-up to deliver his remarks. Halstead was unmoved by the idea of Graham being summoned to the White House as a sufficient reason to miss the dinner.

"Bob Salem (the governor's aide) told me the governor would not attend because he had been invited by the great President of the United States to the peace signing treaty. I told him I guess he might want to stay on and wait tables at the barbecue afterwards. I told him a few other things, too."

With no governor, no commissioner, and no league presidents, dinner chairman Mike Barger decided to refund roughly 900 paying customers and cancel the event. It would be the second time in four years that the dinner would not go on as scheduled, as a labor dispute between owners and players over salaries forced the dinner's cancellation in 1976.

Perhaps in the end, canceling the dinner was for the best. It allowed those who would have otherwise attended the dinner to catch the most-watched college basketball game ever, the national championship between Michigan State and Indiana State featuring two guys named Earvin "Magic" Johnson and Larry Bird.

Hillsborough Terriers Reach Hoops Finals, 3/15/69

On March 7, 1969, a local version of "March Madness" captured the attention of local sports fans. Hillsborough High School, in search of its first state title since 1959, prepared for the state Class AA Region 3 basketball tournament after completing a 21-1 regular-season mark. The Terriers, no strangers to high-stakes basketball, had swept through districts and were poised to begin an exciting run to glory.

Up first for the Terriers would be the crosstown rival Plant Panthers. Hillsborough, the state's top-ranked team, topped Plant twice during the regular season and fully expected to complete the hat trick. The game served as little more than a tune-up for Hillsborough, as the Terriers spanked the Panthers, 79-44, in front of over 3,000 fans at the Tampa Catholic High School gym. Earlier in the day, guard Charlie Green learned he had earned a unanimous selection to the all-state high school basketball team. Green, a senior, finished the game with 27 points and put a once-close game out of reach with his hot shooting.

Green saved some bullets for the following night's tournament finals against the Clearwater Tornadoes. In front of another packed house, Green again delivered. Behind a stellar effort that featured a tenacious full-court press, the Terriers were able to control the state's fourth-ranked team despite several scares.

Green led the way with 15 of his team's 23 first-quarter points en route to a 34-point night. The Tornadoes stayed within four points of the Terriers until Hillsborough pulled away with under a minute left in the game. Trailing, 60-57, with time running down, the Tornadoes needed to foul to get the ball. The Terriers made them pay by converting six straight free throws to put the game out of reach, ultimately wining by a comfortable ten-point margin, 69-59. The win earned Hillsborough a fourth trip to the state finals in seven years.

After the game, Clearwater head coach Jack Wilson praised Green's effort.

"Green was the best I've ever seen," the coach said. "He's not fancy, he does everything he's supposed to do except that he does it better than anyone else."

Plaudits aside, Green and the Terriers still had unfinished business. Since defeating Miami High for the title in 1959, recent trips to the finals had left the Terriers and their fans unfulfilled. In 1964, Hillsborough fell to eventual state-champion Pensacola in the semifinals. The following two seasons in 1965 and 1966 resulted in devastating finals defeats to Jacksonville Paxon and Pensacola. The Terriers did not want to go so far and come up empty yet again.

On March 14, as the astronauts of Apollo 9 were welcomed back to Houston after their four-million mile space voyage, the Terriers were welcomed to the Jacksonville Coliseum for an evening showdown against Coral Gables High School. Hillsborough played like a team determined not to let history repeat. Still, it took a pep talk at the half by head coach Bob Shiver to get his team in gear.

Trailing, 40-34, at the half -- the first time it had trailed at the intermission all season long -- Shiver challenged his team by reminding them of this fact and urging his team to be more aggressive on defense.With their playoff lives on the line, the Terriers responded with a 25-point third quarter to erase the lead while holding Coral Gables to only four points in the quarter. Charlie Green -- who else? -- added 12 points in the quarter en route to his 31 for the game. The rout was on and the Terriers pulled away, disposing of Coral Gables 84-62 to reach the state finals.

Standing in the way of Hillsborough were the Gainesville Hurricanes, led by multi-sport star Eddie McAshan. Named the state’s outstanding football player in 1968, McAshan earned a scholarship to attend Georgia Tech and a chance to compete for the starting quarterback position. The Terriers would have their hands full trying to stop McAshan, who registered 30 points and 22 rebounds in Gainesville’s semifinal win over Jacksonville Raines.

On March 15, in front of a crowd of 5,026 at the Jacksonville Coliseum, Hillsborough once again found itself down at the half. Green rallied the Terriers late and sank two free throws with 1:25 left to tie the score at 50. The Terriers took their first lead of the game when Ron Mitchell added two more free throws to give Hillsborough a 52-50 advantage.

McAshan proved clutch for Gainesville by hitting a short jump shot with just seconds left to tie the game at 52. In what turned out to be a costly mistake, Charlie Green committed an offensive foul – his fifth of the game – while driving to the basket with two seconds left. The game went into overtime, and Hillsborough played a version of “four corners” to control the ball and run down the clock. The Terriers held the ball for 2:45 of the three-minute overtime until the Hurricanes pressured Charley Henderson, in for the fouled-out Green, at mid-court to force a jump ball. McAshan controlled the tip and sank the game-winning shot from eight feet out with 13 seconds left in overtime. His 15th and 16th points of the game sealed the deal for Gainesville, sending the Terriers to yet another heartbreaking defeat in the finals, 54-52.

Despite a magnificent 28-2 season and the unforgettable play of their leader, Charlie Green, the Terriers fell just short in their bid for another state title. In a strange twist, the championship was the first for Gainesville since 1922, when it defeated none other than the Hillsborough Terriers by an identical two-point margin.