In 1975, Tony Conigliaro was the story of spring training

Yaz and Tony C, together again

Each Red Sox spring training a new underdog emerges as a surprise in camp, and all but forces management to keep him on the roster with a string of standout performances.

The hits often stop coming once the regular season starts (see Jackie Bradley Jr., 2013), but for a brief moment or two in the sun these unlikely heroes are a great source of discussion for columnists and sports talk radio callers. 

Forty winters ago, the biggest offseason news in the American League was Hank Aaron's trade to the Milwaukee Brewers after 20 years in the NL with the Braves. Meanwhile, in Winter Haven, Fla., another former home run king showed up at Boston's spring training camp under far different circumstances. 

He had been away from the major leagues for more than three years, but talked his way into a tryout and even offered to pay his own way to Florida. The Red Sox said that wasn't necessary, management would pick up the tab for the 30-year-old hopeful.

Hopeful: 1975

Of course this wasn't just any hopeful. This was Tony C.

Tony Conigliaro, born in Revere and raised a few miles from Fenway Park dreaming of a spot in the Red Sox lineup, had lived that dream and then some. He was signed by his hometown club out of St. Mary's High in Lynn and had an outstanding first year in the minors with Waterloo. 

Portrait of a young slugger.

He first made spring training headlines in 1964, when his slugging prowess against big-league hurlers prompted manager Johnny Pesky to declare him ready for the majors just a few months after his 19th birthday.

Pesky was right. Conig hit 24 home runs as a rookie, 32 to lead the AL in 1965, and slugged his 100th career blast during the magical '67 season -- making him the youngest American Leaguer ever to reach that plateau. His sweet right-handed swing was made for Fenway, and he looked like a 500-homer man for sure.

If that wasn't enough, he also cut rock records and had a face made for Hollywood. Every Boston boy wanted to be Tony C., and every Boston girl wanted to date him.

It's a happy birthday for Tony.

One pitch that hit Conigliaro squarely in the face on Aug. 18, 1967 changed everything. It nearly killed him, severely damaged his left eye, and kept him out of the thrilling AL pennant race and the World Series. Doctors predicted he would never play again. 

He defied the odds, rebounding after more than a year off to hit 20 homers for the Red Sox in 1969 and 36 (along with 116 RBI) in '70 -- even though he later admitted he could only see out of his good eye. 

Star-crossed: Brothers Billy (left) and Tony C.

Management likely suspected his secret, and gambled that Tony couldn't keep it up by trading him to the California Angels after the 1970 season in one of the most unpopular deals in team history. 

They were right, however; things never jelled for Conig out west and he retired midway through '71 with his eyesight getting worse. Tony came home, took up karate, and opened a nightclub with his brother and former Boston outfield partner Billy. Most figured that was the end of the story.

Airbrushed Angel, 1971

Now here was Tony C. again, back alongside his old teammates Carl Yastrzemski and Rico Petrocelli laboring under the Florida sun in those softball-style '75 uniforms. His left eye had checked out OK -- his doctor called the recovery "a miracle" -- and Boston needed more pop in its lineup. 

If Conigliaro could recapture the old magic, general manager Dick O'Connell promised, he had a good chance to make the club as a designated hitter or outfielder.

Dick O'Connell believed in Tony.

And while he didn't exactly crush the ball in spring training, Tony C. did hit well enough early on to force management's hand. As Bostonians were recovering from more than 17 inches of snow, their hearts were warmed when O'Connell signed Conigliaro to a contract with Triple A Pawtucket on March 5, 1975. 

"If he makes good during the spring," the GM told reporters, "he will then be given a contract with us."

A 5-for-8, 5-RBI spree over the final couple games of the exhibition schedule helped Conigliaro's cause, and on April 4 the Red Sox announced he had made the team's 25-man MLB roster. He was in the lineup as the DH against Aaron and the Brewers on Opening Day at Fenway Park, and had a single in his first time up. 

Asked if he could have imagined a year earlier that he and Aaron would be together like this, Tony C. smiled. "The only way would be if he came to my nightclub."

Aaron and Anthony: Opening Day, 1975

Conigliaro was back where he belonged. He hit his first homer a few days later -- his first in an MLB game in nearly four years -- and Yastrzemski told reporters that "There's no question that Tony is going to really help us." All of New England was rooting along with Yaz. This would be the comeback of all comebacks.

In the end, it just didn't happen. Conigliaro struggled, rookie Jim Rice took over as the regular DH, and despite continuing to get huge ovations each time he stepped to the plate at Fenway, Tony C. couldn't get his sweet swing back. In June, with his average at .123, management gave him a choice -- accept a trade, go to the minor leagues, or be released. 

He wanted to play in the majors, but when no other teams were interested, he opted for Pawtucket. After more struggles there including a .220 average and back spasms, he quit for good on August 21 and announced he was taking a job as a TV sports broadcaster with Channel 10 in Providence. 

A new career

Conigliaro looked forward to a long new career, but this wouldn't come to be either. He suffered a massive heart attack and irreversible brain damage in 1982, at age 37, and spent the rest of his life under the care of his family before dying in 1990 -- right around the time he might have been making his Hall of Fame induction speech had life dealt him different cards. 

"If I thought the Red Sox would ever need me, I'd keep playing," Conigliaro said during a press conference at his Nahant bar when he quit in the summer of '75. "But they certainly don't need me."

He was wrong. Boston was in first place at the time, and would wind up winning the AL East and the pennant behind the dynamic rookie duo of Rice and Fred Lynn. 

But Boston always needed Tony C.    

      

       


    

Spring training on the radio: Mookie Betts and MC Hammer

Don't get the connection? Listen in.

There is a casual feel to spring training games on the radio that puts one at ease, as banter about young hopefuls and new faces can quickly dissolve into topics beyond baseball. Nobody cares much about the score, especially once the starters have left the game, so broadcasters do what they can to keep themselves and their audience interested. 

Such it was in the late innings of last night's Red Sox-Yankees game, as Joe Castiglione and Rob Bradford began peppering their WEEI broadcast with sports, music, and pop culture references going back a half century. 

When center fielder Mason Williams came up for the Yankees in the top of the seventh, Castiglione noted that he was not only the son of former Patriots wide receiver Derwin Williams, but also the great nephew of former big leaguer Walt "No Neck" Williams -- whose baseball cards, Joe attested, made clear the reason for his nickname.

OK, we get it

While Williams was busy doubling in two runs to give New York a 5-2 lead, Castiglione the old disc jockey went one step further. He explained that another Mason Williams, apparently no relation, was a musician who had notched a few hits of his own back in the day -- including the instrumental smash "Classical Gas" in 1968. 

Castiglione and Bradford agreed that the grammy-winning masterpiece would be a great walk-up song for this Mason Williams.

The Yanks scored three in the seventh to go ahead 3-2, and when 5-foot-9 Mookie Betts came up in the bottom of the frame, Joe speculated on whether he and on-deck batter Sean Coyle (5-foot-8) might be the shortest 1-2 tandem in the major leagues this season. He might be right, unless someone signs up Freddie Patek.

Sean Coyle -- short but sweet.

Bradford added that he had heard from Jon Tomase of the Boston Herald that Coyle had learned to hit by studying Ted Williams' book, The Science of Hitting -- required reading for all Little Leaguers born in the 1950s and '60s but largely forgotten in the cellphone era.

I've still got my copy.

Ever wonder what happened to your copy of the old poster from Ted's book that showed his favorite spots in the strike zone? Well, one hung for a long time in the Red Sox clubhouse, Bradford told us, and may in fact still be there -- although now a refrigerator blocks it from view.

C'mon, move the fridge.

Brian Johnson came in to pitch for the Sox in the eighth, and Bradford mentioned that the big left-hander is a favorite of Boston media members not only because he works extremely fast on the mound, but also because his mother was a "Doublemint twin" in the iconic TV commercials. This delighted Joe, who surmised that based on the pitcher's age, his mom and aunt must have been in one of the later ads extolling the virtues of Doublemint gum. 

   Double your pleasure -- 1980s style.

By this point low-level minor leaguers were filling the boxscore. Bradford joked that he had not seen this many unrecognizable Yankees in one game since the Richard Pryor movie "Brewster's Millions" (in which Pryor plays a minor-league pitcher who faces the Yanks in an exhibition contest). 

As catcher Jake Cave stepped up for New York, Bradford quipped, "Who do you think is the worst catcher in motion picture history?" For his money, John Candy in "Brewster's Millions" had to be the winner. 

Pryor and Candy: anything is game.

All the movie talk reminded Castiglione that New York manager Joe Girardi told him before the game that he had passed the afternoon watching a video of the 1978 Red Sox-Yankees playoff (also known as the Bucky Dent Game). Bradford asked if he thought Girardi was needling him, but Castiglione said he didn't think so. "I told him we got over that in 2004." 

Walk-up songs got one more mention when Castiglione told Bradford that his friend Jeffrey Lyons the film critic had emailed him to say Joe's walk-up song should be "You Can't Touch This." Castiglione not only knew this was an MC Hammer tune, but also that Hammer had originally started out life as Stanley Burrell -- a young batboy and front-office worker with the Oakland A's of the 1970s. 

MC Hammer and Hammerin Hank

Naturally, both "Can't Touch This" and "Classical Gas" were played as lead-ins after commercial breaks between half-innings. "He can find anything," Castiglione proudly said of Red Sox Radio producer Paddy O'Day. 

O'Day couldn't find the Red Sox a way to make up the deficit, however, and New York hung on for a 5-3 win. Bradford and Castiglione agreed that Mookie Betts (2-for-2 with a great catch) had been the Red Sox star of the night, but Bradford found a more interesting stat to share with listeners: "There are 27 guys on the Yankees wearing #60 or higher."

Too bad that wasn't the case in 1978. 

     

Love and Logic: Leonard Nimoy and the Boston Red Sox

Call to the bullpen: Pedro is gassed.

He gained fame traveling among the stars of Hollywood and the United Federation of Planets, but Leonard Nimoy -- who died Feb. 27 -- was at his roots a Boston boy whose life in many ways paralleled that of his hometown baseball team.

Nimoy fell in love with theater while growing up in the West End neighborhood near the Boston Garden. He found time between productions to help support his family by selling newspapers near Boston Common, where his competitors most likely included two other sons of immigrants -- twin brothers Arthur and Henry D'Angelo -- who later became known as owners of the Red Sox superstore Twins Enterprises.

(If you've never heard of the West End, that's because it no longer exists -- it was torn down in the name of urban renewal in the early 1960s and replaced with high-rise apartments and the Central Artery Expressway.) 

Portrait of a young fan.

Young Leonard began attending games at Fenway Park when Ted Williams was at his peak in the 1940s. He recalled seeing The Kid homer on more than one occasion, and likely had a special spot in his heart for Boston's nine-language-speaking bullpen catcher Moe Berg as a fellow brainy Jewish kid from a humble background. 

By the time Ted left for the Marines in 1952, Nimoy had too -- spurning his parents' wishes of a medical or law career by heading to California in search of stardom. It didn't come quickly, and while driving a cab to make ends meet Nimoy once picked up a fellow Hub native who peppered him with questions about life back home: John F. Kennedy. Since both were baseball fans, it's likely that the Red Sox were one topic of conversation.

Taxicab encounter: Two commanders

Like the Sox, Nimoy struggled during the next 15 years before finally making it big in 1967. While Boston shocked the baseball world that summer with its improbable ninth-to-first "Impossible Dream" team, Nimoy became an out-of-this-world superstar as half-human, half-Vulcan Mr. Spock. He took advantage of his popularity on "Star Trek" by dabbling in a second career as a singer, but just as Boston outfielder Tony Conigliaro discovered with "Little Red Scooter," Nimoy's crooning "The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins" didn't make anybody clamor for him to quit his primary job.

Listen if you dare.

After their glorious revival of '67 the Red Sox slumped a bit the next few years, during which "Star Trek" was canceled, but both the ballclub and Nimoy's career  had a resurgence in the late 1970s. The adventures of Spock, Captain Kirk, and their Enterprise crew hit the big screen at the same time the Red Sox were annually battling the Yankees for American League East supremacy. 

He never found Babe's piano either.

One wishes a coach employing Vulcan logic could have been on hand in 1978 to stop Don Zimmer from banishing Bill Lee from the rotation or sending up Bob Bailey to face Goose Gossage, but Nimoy was too busy furthering the "Star Trek" franchise and narrating the hit TV show "In Search of..." There he looked for Big Foot, Amelia Earhart, and the Loch Ness Monster, but Boston fans would have been happier had he sought out more pitching.

Another revival came in the late 1980s -- three division titles and a pennant for the Red Sox and a blockbuster film directed by Nimoy: "Three Men and a Baby." One of the movie's stars, coincidentally, was Ted Danson, who had previously made a name for himself playing washed-up Boston relief ace Sam "Mayday" Malone on "Cheers." 

It must have been exasperating for a man of Nimoy's intelligence to endure the string of excruciating and seemingly preventable Red Sox setbacks during this period. Spock may have lacked emotions, but the man behind the ears had to feel the pain.

Would a well-timed Vulcan nerve pinch have kept John McNamara from leaving Bill Buckner in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series, or Grady Little from taking out Pedro in the '03 ALCS? One can only speculate, but it sure would have been fun to try.

Take that, Grady!

By the time the Red Sox finally broke through in Stardate 2004, "Star Trek" was into its third generation of fans and Nimoy as Spock had become a pop culture icon of the highest order. His reaction to Boston's incredible comeback against the Yankees in the ALCS is not documented, but he was likely not surprised. 

After all, the Red Sox had that season briefly employed a pitcher, Joe Nelson, whose best pitch was known as a "Vulcan Changeup."

Now that's logical.