The 1961 Cincinnati Reds Through The Eyes Of A Child

I get excited just thinking about the 1961 baseball season. I was 10 at the time, so I was looking at it through a child’s eyes.

Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle were challenging each other to be the man who would dethrone King Babe Ruth. I never saw so many homers. 

Maris hit 61, Mantle, 54, Jim Gentile, Harmon Killebrew, Rocky Colavito and Norm Cash all hit over 40 in the American League. In the senior circuit the only two over 40 were Orlando Cepeda and Willie Mays.

The Queen City was the one I had my eye on. Being the closest MLB team to Huntington, WV, the Reds were a no-brainer.

I wish I could have gone to Crosley Field and seen them play in person. Unfortunately, I was relegated to watching them on black and white television.

What a team! Frank Robinson smacked 37 HR and had 124 RBI while batting .323 with a slugging % of .611. Gordy Coleman and Gene Freese each contributed 26 HR and 87 RBI. The great center-fielder Vada Pinson added 87 RBI as well, while batting .343 and collecting 208 hits.

Jim O’Toole, Joey Jay and Bob Purkey all had very fine seasons with Jay picking up 21 wins.

Jerry Lynch gets my vote for the best pinch hitter ever. I know I was a kid, but it seemed like he was always batting for somebody and getting a hit. He also played occasionally in the outfield, spelling either Wally Post or Gus Bell. Lynch in a pinch was a popular term then.

Let’s go back to Crosley Field. What a baseball arena. It was the sight of the first night game ever in Major League Baseball. President Franklin Roosevelt threw the light switch to the historic first Major League night game from the White House six hundred miles away from Crosley Field (excerpt from Baseball-Almanac.com).

Wonder how ol’ FDR did that?  Do you think he could have cut our electricity off if we didn’t pay the bill?

The “terrace” in Crosley field, was one of the most unusual features in any ballpark. 

If you are not familiar with the terrace, let me school you. It was a grassy incline (similar to Tal’s hill in Minute Maid Park) that rose 15 degrees (I think), to the outfield fence. Their was no warning track, so a player would be tracking a high fly going deep when suddenly he began climbing uphill. 

It took visiting players some time to get used to it, but Frank Robinson had it down pretty good. It extended from the left field foul line all the way into the right field corner. It was a gradual leveling from left field to right.

The Reds won the pennant that year besting the Los Angeles Dodgers by four games.

Cincinnati played the New York Yankees in the Fall Classic and they were defeated in five games. They lost the opener in Yankee Stadium to Whitey Ford’s two-hit shutout.

Gordy Coleman hit a two-run homer that helped the Reds win the second game 6-2.  Joey Jay pitched a complete game.

Roger Maris broke a two-two tie in the ninth when he crushed one in the seats in right field at Crosley.  Bob Purkey pitched a complete game and only gave up six hits but had to take the loss.

In game number 4 Ford bested O’Toole again and the Yanks won 7-0.

In the fifth and final game of the 1961 World Series, the Yankees blasted the Reds 13-5.  Six Yankees had a multiple hit game.

The Reds would not return to the World Series again until 1970. They played in four Fall Classics in the decade and became known as the “Big Red Machine”.

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