Someone call 911
First, my apologies to our female readers. I’m not talking about traditional firemen. You know, like the hunky dudes of Fire Station #8 or any other station in the metro area. Those brave men (and many women) who don those bulky suits and race around the city to the closest fire or accident when they’re not making spicy calendars. No, the firemen I’m talking about are the pitchers of the Royals who would come in when the game was on the line and throw three or four innings. Eventually, this position morphed into two different roles: the setup man and the closer.
Can you imagine how difficult the English language is for a person not born here? So many words have multiple meanings, like light or nail or crane or date and yes, fireman.
For this exercise, I’m sure I missed some pitchers who qualified as firemen. I’m also stopping after the reign of Dan Quisenberry, who was a fireman and a closer. The role of the fireman/closer changed dramatically in the late 1970s, especially once the save statistic was invented. The term “save” can be credited to legendary sportswriter Jerome Holtzman, who coined the term during the late 1960s, thereby making several generations of pitchers multi-millionaires and household names and in many ways, he changed the way baseball was played.
Some of the best firemen in the early era were guys like Jim Hughes, Stu Miller, Dick Radatz, and Hoyt Wilhelm. Jack Aker of the Kansas City Athletics had a fantastic fireman season in 1966. He appeared in 66 games, threw 113 innings while leading the league in games finished with 57, and saves with 32, all while posting a sparkling ERA of 1.99. His efforts picked him up some down-ballot MVP votes, a rarity for Athletic players.
Firemen hit their stride in the 1970s with guys like Ken Sanders, Sparky Lyle, John Hiller, Bill “Soup” Campbell, and Mike Marshall. Marshall broke the mold with his 1973 and 1974 seasons in which he appeared in 92 and 106 games respectively while throwing a crazy number of innings: 179 in ’73 and a whopping 208 in 1974, all accrued without starting a single game. He won the Cy Young in 1974 and finished third in the MVP vote. Marshall was an unusual and somewhat crusty dude. He had a Doctorate in Exercise Physiology and threw a devastating screwball. On the mound, he was a machine.
Hoyt Wilhelm, one of the most prodigious of the early firemen, was taken by the Royals in the 1969 expansion draft. Not needing a closer for an expansion team. GM Cedric Tallis shrewdly swapped him to the Angels for utility man Ed “Spanky” Kirkpatrick and Dennis Paepke. Paepke was viewed as a power hitter who unfortunately didn’t pan out, but Kirkpatrick, who came to the Royals at the age of 24, was a valuable contributor and fan favorite for five seasons. Spanky had been a 17-year-old bonus baby with the Angels and by the time he got to Kansas City, he was already in his eighth year in the big leagues. You can work out the math on that, but it’s a little mind-blowing.
Moe Drabowsky was the Royals’ first fireman. On that 1969 team, Moe appeared in 52 games, and threw 98 innings with an ERA of 2.94. Drabowsky, one of baseball’s great pranksters (he once gave baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn a hot foot at a World Series press conference no less) finished 37 games while saving 11.
The 1970 team had a rotating cast of pitchers who qualified as firemen, including Jim Rooker, Wally Bunker, Dave Morehead, and Al Fitzmorris. Drabowsky was still on hand for 24 games, but the key fireman role shifted to Ted Abernathy. Abernathy was a submariner who had led the league in appearances three times and saves twice before coming to the Royals in a deal with the Cardinals for pitcher Chris Zachary. Over the final three seasons of his career, he performed admirably for the young Royals. He appeared in 144 games, finishing 102 of them, while posting a 16-13 record, with 40 saves and a sterling 2.31 ERA. Cedric Tallis made a lot of great trades during his tenure and the Abernathy trade often gets overlooked. Abernathy gave inspiration to a future generation of submarine pitchers such as Kent Tekulve and Dan Quisenberry. I always loved my Ted Abernathy baseball cards. Even though he was just 39 when his career ended, he looked like he was 60.
When Abernathy began to age out, the fireman role shifted to lefty Tom Burgmeier. In 1972, Burgmeier appeared in a team-high 51 games, finishing 30 while saving 9. He only threw 55 innings that season while three other swingmen, Abernathy, Fitzmorris, and Bruce Dal Canton soaked up 58, 101, and 132 innings respectively. The Royals starters threw 44 complete games that season, which went a long way toward minimizing the fireman role. Burgmeier’s usage also gave rise to another pitching style: the situational lefty, which Tom perfected over the remaining years of his career.
Maybe you noticed that I slipped in the term swingman? Many of these pitchers were called on occasionally to start a game as well as finish. When Jack McKeon took over for the 1973 team, he moved former fireman Al Fitzmorris to the starting rotation and leaned heavily on three pitchers: Gene Garber, Dal Canton, and rookie Doug Bird. Bird appeared in 54 games and led the team with 20 saves. The sidewinding Garber threw an impressive 153 innings while saving 11. Dal Canton did a little of everything, making 32 appearances, finishing 16 games, and saving three.
Dal Canton joined Fitzmorris in the starting rotation for most of the 1974 season while McKeon again spread the firemen duties to three players, Bird again led the way with 55 appearances and 10 saves while the newly acquired Marty Pattin and Lindy McDaniel each threw over 100 innings.
It was more of the same in 1975 as those three plus Steve Mingori handled the setup/firemen/closer duties. Those four players, Bird, Pattin, McDaniel, and Mingori appeared in 171 games, throwing 412 innings while finishing 88 games. This was remarkable considering the Royals starters threw 52 complete games.
A couple of new arms showed up for the 1976 West Champions. Pattin and Mingori were still their dependable selves, while 23-year-old fireballer Mark Littell came on to appear in 60 games with 37 finishes and 16 saves. The other was Larry Gura, who made just 20 appearances, including two starts. One of his late-season starts was a complete game shutout victory over Oakland, giving the Royals their first division title. It remains one of the most clutch pitching performances in team history.
The workload was again split in 1977, with Pattin, Bird, Mingori, and Littell getting 415 innings of work and 90 games finished while Gura picked up 52 appearances with 24 finishes over 106 innings of work. Those five relievers and the Royals four starters threw all but 22 innings that summer.
Frustrated by the Royals inability to get past the damn Yankees in the ALCS, Manager Whitey Herzog orchestrated a trade of pitchers with the Cardinals, with Littell moving east while the Royals picked up the Mad Hungarian Al Hrabosky. In 1978, Hrabosky led the team in appearances with 58, while Bird, Pattin, and Mingori appeared in another 117. This quartet was known by Herzog as Hungo, Mungo, Duck and the Bird.
The Royals starters threw 53 complete games that summer, which might explain why they couldn’t get past New York. The Fireman role took another step in morphing into the closer role as Hrabosky only threw 75 innings with 20 saves.
Dan Quisenberry made his first appearance in 1979, while most of the fireman work fell again to Hrabosky, Pattin, Mingori, and a guy I have no memory of, Eduardo Rodriguez. Mr. Rodriguez appeared in 29 games, throwing 74 innings while finishing 13. The Royals had purchased him from the Brewers in the off-season and 1979 was his last year in the majors.
Quisenberry changed the dynamic for the team starting in the 1980 season. Quiz appeared in 75 games, finishing 68 while saving 33 (all league-leading totals) over 128 innings. This was the first of a glorious run of six consecutive seasons in which Quisenberry averaged 69 appearances, 35 saves, and 121 innings of work per season. He picked up Cy Young votes in five of those six seasons, finishing second twice and third twice. He picked up MVP votes in five seasons, including a third-place finish in 1984. Quisenberry still sits in the top spot in four career pitching categories and his name dots the top ten of many others.
There’s been a lot of debate on whether Quisenberry should be in the Baseball Hall of Fame. His numbers are almost identical to another Hall of Fame fireman, Bruce Sutter. Quiz and Sutter only played for 12 seasons, which made for a tougher argument when compared to contemporaries like Rollie Fingers (17 seasons), Lee Smith (18 seasons), and Goose Gossage (22 seasons). I’m always a Royals homer, so the answer for me is, yes, I believe Quiz should be in the Hall of Fame. His six-year peak was utterly dominant. Plus, Quiz was one of baseball’s truly nice gentlemen and funny as hell. Maybe someday, a veterans committee will look back on his remarkable career and give him his due.