| Decade: The Viet Nam War Years (1960-1969) | ||||
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| Team Decade Pages (Average Win Shares / Points per year in decade): | Top Team Builders In Decade: | |||
| AMERICAN LEAGUE: | NATIONAL LEAGUE: | 1 - Jerry Hoffberger (Owner), Paul Richards (GM), Lee MacPhail (GM), Harry Dalton (GM) - Orioles | ||
| Baltimore Orioles - 113 | San Francisco Giants - 112 | 2 - Buzzy Bavasi (GM), Walter Alston (Manager) - Dodgers | ||
| New York Yankees - 110 | St. Louis Cardinals - 110 | 3 - Chub Feeney (GM) - Giants | ||
| Detroit Tigers - 110 | Los Angeles Dodgers - 109 | 4 - Calvin Griffith (Owner) - Minnesota | ||
| Minnesota Twins - 107 | Cincinnati Reds - 107 | 5 - Bing Devine (GM), Bob Howsam (GM) - Cards | ||
| Chicago White Sox - 106 | Milwaukee Braves - 106 | 6 - Rick Ferrell (GM), Jim Campbell (GM) - Detroit | ||
| Cleveland Indians - 97 | Pittsburgh Pirates- 106 | 7 - George Weiss (GM) - Yankees | ||
| Boston Red Sox - 95 | Philadelphia Phillies - 95 | 8 - George Weiss (GM), Johnny Murphy (GM) - Mets | ||
| Anaheim Angels - 94 | Chicago Cubs - 92 | 9 - Ed Short (GM), Al Lopez (Manager) - White Sox | ||
| Kansas City A's - 85 | Houston Astros - 86 | 10 - Joe Brown (GM) - Pirates | ||
| Kansas City Royals - 85 | New York Mets - 76 | 11 - Gabe Paul (GM) - Reds | ||
| Washington Senators - 84 | Montreal Expos - 64 | 12 - Paul Richards (GM) - Houston | ||
| Seattle Pilots - 79 | San Diego Padres - 64 | 13 - Leo Durocher (GM, Manager) - Cubs | ||
| 14 - John Quinn (GM) - Phillies | ||||
| Decade Highlights | ||||
| □ Expansion was the big story of the decade. | ||||
| □ By the end of the decade, the major leagues would grow by fifty percent from sixteen teams to twenty four. Each league would split into two six team divisions and there would be | ||||
| league playoffs. There were a couple of reasons for expansion. The country had grown towards the west and south tremendously since 1900 and there were plenty of fertile markets out there. | ||||
| A third league, the Continental League, was beginning to look like it might become a reality. Major League baseball had to beat them to the new markets. | ||||
| □ 1961 - Washington Senators - Expansion was supposed to happen in 1962. However, Calvin Griffith jumped the gun and moved his Senators to Minnesota in '61. Normally this wouldn't | ||||
| have been a big deal, but major league baseball felt it needed to keep a constant presence in Washington DC to cater to lawmakers so that they wouldn't rescind the reserve clause. | ||||
| Thus, a hasty expansion a year early. The new Senators will use old Griffith Stadium (just what Calvin's father Clark had intended, not). They will also be very bad. Just Washington's luck | ||||
| that as soon as Calvin brought in some serious talent to the franchise, the first in almost thirty years, the Washington fans are stuck with a crappy expansion team. | ||||
| Elwood Richard Quesada was the new Senators' owner. | ||||
| □ 1962 - Los Angeles Angels - Beloved cowboy Gene Autry bought the franchise. The Angels played in minor league Wrigley Field in '61 before making arrangements to share | ||||
| Chavez Ravine with the Dodgers from '62 to '65. Their stadium in Orange County, Anaheim Stadium, was ready in 1966. LA, itself, wasn't big enough for the two of them. | ||||
| □ 1962 - Houston Colt .45's play in temporary hastily built Colt Stadium from '62 - '64. The heat and mosquitos were oppressive. They moved to the domed Astrodome in '65 and the team's | ||||
| name changed to Astros. Judge Roy Hofheinz was the original Houston owner. | ||||
| □ 1962 - - The National League had been without a New York team since 1958. Now they had one. The Mets played in the Polo Grounds in '62 and '63 before moving to | ||||
| Shea Stadium in '64. The Stadium was built right next to the 1964 World's Fair site in Flushing, Queens. Joan Payson owned the Mets. | ||||
| □ 1969 - Montreal Expos - A major league team in Canada. They would use minor league Jarry Parc until Olympic Stadium was built in 1976 for the Olympics. Jarry Parc was too small and | ||||
| spring games there were frigid. Olympic Stadium had a retractable roof which didn't work at all until 1987. After that, the roof experienced myriad problems until replaced by a permanent | ||||
| roof in 1998. Just what the Expos didn’t need on sultry summer nights. More than anything, Olympic Stadium caused the demise of the Expos in Montreal. | ||||
| Charles Bronfman, Seagram's Liquor owner, bought the Expos franchise initially. | ||||
| □ 1969 - San Diego Padres - A stadium was built for the Padres, Jack Murphy Stadium and it opened in 1969. It had a good run until replaced by Petco Park in 2004. | ||||
| The Padres franchise almost moved to Washington in the early Seventies. Two things saved the franchise in San Diego. Ray Kroc, the owner of McDonalds, bought the club and Ted Giannoulis, | ||||
| The San Diego Chicken, brought tons of fans to the games with his antics. | ||||
| □ 1969 - Kansas City Royals - replaced the Kansas City A's who owner Charlie Finley moved to Oakland in 1968. Altho' Kansas City fans never got to enjoy the great teams that Finley built, the | ||||
| Royals were excellent in their own right and passed the A's in the standings in the late Seventies. Ewing Kauffman was an excellent owner for the Royals. They started out playing in Municipal | ||||
| Stadium before moving to Royals Stadium in 1973. | ||||
| □ 1969 - Seattle Pilots - This franchise should have been awarded to Milwaukee right off the bat. Bill Bartholomay had moved a very successful Braves team to Atlanta in 1966 just to milk | ||||
| sweetheart deals involving the stadium, TV and concession rights from the city of Atlanta. It was an ugly game that owners like Charlie Finley and Bartholomay were playing at the time of | ||||
| playing one city off against another to see how much money they could extract from the public. The fans of Milwaukee deserved a team. Meanwhile, Seattle was woefully unprepared and | ||||
| had a weak owner in Dewey Soriano and a tiny little minor league ballpark in Sicks Stadium. The timetable for expansion had moved up from 1971, but, in reality, Seattle should never have been | ||||
| considered over Milwaukee, period. After a year, the franchise ended up moving to Milwaukee anyway, but now the city of Seattle was jilted by Major League baseball with lawsuits to follow. | ||||
| □ The Yankee dynasty ends in 1965, but not after five more pennants and two World Series titles during the decade. After that, the Orioles take over as the best team in the American League | ||||
| with the Twins close behind. Detroit wins a World Series and Boston starts a run sixteen winning seasons with a pennant after finishing ninth the previous year. | ||||
| □ It's the Dodgers, Cardinals and Giants as the best teams in the National League during the decade. But there's a lot of parity as the Pirates and Mets win World Series and the Reds win a pennant. | ||||
| The Phillies and the Cubs also have their moments. The Braves don't contend but they're usually above .500. | ||||
| □ Baseball, in a bit of greed, had two all star games in the '59, '60. '61 and '62 seasons. Fans never liked it. Anything for a buck. | ||||
| □ The game on the field changes radically during the decade. Hitting declines precipitously. Also, as runs need to be manufactured in ways other than hitting, base stealing increases in | ||||
| importance. Again, no one was clear as to the cause of the decline, but it was alarming as baseball fans like their offense. Baseball lowered the mound after tha '68 season and tried to | ||||
| get umpires to call a tighter strike zone. It also didn't help that the mercenary owners in the game were really starting to cause loyalty concerns with fans. There were rumors swirling about | ||||
| franchises such as the White Sox, Giants and Senators moving in addition to the A's and Braves already abandoning the viable cities of Kansas City and Atlanta, respectively. | ||||
| Major League baseball owners were beginning to kill the Golden Goose. | ||||
| □ Backdrops for the decade were the Viet Nam war and the resulting protests, the assassinations of John F Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy in the midst of all of the political | ||||
| and racial unrest in the country and the coinciding psychedelic era. Baseball, which had been at the heart of the country in the Fifties, was woefully out of step in the Sixties. Also, other sports | ||||
| were encroaching on the popularity of baseball. With television booming in the Sixties, NFL games, NBA games, golf, tennis, boxing, olympic games, horse racing, etc. were all getting a lot | ||||
| of exposure and increasing in popularity at the expense of baseball. | ||||
| Top Players In Decade Pages (Win Shares / Points and WAR (in parentheses) for Decade ): | ||||
| All Positions - Top 50 | Top Starting Pitchers | Top Catchers | Top Outfielders | |
| 1 - Willie Mays Giants (84.19) - 167 | 5 - Juan Marichal Giants (55.33) - 122 | 34 - Joe Torre Braves (36.25) - 80 | 1 - Willie Mays Giants (84.19) - 167 | |
| 2 - Hank Aaron Braves (81.02) - 157 | 8 - Bob Gibson Cards (54.34) - 114 | 49 - John Roseboro Dodgers (20.35) - 71 | 2 - Hank Aaron Braves (81.02) - 157 | |
| 3 - Frank Robinson Baltimore (64.64) - 137 | 14 - Don Drysdale Dodgers (44.83) - 105 | 50 - John Romano Chicago (19.53) - 70 | 3 - Frank Robinson Baltimore (64.64) - 137 | |
| 4 - Maury Wills Dodgers (36.63) - 122 | 17 - Jim Bunning Phillies (46.43) - 98 | Earl Battey Twins (17.52) - 69 | 6 - Vada Pinson Reds (41.69) - 119 | |
| 5 - Juan Marichal Giants (55.33) - 122 | 20 - Sandy Koufax Dodgers (48.02) - 94 | Elston Howard Yankees (21.62) - 69 | 7 - Mickey Mantle Yankees (42.26) - 118 | |
| 6 - Vada Pinson Reds (41.69) - 119 | 21 - Larry Jackson Cards (35.95) - 90 | Bill Freehan Detroit (24.87) - 68 | 9 - Al Kaline Detroit (48.67) - 110 | |
| 7 - Mickey Mantle Yankees (42.26) - 118 | 22 - Jim Kaat Twins (23.14) - 90 | Tom Haller Giants (25.85) - | 10 - Lou Brock Cards (31.26)- 108 | |
| 8 - Bob Gibson Cards (54.34) - 114 | 35 - Dean Chance Angels (33.65) - 80 | Tim McCarver Cards (20.79) - | 11 - Willie Davis Dodgers (34.57) - 107 | |
| 9 - Al Kaline Detroit (48.67) - 110 | 36 - Whitey Ford Yankees (27.27) - 80 | 15 - Roberto Clemente Pirates (66.44) - 104 | ||
| 10 - Lou Brock Cards (31.26)- 108 | 38 - Claude Osteen Dodgers (25) - 78 | Top First Basemen | 16 - Curt Flood Cards (39.1) - 103 | |
| 11 - Willie Davis Dodgers (34.57) - 107 | 39 - Milt Pappas Baltimore (25.33) -78 | 13 - Norm Cash Detroit (42.91) - 107 | 18 - Carl Yastrzemski Boston (53.25) - 97 | |
| 12 - Luis Aparicio Chicago (34.7) - 107 | 40 - Camilo Pascual Twins (24.5) - 77 | 19 - Willie McCovey Giants (44.48) - 95 | 26 - Billy Williams Cubs (41.09) - 87 | |
| 13 - Norm Cash Detroit (42.91) - 107 | 43 - Denny McLain Detroit (22.16) - 74 | 28 - Orlando Cepeda Giants (37.79) - 87 | 27 - Tony Gonzalez Phillies (27.97) - 87 | |
| 14 - Don Drysdale Dodgers (44.83) - 105 | 44 - Mel Stottlemyre Yankees (26.33) - 73 | 31 - Bill White Cards (33.1) - 82 | 29 - John Callison Phillies (39.48) - 85 | |
| 15 - Roberto Clemente Pirates (66.44) - 104 | 50 - Chris Short Phillies (28.78) - 70 | 32 - Ernie Banks Cubs (26.01) - 81 | 30 - Bob Allison Twins (32.73) - 83 | |
| 16 - Curt Flood Cards (39.1) - 103 | Gary Peters Chicago (21.34) - 66 | 33 - Dick Allen Phillies (35.18) - 80 | 37 - Frank Howard Washington (30.14) - 79 | |
| 17 - Jim Bunning Phillies (46.43) - 98 | Joel Horlen Chicago (23.8) - 66 | 42 - Felipe Alou Giants (36.87) - 76 | ||
| 18 - Carl Yastrzemski Boston (53.25) - 97 | Jim Maloney Reds (35.33) - 66 | Top Second Basemen | 45 - Tony Oliva Twins (31.87) - 73 | |
| 19 - Willie McCovey Giants (44.48) - 95 | Warren Spahn Braves (15.07) - 65 | Dick McAulliffe Detroit (28.8) - 65 | 46 - Jimmy Wynn Houston (28.93) - 73 | |
| 20 - Sandy Koufax Dodgers (48.02) - 94 | Dick Ellsworth Cubs (23.04) - 64 | Don Buford Chicago (26.62) - 58 | 48 - Roger Maris Yankees (32.2) - 71 | |
| 21 - Larry Jackson Cards (35.95) - 90 | Jim Perry Cleveland (24.39) - 63 | Pete Rose Reds (30.23) - 55 | ||
| 22 - Jim Kaat Twins (23.14) - 90 | Mickey Lolich Detroit (14.16) - 62 | |||
| 23 - Harmon Killebrew Twins (45.83) - 90 | Sam McDowell Cleveland (30.31) - 60 | Top Shortstops | ||
| 24 - Brooks Robinson Baltimore (53.86) - 90 | Gaylord Perry Giants (27.07) - 53 | 4 - Maury Wills Dodgers (36.63) - 122 | ||
| 25 - Ron Santo Cubs (57.59) - 89 | Luis Tiant Cleveland (26.25) - 49 | 12 - Luis Aparicio Chicago (34.7) - 107 | ||
| 26 - Billy Williams Cubs (41.09) - 87 | 41 - Jim Fregosi Angels (37.46) - 76 | |||
| 27 - Tony Gonzalez Phillies (27.97) - 87 | Top Relief Pitchers | |||
| 28 - Orlando Cepeda Giants (37.79) - 87 | Hoyt Wilhelm Chicago (24.4) - 52 | Top Third Basemen | ||
| 29 - John Callison Phillies (39.48) - 85 | Stu Miller Baltimore (15.64) - 46 | 23 - Harmon Killebrew Twins (45.83) - 90 | ||
| 30 - Bob Allison Twins (32.73) - 83 | ElRoy Face Pirates (10.07) - 46 | 24 - Brooks Robinson Baltimore (53.86) - 90 | ||
| 31 - Bill White Cards (33.1) - 82 | Alvin O'Neal McBean Pirates (14) - 43 | 25 - Ron Santo Cubs (57.59) - 89 | ||
| 32 - Ernie Banks Cubs (26.01) - 81 | Phil Regan Dodgers (10.94) - 41 | 47 - Ed Mathews Braves (42.93) - 72 | ||
| 33 - Dick Allen Phillies (35.18) - 80 | Dick Radatz Boston (18.39) - 38 | Ken Boyer Cards (38.18) - 59 | ||
| 34 - Joe Torre Braves (36.25) - 80 | Ron Perranoski Dodgers (14.9) - 36 | |||
| 35 - Dean Chance Angels (33.65) - 80 | Frank Linzy Giants (10.38) - 35 | |||
| 36 - Whitey Ford Yankees (27.27) - 80 | Nelson Briles Cards (10.01) - 31 | |||
| 37 - Frank Howard Washington (30.14) - 79 | Luis Arroyo Yankees (2.58)- 12 | |||
| 38 - Claude Osteen Dodgers (25) - 78 | ||||
| 39 - Milt Pappas Baltimore (25.33) -78 | ||||
| 40 - Camilo Pascual Twins (24.5) - 77 | ||||
| 41 - Jim Fregosi Angels (37.46) - 76 | ||||
| 42 - Felipe Alou Giants (36.87) - 76 | ||||
| 43 - Denny McLain Detroit (22.16) - 74 | ||||
| 44 - Mel Stottlemyre Yankees (26.33) - 73 | ||||
| 45 - Tony Oliva Twins (31.87) - 73 | ||||
| 46 - Jimmy Wynn Houston (28.93) - 73 | ||||
| 47 - Ed Mathews Braves (42.93) - 72 | ||||
| 48 - Roger Maris Yankees (32.2) - 71 | ||||
| 49 - John Roseboro Dodgers (20.35) - 71 | ||||
| 50 - John Romano Chicago (19.53) - 70 | ||||
| 50 - Chris Short Phillies (28.78) - 70 | ||||