Seattle Pilots - The Only Year (1969)  
   
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                  1969 6 64 98                         Click  
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  Titles: Top Pilots Players of the Sixties  
  None  
    Pitchers:  
  Ballpark: Diego Segui (2.4) -   10  
  Sicks' Stadium  Gene Brabender (1.35) -   9  
    Marty Pattin (-1.12) -   3  
  Team Name: Fred Talbot (1.15) -   1  
   Pilots John Gelnar (1.51) -   1  
    Bob Locker (1.91) -   1  
  Owner:  John O'Donoghue (1.69) -   1  
  William Daley  Jim Bouton (0.42)  -   0  
     
  General Managers: Catchers:  
  Marvin Milkes  Jerry McNertney (1.50) -   6  
    Greg Goossen (2.15) -  2  
  Managers: Jim Pagliaroni (0.59) -  0  
  Joe Schultz     
    First Basemen:  
  Hall of Famers: Don Mincher (2.53) -   12  
  None Mike Hegan (3.23) -   3  
       
  Rookie of the Year:  Second Basemen:  
  None John Donaldson -   1  
    John Kennedy (0.20) -  0  
  MVP    
  None ShortStop:  
    Ray Oyler (-0.78) -   2  
  No Hitters: Gus Gil (-0.42) -  1  
  None    
    Third Base:  
  Cy Young: Tommy Harper (0.41) -   2  
  None Rich Rollins (0.01) -   1  
       
  Notable Events: Outfield:  
  Wayne Comer (3.20) -   11  
  1969 - Major League Baseball votes to expand four teams in 1969. Steve Hovley (1.39) -   7  
   One of the new  franchises is placed in Seattle, which is woefully  Tommy Davis (-0.66) -   5  
  unprepared to start playing major league baseball.  Steve Whitaker (0.25) -  0  
e They haven't assembled the management staff to stock the club properly    
e and Sicks' Stadium is a small minor league ballpark with no new park in sight.  Notable Events:  
e    
e 1969 -  Meanwhile, Major League Baseball doesn't put a franchise in 1969 - The Milwaukee group that bought the franchise is headed by   
e  Milwaukee which seems like such a no brainer.  future Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig.  
  Milwaukee is a great baseball town which got stiffed big time by the    This group had been trying to pilfer teams from other cities since   
  Braves when Braves owner Bill Bartholomay callously and foolishly moved 1967 when the Braves had unjustly been moved out of Milwaukee.  
    the team to Atlanta two years earlier.   They finally found a seller in Daley. While Milwaukee certainly had  
   At this point in time, baseball was clearly a rudderless ship for a couple  shown that it deserved a franchise, the cutthroat means at which  
  of reasons:  they got one was not in the best interest of baseball, at large.  
  □    totally out of control allowing greedy owners bail on perfectly   Just the opposite. What flabbergasts me is that, of all people,   
  good and supportive cities to squeeze money out of another metropolis. the head of this group ends up being the future major league   
   It was a time that baseball should be ashamed of. baseball commissioner. A person with this me-first, to hell with  
  □   Not realizing that expansion was a golden opportunity to avoid  the effect on the overall game of baseball attitude is absolutely the    
  a myriad of problems by making things right just after you've  last person that you would want as commissioner.  
  screwed a perfectly viable city out of its baseball team.   You want someone who has vision, not someone who cared only  
  By not giving Milwaukee one of the expansion franchises, what did    myopically about his own interests and had zero interest in the  
  the owners think would happen? Maybe they liked a disenfranchised  sport at large. Time and again, as Commissioner, Selig would act in his  
  city courting them. If so, they were more clueless than you would think.  own self interest over the interest of the sport in general. No surprise there.  
    Selig was a used car salesman and this same selfish attitude is precisely  
  1969 - On the field, the Pilots are a mess. They're bad, even as expansion  what has given used car salesmen a bad name.   
   clubs go. With this management group, had the club stayed, Seattle     
  fans were in for hard times. 1969 -  This franchise move predictably causes major league baseball huge   
    headaches down the road.   
  1969 - It only gets worse as the Seattle Pilots owner, William Daley,  The city of Seattle understandably sues the major leagues.   
   gives up and sells the club to a group who move the franchise Fast (slow, really) forward seven years and the city of Seattle win   
   to Milwaukee after only one season in Seattle. What in the world was  their case and major league baseball is obligated to place a   
  Major League Baseball thinking to cause this fiasco to happen in the  franchise in Seattle. This time, the brain surgeons running baseball   
  first place? What kind of vetting process could they possibly have had? figure out, "Hey let's fix this thru expansion!"  
  The Seattle Mariners franchise is created thru a new expansion that  
  1969 - Jim Bouton writes his book, Ball Four, about his Seattle   major league baseball didn't want and wasn't prepared for.  
  Pilots experience. It was the first sports book that revealed, in detail,   The American League now had two more teams than the National.   
  what went on in a big league clubhouse. It's revelations are mild by today's It was an extremely clunky setup. Exactly the opposite of how you  
  standards, but in the early 1970's, they were dynamite and Bouton was   would want to run your business - court ordered activities.   
  turned into a pariah by many ballplayers as a result. Welcome to the fruits of Bud's World of myopic thinking.