Herb Score
The phenom of phenoms; what might have been
Last week in this space I wrote about Major League Baseball’s unique tragedy, the death of one of its players following an on-field incident, and the phenom who followed in his wake. The phenom was Joe Sewell, and incidentally Duster Mails; the man whose death precipitated their onset was Ray Chapman.
This week, preparing to profile Herb Score as a prime example of the “phenom” phenomenon, it struck me only belatedly that he was a Cleveland Indian, too — and that this franchise had had perhaps more than its share of flameouts and sad stories. Before Chapman there was Lou Sockalexis — who arrived as a prodigy, gave the franchise its name, and drank his way out of the game. And there was pitcher Addie Joss, whose death from meningitis in what would have been his tenth year with the club had for decades thwarted his entrance into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
And there were other disappointments, from phenoms like Hal Trosky to Don Black, who threw a no-hitter for the Indians in 1947, and was on the team the next year when they made their run to the World Series. By then, however, the glory was gone and he was being used as a spot starter. On September 13, 1948 Black pitched two scoreless innings before suffering a cerebral hemorrhage while batting. Though he never pitched again in the big leagues, Black did survive and on September 22 was the recipient of a large purse from a benefit game.
During spring training of 1993 two Cleveland Indians pitchers died in a boating accident: Tim Crews and Steve Olin — and, very nearly, Bob Ojeda. But that’s a story for another day; let’s get back to Herb Score, who was, according to Ted Williams at the time, the greatest lefthander he had ever seen.
The bare bones of the story are these: In 1955, Score won 16 games for Cleveland and struck out 245; in 1956 he improved to 20 wins and 263 strikeouts. But on May 7, 1957, at Municipal Stadium in Cleveland, he was hit in the eye by a line drive off the bat of Gil McDougald of the New York Yankees and seriously injured. His recovery was slow, and he did not return to the Indians until 1958 and then only for 12 games. On April 18, 1960, no longer a flamethrower, he was traded to the White Sox for Barry Latman. After three seasons of limited duty for the Sox, he called it a day.
Score had begun his career as Cleveland’s lefthanded successor to Bob Feller, destined for Cooperstown. In 1952 at age 19 he had signed with the Indians and snagged a $60,000 bonus. Two years later he was at Indianapolis, the franchise’s triple-A team, where he had a 22–5 record with 21 complete games in 32 starts, fanning 330 hitters in 251 innings.
Next year he made his big-league debut, joining an Indians team that had won 111 games and a pennant the year before, led by an all-time great pitching staff. They had a Big Three in Bob Lemon, Early Wynn, and Mike Garcia, plus the aging Bob Feller and a skilled spot starter in Art Houtemann. Young Herb fit right in. He was voted the American League Rookie of the Year and made the cover of Sports Illustrated magazine. In 1956 he became the first pitcher since 1900 to strike out more than 200 hitters in each of his first two seasons.
Then came May 7, 1957 and the accident. He retired the Yanks’ leadoff batter, Hank Bauer. McDougald was next and he lined one back through the box. Score could see it coming straight at his eye, but there was nothing he could do. Knocked down, he bled profusely and his teammates stuffed a towel around his mouth and nose. “Hey, get the towel out, you’re going to choke me!” he shouted. “I was conscious the whole time and lucid and calm. I think I was the calmest one there,” he recalled.
When they got him back to the clubhouse, Score realized he couldn’t see anything out of his damaged eye. “Do I still have an eye?” he asked the team physician. He did, but he had to spend eight days in a Cleveland hospital, motionless, in total darkness. He would not pitch again until 1958.
He seemed fully recovered in spring training and on April 23, he threw a three-hitter against the White Sox, striking out 13 and bringing his record to 2–1.
“You know, people think what happened to me that night cost me my career,” Score said years later. “But they’re wrong. That had nothing to do with my losing my effectiveness. The following spring I was pitching as well as I ever did. Then [in May 1958] I was pitching in Washington. In the third or fourth inning my arm started to bother me. I didn’t say anything. I figured it would work out. These are the mistakes you make when you’re young.”
He had torn a tendon in his elbow and was placed on the shelf again. In the first half of the 1959 season he was 9–5 but suddenly lost it and in his final nine starts was 0–6. That offseason he was traded to the White Sox and could only throw to a 5–10 mark in 1960.
“The reason my motion changed,” he said, “was because I hurt my elbow, overcompensated for it and ended up with some bad habits.” He lost the hop on his fastball and the arm was never the same. He spent some time in the minors, only pitched in 12 games in 1961 and ’62 combined and called it quits, eventually becoming a broadcaster for the Indians, a second career that lasted 30 years.
