New York Yankees legend Don Larsen was the mastermind behind the only perfect game in World Series history and the oddity may be HE was the one to do it.
For a long time, I have been giving Don Larsen props maybe he didn’t deserve. I wonder if the casual New York Yankees fan or even some die-hard Pinstripers knows about Larsen’s pitching record in the big leagues.
Knowing Larsen was the pitcher who tossed the only perfect game in World Series history, and for the New York Yankees nonetheless, I would have thought he had a great track record. I mean they were in the midst of winning eight of the last twelve World Series titles.
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Accomplishing such a feat as the perfect game would be something to hang your hat on for sure, but for Don Larsen, it was by far the only thing to hang his hat on. Prior to checking some stats on the guy, I would have fancied Larsen for being all-over the top ten lists of pitching records for the Yankees. He just has that affable name and is synonymous with World Series lore.
I would have guessed he spent his entire career pitching in the Big Apple much like Whitey Ford or Ron Guidry. Surely his uniform number 18 is one of the ones retired, never to be worn again by a Yankees player. After a little research on the guy, none of these things are true.
Don Larsen pitched a perfect game in the World Series, that’s all the guy did. Never an All-Star (and three of the years he pitched there were two ASGs a year). Never a twenty game winner (he won 11 games in his best season).
Larsen was a vagabond, suiting up for seven teams in his fourteen-year career. He did call New York home for the longest amount of time, though he was a winner of only 45 games in a Yankees uniform. With the Yankees, he won twenty-one more games than he lost. With the other teams, he lost thirty-one more games than he won. Thank you big bats in the Yanks lineup.
Before Larsen was pitching in the World Series he was going 3-21 for the Baltimore Orioles. After winning two rings with the Yankees he was going 1-10 for the Kansas City Athletics. I’m starting to think if Don Larsen wouldn’t have spent five years with the Yankees, he wouldn’t have spent five years in the league.
I am not trying to belittle Larsen’s accomplishments or his perfect game in the World Series, the rarity of that is well known. I shouldn’t say the perfect game is all he has on his Yankees resume either. His trade to Kansas City did return the likes of Roger Maris.