1915– The St. Louis Cardinals traded Pol Perritt to the New York Giants for players to be named later. The New York Giants sent Bob Bescher (March 25, 1915) and cash (March 25, 1915) to the St. Louis Cardinals to complete the trade
1998– Long time baseball announcer Harry Caray dies at the age of 84 after suffering a heart attack four days earlier while having Valentine’s Day dinner with his wife, Dutchie. The colorful “Mayor of Rush Street” started his career in 1945 with the Cardinals and also did play-by-play for the A’s, White Sox, and the Cubs during his 52 years in the broadcast booth.
2011- Jim Edmonds at spring training, announced his retirement .
Birthdays
Luis Arroyo (February 18, 1927 – January 13, 2016), was a major league baseball pitcher from 1955 to 1963. Arroyo was the first Puerto Rican born baseball player to play for the New York Yankees and and was a key part of their pennant winning seasons in 1961 and 1962.
He was from Peñuelas, Puerto Rico, made his Major League Baseball debut on April 20, 1955. A stocky left-hander, he spent one season primarily as a starter with the St. Louis Cardinals. Though he was a member of the National League All-Star team that year, he was traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates the next spring, where he was moved to the bullpen. Struggling to establish himself in the role, he went from the Pirates to the Cincinnati Redlegs, then the New York Yankees. Arroyo was the first to play for the Yankees, and despite his earlier struggles, he quickly became an important contributor to the club.
American League hitters had little success against Arroyo’s screwball, and after a solid contribution at the back of their bullpen in 1960, he enjoyed the best season of his career in 1961. That year, Arroyo pitched 119 innings with a 2.19 ERA, while winning 15 games as the team’s relief ace. His totals of 65 games pitched and 29 saves both led the league, he surrendered only five home runs in a season where league-wide offensive totals were very high by historical standards, and was named to his second All-Star team while finishing sixth in AL MVP voting.
Arroyo’s glory was, however, short-lived. He injured his arm the following spring; while he pitched for two more seasons, he never regained his prior effectiveness. Arroyo retired after appearing in only six innings in the 1963 season. Over the course of his MLB career, he pitched 5311⁄3 innings with a 3.93 ERA, collecting 40 wins, 32 losses, and 44 saves. Following his retirement as a player, Arroyo became a scout and pitching coach for the Yankees.
Dal Maxvill (born February 18, 1939 in Granite City, Illinois) is a former shortstop, coach and general manager in Major League Baseball (MLB). During his career, Maxvill played, coached, or was an executive for four World Series winners and seven league champions. A graduate of St. Louis’ Washington University, he earned a degree in electrical engineering. Maxvill signed his first professional baseball contract in 1960 with the hometown St. Louis Cardinals.
Maxvill appeared in 1,423 regular-season games for the Cardinals (1962–72), Oakland Athletics (1972–73; 1974–75) and Pittsburgh Pirates (1973–74). He batted and threw right-handed. A smooth fielder but notoriously weak hitter, Maxvill set a number of dubious hitting records in his career. He batted .217 with just six home runs in 3,989 plate appearances over his 14-year major league career. Due to the position he played – and the effectiveness with which he fielded – he was also the beneficiary of the convention that shortstops generally do not need to hit as well as other positions for their skills to be considered assets as Major League players.
Maxvill’s best season with the bat was 1968 with the Cardinals. He set career highs in batting average (.253), on-base percentage (.329), and slugging percentage (.298). He also received his only Most Valuable Player award votes (finishing in twentieth place) and won his only Gold Glove. Ironically, as the rest of baseball’s pitching became more dominant and hitting trended downward that year, Maxvill’s hitting trended upward. In the “Year of the Pitcher,” he benefited in part from not having to bat against teammate Bob Gibson, who set the modern-day record for earned run average (ERA) at 1.12, or the rest of the Cardinal’s pitching staff, which led the Major Leagues in ERA at 2.49.
Although comfortably above the hitting prowess of the legendary Casey Wise, Maxvill holds the National League record for fewest hits for a batter playing in at least 150 games. He had 80 hits in 1970 in 399 at-bats in 152 games, just barely over the Mendoza line at .201.
Cardinals fans of that era often said that when pitching Gibson took his turn, Gibson should bat ahead of Maxvill in the lineup, since he was the better hitter. Gibson’s career average was 11 points lower than Maxvill’s, but he was much more productive at the plate. Gibson had 24 career home runs in 2,000 fewer at bats. He also had 144 runs batted in (RBIs) compared with Maxvill’s 252, meaning that Gibson had an RBI about every tenth at bat, whereas Maxvill had one about every 14th turn.
Despite Maxvill’s relatively poor hitting, he frequented the postseason. Maxill appeared in five total World Series – three (1964, 1967 and 1968) with the Cardinals and two (1972 and 1974) with the Athletics. In the 1964 Series, which the Cardinals took from the New York Yankees in seven games, Maxvill caught Bobby Richardson’s pop-up for the final out in the seventh game. In the 1968 Series, which the Cardinals lost to the Detroit Tigers in seven games, Maxvill went a record 0-for-22 at the plate. His overall World Series batting record was 7-for-61, a .115 percentage. Both of those figures are record lows for a position player.
After his playing career ended, Maxvill served as a coach with the A’s, Cardinals, New York Mets and Atlanta Braves (where he served on Joe Torre’s staff). After the 1984 season, he became general manager of the Cardinals, spending a decade as the Cardinals’ top baseball executive, and the team won two more National League pennants in 1985 and 1987.
The 1987 season was the last time one of Maxvill’s teams made the playoffs. The Cardinals finished above .500 in 1989, 1991, 1992, and 1993, but their highest ranking was second place.ongtime owner and president August “Gussie” Busch died in September 1989 and Anheuser-Busch took over operations of the team.
Changes within the top levels in the organization continued to the point that most remnants of the Busch era turned over. The next season, longtime manager Whitey Herzog resigned and Torre was hired in his place. However, the brewery did not appear as invested as Busch in making the Cardinals a winning team and began looking to sell the team. As a result, after new president Mark Lamping was hired in 1994, he sought to make changes to attempt to build a winner. Three weeks after Lamping’s hire, he fired Maxvill. The next year, Anheuser-Busch sold the team to an investment group led by Fred Hanser, Drew Baur and William DeWitt, Jr. At this point, Maxvill pursued no further baseball opportunities, citing the desire to spend more time with his family.
Jerry Morales (born February 18, 1949) is a former Major League Baseball outfielder who played from 1969-1983.He was originally signed by the New York Mets as an amateur free agent at the age of 17 in 1966. He went to the San Diego Padres in 1968 as a choice in that year’s expansion draft, and spent several seasons going up and down in the Padres’ farm system, finally becoming a semiregular in 1972 and 1973, leading Tribune reporter Richard Dozer to ask, “Who’s Jerry Morales?” in the lead to his November 13, 1973, Tribune article on the Cubs’ trade of Glenn Beckert (and minor league infielder Bobby Fenwick) to San Diego for a 24-year-old center fielder, Morales, who ended up playing seven seasons for the Cubs. During his two stints for the Cubs, 1973-1977 & 1981-1983, Morales was a consistent and quiet outfielder (he played all three outfield positions) with above average speed and a good glove. He was known for his unusual “basket catch” style. Unless he was running when he caught a ball, he always made a two-handed basket catch, directly in front of his body, below the belt.
At the time of the Beckert deal, Cubs General Manager John Holland believed acquiring Morales was “in line with our movement for youth and speed”. In the same offseason, the Cubs also moved Ferguson Jenkins, and, at the time of this trade, speculation was that by acquiring Morales, Billy Williams would either be moved to first or traded. By trading Jenkins and Beckert, the Cubs payroll decreased (Fergie’s and Beckert’s salaries totaled over $200,000).
While Morales led the Cubs with 91 RBI during the 1975 season, his most promising season was for the 1977 Cubs. Along with Rick Reuschel, Bruce Sutter, and Manny Trillo, Morales represented the Cubs in the 1977 Major League Baseball All-Star Game at Yankee Stadium, in which Morales was plunked in the knee by Yankee pitcher Sparky Lyle. The hit by pitch, one of 28 in All-Star Game history, a subsequent back injury, and a broken finger from making a catch in center field all shortened the 1977 season for Morales. His injuries contributed to the Cubs decline that season (they had a five game lead over the eventual champs, the Phillies, after 83 games), and Morales never seemed to be the same player.
In the offseason between the 1977 and 1978 season, Cubs General Manager, Bob Kennedy, traded Morales to the St. Louis Cardinals for catcher Dave Rader. The trade – Morales, Steve Swisher, player to be named for Rader and Hector “Heity” Cruz – was intended to upgrade the Cubs’ catching position. “Rader is a very good hitter and a fine receiver,” said Kennedy, “He is considerably better than what we had”. The 1977 Cubs had George Mitterwald and Swisher behind the plate, and the Morales trade brought the Cubs Rader to team up with newly acquired defensive catcher Larry Cox. At the time, Morales was considered a surplus outfielder who could be traded to help upgrade the position.
Marc Hill (born February 18, 1952 in Elsberry, Missouri) is a former Major League Baseball catcher for the St. Louis Cardinals (1973-1974), San Francisco Giants (1975-1980), Seattle Mariners (1980), and Chicago White Sox (1981-1986). He helped the White Sox win the 1983 American League Western Division. He batted .223 with 34 home runs and 198 runs batted in for his career.
Former Cardinals that Died on this Date
Epp Sell – played for Cardinals 1922-1923 4-3 record with 6.82 ERA in 33 innings
Mike Gonzalez– Former player and manager of the Cardinals. First Cuban born manager. He played in 566 game with .261 batting average
Phil Paine– played in 1958 and went 5-1 in 73 innings and a 3.56 ERA