In a 26-year career as an NL umpire, totaling 3,743 regular-season games, Terry Tata says few stand out. Aside from the high-profile, postseason and special-event games, only select games are memorable and sometimes for the craziest reasons.
Sunday, Sept. 22, 1974. It was a cool, early fall day in St. Louis at the old Busch Stadium. Both the hometown Cardinals and visiting Cubs were enduring seasons in which neither would advance to the playoffs, and both teams wanted to wrap up the season and head home.
“I was the second-base umpire,” said the now 84-year-old Tata, who worked that day with crew chief Shag Crawford, John Kibler and Dutch Rennert. “The season was winding down. This was my second year in the National League, and it was Dutch’s first year. We had a fun time on that crew.”
“The Cubs had slipped. They were not a contending team,” recalls Cubs play-by-play announcer Jim West, who is now 95 and living in his hometown of Baltimore after retiring as a longtime MLB and NHL announcer. “The Cubs and the Cardinals just didn’t like each other.”
The Cubs finished the year in sixth place in the NL’s Eastern Division at 66-96, while the Cardinals were much better at 86-75 and in second place, 1½ games behind the Pirates. It was a good season, but not good enough.
But then again, this was a Cubs versus Cardinals series, where anything can happen in one of baseball’s storied rivalries. Both had superstars, including future Hall of Famers Bob Gibson and Ted Simmons. St. Louis also had colorful relief pitcher Al Hrabosky, “The Mad Hungarian.” The Cubs were led by outfielder Billy Williams, who would also be selected for Cooperstown, and hard-hitting third baseman Bill Madlock.
A YouTube video preserves one of the craziest scenes in baseball history. It’s another example of the toughness of that era, with the players and umpires not backing down from a fight. Obviously, the video still resonates with fans, as it has gotten more than five million views.
Things Get Strange in the Ninth
It’s the top of the ninth, the score is tied, 5-5, and Hrabosky is on the mound.
On WGN-TV in Chicago, West is almost matter of fact in his delivery. Madlock appears upset with Hrabosky’s habit of stepping off the pitching rubber and sometimes the mound, delaying the game. Madlock walks back to the on-deck circle to get the pine tar rag, and the next batter, Jose Cardenal, stands nearby.
Madlock is tiring of Hrabosky’s pre-pitch routine and just wants to get his at-bat in, according to a Los Angeles Times report. Madlock believed he had broken Hrabosky’s concentration.
Enter Crawford, who is standing outside the hitter’s circle and tells Madlock to get back to his at-bat.
After the game, Crawford told Chicago Tribune beat reporter Dick Dozer what happened.
“He (Madlock) didn’t hear me; I told him again,” the story said.
“Now we’ve got Jose Cardenal into it with Shag Crawford, and (Cubs manager) Jim Marshall is out to chat with him. Pretty wild stuff,” West said as Crawford walked back to his position behind home plate, put on his mask and emphatically gestured to Hrabosky to throw a pitch. Madlock was not prepared to hit. “Now both managers have gotten into it, and (Crawford) says to pitch the ball and he called a strike on him. Wow, this is the strangest thing I have ever seen.”
That’s right. Marshall stood in the batter’s box and was not holding a bat while arguing with Crawford. Crawford went into his stance, Hrabosky threw a pitch and Crawford raised his right arm.
“They were yelling, and Shag told Madlock to get in the batter’s box, so he ordered the pitcher to pitch, and regardless of where the pitch was, it was a strike. And he couldn’t get to the plate fast enough and was practically swinging from the on-deck circle,” Tata said. “Hrabosky triggered it.”
West is still sharp and remembers the game. “I recall the confrontation and what happened during that at-bat,” West said. “Shag Crawford, the umpire, didn’t take anything. He was a tough guy, and I recall he was quite a well-known umpire and very good.”
Two Batters in the Box
Cardenal then joined Madlock in the batter’s box and, with two batters in the box, Hrabosky throws a pitch that knocks Cardenal down. Catcher Simmons then lets rip with a hard punch to Madlock’s jaw. Cardenal takes off his helmet and tries to embed it in Simmons’ head.
Chaos ensued for several minutes as dugouts and bullpens emptied with punches thrown. Fifty years later, it’s still considered one of the wildest brawls in baseball history.
Players were on the turf punching as the umpires formed a perimeter. Tata said they stayed out of the way and let the brawl end naturally as the players eventually ran out of energy.
“They were throwing haymakers. There were no headlocks,” Tata said. “If you get involved or entangled, you may take a haymaker to the temple. You try and break it up, as best you can, before it escalates. Once it explodes, you back off and pick out the people fighting. That’s what we did. Once they get going, you let them go.”
“Now, this is the strangest thing I have ever seen. Now, wait a minute. Hold on here,” West said, his voice rising. “Ted Simmons is getting into it. He’s throwing punches at Madlock, and down they go as the benches clear. Now, the ballplayers who at first were venting their anger at the umpire are throwing punches at each other as they pile up just along the third-base side. Bill Madlock being forcibly restrained and being tackled by a teammate, Ray Burris, on the left side as they pile up and tangle up, and I believe I see (Joe) Torre in the middle of all of that.”
The 34-year-old Torre played third base for the Cardinals. He went on to a Hall of Fame career as the manager of several teams, including the New York Yankees, with whom he won four World Series titles. Later, he was named MLB’s chief baseball officer, overseeing the MLB umpiring staff.
After the game, Hrabosky made light of the fight. “My next pitch separated all three of them,” he said, grinning. “For some reason, that started a fight. And it was a good one.”
West believes Simmons instigated the fight. “He was a hard-nosed guy,” West said.
One Ejection and a Walk-Off Finish
Tata speaks affectionately of his legendary crew chief Crawford, who worked 20 years in the NL. “Shag was an exceptional umpire,” he said.
To give you an idea of how much baseball has changed in 50 years, on that Sunday afternoon, almost 60 ballplayers, managers and coaches engaged in a wild brawl, and there was only one person ejected.
When the field was cleared, Marshall got run by Crawford for coming out of the dugout to argue and protect Madlock in the early stages of the argument. Simmons, who hit Madlock with a punch that would have made George Foreman proud, stayed in the game, as did Hrabosky, Cardenal and Torre.
“We couldn’t beat them playing. So I think we might have won the fight,” Madlock said years later.
“That’s one of the great fights right there,” then Cardinals first baseman and now Mets announcer Keith Hernandez said.
After the fight, Hrabosky sat the Cubs down in order.
Meanwhile Simmons came up in the bottom of the ninth and notched a walk-off RBI single to give the hometown Cardinals a 6-5 win.
Both West and Tata agree it was a wild day.
“There are some games you just never forget; this was one of those,” West said.
“Fifty years later, wow, I still remember that day,” Tata said with a deep laugh. “It was a Sunday afternoon; we were trying to get out of there and get to the airport.”
Dan Ronan is a Washington, D.C.-based journalist, and retired small-college basketball official and NCAA baseball umpire.
