A big deal at first, relegated to semi-obscurity
later on….Pirates his only team…excellent glove man and proficient at small
ball….after one season of getting his feet wet in 1964 career started to take
off…hit .252 in 1965…reaches personal highs in 1966-67 hitting .299 and .287 winning gold
gloves and is possibly the best shortstop for the time…because the best NL
shortstop Maury Wills was playing about 30 feet to his right….starting 1968 settled
into .240ish batting numbers and losing playing time to Fred Patek….played into
1973….major fails in post season…a fact not lost on skipper Danny Murtaugh who
replaced him with sub Jackie Herandez in 1971 WS who hit worse than Gene’s pale .227
regular season mark…final post season tally of 1 for 27....Ouch.
