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TONY CONIGLIARO |
THE CURSE OF THE BAMBINO, PART 6 ...
"THE IMPOSSIBLE DREAM"
Gary Bell
coasts, but Tony C. gets beaned
August
18, 1967 ... The Red Sox beat the Angels 3 to
2 at Fenway Park. Gary Bell flirted with a no-hitter for 6 1/3
innings, but his flirtation with history was overshadowed when Tony
Conigliaro was hit by a pitch ball in the face. Conigliaro has been
the target of many pitches, since he stands so close and a plate. He was knocked
down by the first pitch thrown to him by Jack Hamilton in the fourth inning. The
ball hit him flush on the left cheekbone and he was taken off the field by
stretcher to Sancta Maria Hospital, in Cambridge.
When Conigliaro dropped in the batter's box, he never stirred. The rush from
the Red Sox dugout started with Dick Williams, and once it was seen that Tony
was not be able to get up, Jim Lonborg, Mike Ryan, Joe Foy and trainer Buddy
LeRoux grabbed a stretcher and carried him into the locker room.
The game actually was not as exciting to the crowd as it should've been after
that. José Tartabull took Conigliaro's place and many of the fans booed
Hamilton. When Rico Petrocelli broke the 0-0 tie with a triple in the bottom of
the fourth inning, scoring José Tartabull, Carl Yastrzemski made a gesture
towards Hamilton.
Hamilton matched Bell, pitch for pitch, for three innings, but in the fourth
George Scott hit him for a single to center. He tried to stretch it into a
double and was cut down at second base. Then Reggie Smith flied to center before
Conigliaro was hit. When play resumed, Rico Petrocelli hit a long fly to
right-center that José Cardenal couldn't catch up with. It scored Tartabull
easily and Petrocelli tried to make it all the way home. The throw from Jim
Fregosi, in short center field, was on the third-base side of the plate and
catcher Bob Rodgers couldn't grab it. Petrocelli was given a triple and an error
was given to Fregosi.
Bill Kelso came into pitch for the Angels in the seventh, after Hamilton had
been pinch-hit for. The Red Sox added their final run when he walked José
Tartabull and Rico Petrocelli. Tartabull was forced at third and then Gary Bell
singled to center to score Rico, making it 3 to 0.
The Angels got only one man to first base in the first six innings, when
Rodgers walked with two outs in the fifth. But the Angels finally got to Bell in
the seventh, when Jimmie Hall and slammed a home run into the left-field net.
Hall repeated his feat again, with a home run into the bleachers in the ninth.
The only other two Angels hits were made by Don Mincher in the seventh and by
Bobby Knoop in the eighth. Both were singles. |
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