This Day in Dodgers History
On this day, April 27, 2020, absolutely nothing happened. No runs, no drips, no errors, no wins, no losses, no no-pitch intentional walks and no crotch grabbing by Gerardo Parra, who is no longer a major leaguer. Los Angeles is tied for first (and last) in the National League West with a glittering record of 0-0. Insert sad face here.
A few things happened in the other 136 April 27ths in the franchise's history, however, and here are ones which struck me as I perused box scores. Details below.
1941: Second-year man Pee Wee Reese goes 3-5 to raise his early-season mark to .298/.437/.404 and veteran third baseman Cookie Lavagetto goes 4-4 to improve to .444/.552/.593 as Brooklyn beats Carl Hubbell's Giants, 7-5. Lavagetto, don't cha know, is famous for breaking up Bill Bevens' no-hitter with two outs in the bottom of the ninth to drive in the tying and winning runs in Game 3 of the 1947 World Series. We will not speak of what happened during the rest of that particular Fall Classic.
Dodgers catcher Mickey Owen homered in the Dodgers win 79 years ago today. We will not speak of Owen's boner in that particular World Series either.
1959: Los Angeles drives the Bucs' Red Witt from the box with five runs in the first and goes on to victory, 9-3, behind Don Drysdale's two hits and complete game win at Pittsburgh.
1963: The Cards behind Ray Washburn's three-hit shutout over the Dodgers, 3-0, at Chavez Ravine.
1977: Doug Rau over San Diego's Tom Griffin, 7-5, behind a 15-hit Dodgers attack (including Bill Russell's four nocks) at San Diego Stadium. L.A. goes on to win 22 of 24 April games and the National League pennant.
1981: Fernando Valenzuela improves to 5-0 with a 5-0 shutout of the Giants at home. With his three hits that night, Fernando's batting line stands at a cool .438/.438/.438, his ERA at 0.20, with Los Angeles going on to win their first World Series in 16 years that October, God bless em.
1988: Six scoreless from Don Sutton and a three-inning save by Alejandro Pena gives the Dodgers a 4-0 win over Jamie Moyer and the Cubs at Los Angeles. Three hits by Pedro Guerrero and two by Kirk Gibson.
2017: Twenty-year-old Julio Urias holds the Giants at bay through 5 2/3, allowing only a run, the Dodgers score four in the 10th and Chris Hatcher closes it out in L.A.'s 5-1 win at AT&T Park. Yes, Chris Hatcher.
2019: Joc Pederson drives in two with a seventh-inning triple off Joe Musgrove and Clayton Kershaw allows a run in a four-hit, no-walk, eight-strikeout, seven-inning performance as the Dodgers beat the Pirates, 3-1, at Los Angeles.
2021: There is baseball. I'm almost sure of it.
And remember, glove conquers all.
Howard Cole has been writing about baseball on the internet since Y2K. Follow him on Twitter.
