Where Were They Then? Part Five
As 1959 loomed, the White Sox didn't really make any major additions at the Winter Meetings. They grabbed a young bullpen arm in the Rule 5 draft from the Braves named Claude Raymond. He actually could have made this list, as he accumulated 3.4 career bWAR, and would have nudged Cam Carreon from the No. 10 spot. But he faced 19 batters, and seven reached base. He was returned to the Braves in May.
The 1959 White Sox were dubbed the "light-hitting" White Sox for a reason: They were always in search of upgrades to their pallid offensive presentation. Some decisions were made to give a couple of kids a look at the beginning the the season, who just happened to be the two most promising outfielders in the system.
Today's final installment of the Top 10 White Sox prospects in 1959 presents two players who would fuel so many "what-if" conversations when they blossomed into a couple of the best in the game — away from the South Side.
2. Johnny Callison was a phenomenon before he ever played pro ball. The White Sox signed him for $7,000 in 1957, and plugged the 18-year-old into their C-level league to ease him into the grind in his hometown of Bakersfield. He tore it up with a .340/.423/.571 line, with hit 17 homers in 403 PAs. Callison started the 1958 season in Triple-A Indianapolis, and playing eight years younger than the league average he hit .283/.352/.469 with 29 HR before his call-up to the parent club. So assured of his talent, Al Lopez wrote him in as the 1959 Opening Day left fielder. Callison's reign lasted for about seven games, hitting .048 in 25 PAs. Bench bait leeched at-bats from a slumping Callison until a May 1 trade for an aging Del Ennis sent the youngster to the bench, then back to Indianapolis. He finished 1959 with a .173/.271/.288 batting line.
Bill Veeck's attempt to stay atop the American League in 1960 resulted in a series of trades to pre-load some firepower for the upcoming campaign. Veeck sent Callison to the Philadelphia Phillies for 25-year-old power-hitting third baseman Gene Freese. On the Phillies, Gene Mauch took Callison under his wing, mentored him, and turned him into a four-time All-Star. As one of the stars on a young team carrying no expectations, Callison bloomed into one of the best right fielders in the National League. His decline started in his age 27 season, when his home runs started turning into doubles. Callison finished his 16-year career with the Yankees after a two-year stint with the Cubs, where he feuded with Leo Durocher over his platoon status. He amassed 226 HR, and 38.4 bWAR in his career.
After the 1960 season, The White Sox would turn Gene Freese into pitchers Cal McLish and Juan Pizarro. The White Sox rung 14.4 bWAR over four seasons out of Pizarro, then weathered two replacement or below efforts when, in 1966, they sent Pizarro to Pittsburgh for a left-handed, minor league soft-tosser named Wilbur Wood. While we may bemoan Veeck's folly, Callison did turn into 2.6 bWAR from Freese, 14-plus bWAR from Pizarro, then 51.8 bWAR from Wilbur Wood.
1. Norm Cash From the two seasons (1955-56) Cash spent at the White Sox Class B affiliate in Waterloo, they knew he could hit. He slugged .500 in both seasons before reporting for his two years of military service. Upon returning to baseball in 1958, Cash was used sparingly as a pinch-hitter on the parent club. Cash was a left fielder, whose defensive abilities suggested a move to first base. Cash would be the 1959 Opening Day starter at first base for the White Sox, and in a 10-game audition, posted a .207/.361/.414 line with two homers until the power-starved Sox moved to a three-man rotation of Ray Boone, Earl Torgeson and Cash. Finding themselves within a game of first place by the end of May, that situation soon morphed into a platoon between the left-handed hitting Torgeson and righty catchers Earl Battey or John Romano, pushing an aging Sherm Lollar from behind the plate to first base. A late August trade for Ted Kluszewski would leave Cash crumbs of at-bats as a pinch-hitter or late-innings sub for the rest of the season. Even though in his reduced exposure, he had clawed his way back to a better-than-Torgeson .240 average, Nash's power wouldn't show up without regular at-bats.
Three days before Veeck traded Callison in December 1959, he traded Cash to Cleveland with a slappy, contact-hitting 3B/OF Bubba Phillips, and part of the catching relief duo, John Romano, for a package headlined by Minnie Miñoso. Little did Veeck realize, Miñoso was beginning his descent from 5-WAR god to above-league-average. Two lefties acquired in the deal, Don Ferrarese and Jake Striker, would contribute a combined seven innings of work to the 1960 White SOx effort before their releases. The fourth return piece, Dick Brown, was a fourth catcher for the 1960 team, and was sold to the Milwaukee Braves the next offseason.
So, while we fret what could have come from a murder's row of Cash and Callison, the former brought back a fan favorite who raked for a year, and league-averaged for a year. Cleveland's GM, old friend Frank Lane, sent Cash at the end of 1960's spring training to Detroit for something called Steve Demeter. Demeter covered 3B well for Cleveland's Triple-A club for two seasons before becoming a Triple-A legend in Rochester.
Cash would hit 377 HRs and post 52 bWAR before being summarily dismissed from Detroit after 14 ½ gin-guzzling seasons.
Recommended Reading
Where Were They Then? Part One
Where Were They Then? Part Two
Where Were They Then? Part Three
Where Were They Then? Part Four