"Rarely does a hurler come along as quickly as Bill Stafford, the cool curver out of Athens, New York, who was a World Series starter as a sophomore. Bill arrived as a Yankee in his 1960 rookie season and continued in '61, winning 14 games and recording a 2.68 ERA. His refusal to panic in the face of enemy firepower made his second year a sparkling success. He worked his way to the Yanks via St. Petersburg, Binghamton and Richmond."
-Don Schiffer, The 1962 Major League Baseball Handbook
"If his 1962 spring training performances are any criterion, Bill Stafford is heading for a great season. The long, lean right-hander, who is just 23, pitched eight consecutive hitless, runless innings in his first two outings at Fort Lauderdale.
He's been a Yankee only since mid-August, 1960, and in that time has won 17, lost 10 and recorded an amazingly low earned run average of 2.58. Last year, his 2.68 ERA was second-lowest in the league. In World Series competition, Bill has a 2.25 ERA.
Bill is one of a growing group of Yankees and future Yankees who come from New York. Born in the Catskills, he resides in Athens. It was his Dad who helped him on his way to the majors. Throwing to targets erected in his backyard as a youngster, Bill learned control. In 255 major league innings, he has walked only 77 men for a per-game average of less than three.
Bill has a confident gait when you watch him walk to and from the mound. He's not cocky at all, but he goes out there to retire the opposition and believes he can on every pitch. The coolness and ease of his performance always are apparent.
Last season, Bill started slowly. He was in military service until late in the training season and really didn't get going until June. With a fine start, Bill Stafford may blossom into a top right-hander in only his second full big league season."
-The New York Yankees Official 1962 Yearbook
William Charles Stafford (P) #22
Born August 13, 1938, in Catskill, NY, resides in Athens, NY. Height: 6-1, weight: 183. Bats right, throws right.
Married.
-The New York Yankees Official 1962 Yearbook
Second lowest ERA in American League (2.68) in first full season in major leagues, 1961.
-1962 New York Yankees Press-TV-Radio Guide
"If Bill Stafford's first full season in a Yankee uniform is any measure of things to come, the rest of the American League is in for some bad times.
The 23-year-old hurler posted 14 wins and was the team's earned run leader with a splendid 2.68 ERA. Only Dick Donovan (traded to Cleveland during the off-season) of Washington bettered Stafford's mark among Junior Circuit hurlers working in the prescribed 162 innings necessary to qualify for the title.
Bill's favorite opponents were the Chicago White Sox. In picking up four victories against no losses against the "Go-Go" Sox, he permitted only six earned tallies in 36 frames. Kansas City was his victim on three occasions and the A's touched him for but four earned runs in 26 innings.
The Bronx Bombers signed Stafford in 1957 and sent him to St. Petersburg of the Florida State League. In nine games he posted a 5-3 record and allowed only 0.86 earned runs per contest.
The Athens, New York, resident moved up to Class A ball in 1958 and had an 11-7 slate with the Eastern League Binghamton Triplets. In '59 Bill ran into his only losing campaign. He was 1-8 with Richmond of the International League and 1-0 with Binghamton.
Bill received his big break midway through the 1960 season when he was called up from the IL by New York after winning 11 of 18 and having a 2.06 ERA for the Virginians. In his abbreviated rookie year (11 games), Stafford was 3-1.
His control is one of his biggest assets as his strikeouts versus bases-on-balls record indicates.
Bill's batting also helped the Bomber cause last season. He contributed 12 hits, including a brace of doubles and a triple, to the attack, a vast improvement over his previous effort with the willow (one hit in 22 1960 at-bats).
Now that he has had a full season of big-league experience, the Yankees are counting on Bill Stafford to be one of their big guns on the mound. He has certainly given Manager Houk every reason in the world to believe that he can produce in the majors."
-The 1962 Jay Publishing New York Yankees Yearbook
STAFFORD'S ALWAYS REAL COOL
Poise Keys Yankee Hurler's Success
"'I never get excited,' says Bill Stafford. 'I really don't know why.'
The Yankees' young right-hander is apologetic and mystified by his ability to stay cool during hot ball games. Stafford has an air-conditioned mind, a businesslike manner and an ability to control his emotions on the mound.
In fact, the last time he got flustered was in 1956 when he was faced with the problem of deciding which of 15 big league clubs he ought to sign with. 'I was graduating from high school in Athens, New York,' he says. 'It was a lot of pressure, going in the box and knowing that 15 scouts were watching me. I knew if I didn't go good on that particular day they wouldn't come around anymore. But once I signed a contract, I knew I could have a bad day, as all kids do, and it wouldn't hurt much.'
Athens (population 1,800) is a town on the upper reaches of the Hudson River south of Albany, south of Coxsackie, where Bill went to high school. It was there that he staked some mound performances that set both communities afire and brought baseball men from all parts of the country. 'I was playing shortstop for Coxsackie in 1954, my freshman year,' he explains. 'Our pitcher got hurt in the third inning and the coach sent me into the box.' With typical modesty, he adds: 'I struck out the next 15 men I faced. After that I was a pitcher. Four days later I pitched the biggest game of my high school career.
'Coxsackie and Ravena-Clemons were big rivals. I started that day and had to pitch 17 innings. No one scored until the fifteenth when we broke through with one run but they tied us up in the bottom of the fifteenth. We finally won, 2-1, in the seventeenth. I was fortunate enough that day to walk only four and strike out 31.'
Striking out 31 batters must be some kind of record; the cool Mr. Stafford really doesn't know. 'I got a lot of publicity at that time and the scouts started coming around,' he says. 'I had a curve ball then but I didn't throw many. But I knew a lot about pitching, thanks to my father.'
Bill Stafford, Sr., was Bill, Jr.'s hero since his toddling days. 'He was a pretty good semipro pitcher who believed that practice makes perfect. When I was old enough to play baseball he ripped up the lawn and installed a pitcher's mound. He hung up a canvas with different-sized holes and made me work on my control. I kept pitching to those holes until I could put the ball through each of them. Control was my biggest asset as a high school pitcher and it's been my chief weapon as a big leaguer. As soon as I got my starting job in school I was out there throwing every day. There's nothing like knowing where the plate is if you want to succeed as a pitcher.
'My father was one of those semipros who would have been a major leaguer if they'd had adequate scouting systems in his day. Every little thing he has taught me has been valuable to me. He didn't urge me to become a ball player. He told me to make up my own mind. Well, if you know how to do a thing right you like to do it. Maybe this accounts for the way I act when I go in the box.'
Immediately after winning that 17-inning game scouts began to ring the Stafford doorbell. 'From then on they followed me through my every high school game. I worked out with the Dodgers during the summer when I was only 15 years old. Al Campanis looked my over and tried to induce me to agree that I'd sign with him when I graduated. The next two years I worked out with the Yankees. The rest of the clubs went after me during my senior year. That season I pitched two no-hitters and didn't give up a single earned run in any game.'
All of which gave young Bill the only serious problem he has ever faced. 'I had 15 offers the day I graduated,' he says. 'At that time there was a rule which said that if you received a bonus over $4,000 you had to stay on the big league club. My father and I looked over the contracts. None offered me more than $4,000. I decided to play with the Yankees, though other scouts warned me it would be harder to make the Yankees because they were always up at the top and had top-notch players ahead of a rookie like me. I decided that if I was going to make it I'd rather make it with the best club in baseball, the Yanks.'
Bill banked the $4,000 Yankee scout Tom Kane paid him and reported to Richmond in September 1956, sitting on the bench until the season opened. 'The next season I went to D Ball in St. Petersburg,' he says. 'I was fortunate to get off to a real good start. In my first game, against the Palatka Reds, I pitched a 2-hit shutout. My record for the year at St. Pete was five wins and three losses for a 0.88 earned run average.'
All of this is said with little emphasis. Bill took for granted that if you know how to pitch you ought to pitch well. For example, he again thinks he was 'fortunate' to have led the Eastern League in 1958 with a 2.25 ERA, 11 victories and seven defeats. The fact is that he averaged approximately two strikeouts to one base on ball, the mark of a contol pitcher. He was ahead of most batters; he could work them into holes, compelling them to swing at his best pitches. And, even in crises, he kept cool.
'1959 was my worst year in professional baseball,' he says. 'I was sent up to Triple-A ball in Richmond and didn't win a game until mid-August- it was the only game I won all year. It was rather discouraging to look at my 1-8 record and 6.17 earned run average. It was hard to say what my trouble was. I just seem to be able to do anything right. I was facing good hitters and when I made mistakes I got hurt. I was throwing too many good pitches when I got ahead of hitters, trying to protect the plate. And there were too many veteran pitchers ahead of me on the staff. I didn't start often enough, with the result that me control was off, and when my control is off I'm likely to be hit hard. In my first game of the season I got beaten, 2-0, and didn't get another chance to start for 35 days. It wasn't manager Steve Souchock's fault- he wanted to win games with seasoned AAA pitchers, and I was just a kid coming up.'
He was a 'little let down' over his poor season, but not enough to let it affect him emotionally. That year's scouting reports invariably tagged him as a sure prospect for the Big Team. He was off to a poor start in 1960, 'but I soon got going and by August had won 11 games with a 2.06 earned run average. The Yanks brought me up to the Stadium.'
The Yankees were in dire difficulties the day Bill reported. They were in third place behind Baltimore and Chicago. Chief scout Bill Skiff was haunting International League ball parks. He had 'discovered' Luis Arroyo in Jersey City and recommended that Stafford be tried out. The two new Yanks added strength to the wobbly box staff at once.
Bill unpacked his bags that first day and was assigned to the 'rookie locker,' a cubicle at the right of the clubhouse door. Newspapermen were immediately impressed by the cool, professional way he handled himself. They had to pry out of him the back story that he'd tossed five shutouts and two 3-hitters for Richmond. They said his poise was remarkable for a kid just 22 years of age.
Bill's first big league start was in Boston a few days later. 'It was a big day for me,' he says. 'I faced the greatest hitter in the game, Ted Williams. I made him roll out to the infield three times. We were trailing, 2-1, in the seventh inning when I was relieved, but we won, 3-2, in the tenth. I was very fortunate that day.'
He was again what he calls 'fortunate' in his first Stadium start. 'Ray Herbert pitched for Kansas City and he held us to five hits but I held the A's to four and won, 1-0, for my first big league shutout.' Bill won three and lost one by the season's end.
Less than two months after he reported Bill appeared in a World Series game. Veteran Yankees may have been annoyed by butterflies in their bellies, but not the kid from Athens. And baseball writers may have so busy that they overlooked Bill's contribution to the Yankees' vain effort to conquer the Pirates. 'I was supposed to start the fifth game,' he recalls. 'However, Art Ditmar got the assignment at the last minute. He was knocked out early and after Arroyo stopped the Pirates' rally I went in. I pitched five innings and gave up three singles and no runs. And I was in that wild last game- they got one run and one hit off me in one inning.' Series statistics show Bill led the Yankee staff with a 1.90 earned run average.
Thirty-six hours after the defeated Yankees sadly trooped off Forbes Field, Bill was in the Army. At Fort Knox, Kentucky, and Fort Lee, Virginia, he planned his return to baseball. 'I knew I'd have to miss the first six weeks of spring training. I remembered by father's advice to work hard. I spent every spare running and throwing, indoors and out. Running outdoors was impossible on snowy and sleety days and tough on the leg muscles because the ground was hard with frost. And indoor workouts weren't much better. I may have thougtht I was in shape when I reported at St. Petersburg late in March, but I wasn't.
'I did a further injustice to myself and the team by overworking myself after I reported. Ralph Houk eased me into a few games in relief after the season opened. By May I'd lost two games and won none and had something a 5.00 earned run average. I think that if I'd had any other manager than Ralph I'd have been sent back to the minors. He called me into his office and told me not to worry, that I'd stay on the staff all season. He sort of read my mind and took the worries off it. I'm thankful to him for the real good year I had in 1961.'
On June 1 Houk announced at clubhouse meeting that Bill would henceforth work in four-day rotation. Four days later he held the White Sox to seven hits, winning 4-3. Four days more and he eased to a 6-1 victory over the A's. 'But I still suffered from lack of slow rounding into shape in camp. My arm began to feel tender and I had to miss several starts. That's why I asked Ralph to let me report this spring on February 5. A pitcher's arm must be nursed into shape. Tension must be worked out of the muscles. The extra training I did last February has done me a lot of good. My arm feels better right now than ever in my career. It's strong and loose.'
Bill's arm was strong and loose on July 6 last year when he twirled a 4-0 2-hitter against the Indians at the Stadium. Willie Kirkland doubled in the second and Mike de la Hoz singled in the ninth- that's all, brother! From August 1 to the end of the season he was the Yankees No. 3 starter behind Whitey Ford and Ralph Terry, pouring it on in the great stretch drive after doing his bit to stop the Detroit Tigers in the super-duper early September series at the Stadium.
Bill held the fort in the fourth Series game with the Cincinnati Reds. He was trailing, 2-1, and still strong when Manager Houk removed him in the seventh in a rare switch for Ralph, who believes in leaving in men in the box until they obviously need relief. With a man on base and left-handed Vada Pinson up, Ralph removed Bill for southpaw Bud Daley. The Yanks won, 3-2, on homers by Johnny Blanchard and Roger Maris.
'Yes, it was a big game,' says Bill. 'But not the biggest for me. The biggest games were ones I wasn't in, the game that won the pennant and the game that won the world's championship.' Which is about par for modesty for a 23-year-old who won 14 games in his first full season.
Bill uses a good fast ball and fast curve with speed variations, a change-up and a slider. 'A lot of people have helped me develop my stuff, my father first, then the minor league managers and coaches who worked with me. I've been lucky and so have the Yanks to have a coaching staff like the one that's guiding the team now. I had a flat slider in the minors, but Johnny Sain showed me how to get a sharper break on it and that's been a big help to me. My slider now goes down and out.
'I don't keep book on hitters. I find it better to rely on my head. And here's another thing that's helped me greatly- the receiving by Ellie Howard. Ellie is the best catcher I've seen in the majors. He's more than just a receiver to me. He studies the hitters just as much as I do, and knows a lot more about them than me. He makes pitching easy. If I'm pitching a batter outside and getting him out regularly, the guys likely to shift his feet on me. It's pretty hard to see such things from the mound. Ellie sees them. If a catcher isn't alert in noticing changes of stance and spreads of feet like Ellie is, the pitcher can get into an awful lot of trouble. When a hitter steps back for an inside pitch, Ellie calls 'em outside. He's won a lot of games for me by just helping me think.
'We think along the same lines which is why he likes to catch me and I like to pitch to him. We have a theory that nothing can go wrong if we agree. Sometimes I'll shake him off, sometimes he'll overrule me. We work as a two-man team in a wonderful relationship.
'I pitch the same way to everyone. I mean, every man who's got a bat in his hands is dangerous and you can't afford to ease up at any time. Just because a batter's hitting .360, as Norman Cash did last year, doesn't faze me. I'm not going to walk him. I not going to try to get him out with the best stuff I have. If a pitcher hasn't enough confidence to keep cool against the best hitter in the league, he doesn't belong on the staff. Otherwise the battle's lost before it really begins. All hitters are tough until I get 'em out. They can be got out by outthinking them.'
In every respect Bill Stafford is a model pro. Like Cletis Boyer, his roommate on the road, he is young, ambitious and determined to overlook nothing that will help him become a star. He has no outside interests, plays golf occasionally and bowls. If he's fortunate enough to rise into the high-income brackets, he hopes he'll go into the ball player's favorite sideline, operating bowling alleys.
'Clete and I are real pals,' he says. 'We enjoy being together. I married Janice Maher, who went to high school with me, two years ago. We rent a house in Yonkers, just over the New York City line. If things break right, we'll buy a house near New York and settle down. Janice is a registered nurse. She's planning to go back to it this year. In the meantime, baseball is plenty for me.'
The wise men who preside over the world's champion Yanks have no doubt that things will break right for Bill. Their unanimous opinion is that he is destined to become one of the American League's leading hurlers during the next decade, with more than one 20-win season under his belt.
'A cool cucumber with a good head,' is their estimate of the young Athenian- that is, if cucumbers have heads.
Bill Stafford has ... "
-Charles Dexter, Baseball Digest, June 1962
"Bill Stafford at the age of 24 is a member of the Yankees' 'Big Three' pitching rotation. The Athens, New York, right-hander has had a winning record since coming up to the Bombers late in 1960 and his lifetime ERA is well under 3.00.
He has no Series decisions, but does have an imposing 2.25 ERA in the fall classic."
-Official Souvenir Program of the 1962 World Series (Yankee Stadium)
