Happy Birthday, Ken Singleton (68)

[OFFNY]

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Granted I have been critical of Singleton for his broadcasting style on YES when the Orioles play the Yankees, but I can put that aside for a guy that played the better part of his 15-year career for the Orioles, winning 1 Gold (1983) and 1 Silver (1979) with those Oriole teams along the way.

One of my earliest memories of Singleton was of the criticism that the Montreal Expos got for trading Rusty Staub for Singleton, Mike Jorgensen, and Tim Foli. Singleton didn't disappoint the Expos though, as he had one of the best years of his career in his 2nd season with the Expos (1973) when he lead the league in OBP (.425), hit 23 HR's, had 103 RBI's, and scored 100 runs for the only time in his career.

The following season (1974) was sub-par for Singleton, but there was a reason ...... as Tony Pente remembers fondly waiting for his annual Xander Hollander Complete Handbook of Baseball to come in the mail every March, I specifically remember my older brother Mark's 1977 version of the book, which explained that Singleton was apparently allergic to the wool uniforms that the Expos were wearing that season (1974), and was much relieved (and much more comfortable) to be wearing a non-wool uniform the following season (1975.)

Singleton's 1977 and 1979 statistics are etched in my mind. In 1977, he beat out the Yankees' Mickey Rivers by 2 points (.326 for Rivers, .328 for Singleton) for the Bronze in that season's batting title. I'll never forget eagerly awaiting my mommy bringing home the NY Daily News every Sunday, which had all of the batting and pitching leader's statistics for both leagues, and hoping that Kenny could hold off Rivers for 3rd place, which he did. The late Lyman Bostock got the Silver (.336), and Rod Carew, who had made a legitimate challenge to a .400 season that year easily won the Gold, finishing at .388.

In 1979, I remember reading in Sports Illustrated that they were playfully calling him "Hey, Hey, Homerton," because of the fact that he started the season very quickly in the round-tripper department. He wound up with a career-high 35 home runs that season. My cousin Donnie (Yankee fan) believed that Singleton was "Swinging for the fences" that year in order to get a big free agent contract, which he was eligible for at the end of that season. We all now know that Kenny wound up remaining with the Birds for the remainder of his career.

In 1981, I remember Singleton hitting a home run in the 2nd inning of that year's All-Star game, which also happened to be the very first game that was played after the season was resumed following that year's player's strike.

In September of 1984, I remember reading an article in our local newspaper here in upstate New York (The Reporter Dispatch) that Singleton was not absolutely sure whether or not that that would be his last season, but he was strongly leaning towards it being so, in spite of the late-season surge that he was having offensively.

Happy birthday, Ken. I hope that you have many more.

 

Patrick (Oriole Fan From New York)

 

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[OFFNY]

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OFFNY said:

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In 1979, I remember reading in Sports Illustrated that they were playfully calling him "Hey, Hey, Homerton," because of the fact that he started the season very quickly in the round-tripper department.

 

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I actually found the article that I was remembering !!!

I was off by one letter, though.

They weren't playfully calling him, "Hey, Hey, Homerton."

They were playfully calling him "Heh, Heh, Homerton."

 

And after Ken Singleton hit his seventh and eighth homers, someone suggested that he change his name to--heh, heh--Homerton.

 

http://www.si.com/vault/1979/05/14/823612/the-week-april-29-may-5

 

My memory failed me, if ever so slightly. ) 

 

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[El Gordo]

And to all the other former MLB players born today.

http://www.baseball-reference.com/friv/birthdays.cgi?day=10&month=6