The final regular season game of 1963 for the New York Mets and Houston Colt .45s. What can you tell me about it?
---------------------------------------
This features the one and only Major League Baseball game in the career of Houston's John Paciorek. He had been called up when rosters expanded in September, got into the final game of the 1963 season, on September 29, as the right fielder. He went to the plate five times, hitting three singles and drawing two walks, for a perfect career batting average and on-base percentage of 1.000, scoring four runs and driving in three during the game.
Back injuries forced Paciorek to have surgery in 1964, causing him to miss the entire 1965 season. He then played in the minors until 1969, but never again played in the big leagues.
Of the 20 players in major league history with career batting averages of 1.000, Paciorek was the only one to have as many as three at-bats.
Kudos to Mark Heuring for recognizing the significance of this game
------------------------------------------
Too funny, Brad -- I was just talking about this game with my son the other day. John Paciorek's only game in the major leagues. He goes 3-3 and never gets back to the Show, leaving him with a lifetime batting average of 1.000.
ReplyDeletePaciorek's younger brother Tom had a decent career in the bigs, too, and used to do commentary on the White Sox games with Hawk Harrelson back in the day.
There was another brother (Jim) who played 48 games for the Brewers in 1987!
ReplyDelete