Swoonin' A's, 5-2-64: Twins KO KC in 11th

Sweet-swinging rookie Tony Oliva homered twice, including as part of  record-tying four straight Minnesota Twins who cleared the wall in the top of the 11th inning of a 9-4 victory over the Kansas City Athletics on May 2, 1964.

By Phil Ellenbecker

  The Minnesota Twins of the early 1960s were a powderkeg waiting to explode, and they detonated with suddenness and finality on the Kansas City Athletics on May 2, 1964.

  With the two teams tied 3-3 heading into the 11th inning that Saturday afternoon at Kansas City's Municipal Stadium, Minnesota's first four batters unloaded home runs, breaking open what had a tight, back-and-forth ballgame as the Twins made off with a 7-3 victory.

  The four consecutive homers tied a record accomplished twice previously, but this was the first time it had been done in extra innings. It remains the only extra-inning occasion among the nine times teams have hit four straight in an inning.

  The Twins would go on to hit 221 homers in 1964, at the time tied for the third-most by a team in a season. And it was the Twins who had the second-best mark of 225 in 1963, behind the New York Yankees' record of 240.

  (Those marks have since been obliterated by the recent homer record-smashing, juiced ball times. The Twins themselves now hold the all-time record with 307 in 2019, edging by one the number the Yankees hit last year. Of the top 10 marks, five were set in 2019 and the most recent was in 1996).

  Tony Oliva, who would be winning the American League batting title in this his rookie season with a .323 average, set off the Twins' 11th-inning eruption in 1964 with a leadoff homer off Dan Pfister. Oliva's blow, his second homer of the game, capped a 4-for-5 afternoon with three RBIs and two runs scored.

  Bobby Allison made it 5-3 with another shot off Pfister, and A's manager Eddie Lopat had to come get the right-hander after he gave up another round tripper, this one to Jimmy Hall.

  (By going to the showers Pfister avoided a shot at the ignominy of giving up four straight homers, which had been done the year before by the Los Angeles Angels' Paul Foytack and has been done four times since.)

  The new A's pitcher, Vern Handrahan, fared no better than Pfister, as Harmon Killebrew went deep off him to complete the Twins' grand slam of game-breaking solo shots. Killebrew had homered in his previous at-bat to put Minnesota ahead 3-2 in the ninth.

  Handrahan, who was pitching in his third major league game, brought a halt to the Twins' thunder and lightning by striking out Earl Battey, then retiring Zoilo Versalles on a foul pop and Bernie Allen on a grounder.

  Gerry Aligo surrendered a one-out single to Charlie Lau in K.C.'s half of the 11th but then struck out Jose Tartabull and got George Williams on a fielder's choice grounder, sending home what remained of the 8,159 at Municipal probably wondering what had happened. Or saying, "Well, that's the good old A's for you."

  It had been anybody's game up until then, and the A's had come quite close to winning it in the ninth.

  Rocky Colavito singled in Ed Charles, who had doubled to end the day for Twins starter Lee Stange, with one out to tie the game. After Twins reliever Bill Dailey gave way to Bill Fischer, a passed ball by Battey allowed Colavito to second, and Lau was walked intentionally. Gino Cimoli advanced Lau and Colavito to second and third with a ground out back to Fischer. Again, the Twins went to the intentional walk, pinch hitter George Alusik drawing the free pass to load the bases.

  The Twins continued with their Bill of bullpen fare by bringing in Bill Pleis, who struck out A's pinch hitter Billy Bryan to bring on extra innings.

Dan Pfister surrendered three straight homers to start the 11th inning May 2, 1964, as the Minnesota Twins snapped a 3-3 tie and overpowered the Kansas City Athletics 9-4. Vern Handrahan relieved Pfister and also gave up a homer as the Twins tied the record for consecutive homers in an inning.

  Pfister came on for John Wyatt and kept the Twins in the park and off the scoreboard by retiring them in order in the 10th.

  Aligo became the Twins' fifth pitcher starting the K.C. 10th and gave up a two-out single by Charles, who finished the day 3-for-5. But Doc Edwards went out to second. Then, lights out with Minnesota's brash brigade in the 11th, handing the loss to Pfister in his first decision of the year. He saw his ERA drop to 19.29. (He finished the year 1-5 and 6.53 in this, his last of four seasons in the majors.)

  Aligo got the win to go to 1-0 with a two-inning scoreless stint in which he allowed two hits and struck out two. 

  Oliva gave the Twins the early lead with a two-run homer in the first after Rich Rollins had led off the game with a single.

  Lau, who went 2-for-4, tied the game in the seventh by tripling in Charles and Colavito, Lau's only three-bagger of the season. (Lau, who became a renowned batting coach in the 1970s and '80s, hit .271 in 1964 and .255 lifetime).

  Killebrew regained the lead for the Twins with his solo homer off Wyatt with one out in the ninth.

  Wyatt had relieved starter Aurelio Monteagudo, who allowed five hits and two runs, both earned, over seven innings while walking only one.

  Both starters had solid outings. Stange allowed five hits and three runs, all earned, with three walks and four strikeouts in his eight innings of work.

  At this early stage of the season the Twins found themselves one-half game back of league-leading Cleveland with a 9-6 record. Kansas City was in 10th in the 10-team AL with a 4-8 mark.

  Killebrew and Oliva each hit their third and fourth homers of the year. Allison also hit his fourth while Hall got his third.

  Killebrew finished the season with a league-leading 49 homers. Oliva and Allison tied for sixth with 32, Hall belted 25, Don Mincher added 23 and Versalles had 20.

  All that power didn't equate to overall success as the Twins finished seventh with a 79-83 record, 20 behind the pennant-winning New York Yankees. In 1963 the Twins had finished third with their 225 homers.

  The Twins' homers dropped to 150 in 1965, but with other elements added to their game they won their first AL pennant since moving to Minnesota from Washington in 1961. And they took the Los Angeles Dodgers to seven games in the World Series before falling in Game 7 to Sandy Koufax.

  The Athletics had some power of their own in 1964, with Colavito finishing fourth in the league in homers with 34 and Jim Gentile tied for 10th with 28. But that's about all K.C. fans had to cheer about, as the A's finished 57-105-1, last in the AL, 42 games behind the Yankees and five back of the next-nearest team in the league, the new Washington Senators. These Senators had replaced the old ones who'd moved to Minnesota.

  The A's won 16 fewer games than they had in 1963, and their 52 wins in 1956 were their only lower total in the 13 years they were in K.C., between 1955 and 1967.

Sources:

Play-by-play: https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1964/B05020KC11964.htm  

Homer records: https://www.baseball-almanac.com/recbooks/rb_hr7.shtml, https://www.baseball-almanac.com/recbooks/rb_hr8.shtml  and "The Home Run Story," 1966, W.W. Norton & Co.

Additional background came from various sources on the Retrosheet and Society for American Baseball Research's Biography Project and Games Project websites, as well as baseballreference.com.