| Ralph Houk | |
|---|---|
 Houk in 1975 | |
| Catcher /Manager | |
| Born:(1919-08-09)August 9, 1919 Lawrence, Kansas, U.S. | |
| Died: July 21, 2010(2010-07-21) (aged 90) Winter Haven, Florida, U.S. | |
Batted: Right Threw: Right | |
| MLB debut | |
| April 26, 1947, for the New York Yankees | |
| Last MLB appearance | |
| May 1, 1954, for the New York Yankees | |
| MLB statistics | |
| Batting average | .272 |
| Hits | 43 |
| Runs batted in | 20 |
| Managerial record | 1,619–1,531 |
| Winning % | .514 |
Stats atBaseball Reference  | |
| Managerial record at Baseball Reference | |
| Teams | |
| As player As manager | |
| Career highlights and awards | |
Ralph George Houk (/ˈhaʊk/; August 9, 1919 – July 21, 2010), nicknamed "the Major", was an Americancatcher,coach,manager, and front office executive inMajor League Baseball. He is best known as the successor ofCasey Stengel as manager of theNew York Yankees from 1961 to 1963, when his teams won three consecutiveAmerican League pennants and the 1961 and 1962World Series championships. In1961 he became the second rookie manager to win100 games in a season and third rookie manager to win a World Series.[1] He was the first manager to win World Series titles in his first two seasons and the first manager sinceHughie Jennings to win three pennants in his first three seasons.
A native ofLawrence, Kansas (Stull Community), Houk was a catcher working his way through the Yankees'farm system when the U.S. entered World War II. He enlisted in the armed forces, serving with Company I, 89th Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron (Mechanized) of the9th Armored Division in July 1944.[2] He rose to the rank of Major (the source of his Yankees nickname). He was a combat veteran ofBastogne and theBattle of the Bulge, and was awarded theSilver Star with an Oak Leaf Cluster, theBronze Star with an Oak Leaf Cluster andPurple Heart.[3][4]
Returning to baseball after the war, Houk eventually reached the major leagues, serving as the Yankees' second- and third-string catcher behindYogi Berra. A right-handed hitter listed as 5 feet 11 inches (1.80 m) tall and 193 pounds (88 kg), Houkplayed in only 91 games over eight seasons (1947–1954), finishing with abatting average of .272. Although the Yankees participated in six World Series during that period, Houk had only twoat bats (one in1947, the other in1952), batting .500.
During his last five years as a major-league player (1950–1954), Houk played in only 31 regular-season games, made 30 totalplate appearances, and caught 83innings.[5] By 1953 he had transitioned to becoming the Yankees' full-time bullpen coach, effectively beginning his managerial apprenticeship.
In 1955 he was named manager of the Yanks'Triple-A affiliate, theDenver Bears of theAmerican Association. Following three highly successful seasons at Denver, culminating with the 1957 league playoff andJunior World Series championships, Houk returned to the Bronx as Stengel's first-base coach from 1958 to 1960. From late May through early June1960, Houk served as acting manager of the Yanks for 13 games while Stengel, 70, was sidelined by illness. (The team won 7 and lost 6.) Then, after the Yanks lost the1960 World Series to thePittsburgh Pirates—and with Houk one of the hottest managerial candidates in baseball—the Yankees "discharged" Stengel (to use Stengel's own words) and promoted Houk.
Houk was known as a "player's manager"—albeit one with a quick temper. FutureLos Angeles Dodgers managerTommy Lasorda briefly played for Houk at Denver and called Houk the best handler of men he ever played for, and modeled his managerial style on him.[6] TheKansas Sports Hall of Fame, of which Houk is a member, describes Houk as "rough, blunt and decisive" and his tantrums in arguments withumpires earned him 45 ejections as a manager in the majors. Houk is tied withBilly Martin for fourteenth place on baseball's "most ejected" list.[7]
The early 1960s Yankees responded to Houk's leadership; the 1961 team led byRoger Maris (61home runs),Mickey Mantle (54 homers) andWhitey Ford (25 victories) won 109 games and beat theCincinnati Reds in five games in theWorld Series. His1962 club won 96 games, and were victorious over theSan Francisco Giants in seven games in theFall Classic. In1963, the Yanks won 104 games and rolled to the pennant, but were swept in four games by the Dodgers in theSeries.
Not all players found him to be a stellar players' manager, though. He was featured a handful of times inJim Bouton's bookBall Four, as Bouton was reminiscing about his time with the Yankees in 1969. Houk was described in one instance as "sometimes...99 percent pure bullshit."[8]
Houk moved into the Yankees' front office asgeneral manager on October 23, 1963,[9] replacingRoy Hamey, and Berra, at the end of his playing career, became the Yanks' new manager. The Yankees won the1964 pennant under Berra after a summer-long struggle with theBaltimore Orioles andChicago White Sox, but Houk and the Yankee ownership quickly became disenchanted with his work and in late August they made up their mind to fire him regardless of how the season turned out. After the Yankees' seven-game loss to theSt. Louis Cardinals in the1964 World Series, Houk sacked Berra. Later, Houk said that the Yankee brain trust had concluded Berra wasn't ready to be a manager, though he didn't elaborate on the reasoning.[10]
To succeed Berra, he then hiredJohnny Keane, who had just resigned as manager of the champion Cardinals. Houk had admired Keane as a competitor in the American Association from almost a decade before and, according to authorDavid Halberstam, the Yankees had made overtures to Keane during the 1964 regular season about becoming their manager for 1965.[11] But the great postwar Yankee dynasty was aged and crumbling, the farm system had seriously deteriorated, and theKansas City Athletics were no longer a reliable source for major league talent. Keane, a longtime minor league manager, was better suited by temperament for managing young players than established and aging superstars, and his hiring was a failure. The team fell to sixth in1965—their first losing record since 1925, and only their second since 1918. When they won only four of the first 20 games of1966, Houk fired Keane on May 7 and named himself manager, assuming that job for the second time.
Houk (eventually succeeded as general manager byLee MacPhail) thus began a second, and far less successful, term as Yankee manager, finishing the 1966 season. Their talent and farm system both depleted, the Yankees finished in last place for the first time since1912. A long rebuilding process followed, includingBobby Richardson's retirement (Richardson's roommate,Tony Kubek, had retired because a bad back after the 1965 season) and the trading away of Maris,Clete Boyer and, during the 1967 season,Elston Howard. Houk continued to manage the Yankees from 1967 until 1973. His best season was1970, when the Yanks won 93 games, but finished 15 games behind the eventual World Series championBaltimore Orioles.
Despite two years left on a three‐year contract, Houk announced his resignation immediately after aseason-ending 8–5 loss to theDetroit Tigers on September 30, 1973, in the final game atYankee Stadium prior to its closure for a two-year renovation.[12] While first-year team ownerGeorge Steinbrenner's commanding style has led some to think the new owner influenced Houk's departure, he told Bill Madden of theNew York Daily News it was the constant booing of Yankee fans that pushed him. Houk even said that Steinbrenner insisted he'd get some new players to restore the team's greatness. "And he did, bringing inCatfish andReggie, " Houk told Madden inPride of October. "That'll make you good in a hurry!" Apart from a brief stint with the Tigers' Class B affiliate inAugusta, Georgia, he had spent the first 35 years of his adult life on the Yankees' payroll.
Houk signed a three-year, $225,000 contract to join the Tigers in a similar capacity just less than two weeks later, on October 11. He succeeded former Yankees teammateBilly Martin, who had been fired on September 2 andJoe Schultz, who served in the interim for the remainder of the1973 season.
Aware of the challenge he was going to face, he stated, "I'm more concerned with winning than rebuilding, but we have to rebuild, there's no doubt about it."[13] A veteran team -- Detroit's1973 roster averaged 31.8 years of age[14] -- the Tigers werefive years removed from winning the World Series and had just had won theAL East in 1972 under Martin. But the team was in need of a rebuild and began moving on from their longtime stars -- including future Hall of FamerAl Kaline, who retired after Houk's first season.
The low point came in1975, when Houk's team lost 102 games -- at the time the second-most losses in a season in franchise history -- but the1976 Tigers improved their record by 14 games behind the heroics of rookie pitcherMark Fidrych, who won 19 games while becoming a national sensation. By1978, Houk had restored Detroit to respectability and the Tigers won 86 games -- their first winning season since 1973, and the first of 10 consecutive winning seasons -- with future stars of theSparky Anderson-led 1980s Tigers such asLou Whitaker,Alan Trammell andJack Morris.
After the 1978 season, with the roster's average age a youthful 26.3,[15] Houk retired from baseball.
Houk's name had been linked by the media with theBoston Red Sox' managerial job since his days as a Yankees' coach. After two years of retirement, in the autumn of1980, Houk, then 61, was ready to get back into baseball. In late October, when the Red Sox called about their opening after they had firedDon Zimmer, he jumped at the chance.
Although not as daunting as his Detroit assignment, Houk faced another rebuilding job: the powerful Boston team of the 1970s was about to lose marquee players such asCarlton Fisk andFred Lynn and needed to retool its roster. But Houk rose to the challenge, and in four seasons produced three over-.500 teams. On his watch, Boston broke in young playersWade Boggs,Roger Clemens,Bruce Hurst andMarty Barrett. When Houk retired from managing permanently in October1984, just after his 65th birthday, he bequeathed the core of another pennant winning ballclub (in this case, the1986 Red Sox) to his successor,John McNamara.
His final record, over 20 years with the Yankees (1961–1963, 1966–1973), Tigers (1974–1978) and Red Sox (1981–1984) was 1,619 wins and 1,531 losses (.514), plus eight wins and eight losses in the World Series. In twenty seasons as manager, he had eleven winning seasons, with six finishes of third or better and five seasons with a finish of sixth or worse. After his first three championship seasons, he never appeared in the postseason.[16]
Houk served with theMinnesota Twins as a special assistant to general managerAndy MacPhail, Lee's son, from 1987 to 1989 before retiring from the game for good.[9] He thus enjoyed one additional world championship season, when the Twins defeated the Cardinals in the1987 World Series.
Colorful opinions about Houk can be found inJim Bouton's classic 1970 memoir,Ball Four. Houk was Bouton's first big league manager and sparred with him over contracts when Houk was the Yankees' GM.
Houk was portrayed byBruce McGill in the 2001 film61*.
He died on July 21, 2010, inWinter Haven, Florida, just nineteen days before he would have turned 91. At age 90 he was, at the time, the oldest living manager of a World Series-winning, pennant-winning or post-season team. He was survived by a daughter, Donna; a son, Robert; four grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.
On July 22, 2010, the Yankees announced players and coaches would wear a black armband in Houk's memory on the left sleeve of their home and away uniforms for the remainder of the 2010 season.[17]
| Team | Year | Regular season | Postseason | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Games | Won | Lost | Win % | Finish | Won | Lost | Win % | Result | ||
| NYY | 1961 | 162 | 109 | 53 | .673 | 1st in AL | 4 | 1 | .800 | WonWorld Series (CIN) |
| NYY | 1962 | 162 | 96 | 66 | .593 | 1st in AL | 4 | 3 | .571 | WonWorld Series (SF) |
| NYY | 1963 | 161 | 104 | 57 | .646 | 1st in AL | 0 | 4 | .000 | LostWorld Series (LAD) |
| NYY | 1966 | 139 | 66 | 73 | .475 | 10th in AL | – | – | – | – |
| NYY | 1967 | 162 | 72 | 90 | .444 | 9th in AL | – | – | – | – |
| NYY | 1968 | 162 | 83 | 79 | .512 | 5th in AL | – | – | – | – |
| NYY | 1969 | 161 | 80 | 81 | .497 | 5th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| NYY | 1970 | 162 | 93 | 69 | .574 | 2nd in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| NYY | 1971 | 162 | 82 | 80 | .506 | 4th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| NYY | 1972 | 155 | 79 | 76 | .510 | 4th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| NYY | 1973 | 162 | 80 | 82 | .494 | 4th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| NYY total | 1750 | 944 | 806 | .539 | 8 | 8 | .500 | |||
| DET | 1974 | 162 | 72 | 90 | .444 | 6th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| DET | 1975 | 159 | 57 | 102 | .358 | 6th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| DET | 1976 | 161 | 74 | 87 | .460 | 5th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| DET | 1977 | 162 | 74 | 88 | .457 | 4th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| DET | 1978 | 162 | 86 | 76 | .531 | 5th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| DET total | 806 | 363 | 443 | .450 | 0 | 0 | – | |||
| BOS | 1981 | 56 | 30 | 26 | .536 | 5th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| 52 | 29 | 23 | .558 | 2nd in AL East | ||||||
| BOS | 1982 | 162 | 89 | 73 | .549 | 3rd in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| BOS | 1983 | 162 | 78 | 84 | .481 | 6th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| BOS | 1984 | 162 | 86 | 76 | .531 | 4th in AL East | – | – | – | – |
| BOS total | 594 | 312 | 282 | .525 | 0 | 0 | – | |||
| Total[16] | 3150 | 1619 | 1531 | .514 | 8 | 8 | .500 | |||
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
