Inductees

In baseball, everybody’s got a story – some better than others. And when it comes to Al Nipper, he’s got a lot of good ones.

Think he loved the game at an early age?

A St. Louis Cardinals fan, he used to plot down $1.25 for a blue-marked GA ticket into old Busch Stadium and yet trick ushers into believing that his ticket stubs were good for the box seats, since he would find the pink-coded stubs and put a portion of them in his mouth (for the usher to see) since both hands were full of concessions.

Years later, people paid to see him pitch.

In fact, Nipper spent eight seasons in the major leagues, including on the Boston Red Sox’s 1986 World Series team. That was part of a journey that has led to the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame, which proudly inducted Nipper with the Class of 2018.

A Hazelwood West High School graduate and Truman State University standout, Nipper was an eighth-round draft pick in 1980. He pitched in the big leagues from 1983 to 1990, including five seasons with Boston, and was a 10-game winner on the Red Sox’s 1986 team that won the American League pennant.

Nipper, who also pitched one season each with the Cleveland Indians and Chicago Cubs, appeared in 144 total games, including 124 as a starting pitcher. He was 46-50 with a 4.52 earned run average in almost 780 innings. He struck out 381 batters.

Of course, it all started in St. Louis at Hazelwood West, where Nipper was an all-conference and All-District selection and Most Valuable Player.

After being recruited by Sam Nugent, he enrolled at Truman State in 1977 and finished his freshman season with a 3.24 earned-run average.

However, he dramatically improved. As a sophomore, he posted an NCAA Division II-leading ERA of 0.98 and a 6-2 record, earning First Team MIAA and All-District honors.

In his junior year, Nipper compiled a 3.76 ERA and made the all-conference second-team. That was his final campaign as a Bulldog pitcher but not before he set a school record for career strikeouts (152) and career complete games (18), plus tied a school record for single-season wins (6).

A month after the end of the 1980 season, Nipper was selected in the MLB Draft and chose to sign.

During the next three years, he traveled up the minor league ladder through the Red Sox farm system until reaching the parent club in the last month of the 1983 season. He won his first major-league game on the last day of the year, beating Cleveland to make Carl Yastrzemski a winner in his final career game.

Nipper then earned a spot in Boston’s starting rotation in 1984 and finished his first full big-league season with an 11-6 record and a 3.89 ERA.

However, 1985 became a season of misfortune for him. He was tested with leukemia in spring training but it ended up being a stomach ulcer and later developed severe back spams.

Still, Nipper finished that campaign with a 9-12 record and a 4.06 ERA.

In 1986, the injury jinx was still haunting him. In May, he suffered a four-inch gash along the kneecap after being spiked in a home-plate collision. But he was back in action by late June with 250 stitches in his knee, finishing with 10 wins – including one against the Yankees — as the Boston clinched its first pennant since 1978.

In the World Series against the Mets, Nipper started Game 4 and held them scoreless in five of his six innings of an eventual Mets win.

In 1987, Nipper compiled an 11-12 record. After the season, he was traded to the Chicago Cubs but suffered an elbow injury in the first half of the summer and finished the year with only 80 innings.

In the spring of 1989, he sustained a knee injury and was released by the Cubs. He was signed by Cleveland in 1990, and then retired after a year with the Cardinals’ Triple-A Louisville affiliate in 1991.

He then set about giving back to the game as a scout and coach for big-league clubs since the mid-1990s.

Nipper has spent a majority of his coaching career with the Red Sox, as their big-league pitching coach (1995 & 1996), big-league bullpen coach (2006), a roving instructor in the minor leagues and, from 2007 to 2011, a special assignment scout. He also was the pitching coach of the Kansas City Royals (2001-2002) and pitching coordinator for the Texas Rangers (1997-2000) and Detroit Tigers (2012-2014).