Inductees

Quick, remember the moment you knew what wanted to be in life? Jerry Reuss does. He was 8, and had just attended his first St. Louis Cardinals game at old Sportsman’s Park.

This was, of course, long before he led St. Louis County’s Ritenour High School to the 1966 and 1967 Missouri state baseball championships and years before he pitched a no-hitter and won a World Series.

The “electric” atmosphere outside the ballpark on a picture-perfect Sunday afternoon fascinated him, as did the Cardinals crisp, white uniforms.

“On the ride home, I said, ‘I want to be a major-league ballplayer. My brother, Jim, said, ‘Don’t we all? The odds of making it are one in a million,’” Reuss said. “I responded, ‘Well, there has to be one. And why can’t that one be me?’”

Reuss succeeded, pitching 22 seasons in the big leagues from 1969 to 1990, and the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame is proud to induct the left-hander among its Class of 2016.

Overall, a red StL or blue LA hat often rode atop his blonde hair while Reuss rode a wicked, two-seam fastball to a 220-191 record in 547 starts. He pitched for eight teams, beginning with the Cardinals (1969-1971), but rose to national fame with the Los Angeles Dodgers (1979-1987). He won at least 14 games in 10 seasons between 1971 and 1985, and finished second to Steve Carlton in National League Cy Young Award voting in 1980. Overall, he struck out 1,907 in 3,669.2 innings and was a two-time NL All-Star.

In his Dodgers days, Reuss tossed a no-hitter on June 27, 1980 – he was Bill Russell’s throwing error away from a perfect game – and, a year later, helped beat the New York Yankees to win the World Series in six games. Reuss started Game 1 and the pivotal Game 5, in which his complete-game five-hitter outdueled Ron Guidry in a 2-1 victory. He’ll never forget the flight back to New York for Game 6.

“From my window seat, I saw a huge glare of lights and thought that it might be St. Louis,” Reuss said. “It was then I retraced the steps I had taken and remembered the people who had helped me get from the ball fields of St. Louis to the World Series. How fortunate I was to be born in a perfect time with a God-given talent that turned into a career.”

Reuss had been a first-round draft pick of the St. Louis Cardinals in 1967. What made him special?

“No. 1, his size. But, No. 2, his ability to listen and comprehend what you were talking about,” said his Ritenour baseball coach, Lee Engert. “In 45 years of coaching, I wanted players to listen but I also thought it was important that coaches listened, too. He understood the importance of listening. And he always worked above and beyond 100 percent.”

Reuss reached Triple-A Tulsa at age 18 in 1967, mentoring under Hall of Fame pitcher and then-manager Warren Spahn, and won his St. Louis debut on Sept. 27, 1969 at Montreal. He remained a Cardinal until April 1972.

“By watching Carlton and (Bob) Gibson,” Reuss said of the two Hall of Famers, “I learned the things to do and the things not to do. I could see how to handle wins and shake off losses.”

Reuss pitched two seasons in Houston, working 279 innings and 40 starts in 1973, and spent six seasons in Pittsburgh, appearing in two NL Championship Series.

A 1979 trade to the Dodgers rebooted his career. Back in the starting rotation, Reuss employed a cut fastball to compliment his two-seamer. It allowed him to focus less on strikeouts, more on command. As a result, Reuss averaged only 2.1 walks per nine innings in his Dodgers tenure.

Fortunately, Reuss hasn’t taken himself too seriously. He recently penned an autobiography titled, “Bring in the Right Hander.”

Even of his no-hitter, Reuss jokes, “Hey, I had to get 28 outs. Anyone can pitch a perfect game. There’s been 13 of them.”

And, of his World Series victory in which Guidry retired 14 of 15 batters before coughing up back-to-back home runs in the seventh, Reuss said this: “I remember walking to the dugout after the top of the seventh, we’re down 1-0 and I thought, ‘Get me a run or two, and I’ll hold it.’ I guess I should have asked earlier.”

Reuss also pitched for the Cincinnati Reds, California Angels, Chicago White Sox, Milwaukee Brewers and retired after starting the final regular-season game of the 1990 season, for the Pirates. He left to a standing ovation.

“That’s the way great ballplayers should finish their careers,” Reuss said. “I truly was one of the lucky ones.”