17 June in Sports History

Some of the interesting events in team sport history that occurred on June 17. We try and take these stories and combine them with the players and their numbers that made them oh so special.

Sports history is made every day of the year. We will preserve at least a small sampling from some great athletes every day based on the uniform number they wore.

4 - 49

June 17, 1880 - The Providence Grays MLB pitcher John M. Ward threw a perfect game beating the Buffalo Bisons, 5-0. This was the second perfect game in National League in the same 6 day span. The next time that two perfect game in the same season would occur was years later in 2010 when Roy Halladay and Dallas Braden each pitched perfection in the month of May that season.!

June 17, 1915 - Chicago Cubs relief pitcher George "Zip" Zabel is brought out of the bullpen with 2 outs in the 1st inning. That is kind of odd in its own right but the duration of how much he played is the amazing part of this story. Zabel winds up with a 4-3 score in the 19-inning win over the Brooklyn Dodgers in longest relief job ever in MLB history!

18 Jun 1915, Fri The Richmond Item (Richmond, Indiana) Newspapers.com

June 17, 1943 - Player-manager Joe Cronin, wearing Number 4 for the Boston Red Sox hits 3 pinch hit home runs in just 4 at bats driving in nine runs as the Sox outlasted the A's. Cronin was considered old at the time at 36 years old.

18 Jun 1943, Fri The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts) Newspapers.com

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18 Jun 1943, Fri The Newport Daily Express (Newport, Vermont) Newspapers.com

June 17, 1978 - A new Yankees record was broken on the mound. Wearing uniform Number 49, Ron Guidry set a New York record with 18 strike-outs against the California Angels, 4-0. It was Guudry's 11th victory in a row. In the ninth inning he had a chance to tie the MLB record of 19 in a nine-inning game, but the Angels Ron Jackson refused to surrender it as he hit into a force out to end the inning. The Yankees 27-year old ace would go on to win the AL's Cy Young Award that season finishing with a 25-3 record and a 1.74 ERA. He and the rest of the Pin Striped guys from the Bronx were the defending World Series Champions and they repeated in 1978 by defeating long time rival the LA Dodgers 4 games to 2.

A Very Special thanks to information obtained from the following brilliant internet sites: On This Day Sports, the Sports Reference's family of website databases & Stathead.com.

Banner photo is courtesy of Wikimedia Commons of the 1903 Stands along the third base line, Huntington Avenue Grounds, taken by an unknown.