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| Zoilo, Zorro, it's all the same |
The other day, I was doing a quiz on Sporcle about league
MVPs. As always, I knew most from the
early 80’s on, got a good deal just typing in famous names, and then had to
give up. There were a lot of “Oh yeah,
that guy”s, but one name that certainly didn’t elicit that response was the
name of the 1965 AL MVP – Zoilo Versalles.
“Who the hell is that?” I said.
Versailles, like the city in France, or Indiana even? No, not quite (note the lack of “i”). Let’s examine this Versalles character.
Versalles was born in Havana, Cuba in 1939. At some point between then and “early 1958”
when he was signed by the Washington Senators, he made his way to the United
States. He was assigned to Elmira where
he would hit .292 with 18 doubles, seven triples and five home runs. The next year he was promoted to Fox Cities,
where he would hit .278 with 19 doubles, two triples and nine home runs,
earning him a promotion to the Senators.
Versalles made his major league debut on August 1st,
1959 in a 2-1 loss to the Chicago White Sox.
That day, he would go 0-4 with three strikeouts vs. the Sox’ Ray
Moore. He would also commit an
error. We’ll expand on that in a little
while. He would get his first hit the
next day, going 2-3 with a walk in a 3-2 loss to the White Sox. His first home run would come on August 5th
off of Jim "Mudcat" Grant in a 7-3 loss to the Cleveland Indians. Overall for the 1959 season, he would finish
hitting .153 with a home run, one RBI, four runs scored and four walks vs. 15
strikeouts. He also committed six errors
in the field in 106 chances, (not so) good for a .943 for the shortstop.
Deciding he needed more seasoning (and still only 20 years
old), he was assigned to AAA Charleston for 1960. Versalles was a big believer in consistency,
again hitting .278, the same as he did in 1959 at Fox Cities. He also added 33 doubles, 12 triples and eight
home runs with 24 stolen bases. He was
called up again in September of that year, getting four hits in his first three
games back in the majors. Unfortunately,
in the last 12 games of the season, he was 2-33 (.061 average). Overall, he hit .133 with two doubles, four
RBIs and two walks vs. five strikeouts.
As bad as he was in the field the previous year, he was a little more not as good in
1960, as he fielded at a .935 clip.
In 1961, he would finally become a (mostly) full time player
as the Senators moved to Minneapolis. On Opening Day against the New York Yankees, Versalles went 2-5 with a run scored
and two stolen bases. That first month as
a regular, he would hit .314 and had seven stolen bases. Overall in 1961, he hit .280 with 25 doubles,
five triples, seven home runs and 16 stolen bases, with 25 walks and 61
strikeouts. His 30 errors committed at
shortstop in 129 games were tied for second in the league. The leader was the Kansas City
Athletics’ Dick Howser, who committed 38.
Versalles’ batting average in 1960 would unfortunately be the high water
mark for his career.
1962 would see Versalles finish 21st in the AL
MVP voting, when he hit .241 with 18 doubles, five triples, 17 home runs, 67
RBIs and five stolen bases with 37 walks and 71 strikeouts. He committed 26 errors that year, which was
actually the lowest total in any season of his career in which he was a
starter.
1963 would see him make the first of his two All Star Game
appearances, and he won the first of his two Gold Glove awards. It was also the first of three years in a row
where he would lead the league in triples.
Overall, he hit .261 with 31 doubles, 13 triples, 10 home runs, 54 RBIs
and seven stolen bases. It was also the
first of five years in a row where he would have 30+ errors.
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| I could stare at this all day. This is beautiful. |
Versalles had a decent season in 1964. He set a career high in home runs with 20,
and his 10 triples again led the league.
Overall, in addition to those numbers, he hit .259, with 33 doubles, 64
RBIs and 14 stolen bases, with 42 walks and 88 strikeouts. Versalles was one of six Twins that year that
hit 20 or more home runs, along with Harmon Killebrew (49), Bob Allison (32),
Tony Oliva (32), Jimmie Hall (25) and Don Mincher (23).
The 1965 Twins were American League champs, and Versalles
was a centerpiece of that team. He would
lead the AL in plate appearances, at bats, runs, doubles, triples, and total
bases (and strikeouts). He would earn
his second All Star Game appearance and Gold Glove award. Overall, on his way to the MVP award, he
would hit .273 with 45 doubles, 12 triples, 19 home runs, 126 runs scored and
27 stolen bases with 41 walks and 122 strikeouts. The Twins would go on to lose the World
Series in seven games to Sandy Koufax and the Los Angeles Dodgers. Koufax was a hard luck loser in Game 2, but
he threw a complete game shutout in Games 5 and 7, and the two runs the Dodgers
scratched across in the top of the fourth inning in Game 7 were all they needed to win
the series. Versalles' MVP award that year was
the first time a Latin American player ever won the award.
From there, the decline was swift for Versalles. In 1966, he hit .249 with 20 doubles, six
triples, seven home runs, 36 RBIs and 10 stolen bases with 40 walks and 85
strikeouts. Things were even worse the
next year, when he hit .200 with 16 doubles, seven triples, six home runs, 50
RBIs and five stolen bases with 33 walks and 113 strikeouts.
After the 1967 season, Versalles was traded with Mudcat
Grant to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Bob Miller, Ron Perranoski and John
Roseboro. The change of scenery didn’t
help, as he would only hit .196 with 16 doubles, three triples, two home runs,
24 RBIs and six stolen bases with 26 walks and 84 strikeouts. After the 1968 season, he was selected by the
newly formed San Diego Padres in the 1968 expansion draft. Six weeks later, he was sent to the Indians
as the player to be named later in an earlier deal that sent Bill Davis to the
Padres.
In a half season with the Indians in 1969, Versalles hit
.226 with 11 doubles, a triple, a home run, 13 RBIs and three stolen bases with
21 walks and 47 strikeouts. On July 26th,
he was purchased by the Senators, bringing him back to Washington, where he
would hit .267 with two doubles, a triple, six RBIs and a stolen base with
three walks and 13 strikeouts.
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| Grimsley wanted to make sure no one stole his glove. |
Before the 1970 season, he was released by the Senators, and
spent that season in the Mexican League.
He would return to the majors in 1971 with the Atlanta Braves, where he
would hit .191 with 11 doubles, five home runs, 22 RBIs and two stolen bases
with 11 walks and 40 strikeouts. His
last game of his career was on September 28th, 1991, where he would
go 1-3, getting his final hit off of the Reds’ Ross Grimsley in a Braves 4-0
victory. He was released by the Braves
in December 1971, ending his career at the age of 31.
For his career, Versalles hit .242 with 230 doubles, 63
triples, 95 home runs, 471 RBIs, 650 runs scored and 97 stolen bases with 318
walks and 810 strikeouts. His fielding
percentage for his career was .956, committing 284 errors (268 as a shortstop)
in 12 seasons.
After his career was over, Versalles struggled to adapt to
life outside of baseball. Chronic
injuries combined with a very limited lack of English didn’t help things. His house went into foreclosure and he was
forced to sell his MVP and Gold Glove awards along with his All Star
rings. Later, he suffered a couple of
heart attacks and had stomach surgery.
He passed away in June 1995, and was elected to the Twins Hall of Fame
in 2006.
I hope you learned a thing or two about Versalles, and
remember, no matter what your age, or how much you think you know about
baseball, there’s always something new to learn if you look hard enough.
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| Shocking. |
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