Running with J.R.

A friend and teammate remembers a gentle giant

Welcome to Warning Track Power, a weekly newsletter of baseball stories and analysis grounded in front office and scouting experiences and the personalities encountered along the way.

In 1980, Burger King partnered with Topps for the final time to create a “Collector’s Series” run of cards available only at the Home of the Whopper.

More than 40 years later, in the era of brand collaborations and accompanying buzzwords, I marvel at how ahead of their time those two institutions were. Large fries and a pack of baseball cards. Who says no to that?

It was those cards that introduced me to a pitcher who, in 1980, was coming off back-to-back 300+ strikeout seasons. Sadly, that pitcher — J.R. Richard — passed away last week at the age of 71.

While I was too young to appreciate the aura and majesty around Richard at the time, he was one of the first superstars of MLB that my father introduced me to. I remember being with my dad in the basement and watching Richard start the 1980 All-Star Game for the NL, just a few weeks before the pitcher tragically suffered a career-ending stroke. (Here’s some footage from his two scoreless innings in the Midsummer Classic.)

J.R. Richard was in elite company during the 1980 season.

Searching for stories about J.R. Richard, I called one of his best friends and former teammates, Scipio Spinks.

Scipio and I worked together with the Diamondbacks, and I always learned from his evaluations of pitchers. Now 74, Scipio is still involved in baseball, coaching the University of Houston-Downtown club team.

“Where do you want me to start,” Scipio asks with a laugh.

“I might have been the very first person to see him in his very first Spring Training,” he says of Richard, who was selected second overall in the 1969 June Draft.

“I was warning up on the mound, and, at the time, the warmup mounds were by the clubhouse looking directly at the parking lot.” Scipio paints a quick but concise picture of the Astros complex in Cocoa Beach, Florida, explaining that all the players lived in a rotunda-style dormitory. (The third photo on this Houston Chronicle page gives a pretty good feel of the vibe.)

“I saw this figure literally folding out of the car, and said, ‘Who in the hell is that?’”

I think that’s our new #1 draft choice, J.R. Richard.

“What is he?” Scipio asked his teammate, marveling at how his waist was even with the top of the car.

A pitcher.

“Oh shit.”

As the laughter quiets, Scipio settles in. “J and I go back a long way. We became friends from that Spring Training. We finally got together as teammates in Oklahoma City in Triple-A [in 1971]. I can remember a night, we both were pitching in a doubleheader in Oklahoma City. I pitched the first game; J had the second game.”

Scipio explains that, at one point, he was concerned about the runner on first stealing, so he quick-pitched the batter. The pitch — a fastball — caught the batter flush in the helmet. The batter dropped straight to the ground and was removed for a pinch runner.

Game 2 was J.R.’s start. In a move that would never happen today, the batter who was beaned by Scipio was back in the lineup. Concussion? What cusscontion!

Well, it wasn’t that guy’s day. In Scipio’s words, J.R. “just smoked him.”

“It was accidental,” Scipio explains. “Both J and I were really wild in those days.”

“The batter goes down like he was hit by Muhammad Ali, and he didn’t move,” Scipio says. The player had to be removed on a stretcher, during which time the Oklahoma City team retreated to their dugout.

Back in the dugout, Scipio found his friend. “J, you killed him,” he deadpanned, increasing the young pitcher’s fear over what he had just done. Scipio recalls J.R. shaking out of trepidation and panic, and nervously muttering, “Oh no! Oh no!”

“Wait,” Scipio interrupted. “I see his foot moving.”

“Scipio, I will kill you,” the rattled pitcher quickly snapped.

Scipio laughs, but breaks from the story to explain that J.R. was a gentle giant. “There were times that I thought he was going to break somebody’s neck, but he would give that giant grin and just walk away. He was the other side of Bob Gibson.”

Scipio and J.R. were both called up to the big leagues in September 1971. In J.R.’s debut, on September 5th at Candlestick Park against the Giants, he struck out 15 in a complete game victory.

“I remember distinctly,” Scipio says, “Mays walked up to J and said, ‘Young man, don’t hit me.’”

“I’ll try not to,” the rookie pitcher replied.

J.R. honored the request — and fanned Mays three times in that game.

Off the field, Scipio remembers fishing trips on Lake Livingston, about 90 miles north of Houston.

“He had a fishing boat with two-horsepower turbo motors. We’re not fishing; we’re flying through the water. To this day, all I know was the bottom of the boat was in the water and the top of the boat was in the air. I couldn’t tell you how we made it out of that water. That’s J.R. Richard.”

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