Salvador Perez, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Shohei Ohtani enter the final days of an intriguing home run race reminiscent of another memorable battle 50 years ago.
The 1971 American League battle between Chicago White Sox third baseman Bill Melton, Oakland Athletics slugger Reggie Jackson and Detroit Tigers first baseman Norm Cash came down to the final day of the season, but Melton was the only one with a chance to win it.
“I had one game left to play in the daytime,” Melton recalled recently from his home in Arizona. “The other guys’ seasons were over.”
Melton took advantage of having the last at-bats, belting a solo home run in the third inning off Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Bill Parsons to win the AL crown on Sept. 30, 1971, becoming the first White Sox player to accomplish the feat.
Melton had been stuck on 30 home runs since Sept. 15 but hit two homers Sept. 29 to put him in touch of the AL title. Few were paying attention to him — or to the Sox for that matter. The ’71 team was in a rebuild that saw crowds of under 7,000 that month at old Comiskey Park, and the city’s focus remained on the Cubs two years removed from their infamous 1969 collapse.
The big story on the South Side that week involved a controversy emanating from a comment made by Stu Holcomb, the Sox’s executive vice president. Holcomb told reporters he wanted to make an offseason trade with the Cubs, mentioning shortstop Don Kessinger as his primary target. He was quickly deluged with letters from angry Sox fans.
“They say: ‘Don’t do anything to help the Cubs by sending them any of our players,’ ” Holcomb told the Tribune.
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Meanwhile, up in the Sox broadcast booth, Harry Caray was hoping for a late-season attendance surge, knowing a $10,000 bonus would be his to spend if the team drew 850,000. The Tribune’s In the Wake of the News columnist David Condon implored his readers to “rush to the White Sox Park this afternoon to help boost the crowd and send Harry to Sully’s Saloon.”
Yes, it was a different era, and no, I am not related to the owner of Sully’s Saloon.
On the penultimate day of the ’71 season, Sox manager Chuck Tanner inserted Melton into the leadoff spot against the Brewers to give him more at-bats. He homered in his first two at-bats to tie Jackson and Cash and give the Sox a 2-1 win before a crowd of 5,106. Knuckleballer Wilbur Wood won his 22nd game, finishing the season with a 1.91 ERA.
Instead of resting up for his shot at passing Jackson and Cash, Melton was taken out to dinner by catcher Ed Herrmann and a few other players who wanted to celebrate before they went home for the winter.
“They had to get me out of bed the next day because we were celebrating the night before on Rush Street,” Melton said. “Nothing new. In those days you didn’t think about leading the league in home runs. When it was all said and done, I was like, ‘Oh, I’m going to make a little more money here.’ “
Hung over and exhausted, Melton arrived at Comiskey on the morning of Sept. 30 and saw he was leading off again. He didn’t think the Brewers would give him anything to hit, but Parsons challenged Melton in his second at-bat and he lined it into the left-field stands for the home run title. Melton is unsure why they pitched to him.
“Maybe they didn’t like those other guys, you never know,” he said. “I know it wasn’t a cheap one. I came around third base and the guys in the dugout said, ‘Hey, you led the American League in home runs.’ I said, ‘OK.’
“I was hung over and it was a hot day playing on that AstroTurf (infield). The Sox felt that we could utilize the AstroTurf more than any other team with Wilbur Wood and our staff, and it worked just the opposite.”
Melton thought his day was over and threw his helmet into the crowd. He went back to the clubhouse before infielder Rich Morales told him to come back because the crowd of 2,814 still was cheering.
“I came back to the dugout and slipped and fell as I went up the steps to acknowledge the cheers,” Melton told reporters after the game.
He didn’t tell them he had spent the night on Rush Street.
A fan came to the clubhouse door to give Melton the home run ball. Melton handed him $50. The fan told him it was the 490th he had caught at a game at Comiskey and Wrigley Field. Melton asked him if he ever worked.
There was little fanfare outside Chicago. Melton said the only home run race that mattered in our town was the mythical one between him and Cubs third baseman Ron Santo, who hit 21 that season.
“Nobody really acknowledged who was leading the league,” Melton said. “You’d know it in your own clubhouse. The Sox got behind me, but mostly they were bragging about me in the South Side bars because I was beating Santo in home runs.
“That’s the way it was back them. It was Chicago baseball. The home run race was not a big deal.”
Melton’s homer was the 138th by the ’71 Sox, tying the club record set 10 years earlier. The current record is 242, set in 2004 at the new ballpark, then nicknamed “the Cell.” The Sox acquired slugger Dick Allen after the 1971 season, and Allen would go on to win the American League home run crown the next year and in ’74.
No Sox player has won a home run title since, leaving Melton and Allen in an exclusive club.
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