Infinite Cincinnati

1972 World Series: Game 4
CINCINNATI REDS @ OAKLAND ATHLETICS
OCTOBER 19, 1972
TIMELINE 31
GAME LOG
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E
Cincinnati Reds 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 2 10 3
Oakland Athletics 0 1 0 2 0 0 0 0 X 3 0 1
A's Win Game 4 Without a Hit: Walks, Errors Sink Gullett
The box score will require explanation for anyone who encounters it decades hence, because it contains a result that belongs less to baseball than to some Dadaist exhibition: Oakland 3, Cincinnati 2, and across the Athletics' line in the hit column, a zero — immaculate, absolute, and mocking. Not one hit. A team won a World Series game without managing a single base hit, and the 49,419 witnesses sat in the fifty-nine-degree October air watching it happen as if hallucinating collectively, watching Don Gullett issue walk after careful walk — seven in all, four of them strung together in the second inning like beads on a rosary, the last one to Holtzman himself forcing home Sal Bando with the gentlest of runs.

The 1906 White Sox earned their "Hitless Wonders" nickname across an entire summer, yet at least managed base hits when the World Series came. Bill Bevens took a no-hitter into the ninth in the '47 Series and lost — but that was a pitcher's masterwork undone. What unfolded here was stranger, almost philosophical: Oakland scoring three runs in the manner of a river finding its way around stones, through Morgan's error in the fourth, through Menke's wild throw that sailed past everyone with purpose, through yet another of Gullett's walks loading the bases for a force. Holtzman, meanwhile, absorbed Cincinnati's ten hits across his seven innings the way a levee absorbs a flood — bending everywhere, breaking nowhere, his earned-run column reading zero with the serenity of a man who understood that hits are merely requests, not demands.

The Reds' fury arrived in the eighth — Geronimo singled, Morgan singled, Tolan moved them along, and when Pérez's grounder skipped through Campaneris at short, two runs scored and the deficit narrowed to one fragile run. But Menke, who had already killed one rally with a double play, killed another with the same grim efficiency, and the air left the building in a single collective exhalation. In the ninth Concepción and Javier singled with two outs, and the old concrete bowl trembled with possibility — Morgan stepping in, the tying run ninety feet away — but the grounder went to short, and one was left to wonder whether, in some other arrangement of this same October evening, those ten Cincinnati hits might have found their way into runs.
CINCINNATI 1972 BATTING LINESCORE OAKLAND 1972 BATTING LINESCORE
Player AB R H RBI BB K LOB AVG HR RBI
J. Morgan 2B 5 1 1 0 0 0 2 .200 0 0
B. Tolan CF 3 0 2 0 0 0 0 .667 0 0
T. Perez 1B 4 0 1 0 0 0 2 .250 0 0
J. Bench C 3 0 2 0 1 0 1 .667 0 0
D. Menke 3B 4 0 0 0 0 1 5 .000 0 0
P. Rose Sr LF 4 0 0 0 0 1 0 .000 0 0
H. McRae RF 3 0 1 0 0 0 0 .333 0 0
b- J. Hague PH 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 0 0
D. Concepcion SS 4 0 1 0 0 1 1 .250 0 0
D. Gullett P 2 0 0 0 0 1 0 .000 0 0
E. Sprague Sr P 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 0 0
a- C. Geronimo PH 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 1.000 0 0
T. Hall P 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 0 0
c- J. Javier PH 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 1.000 0 0
Totals 35 2 10 0 1 4 11
a - C. Geronimo pinch hit for E. Sprague Sr in the 8th
b - J. Hague pinch hit for H. McRae in the 9th
c - J. Javier pinch hit for T. Hall in the 9th

BATTING
Doubles: B. Tolan (1, 6th Inning off K. Holtzman, 0 on, 1 out)
Total Bases: J. Bench 2 , B. Tolan 3 , T. Perez , J. Morgan , H. McRae , D. Concepcion , C. Geronimo , J. Javier
Runners left in scoring position, 2 outs: J. Bench , J. Morgan , D. Menke
GIDP: D. Menke 2
Sac Bunt: B. Tolan
Team LOB: 8

FIELDING
Errors: J. Bench , J. Morgan , D. Menke
Player AB R H RBI BB K LOB AVG HR RBI
B. Campaneris SS 3 0 0 0 1 0 3 .000 0 0
M. Alou RF 3 0 0 1 1 0 0 .000 0 1
J. Rudi LF 4 0 0 0 0 0 3 .000 0 0
S. Bando 3B 3 1 0 0 1 0 0 .000 0 0
D. Mincher 1B 3 1 0 0 1 0 0 .000 0 0
A. Mangual CF 3 0 0 0 1 3 1 .000 0 0
G. Tenace C 3 0 0 0 0 0 4 .000 0 0
D. Green 2B 2 1 0 0 1 1 3 .000 0 0
K. Holtzman P 2 0 0 1 1 0 1 .000 0 1
R. Fingers P 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .000 0 0
Totals 26 3 0 2 7 4 15
BATTING
2-out RBI: M. Alou , K. Holtzman
Runners left in scoring position, 2 outs: K. Holtzman , J. Rudi , B. Campaneris
Team LOB: 4

FIELDING
Errors: B. Campaneris
Double Plays: 2 (Campaneris-Green-Mincher, Green-Campaneris-Mincher)
CINCINNATI 1972 PITCHING LINESCORE OAKLAND 1972 PITCHING LINESCORE
Player IP H R ER BB K HR PI PS ERA
D. Gullett L (0-1) 5.0 0 3 1 7 2 0 89 46 1.80
E. Sprague Sr 2.0 0 0 0 0 1 0 15 13 0.00
T. Hall 1.0 0 0 0 0 1 0 19 15 0.00
PITCHING
Game Score: D. Gullett 54
Batters Faced: D. Gullett 24, E. Sprague Sr 6, T. Hall 3
Ground Outs - Fly Outs: D. Gullett 6-7, E. Sprague Sr 1-4, T. Hall 1-1
Pitches - Strikes: D. Gullett 89-46, E. Sprague Sr 15-13, T. Hall 19-15
Player IP H R ER BB K HR PI PS ERA
K. Holtzman W (1-0) 7.0 8 2 0 0 4 0 89 61 0.00
R. Fingers SV (1) 2.0 2 0 0 1 0 0 39 22 0.00
PITCHING
Game Score: K. Holtzman 61
Batters Faced: K. Holtzman 28, R. Fingers 9
Ground Outs - Fly Outs: K. Holtzman 8-8, R. Fingers 4-1
Pitches - Strikes: K. Holtzman 89-61, R. Fingers 39-22
Inherited Runners - Scored: R. Fingers 2-2
GAME NOTES
Player of the Game: Ken Holtzman
Ballpark: Oakland Coliseum
Weather: Partly Cloudy (59 degrees), wind blowing left to right at 9 mph
Start Time: 6:07 PM Pacific
Time: 2:59
Attendance: 49,419