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Bases Loaded, Part 13:
The History of the Los Angeles Kings
by Chris Oakley
Adapted from material previously posted at Othertimelines.com

Summary:

In the first twelve chapters of this series we recalled William Randolph Hearst’s creation of the Continental League and the Los Angeles Kings; the 1935 CL-MLB merger and subsequent MLB reorganization; the Kings’ postseason triumphs and heartbreaks in the late ‘30s and the firing of manager Al Bridwell after they lost the 1940 World Series; the Kings’ spectacular 1941 season; L.A.’s World War II doldrums on the diamond; the Los Angeles postwar resurgence which led to World Series victories against the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947 and the Boston Braves in 1948; the heartbreak of their 1949 ALCS defeat; their collapse in the home stretch of the 1950 baseball season; Hearst’s death late in the 1951 season; the retirement of “California Clipper” Joe DiMaggio; the return of Al Bridwell as Kings manager in 1952; the Kings’ epic playoff runs of the mid-1950s; the uproar among Kings fans over Dodger owner Walter O’Malley’s decision to move his team from Brooklyn to southern California in 1957; O’Malley’s purchase of land in the San Fernando Valley for a new Dodgers home field; the Kings’ remarkable run to the 1958 World Series championship; the evolution of Purple & Gold right-hander Don Drysdale into one of the best starting pitchers in MLB history; the Purple & Gold’s heartbreaking collapse in the final weeks of the 1959 MLB season; the Kings’ return to the postseason in 1960 ; L.A. outfielder’s outfielder Mickey Mantle’s highly memorable 1961 home run race with New York Yankees slugger Roger Maris; the Kings’ 1961 ALCS showdown with the Yankees; and their 1961 World Series triumph over the Cincinnati Reds.

In this chapter we’ll remember L.A.’s 1962 season and the run-up to the Kings’ clash with the Dodgers in the 1963 World Series..

The first game of the 1962 MLB season saw the largest Opening Day crowd to grace Hearst Palladium since the death of Kings founding father William Randolph Hearst nearly eleven years earlier. The roar that greeted the unfurling of L.A.’s 1961 World Series championship pennant was, according to one Los Angeles Examiner sportswriter, “loud enough to be heard in Las Vegas”¹. And when Orlando Cepeda drove the second pitch of the young season deep into right field for a standing triple, it seemed like there was almost nothing Harry Hooper and his players couldn’t do. Even before spring training was over, some fans were already predicting the Purple & Gold would repeat as World Series
champs.

And few would have been inclined to question the accuracy of such predictions after the Kings racked up a 5-2 victory over the Kansas City Longhorns to kick off the season and racked up nine wins in their next ten games. Indeed, some particularly optimistic members of L.A.’s baseball fandom were even daring to anticipate the possibility of a Los Angeles sweep in the ’62 ALCS. When the Kings registered a six-run shutout of the Houston Athletics in their first road trip of the young season, the question seemed to be less if they could win the ’62 World Series than how they would do it and who their National League victims would be this time around.

The Purple & Gold were brought crashing back to earth with a brutal doubleheader loss against the Chicago White Sox at Comiskey Park on May 6th, getting shutout 3-0 in the first game and blowing a 5-4 lead late in the second game to end up losing that one 7-6. It was the second defeat that particularly stung for Los Angeles fans:

Orlando Cepeda had been at bat with the bases loaded and two outs and hit what at first looked like a game-winning single only to have Chicago third baseman Al Smith snag the ball with a diving catch to his left and then turn a seemingly impossible force play down at home plate to snuff out the Kings’ last hopes for salvaging a split of the doubleheader.

The next thing they knew the Kings had fallen into a decline and were trailing both of their two biggest division rivals, Kansas City and San Francisco, in the AL West standings while at the same time the Athletics were breathing down L.A.’s neck as Houston went on a torrid home winning streak. Dreams of sweeping the 1962 ALCS and winning the ’62 World Series began to fade into mist as Los Angeles fought simply to keep its collective head above water. A slump like this in May was bad enough as far as Harry Hooper and his men were concerned; one or more these dry spells in June would be that much worse. And if the Purple & Gold were still struggling when July came around...well, there wouldn’t be very much need for the team’s ticket office to be open for business in October.

******

It was a desperate Kings team that arrived at Fenway Park in Boston in early June for their first East Coast road trip of the ‘62 MLB season. Carl Yastrzemski, a former Long Island resident who had succeeded Ted Williams as Red Sox left fielder during the previous year, was turning out to be every bit as much of a Kings-killer at the plate and in the outfield as Williams had been; not surprisingly, the Los Angeles pitching staff greeted the idea of having to pitch to him with all the enthusiasm of Moby Dick encountering Captain Ahab for the first time.

The first game of the Boston series didn’t do very much to make L.A.’s starters any more eager to face Yaz. The Sox outfielder went 3 for 4 against the Kings at the plate, including two home runs and four RBIs; he also gave them fits on defense, twice robbing the Los Angeles lineup of what would have been homers or extra base hits in most other ballparks and throwing Felipe Alou out at third late in the eighth inning to kill a potential Purple & Gold rally. Yastrzemski’s clutch play was a vital ingredient in Boston’s 7-1 victory over the hapless Kings and set the tone for the second game of the series, a three-run Boston shutout of Los Angeles.

Were it not for the one-hit gem pitched by Don Drysdale in the third game of the Fenway set, the Red Sox might well have swept the series; as it was, L.A. barely managed to salvage a split. And the road didn’t get any easier for the Kings to hoe as they traveled to New York for a three-game string with the Yankees-- in fact, it was about to get even harder as Mickey Mantle was sidelined by injuries yet again. Like a boxer setting up his opponent for the knockout blow, the Bronx Bombers adjusted their game strategies to take advantage of Mantle’s absence. Roger Maris, still struggling with the psychological consequences of his home run duel with Mantle the previous season and the Yanks’ 1961 ALCS loss to the Kings, seemed visibly relieved about not having to cope with the Mick; he batted .527 during the trifecta, including four home runs(one of which was a grand slam that clinched a nine-run shutout win for the Bronx Bombers in the series finale).

By the time the All-Star break arrived the Kings were mired in fourth place in the AL West division standings, and to many observers on the West Coast baseball scene it looked like Harry Hooper’s second stint as L.A. manager might soon end in the same bitter way that his first one had. Back-to-back home losses against the Cleveland Indians in the first week after the break ended didn’t do too much to reassure Hooper about his job security. But in early August, the Purple & Gold started to turn their fortunes around with an extra innings comeback victory over the Baltimore Orioles and a 4-1 pasting of the Athletics in Houston.

In mid-August the Kings overtook the Prospectors in the AL West standings and began to close the gap on the Longhorns. By September 3rd only two and a half games stood between Los Angeles and the top of the division; when Mantle returned to action in the second game of a road stage against the White Sox at Comiskey Park, it seemed like the Purple & Gold just needed one more little push over the cliff to make it into the 1962 ALCS. Unfortunately for Kings fans, it was precisely at this point the team went off the rails once and for all -- the White Sox hammered L.A. mercilessly in the finale of that series, sparking a nine-game skid that allowed San Francisco to catch up with, and then pass, the Kings in the heat of the stretch drive.

By the final week of the regular season Los Angeles was firmly entrenched in third place, leaving Harry Hooper and his players with little to do except watch from a distance as Kansas City duked it out with San Francisco for the AL West division title; the Prospectors won the division crown by sweeping back-to-back games at Prendergast Park against the Longhorns in the last three days of the season. Dismayed that his club wouldn’t be making a return trip to the World Series, a glum Harry Hooper declined all interview requests after the Kings’ MLB regular season finale(a 5-2 loss against the Baltimore Orioles) and strongly considered resigning his post; it took a number of hours on the phone with the Hearsts to convince Hooper to return as manager for the ’63 season.

******

Orlando Cepeda started what would turn out to be his last year in a Kings uniform struggling in the minors. He’d finished the 1962 season locked in the throes of a hitting slump, and that slump still plagued him as the ’63 campaign rolled around. It didn’t exactly take Nostradamus to predict such troubles with run production would make it difficult if not impossible for the Kings to even get into the World Series again, much less win it. With that in mind, the Hearst family had recommended Hooper send the Baby Bull to Bakersfield to see if he could get his groove back.

By the time Cepeda rejoined the parent team in early May, the Kings were tied with San Francisco for second place in the AL West and only a cat’s whisker behind the White Sox for first place in the divisional standings. Cepeda’s revitalized swing helped get the Purple& Gold over the top; Los Angeles gained sole possession of first place on May 18th with a doubleheader sweep of the Indians in Cleveland, and as May faded into June the Kings were four games ahead of Chicago in the division pennant race. An 8-1 home stretch during the second half of June helped stretch Los Angeles’ division lead to seven games, and by the 4th of July L.A. was sitting atop a comfortable ten-game cushion in the AL West standings.

On the afternoon of July 9th, 1963 Stan Musial came to bat in the fourth inning of the ’63 MLB All-Star Game for the final All-Star appearance of his storied career. Musial went out with the proverbial bang, thumping an RBI single off Cubs pitcher Larry Jackson; the hit zipped straight past the outstretched glove of rookie Cincinnati Reds second baseman Pete Rose, who would join and later surpass Musial on the all-time MLB hit leaders list. When the regular season resumed on July 12th, Musial added yet another page to his already immense career resumé by hitting for the cycle in a nine-run Los Angeles shutout of the Tigers in Detroit.

By mid-August the question wasn’t so much if or when the Kings would clinch the AL West as where they would be playing when the magic moment happened. As it turned out, they would be at Memorial Stadium in Baltimore in the midst of their final road trip of the ’63 regular season when they defeated the Orioles 7-5 to secure the division crown and an ALCS rematch against the Yankees. While the 1963 NLCS was for the most part an anticlimactic affair which saw the NL West champion Dodgers crush the NL East champion Cardinals² three games to one, the American League playoffs were a nerve-racking chess match where three of the first four games of that series would come down to the final
at-bat-- and two of those three would be decided on the final pitch.

The outcome of the ’63 ALCS was hanging in the balance all the way to the top of the ninth inning of Game 5, when Dean Chance came out of the bullpen to relieve Bill Monboquette with Los Angeles ahead 4-2 and Yankee runners on first and second with one out. The fate of the Kings rested on Chance’s shoulders as Elston Howard came to the plate for New York trying to avenge the Bronx Bombers’ ALCS demise two seasons earlier. It was a classic baseball example of the irresistible force vs. the immovable object.

The irresistible force won; Chance struck out Howard on three straight fastballs, then retired Roger Maris on a force play at second base to end the game and the ALCS. When the final out was recorded by the first base umpire, euphoria broke out among baseball fans all over southern California-- and not just Kings supporters either. The Purple& Gold’s ’63 ALCS victory meant an all-Los Angeles World Series, which in turn signaled that the dream of a Koufax vs. Drysdale Fall Classic pitchers’ duel was on the verge of finally becoming reality. Tickets for the 1963 World Series started to sell out literally at the second Game 5 of the ALCS was over. By 5:30 AM L.A. time the next morning, just twelve hours after the first pitch of the ALCS finale was thrown, not only were all the tickets for the first two World Series games at Hearst Palladium gone but most of the tickets for Games 3 and 4 over at Dodger Stadium were sold out too. Ticket demand reached the point where Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley actually considered asking then- MLB commissioner Ford Frick to have all subsequent Series games moved to the L.A. Coliseum to accommodate the overflow.

******

Once it was confirmed that both Series contestants would be from Los Angeles, the inevitable trash-talking between Dodger fans and King fans got underway. From the time the Bums had first tangled with the Purple & Gold back in 1941, when the Dodgers were still calling Ebbets Field home, Kings fans had seldom if ever passed up the opportunity to vent their contempt for the sons of Walter O’Malley; the war of words had only escalated once the Dodgers officially confirmed after the end of the 1957 season they’d be moving from Brooklyn to California. And now that the two franchises were practically next-door neighbors, the verbal assaults preceding their latest Series clash promised to take the long-running Dodgers-Kings postseason feud to a whole new level...

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