Remembering Richie Ashburn
Today marks what would have been the 97th birthday of Hall of Famer Richie Ashburn, baseball’s best center fielder in the 1950s not named Willie, Mickey or the Duke.
Ashburn spends the first 12 seasons of his Hall of Fame career in the majors with the Philadelphia Phillies from 1948-59.
He then plays two seasons with the Chicago Cubs before spending a final season in 1962 with the historically bad, expansion New York Mets.
During his time with the Phillies, Ashburn hits .311 in 1,794 games with a then-franchise record 2,217 hits, five All-Star Game selections and two National League batting titles.
No player in baseball during the decade of the 1950s has more hits than Ashburn’s 1,875 hits.
With the Mets in 1962
And no center fielder catches more fly balls during the ’50s than Ashburn, who nine times from 1949-58 leads all National League center fielders in putouts.
Ashburn remains a solid player in his final season in 1962 with the Mets, batting .306 in 135 games for New York and – at age 35 – being selected as their lone representative for the All-Star Game.
The Mets also name Ashburn their most valuable player for that inaugural season.
“MVP on the worst team ever?” Ashburn rhetorically asks. “I wonder what exactly they meant by that?”
The Philadelphia icon promptly retires after the 1962 season and spends the next three-plus decades as a Phillies' broadcaster before passing away in 1997 – two years after he enters baseball’s Hall of Fame.
Richie Ashburn in the Phillies broadcast booth with fellow Hall of Famer Harry Kalas