Switching teams

The United States Marines announce plans 72 years ago today to add more pilots to its lineup for the Korean War.

Among the pilots on the Marines’ call-up list happens to be playing for another team at the moment.

That pilot is Ted Williams, the Boston Red Sox’s All-Star left fielder who previously serves in World War II flying both for the Navy and Marines.

This time, the Marines want Williams to fly jets in Korea, even though he lasts flies a plane in 1945.

Williams gets to open the 1952 season with the Red Sox, but plays in only six games before going back into the service.

Ted Williams in Korea

In Korea, Williams flies 39 combat missions, including one in which he crash lands his Grumman F9F Panther jet after it sustains heavy damage from anti-aircraft fire.

After missing nearly all of one season and most of a second, Williams returns to the Red Sox toward the end of the 1953 season.

In moments that are so, well, Williams-like in their nature, he homers in his final at-bat in 1952 before rejoining the Marines and then homers again for his first hit after returning to the Red Sox in August 1953.

Williams plays another seven seasons with the Red Sox before retiring after the 1960 season with a Hall of Fame resume that includes a .344 career batting average, 521 home runs, six American League batting titles, two Triple Crown seasons, two Most Valuable Player Awards, 19 All-Star Game selections and, of course, a first-ballot nomination to the Hall of Fame in 1966.

“I liked flying,” Williams later says. “It was the second-best thing that ever happened to me. If I hadn’t had baseball to come back to, I might have gone on as a Marine pilot.”

Williams’ distinguished service in Korea leads one member of his squadron to say he considers Williams to be a Marine aviator first, a ballplayer second.

“Ted flew as my wingman on about half the missions he flew in Korea,” Williams’ onetime wingman later says.

“(During his crash landing) he was on fire and had to belly land the plane back in. … It came up the runway about 1,500 feet before he was able to jump out and run off the wingtip. As much as I appreciate baseball, Ted to me will always be a Marine fighter pilot.”

Oh, Williams’ wingman in Korea?

That would be future NASA astronaut — and the first American to orbit the Earth — John Glenn.

Yeah, that John Glenn.

Ted Williams in Korea with his wingman, future NASA astronaut John Glenn