Elliott: Dave (The Cobra) Parker takes quick wit, quicker bat into Cooperstown Hall
Dave Parker, a one-time Toronto Blue Jay, was elected into the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, along with slugger Dick Allen.
December 26, 2024
By Bob Elliott
Canadian Baseball Network
The career of new Hall of Famer Dave Parker has a number of memorable highlights.
No one made fun of his line “When the leaves turn brown, I’ll be wearing the batting crown” line. That’s because he won the batting title in both 1977 and 1978 with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
At the 1979 all-star game in Seattle, he made a perfect throw from right field to catcher Gary Carter of the Montreal Expos, who tagged a sliding Brian Downing of the California Angels, keeping the score even at 6-6 in the eighth. Parker walked in the ninth as the Nationals scored the winning run, singled in a run and earned MVP honours.
Parker won the NL MVP in 1978 and his 1979 Pirates and the 1989 Oakland A’s won World Series titles.
Good memories and no doubt some will be shown in January when the rest of Cooperstown’s class of 2025 arrives ... same for induction day in July in upstate New York.
They are all excellent memories of Parker, elected to the Hall of Fame along with former Chicago White Sox and Philadelphia Phillies slugger Dick Allen, but I have three of my own ...
_ In 1980, the Montreal Expos visited Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. I forget who wrote the story in the Pittsburgh paper but it went something like this:
Hey if you aren’t doing anything the next three nights drop by Three Rivers Stadium.
The weather is supposed to be good, but the attraction is this guy in field.
He’s 6-foot-5, runs well and has a cannon for an arm.
I’m talking about a real big-time arm.
He’s a power hitter that general managers dream about locking up for long-term contracts.
His name is Ellis Valentine,
And oh yeah ... Dave Parker will be there too.
We read the paper at the Pittsburgh Hilton and wondered what pre-game fireworks there would be around the batting cage between Parker and the scribe. We didn’t see a thing ... until ...
Expos coach Billy DeMars began to hit one hoppers starting with Valentine in right. After Valentine’s second throw Parker emerged from the right field bullpen signaling to DeMars “‘c’om ... hit me one.”
Parker threw a strike to third base, then Valentine did the same. We looked outside the press box and fans were screaming to their friends on the concourse: something special was unfolding.
Finished throwing to third, Valentine and Parker then, took turns showing off their arms with strikes to the plate. The early-arriving fans -- maybe 3,500 were cheering each throw.
_ In 1983, I was covering the Montreal Expos during spring training in West Palm Beach. That year I made my third of six yearly Saturday trips to Bradenton, home of the Pirates. That’s because Doug Frobel (Ottawa, Ont.) who I had first seen with the 1977 Ottawa-Nepean Canadians seniors and again with the 1981 double-A Buffalo Bisons at Pirates camp.
We didn’t have a Sunday paper, so I would skip the Expos workout and drive to the other coast, spend the night and head home early Sunday.
Most years his locker was near Parker’s locker. This spring day I arrived at Frobel’s locker, but no Frobel. Parker asked, “You looking for Tyrone?”
“No sir, looking for Frobel,” I answered.
“Yeah, that’s him, don’t you think he looks like Tyrone Power?” Parker said. I knew who Power was -- a matinee idol from the movies, but I didn’t know, like Parker, Power, was from Cincinnati.
Frobel played 288 games in the big leagues and 11 seasons in the minors, but there was zero resemblance between the outfield and the actor.
_ In 1991, the Toronto Blue Jays added Parker as a bat off the bench on Sept. 14, a week after he was released by the California Angels. In those days, a beat writer from each paper had a seat on the team charter (We never understood how it worked, but if I remember it was a barter system: the writer from the paper gets a free seat, the paper gave the Jays free adds.)
Then president Paul Beeston asked me why I was watching on the TV from the lunchroom that Sunday afternoon. I explained how we had three seats in the press box, they were full and I didn’t have to write since I was on the charter. “Come sit in my box,” Beeston said.
Beeston sat to my left, his future Hall of Fame general manager Pat Gillick was to my right in line with home plate. The first-place Jays (81-62) had a 4 1/2 game lead over the Boston Red Sox in the American League East.
The Jays were losing 5-3 headed into the bottom of the seventh against Mike Moore when Greg Myers led off with a double and the wheels were spinning for manager Cito Gaston. Derek Bell took over at second base for Myers. Parker pinch-hit for shortstop Eddie Zosky.
PA announcer Murray Eldon told the crowd “Pinch hitting ... No. 39 ... Dave Parker.” The sellout crowd of 50,315 cheered and cheered ... a welcome to Toronto serenade. As I looked down from the 300 level, I noticed Gillick’s bottom lip quivering and tears flowing down his cheeks.
Parker singled to score Bell, putting the tying run on base. The crowd erupted and Gillick was sobbing again.
Gaston sent in Mookie Wilson to pinch-run for Parker and Parker lumbered off field to dugout high-fives and a third ovation in less than five minutes. Plus a third showing of tears from Gillick.
I turned to Beeston and whispered, “How often is your general manager like that? All this emotion for a guy playing his first game?”
Beeston replied: “Ah, he cries every time John Olerud gets a base hit.”
Olerud was Baseball America’s player of the year as a sophomore at Washington State and suffered a brain aneurysm. Gillick drafted Olerud in the third round in 1989. Gillick made nine trips to Seattle before making Olerud an offer and he went directly to the majors.
The A’s won that day after David Wells loaded the bases in the ninth and Jose Canseco hit a grand slam to finish the 10-5 A’s win.
And on December 8, 2024 in Dallas, Parker won. He was finally elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
“I’ve been waiting 15 years to give this speech,” Parker, who is suffering from Parkinson’s, told MLB Network. “I’ll be ready.”