Tiger Untamed

He stands with a permanent lopsided slouch, his left shoulder 1 in. higher than his right. He peers out at the world through one clear contact lens and one that is blue-tinted; he is simply too lazy to replace the other half of either pair. He is a Pepsi-Cola addict, but insists that he has kicked the habit: he drinks only ten 16-oz. bottles a day now instead of 15. He likes to read about J. Paul Getty, because he is so rich, and his hero is Frank Sinatra, "because he doesn't give a damn about anything."

Every day, in every way, Dennis Dale McLain, 24, works overtime to bolster his growing reputation as an antic oddball. But out of his restless energy he has also managed to build another kind of record entirely. When he is not cracking wise or acting up, Denny McLain throws baseballs for the Detroit Tigers. In a summer when pitchers are dominating the big-league game, Denny is, in fact, dominating the pitchers. A few fans still call him "Super Flake" or "Mighty Mouth," but the sneers stop when he steps up on the mound. This season, as never before, Denny has been putting his muscle where his mouth is.

The Tigers' star righthander has started 36 games, finished 25, struck out 243 batters and allowed just 64 earned runs, or an average of 1.95 per nine-inning game. Last week, against the Minnesota Twins, he scattered nine hits, struck out twelve, and coasted to an 8-3 victory--his 28th of the year against only five losses. With perhaps five starts still ahead of him, McLain has already surpassed the best single-season performances of Carl Hubbell, Bob Feller, Warren Spahn, Whitey Ford and Sandy Koufax. No one has approached his performances in 16 years, and just two more victories will make him the first 30-game winner since Dizzy Dean turned the trick in 1934. These figures may make Denny baseball's man of the year. In Detroit, they have made him the man of the quarter-century--a civic hero whose strong right arm is pointing the Tigers toward their first American League pennant in 23 long years.

Pennant Fever. Still scarred by last summer's riots, still suffering from the divisive effects of a 267-day newspaper strike that all but paralyzed the town, Detroit these days is diverted by the exhilarating symptoms of a raging case of pennant fever. The very idea of getting into the World Series once again has temporarily brightened everything. Fights may still erupt during discussions of such volatile topics as race relations, religion or politics. But talking about Tiger successes is absolutely uncontroversial. September's mood is a reflection of the relief expressed by the Detroit News after the Tigers' last pennant: "Again this fall, when a mass neurosis settled on us and the whole town seemed gripped by a home front battle fatigue in which energies went limp, tempers shortened and all reason fled, the athletes came through. We needed a miracle, and this the Tigers--bless them--provided."

Now, at the busy intersection of Trumbull and Michigan Avenues, long lines of fans trying to buy their way into sold-out Tiger Stadium spill over the sidewalk into the street. Signs in store fronts all over town exhort: "Sock it to 'em, Tigers!" In the J. L. Hudson Co.'s six metropolitan department stores, "Tiger Shops" are doing a brisk business in tiger meat (the real thing) and "tiger" everything else. "Action Line," the ombudsman column of the Detroit Free Press, is being deluged with 30 requests a day from "little old ladies" seeking World Series tickets.

Even with each game that the Tigers lose, the town's fever barely cools. Every fan knows, after all, that the best of teams can crack under late-season pressure. The Tigers themselves have blown big leads and folded in the stretch run before. But this season the team and the town are supremely confident. Most of that confidence is based on the oaken endurance and the impish excellence of Denny McLain.

Endless Quarrel. The confidence is well placed. A look at this year's leading hitters is an eloquent reminder of how good Denny and the other top pitchers really are. Only five men in the majors are batting .300. Boston's Carl Yastrzemski, No. 1 in the American League, has a .290 average and faces the dubious distinction of becoming baseball's first sub-.300 batting champion. In 1961, a year when the sluggers controlled the game, 18 players batted .300 or better and 2,730 home runs went into the record book. This season's home-run output: 1,772.

Frustrated batters quarrel endlessly over the reasons for baseball's power failure. San Francisco's Willie Mays, a lifetime .309 hitter who is now batting .279, blames the anemic averages on umpires. He is sure that they are "making the strike zone bigger." Other batsmen have other bugaboos: the physical strain of coast-to-coast travel, the bushel-basket-size gloves used by today's fielders, the visual vicissitudes of night baseball, the distant fences in modern ballparks. "You got at least two parks in our league that ought to be outlawed," grouses St. Louis Cardinal Outfielder Curt Flood. "In San Francisco, the wind blows 90 m.p.h. in your face. In Los Angeles, the park is so big you got to play golf--hit the ball, go get it and hit it again." Houston Second Baseman Joe Morgan, on the other hand, insists that slumping hitters have no one but themselves to blame: "They continue to wait for their pitches instead of making the most of what's thrown them."

Atlanta Catcher Joe Torre explains it all in one word: "Pitchers." There are too many good ones, he says. "Each team used to have only one or two good pitchers, and you could expect to face second-liners, in doubleheaders at least. Now each team has six or so good ones." Richie Allen, leftfielder of the Philadelphia Phillies, agrees: "There are more good pitchers today, quite a few more. And they have a better idea of how to move the ball around, how to make a batter get himself out." They do indeed. Before this week is out, National League pitchers are likely to break the alltime season shutout record of 164, set way back in 1908, when the game was played with a dead ball doctored with everything from spit to slippery elm. In 1961, the year when all those hitters were belting the seams off the ball, there were only three pitchers in the majors with an earned-run average under 3.00. This year there are 59. None of them can boast a won-lost record that comes close to Denny McLain's, but their performances nonetheless have been spectacular.

Veterans and Rookies. For St. Louis fans, there is no one like the Cardinals' Bob Gibson, 32. Hero of last year's World Series against the Boston Red Sox, Gibson leads the National League in strikeouts this year (with 230), has pitched twelve shutouts, and run up a 20-7 record. "Bob challenges the hitter more than any other pitcher," says Cardinal Catcher Tim McCarver. "He just gets out there and says, 'O.K., baby, here comes the big one. What are you going to do about it?' " The Los Angeles Dodgers' Don Drysdale, 32, labors for a ball club mired in last place, 251 games off the pace. But he has still compiled a 14-12 record, and this June he broke Walter Johnson's 55-year-old mark of 56 consecutive scoreless innings. He obviously has something on the ball. Nobody is quite sure what, although there is suspicion in some quarters that, whatever it is, it may be moist and illegal.

The San Francisco Giants' Juan Marichal, 30, is another distinguished veteran. He claims a wide repertory of 13 pitches, all of which he can throw with great accuracy. Says Giant Pitching Coach Larry Jansen: "If you put up a six-inch target 60 feet away, Juan would hit it nine out of ten times." This year marks the fifth season that Marichal has won at least 20 games; his 25-7 mark is second only to McLain's. By contrast, Baltimore's Dave McNally, 25, makes do with only three pitches--fastball, curve and a slider that he perfected just last spring--yet he has put together eleven straight victories since last July's All-Star break. Then there is the Cleveland Indians' Luis Tiant, 27. A hard-luck hurler in 1967, he lost seven games by one run and finished with a 12-9 record. "If I am lucky," says Luis, "I kill them." This year he has been lucky, winning 19 out of 28 decisions.

Along with those old pros, the Year of the Pitcher has spawned a flock of superlative youngsters. Graduates of the Little League, the Pony League, the Babe Ruth League, the American Legion League, they were poised and polished pitchers by the time they broke into the majors. Baltimore's Jim Hardin, 25, has already won 17 games in his first full big-league season, and even the lowly New York Mets boast a couple of budding superstars in 25-year-old Jerry Koosman (17-10) and 23-year-old Tom Seaver (14-9). "Pitchers never used to mature until they were 27 or 28," says Manager Walter Alston of the Los Angeles Dodgers. "Sandy Koufax was 27 when he first won 20 games in a season; Whitey Ford was all of 32."

Gift of God. It all happens sooner now. Denny McLain is only 24. And not since blue-bearded Sal Maglie, who used to point his glove like a pistol at the batter's heart during his follow-through, has there been an angrier, more arrogant or more confident man on the mound. A chunky, 5-ft. 11-in. 190-pounder, McLain stands there stiff-backed, briefly fingering the resin bag before throwing it violently to the ground. Like a high-school wise guy, he tilts his cap so far down over his eyes that he has to cock his head back to see the catcher's signs. Then, with the barest hint of a nod, Denny is ready to pitch. He squirts a stream of spittle out of his mouth, the left corner of his upper lip curls back in a sneer, his hands come slowly together at his chest. Suddenly he wheels to the right, rears back and throws. If it is a strike, McLain licks his teeth with obvious satisfaction. Back comes the ball from the catcher and, as if bored with the very sight of the batter, McLain turns away from the plate.

More often than not, Denny's second pitch is identical to the first. So is the third. He delights in tweaking danger by the nose just for the sheer, perverse fun of it. An opponent who hits a home run off McLain's fastball will probably get another hummer the next time he comes to bat. Denny is always anxious to prove that any hit was a fluke.

Although his arsenal includes a slider, a medium-speed curve and a jug-handle changeup as well as a fastball--all of which he can deliver either overhand, three-quarter-arm or sidearm--McLain's main assets are speed and control. Cuteness and cunning are foreign to him: he rarely wastes a pitch, and he does not try to sucker batters into swinging at bad balls. "Control is God-given," Denny claims. "Like a good arm. You don't develop it, and I thank God He gave me both." Last month, in a typical McLain display of power and accuracy, Denny fired seven straight fastballs at Carl Yastrzemski, Boston's batting champ. Every one of them was a strike, and Yastrzemski only postponed the inevitable by fouling off four pitches before he went down swinging. Says Umpire Ed Runge: "I don't think McLain ever throws anything but a strike intentionally."

Keyboard and Diamond. On and off the field, McLain has been tackling all comers with careless abandon ever since he was an eighth-grader in suburban Markham, Ill., and refused to wear the blue uniform tie prescribed by the Roman Catholic sisters at Ascension grade school. As Denny tells it: "Ten days or so before graduation, I decided I wasn't going to wear that goddam blue bow tie any more. So I ripped it off, and Sister said, 'Put that tie back on,' and I said, "I'll be damned if I'll put it on.' Well, she called my parents and they came to school to get me. My father took me home and beat the living hell out of me with his belt. That's the worst beating I ever got." It was not the last. And there were plenty of near misses. Denny still remembers nervously the day when he was only twelve and "borrowed" one of the family cars. It ran out of gas, and he pushed it all the way home. He barely got it back in the garage before his father walked into the house. "If he had caught me," says McLain with a reminiscent shudder, "I wouldn't be alive today."

An insurance adjuster who picked up extra cash by giving electric-organ lessons on the side, the heavy-handed elder McLain was a semipro shortstop in his youth. He started Denny on his lessons early--both at the keyboard and on the diamond. Denny had trouble deciding which he liked best, the organ or baseball. "He'd be having a game in the park across the street," his mother remembers, "and he'd call Time!' and run into the house and play a couple of songs on the organ. Everybody would have to wait for him, and he'd play so loud they all could hear him." Says Denny: "I practiced on that organ every night. Sure, I knew a lot of people thought it was a sissified thing to do, and I beat up a lot of guys who said it out loud."

When he was not playing the organ, Denny was playing ball. By the time he was eight, he was the star pitcher for a Little League team in Markham, blazing them past kids three and four years older. He still brags about his record. "Nobody could hit me. I was too fast." No one could catch him either. "I'd throw the ball to my brother Tim, and he used to fall down," says Denny! "He was only four feet five inches tall."

After graduating from Ascension (with bow tie firmly in place), McLain went on to Mt. Carmel High, Chicago's "Little Notre Dame." Father Ben Hogan, a former English teacher at Mt. Carmel, remembers Denny well: "He had a lot of trouble keeping his mouth shut." And he was no whiz in the classroom, although he managed to maintain a C average. Denny insists that he was really better than that. "I went to school like I pitch," he says. "I am as good as I want to be. I could study 20 minutes and pass a test. Or I could pass without studying. I'll bet I didn't crack twelve books in four years."

All through his time at Mt. Carmel, Denny really majored in baseball--although he did try his hand briefly at basketball. "I was an average player," he says with rare modesty, "but the sport did not impress me. I didn't like to be coached. All I ever wanted to do was shoot." Heeding his father's advice to "just throw hard and fast, no curve balls," McLain became a schoolboy pitching sensation at Mt. Carmel, winning 38 games for the school team and losing only seven. On the side, he played in as many as five or six organized leagues simultaneously. "A lot of it was probably against the rules," says Father Hogan. "But baseball was Denny's whole life. When he first came to Mt. Carmel, he had to fill out a counseling form. On the line that asked what he wanted to be, he wrote: 'A major league baseball player.' " Father Hogan and Denny's other teachers tried to get McLain to go to college on an athletic scholarship. But the boy's mind was made up. No sooner had he graduated in 1962 than Denny signed with the Chicago White Sox for a $17,000 bonus. And no sooner did he get his bonus check than he blew a chunk of it on a flashy new Pontiac convertible.

Something Back Home. First stop as a pro was the White Sox Class D Appalachian League farm club in Harlan. Ky. (pop.: 4,000). Denny stayed only three weeks, but that was enough time for him to stand the town on its ear. In his very first game, he pitched a no-hitter. He also began setting records with his mouth, sounding off on his impressions of Harlan. He called the town "hick" and complained loudly about the lack of private toilet facilities in his hotel. For his own sake as well as the team's, the White Sox shipped McLain off to Clinton, Iowa.

"Ah, Clinton!" recalls Denny fondly. "That's where I got into big trouble. I quit the club. I jumped it four or five times that season. I had something going back home." Each jump cost him a $100 fine, levied by Clinton Manager Ira Hutchinson, who pressed a bridge toll collector into service to pass the word whenever McLain crossed over on his way to Chicago. The "something" Denny had going in those days may have been pretty, dark-haired Sharyn Boudreau, daughter of former Cleveland Indian Player-Manager Lou Boudreau. To hear Denny tell it, he first met Sharyn when he was 15. He struck out during a Babe Ruth League game and angrily flung his bat into the stands, hitting Sharyn on the leg. He apologized, says Denny, and romance blossomed. Sharyn says the missile was a ball, not a bat. And it hit her on the arm, not the leg. Such minor differences have bothered neither storyteller, and today Sharyn is Mrs. McLain.

Despite his transgressions at Harlan and Clinton and his 5-8 record as a rookie pro, McLain came within one run of making it all the way to the White Sox in the spring of 1963. Unable to choose between Denny and another promising young pitcher, Bruce Howard, Chicago Manager Al Lopez decided to let them fight it out in an intrasquad game. Howard won 2-1 and got the job; McLain was put on waivers and claimed by Detroit for a piddling $8,000, an indignity that triggered the terrible McLain temper. He still gets mad when he thinks about it: "Isn't that a hell of a way to make a decision --on the basis of one ball game?" Denny was still fuming when he was called up from a farm club to pitch for Detroit in September 1963. In Tiger Stadium on Sept. 21, he made his major-league debut--against the Chicago White Sox. A few days before the game, Detroit Manager Chuck Oressen took Denny aside, and in a few short minutes of instruction taught him how to throw a curve. Thus armed, McLain mowed down the hated White Sox 4-3, striking out eight batters and aiding his own cause with a home run.

Back trouble and a proclivity for serving up home-run balls kept Denny a so-so pitcher for the next two years. Then, in mid-June of 1965, he was called in from the bullpen to relieve against the Boston Red Sox. McLain suddenly found what he calls "my rhythm, my groove." He struck out seven straight hitters to tie an American League record. He went on to win eight games in a row, and wound up the year with a mark of 16-6.

Mutual Irritation. McLain has not had a losing season since. He was 20-14 in 1966, 17-16 last year. But if he had matured on the mound, he still had his problems off it. It was a regular occurrence for an angry McLain to bash his eyeglasses against the dugout wall (which is one reason why he now wears contacts). In Baltimore, when he was taken out of a game, he threw the ball at his manager and tossed his glove at the dugout. His control that day was so bad that the ball sailed over the dugout roof and into the stands.

Denny's relations with his teammates became strained, particularly after he was quoted by a newspaper as calling the Tigers a "country-club ball team." He vigorously denied ever making the remark: "And may God strike me with a lightning bolt if that isn't true." Denny's traveling roommate, Pitcher Joe Sparma, promptly requested new accommodations, "just in case the Almighty should make a mistake and get the wrong man."

With Detroit's general manager, Jim Campbell, Denny established what he described as a "mutual-irritation society," which was largely a result of the pitcher's propensity for popping off about Tiger Stadium, Detroit fans, his teammates--and just about anything that came to mind. Denny became so annoying that after Detroit lost the 1967 pennant by one game, rumor had it that he was on the trading block.

That was last year. "I've grown up a lot this season," says Denny. For one thing, he has learned to put a muzzle on his mouth or at least to temper his cracks. He still insists that "Tiger Stadium is the worst in the league," but now, instead of simply railing that "Detroit fans are the worst I've ever seen," he is careful to limit his complaint to "some" Detroit fans. Even so, he has been belligerent enough to inspire one of those fans to wire a smoke bomb to the engine of Sharyn's car. The bomb was a dud, but it blew the lid off Denny's volcanic temper once again. Says Denny with solemn intensity: "If I ever catch the man who did that, I'll kill him."

Denny means what he says. But before he could carry out such a threat, he would have a whole platoon of buffers to contend with. Now that the going is good, he is surrounded by a public relations man, a business agent, a lawyer and an accountant--all devoted to protecting him from himself. They are necessary. Fame has brought Denny fortune--and constant problems. At home, the phone is forever ringing with calls from people pleading with him to visit their store, appear at their nightclub, endorse their product. On the road, Denny's current roommate, Shortstop Ray Oyler, has taken to answering the phone: "Mr. McLain's office." Denny is already scheduled for post-season appearances, playing the organ on the Ed Sullivan Show and at the Riviera Hotel in Las Vegas. Capitol is preparing a record album by the Denny McLain Quintet, with Denny playing such standards as Lonely Is the Name and a new song, Extra Innings, that he says has "a dirty beat." There is an eight-week nightclub tour in the offing. There are personal promotions for Hammond's new $6,000 X-77 organ, which Denny says "is a helluva lot better than the old B-3." He ought to know; he owns one of each. "Music has always been the No. 1 thing in my life," he typically exaggerates. "Baseball is a means to an end. I want to ultimately be a professional musician."

All the extras that Denny brings in ought to add another $100,000 to the $35,000 salary the Tigers are paying McLain this year. And next year Denny plans to hit Tiger General Manager Campbell for a $65,000 raise--to an even $100,000. Yet despite the steady influx of cash, he continues to demonstrate his need for help by spending money as if it were going out of style. Just last month Denny was sued by Diners' Club Inc. and S. S. Kresge Co. for a total of $1,120 in long-overdue bills that he had simply forgotten. His business manager quickly settled the suits by sending off checks.

Come Fly with Me. "I'm just a smalltown boy," says Denny disingenuously. "I'm awed by all this. Money impresses me. Big business impresses me. Important people impress me. I'm a mercenary. I admit it. I want to be a billionaire." Not surprisingly, Denny dreams other big, important money-filled dreams. One day, for example, he intends to travel in his very own private Lear Jet. His blue eyes sparkle as he stares at the magazine ads. "Look at this," he says. "Lear Jet for $718,000. . .The turboprop takes off at 2,000 feet per minute. The Lear Jet takes off at 6,300 feet per minute! Wow!. . .The Lear cruises at 41,000 feet. Wow!" He brushes back his dirty-blond hair. "All rich people have them, you know. Lear Jets. I don't know if I want to learn to fly one myself. No, I just want to ride in one, and hire a couple of pilots of my own."

Will he ever get the jet? The answer depends on the next two weeks. McLain claims to be unaffected by the mounting pressure as the Tigers close in on the pennant and he approaches his 30th victory. "Oh, sure, I've been thinking about 30 ever since I got to 15," he admits. "I mean, it's got to be in your mind. But I'm not losing any sleep over it. I adore sleep."

One of his favorite expressions is "Nobody's perfect." When he fouls up a game for whatever reason: "Well, that's the way it is. Nobody's perfect." Last month, after victory No. 25 in Boston, he spent two solid days hopping around New York and Detroit, appearing on the Today show, huddling with his agent, attending promotional meetings for his Quintet records. In 48 hours, he managed only five hours of sleep, and when he went out to pitch the second half of a doubleheader against the Chicago White Sox, Denny was dreadful. He was sent to the showers in the sixth inning, and the White Sox won 10-2. Denny had no excuses. But he had no apologies for his energy-sapping extracurricular activities either: "If I have to sit still, I lose my mind. If I'm going or coming I'm okay, but once I stop, I get nervous." Despite these occasional lapses, Denny boasts: "On the days I pitch, I'm the best there is."

To his credit, there have been few games like that for McLain this year. Except for him, the Tigers have no reliable starting pitcher. He is their "stopper," the man they count on to save the big ones and allay any possibility of a losing streak that could demoralize the team. Indeed, twelve out of McLain's 28 victories have followed immediately after Detroit losses. Yet for all that, Denny is no one-man team, and he knows it. "I tend to coast unless I'm pressed. I've been in trouble almost every game this year," he says. "But with this ball club, all I have to do is keep the score close." Although Detroit's team batting average is only .230, fifth best in the American League, the Tigers hit when it counts. They lead in runs scored (586), and they have clouted 159 home runs, 34 more than any other team.

That kind of power gives Detroit the ability to spot other teams runs and still bounce back. In 35 games this season, they have either trailed or been tied in the seventh inning or later, and still managed to squeak out a victory. In 27 games, they have scored the winning run in their last turn at bat. A tight defense, enough depth to permit platooning of players, and a strong bullpen crew that has saved 21 games so far, have all figured strongly in Detroit's push toward the pennant.

Equally important, the Tigers have been getting the breaks. Last week the Baltimore Orioles touched McLain for two runs in the first inning, but the Tigers tied it up, went ahead 4-2 in the second. In the third, with two men on base and no one out, Baltimore's Boog Powell smashed a line drive straight at Denny. It might have put the Orioles ahead. Instead, in pure self-defense, Denny caught the ball and turned a sure hit into the beginning of a triple play.

A few more such breaks and it will all be there for Denny McLain--30 victories, the World Series, that five-figure bonus check, more endorsement money, more of everything. And for McLain, it will be none too soon. "I want what I want now," he says. "I don't expect to live to 40. My wife keeps telling me to slow down. But I can't slow down. I just live too fast. My father died at 36. His father died at 36. And his father died at 32. I'm in a little better shape than my father, and I can do a lot in 16 years." With that, Pitcher Denny McLain goes whomp, whomp on the pedals --and the sweet organ music floats past.

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