I hope everyone is enjoying the new format. Â I’ll be tweaking the colors to green and gold as soon as I can, but in the meantime let’s take a look back at another great Athletics pitcher, and one of my favorites, Ron Darling.
Ronnie spent 5 seasons with the A’s, posting a 37-44 record. Â He spent the earlier part of his career pitching for some long forgotten team that only 35,014 people care about – but for me, I will never forget his start for us in the 1992 ALCS.
The series shifted to Oakland for Game 3, as Juan Guzmán took the hill for the Jays while Ron Darling toed the rubber for the A’s. Toronto struck in the second, when Winfield reached on an error by Athletics’ third baseman Carney Lansford, moved to third on a wild pitch by Darling, and scored on a single by Candy Maldonado. Roberto Alomar hit a solo home run in the fourth to give the Jays a 2–0 lead, but in the bottom half of the inning the A’s tied the game with RBI base hits by Baines and Steinbach.
However, the very next inning, Maldonado hit a solo homer of his own, and after Oakland manager Tony La Russa gave Darling the hook in the seventh, the Jays added two unearned runs due to an error by Lance Blankenship and a triple by Lee, making it a 5–2 game. Although the A’s cut Toronto’s lead down to a run, the Jays tacked on single runs in the eighth and ninth. Henke retired the Athletics in order in the ninth, giving Toronto a 7–5 victory and a 2–1 edge in the series.
2 earned runs in 6 innings, a tough loss for Ronnie. Â He always seemed to have tough luck, didn’t he? Â I’m not sure what happened to #17 (why would he choose that number? Odd.)Â but wherever he is, I hope he is well and surrounded by old friends.
