How old is johnny bench

We have dramatically expanded our coverage of the Negro Leagues and historical Black major league players. Read our Announcement. WAR R Batting Career Batting Postseason Fielding Postseason. Pitchers in non-DH games that appeared on the lineup card but didn't bat will still have a game in this column.

Bold season totals indicate player led league. Italic season totals indicate player led all major leagues. Sign up for the free Stathead newsletter and get scores, news and notes in your inbox every day. View a sample email. It's also available for football, basketball and hockey. Sign Up For Free. Javascript is required for the selection of a player. Choice is:. Powered by. Postseason Batting Postseason Game Log. He looks around on parents' nights and the generation gap is clear.

Says Bench, "Not too many of my boys' friends' parents are saying, 'Hey, I remember watching you play. If life at 70 is different than the way he'd imagined, Bench points out that it is irrelevant. It's a commitment, but I've made that commitment to them.

Happy to have. As if on cue, he receives a text. Back to his original train of thought: "When people say, 'You have two wonderful boys and you're a great father As the tears form in the corners of his eyes, Bench quotes a country song—as he often does. Mom' by the band Lonestar? Bench grabs his phone, toggles through iTunes and there in the middle of an Italian restaurant sings along in a pleasant, rumbling voice:.

He grew up in Binger, Okla. His father, Ted, worked for a propane company, rising early and driving an oil truck, and his mom, Katy, kept order for their four kids.

Johnny—never John—was one of those sports omnivores who excelled at everything. But Ted had been a semi-pro baseball player, and as Johnny was growing up, Mickey Mantle was proving that Oklahoma boys could become luminous stars on the diamond. So baseball took precedence in the Bench home. By elementary school, Johnny was listing his future profession as "major leaguer" and practicing his autograph.

He chose catching because—an early bit of analytics—his father thought it was the position that offered the greatest probability for making the majors.

In Binger his ambition engendered giggles and suggestions that the Bench boy manage his expectations. But Johnny never required the validation of others. At 17, in , he was a second-round draft pick of the Reds. In Bench's first game with Triple A Buffalo, in , he broke his right thumb. During his recovery he sat in the stands at Crosley Field above the Reds' bullpen and yelled down, "If any of you guys are catchers, you'd better remember me.

I'm gonna take your job. Which he did. In , Bench continued his ascent, hitting 45 home runs and driving in runs. Bench's right arm was worthy of U. He led the major leagues in caught-stealing percentage in and ' And before it was an occupational requirement, Bench had perfected the dark art of framing pitches. By the Big Red Machine was humming. The Reds scored another run to win the game and the pennant before falling to the A's in seven games in the World Series.

Though barely in his 20s, Bench comported himself like a veteran. During just his second season in the majors, he reckoned that the arm of his pitcher, Gerry Arrigo, was tiring. So Bench called for a curveball. Six years older than Bench, Arrigo declined. When Arrigo reared back and threw a fastball, Bench caught the pitch barehanded. Point made. As Bench once recalled to Sports Illustrated , "I didn't want to show him up, but And I like it.

A bon vivant, he knew the best restaurants in every NL city. He subscribed to Time and made it a point to know the landed gentry of Cincinnati. He began producing and hosting a daily morning show on local television, interviewing Bob Hope and Gerald Ford, among others.

He hired his team's young radio announcer as his sidekick. Confident and self-possessed, Bench was a wallflower compared with the team's shaggy-haired outfielder. For a time Bench and Pete Rose were cast as contrasts: the graceful, polished, socially ambitious catcher versus the gritty, dirt-on-the-uniform, what-you-see-is-what-you-get grinder.

While that was an oversimplification, an unmistakable chill passed between them. Who was the alpha dog? But this was never to the detriment of the team. The Reds of the '70s were an extraordinarily close unit; many of the players lived in the same apartment complex.

It didn't matter. None of it makes a difference. You could go to a bar after a game and take a team picture because we all hung out together. Nor was the team destabilized by the social stresses of the late '60s and '70s. While some teams were questioning and challenging convention—the A's presented themselves as a mustachioed band of rebels—Cincinnati players offered little push back to team strictures banning facial hair, decreeing that the white-and-red uniforms show only a certain amount of stocking and demanding that players "show proper posture" in the dugout.

The team's manager from through '78, Sparky Anderson, was a revered figure whose decisions went largely unquestioned by his minions. He made you feel like a professional. Bench jokes that he dates himself when discussing his salary. For another signifier of how times have changed, he talks about the basketball team he and his teammates—including Rose—formed during the offseason.

See also Magazine covers External links JohnnyBench. Universal Conquest Wiki. December 7 Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. August 28 , Cincinnati Reds vs. Philadelphia Phillies , Crosley Field. Cincinnati Reds - Johnny Bench is a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. Preceded by: Tom Seaver. National League Rookie of the Year Succeeded by: Ted Sizemore.

Preceded by: Willie McCovey. National League Most Valuable Player Succeeded by: Joe Torre. Preceded by: Joe Torre. Succeeded by: Pete Rose.