May 15, 1977 – Angels 8, Yankees 2
- Sal Maiorana
- May 15, 2017
- 3 min read
ANAHEIM – Even though he loved Billy Martin, it’s unlikely that Thurman Munson planned it this way. Just days after Martin had been fined $2,500 for carping too loudly about the need for a third catcher, specifically Elrod Hendricks, to be added to the roster, Munson had to come out of the series finale at Anaheim Stadium in the fifth inning because of a sore foot.
The night before, Munson had fouled a ball off his foot, but he still made his 31st start straight start in the series finale against the Angels. However, midway through the game he told Martin the foot was swollen and it was too painful to continue, so Martin had to send in Fran Healy to finish this game. Had anything happened to Healy, the emergency catcher was backup shortstop Fred Stanley, who last caught a game in 1973 at triple-A Syracuse.
“If it’s bothering him I won’t play him,” said Martin. “The toughest thing on him is going from a night game to a day game like he had to do today.”
Before leaving the game, Munson went 0-for-3 against Angels starter Frank Tanana, extending his incredible run of bad luck against the star left-hander to a career 0-for-34.
The Angels jumped on Mike Torrez for four runs in the first inning, and with Tanana firing peas followed up by his dazzling curveball, it was all but over. The first four men reached on a single, triple, walk and single for two runs, and then Don Baylor’s RBI grounder made it 3-0. The fourth run came on Tony Solaita’s two-out RBI single.
The Yankees had only one baserunner through four innings before breaking through in the fifth when Chris Chambliss doubled, Roy White singled, and Tanana’s wild pitch scored Chambliss.
Torrez was knocked out during a three-run fifth, and the suddenly resurgent Graig Nettles produced the only other Yankee run with a solo homer in the eighth.
If Solaita’s name sounds familiar to Yankees fans, perhaps it’s because he was a player who spent eight years – that’s right, eight years – in the Yankees farm system, the end result of which was just one plate appearance in pinstripes in all that time.
Solaita came to the United States as a young boy from his native American Samoa, lived in Hawaii, San Diego and San Francisco, and was first seen by former Brooklyn Dodger Dolph Camilli who was a northern California scout for the Yankees. The 18-year-old signed with New York in 1965, then began a seemingly endless journey through the bush leagues.
In 1968, playing single-A ball for manager Jack McKeon, Solaita hit 51 home runs counting the postseason, and that earned him a brief call-up to the big club in September. On Sept. 16 at Yankee Stadium, he made his debut against the Detroit Tigers when he replaced Mickey Mantle – who was playing his final season – in the fourth inning. He was struck out by John Hiller in his only at-bat.
He was back in the minors thereafter, buried by the Yankees which never made sense given how generally mediocre those non-playoff Yankee teams were through 1973. They eventually traded him to Pittsburgh, and then he was picked by Kansas City in the 1973 Rule 5 draft where the manager was McKeon. Solaita spent two years in Kansas City and later played for the Angels, Expos and Blue Jays through 1979, then finished his career playing four years in Japan. He played in 525 major-league games and batted .255 with 50 home runs and 203 RBI.
Sadly, at the age of 43 in 1990, Solaita – the first and still only major leaguer from American Samoa - was shot to death in his native land following a land dispute with a known antagonist of the Solaita family.
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