Friday, November 6, 2020

#285 Harry Anderson



Harry Anderson  Philadelphia Phillies

Career: Harry 'The Horse' Anderson was a 6'3" outfielder/firstbaseman out of Maryland who signed with the Phils in 1953. A couple of minor league seasons and a military stretch later he was in the outfield at Connie Mack Stadium for 1957. He hit .286 that first season and .301 (with 23 homers and 97 RBI) the next and got scattered MVP vote each year. 

At that point it appeared the Phils had a star blooming but Anderson fell off the hitting cliff in 1959 and he soon found himself with the Reds where he banged around between the majors and minors before retiring after the '62 season.

In 1960: He was off to a slow start (although it wasn't much worse that the previous year) and on June 15 he was shipped to the Queen City where he served mostly as a pinch-hitter. For the year he hit .214 in about 180 at-bats over eighty games.

Off The Charts: The trade that sent Anderson to Cincinnati brought Tony Gonzalez to the Phils where he played for almost a decade and hit close to .300 for that period.

The Harry Anderson I remember was this guy....

Actor/Magician Harry Anderson played Judge Harry Stone on the NBC sitcom Night Court in the 80s and early 90s. I've never been a sitcom guy (I never once watch Seinfeld) but I enjoyed Night Court. Anderson had a fun, sarcastic personality and the side characters were well written.


3 comments:

  1. Immediately thought of Night Court when I saw the name.

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  2. Topps must have really liked this guy. They gave him a good card number (ending in "5") in both 1959 and 1960. I remember in your earlier post, you pointed out that HOFer Robin Roberts did NOT get a star number in 1960.

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    Replies
    1. I'm still baffled by the Robin Roberts thing.

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