Tom Sturdivant

Tom Sturdivant threw a curveball sharp enough to earn him a nickname -- "Snake" -- and for two seasons in the middle 1950s, it beat some of the best lineups in the American League. He pitched for the New York Yankees from 1955 to 1959 and won a World Series game outright in 1956. A year later, in the same October spotlight, Hank Aaron turned on one of his pitches in Milwaukee and ended his start before the fifth inning. Both are part of the record. Neither tells the whole story of a converted infielder who spent five years in the Bronx and five more scattered across six other clubs trying to find his way back to it.

From Third Base to the Mound

Sturdivant grew up in Oklahoma City, and the Yankees signed him in May 1948 out of Capitol Hill High School as an infield prospect -- a third baseman who could hit, not yet a pitcher anyone took seriously. The same scout, Tom Greenwade, would sign another Oklahoma kid named Mickey Mantle less than a year later. Sturdivant hit .338 in his first pro season with the Quincy Gems, then slid to .241 at Norfolk, numbers that told the organization exactly what they needed to know about his bat.

He spent two years in the U.S. Army before returning to baseball, and it was there that he committed to pitching full-time. The curveball that would define his career -- the one that got him the nickname "Snake" for how late and how sharply it broke -- came out of that stretch. He debuted with the Yankees on April 14, 1955, an infielder no longer.

The Best of It: 1956-57

Casey Stengel had a deep enough staff that Sturdivant never had to carry it, and that suited him fine. In 1956 he went 16-8 with a 3.30 ERA, and on October 7 he got the ball for Game 4 of the World Series at Yankee Stadium with Brooklyn leading the Series two games to one. He didn't need the bullpen. Nine innings, six hits, two runs, a 6-2 win over Brooklyn behind home runs from Mantle and Hank Bauer. The Yankees evened the 1956 World Series at two games apiece and went on to win it in seven, the championship season that also produced Don Larsen's perfect game and Mantle's Triple Crown.

Whitey Ford and Johnny Kucks got more of the ink that year. Sturdivant's complete game held up just the same.

1957 was better by the numbers -- 16-6, a 2.54 ERA, and a share of the American League lead in winning percentage at .727. It was the best season of his career, and almost nobody remembers it, because October went a different way.

Aaron's Answer

The 1957 World Series belonged to Lew Burdette and the Milwaukee Braves, and Sturdivant found that out up close. He started Game 4 at County Stadium, held a shutout into the fourth inning, and then Hank Aaron turned on a pitch and drove it out for a three-run homer. Frank Torre followed with a solo shot in the same inning. Sturdivant was done for the day, and the Yankees lost 7-5 in ten innings on an Eddie Mathews walk-off. He wasn't charged with the loss -- that fell to the bullpen -- but the start was the kind hitters like Aaron made you remember.

By 1958, the arm that had carried him through two strong seasons was fraying. A spike wound to the heel didn't help. He finished 3-6 with a 4.20 ERA in just 15 games, a shell of the pitcher from the year before. He and Larsen were both certified eligible for that October's World Series roster at the last minute -- Sturdivant didn't appear in the Series itself, but the Yankees beat the Braves in seven to avenge the year before, and he was part of the roster when it happened.

Traded, and Traded Again

The Yankees moved on from him on May 26, 1959, sending Sturdivant, Kucks, and Jerry Lumpe to the Kansas City Athletics for Hector Lopez and Ralph Terry. It wasn't a blockbuster and nobody remembers it that way now, but Lopez and Terry both stuck around for the pennant-winning years that followed. Sturdivant didn't even finish out the year in Kansas City -- Boston picked him up that December for a catcher named Pete Daley.

What came next was the back half of a journeyman's career: Washington, Pittsburgh, Detroit, a second stint in Kansas City, and finally the Mets, where he threw his last big-league pitch on June 21, 1964. Ten seasons, seven teams, 59 wins. Five of those years, and the best of those wins, belonged to the Yankees.

He settled back in Oklahoma City after baseball and went into the trucking business. He died there on February 28, 2009, more than four decades removed from the sport he'd left the infield to play.