Ask Len - Danny Murphy?
Phil and Nancy Pontillo
Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin
Back in the late 50's, could be 1959 or 1960, I'm not sure, the Cubs had a ball player, top prospect by the name of Danny Murphy. He was called the $40,000 bonus baby. He came up at the end of the year for about 20 or 30 games and once the season ended we never heard any more about him. Maybe Ron might know what became of him.
Phil & Nancy,
We put the WGN staff on this one. Here are the numbers on Danny Murphy from the Baseball Encyclopedia:
YEAR GAMES AVG. HR RBI
1960 CUBS 31 .120 1 6
1961 CUBS 4 .385 2 3
1962 CUBS 14 .200 0 3
1969 SOX 17 .000 0 0
1970 SOX 51 .333 1 1
Len
Comments
Have done stat work comparing Santo to living HOF inf, also Hof inf since 1950, also HOF inf/of since 1950. Out of 26 living INF he ranks 15 in BA, 17 in hits per yr,20 in runs/yr, 9 in rbi/yr, 7 in HR/yr,11 in total bases/yr and last in fielding. But what to do with info? Sent it last yr to HOF attn Vet Com. Got a nice letter saying everyone knew of Santo's stats. Vote doesn;t sound like it.
You guys have any ideas? Will be glad to send complete packet of stats. Thanks Have been Cub fan since 1940.
Posted by: Tom Klingaman | March 8, 2007 4:17 PM
Danny had a collision in the outfield with Bob Will while they were fielding a ball. I believe Danny ended up with a fractured jaw and Bob injured his knee.Both players left the field. You might get more info from my brother Bob. His e-mail is excub28will@aol.com.
Posted by: jim will | April 15, 2007 10:28 AM
Danny Murphy and I grew up in Beverly, MA although I am 6 years younger. His younger brother Kevin caught some games that I pitched. Danny lost a couple of teeth in that outfield collision. Good thing his father was a dentist. By the way, Danny was the first $100,000 bonus baby.
Posted by: Fred McFaulds | July 25, 2007 6:44 PM
Ooops, I goofed. Well, I was only 11 at the time. Danny Murphy was baseball's first 130,000 Bonus Baby.
Posted by: Fred McFaulds | July 25, 2007 6:53 PM