A Higher League: The Legacy of Brooks Robinson By Hank Indictor

With the death of Brooks Robinson came the loss of another Baseball Hall of Famer. How great was Brooks Robinson? His accomplishments speak for themselves. 18 All-Star Appearances, 16 Gold Gloves, an M.V.P., and 2 World Series rings while playing for some powerhouse Baltimore Orioles squads. While I generally lean towards Mike Schmidt regarding the debate for the greatest Third Baseman in Baseball History, cases for Brooks Robinson are more than valid. After all, if we were to focus solely on defense, then the debate is over immediately. But anyway, let’s talk about some of the most important moments of Brooks’ career.

Although Robinson came up to the Orioles late in the 1955 season, it wasn’t until the 1960 season that he firmly entrenched himself as a cornerstone for the Baltimore Orioles. That year, he would hit .294 with 14 home runs and 88 R.B.I.s numbers that were good enough to earn him his first All-Star Appearance and place 3rd in the M.V.P. Voting behind the M&M Boys (Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle, respectively) as this was the Orioles first winning season since the move to Baltimore! (They were originally the St. Louis Browns from 1901 to 1953). However, this was also the year Robinson would win the first of his 16 consecutive Gold Gloves.  

By 1964, Brooks Robinson had become the face of the Baltimore Orioles. That year, the Orioles would receive their first taste of a September Pennant race as they were edged out by the Yankees, who were nearing the end of their Golden Age, by two games. However, despite falling short, this was Brooks Robinson’s best season as he hit .317 with 28 home runs while driving in 118 runs to lead the American League in the latter category. These numbers were good enough to make him the first player in Orioles history to win the league M.V.P. Award. As for the Orioles, their best was yet to come.

A few years later, the Orioles would establish themselves as a new American League powerhouse. By 1966, the Orioles had traded for Frank Robinson to complement an already solid lineup that included Brooks, Davey Johnson, Boog Powell, and Paul Blair, to name a few. The Orioles would win their first-ever American League Pennant thanks to Frank Robinson’s Triple Crown Season. However, Brooks would also chip in that year with a .269 Batting Average, 23 Home Runs, and 100 RBIs, in addition to an incredible .976 fielding percentage! They would face the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series, where the Robinson boys would set an early tone, hitting back-to-back home runs in the first inning in the first game off Don Drysdale. However, while Frank would take home M.V.P. honors in the Orioles 4-game sweep, this was a series defined by pitching, as the 2 runs the Orioles allowed in Game 1 were the only ones they would allow in the entire series! In addition, they also handled 141 total chances without an error.

Within the next few years, the Orioles were arguably the best team in baseball. By the end of the ’60s, Brooks Robinson had become beloved in Baltimore in the same tier that Johnny Unitas was and what Cal Ripken Jr. and Ray Lewis would become many years later. However, his play in the 1970 World Series elevated him into an all-time legend. Just one year prior, the Orioles were upset by the “Miracle Mets”, after a year where they had a dominant 109-win season, the Orioles were seeking redemption, which they got as they would win 108 games in addition to a sweep of the Twins in the ALCS just as they had done one year prior. But this time in the World Series, they were up against a Big Red Machine team in their first World Series together. In the first game, Brooks Robinson made arguably the most iconic play of his career when he made a backhanded grab of a Lee May grounder and, in an off-balance throw, managed to get him out. Throughout the series, Brooks would hit .429 with 2 R.B.I.’s and several more outstanding plays such as the one where he robbed Johnny Bench! In the end, the Orioles won in 5 games, with Brooks winning the M.V.P. and many Cincinnati Reds wishing he was in a higher league, as Pete Rose once suggested.  

Robinson would continue to help the Orioles for the next five seasons before age, and injuries forced him out of the starting lineup. He would retire in 1977 before getting inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame on his first appearance on the ballot. However, in addition to the Hall of Fame, I can think of at least three different Mount Rushmore for which he belongs: Greatest Baltimore Orioles (along with Cal, Jim Palmer, and Eddie Murray), Greatest 3rd Basemen (along with Schmitty, George Brett and Chipper Jones) and of course Greatest Baltimore Athletes as a whole! It’s not very often a ballplayer spends 23 years with one team, but Brooks Robinson is in very rare company. And his legacy as the greatest fielding 3rd baseman has more than withstood the test of time.