No one will ever equate Willie McCovey and Ron Fairly--two very different lefty hitters, one enshrined in Cooperstown and the other a subtle cog in an inscrutable machine that managed to beat the Hall of Famer's team 3-1 in pennants during the 1960s.
They had one thing in common, however, that contributed to their managers' reluctance to play them full-time: both McCovey and Fairly struggled against lefties. McCovey would overcome his problems with southpaws in 1967 and emerged as baseball's best hitter in 1968-70; Fairly never did turn the corner, winding up with a .221 lifetime BA against left-handers.
That factor, along with the talent glut on the two teams, kept these two on the bench for much of the early going in '62. It's shocking to note that McCovey had only four plate appearances in April! But, then again, the Giants went 15-5 that month with him on the bench. Fairly appeared in 13 of the Dodgers' April contests, getting seven starts, but he was clearly fourth in the conga line behind Duke Snider, Wally Moon, and Frank Howard.
Fairly would get red-hot in the second half of May, hitting .540 over a stretch of 15 games, driving in 16 runs as the Dodgers went 14-1 in that time frame. He would push Wally Moon off first base, and Frank Howard would eventually push Moon out of right field and onto the bench, where he and Duke Snider could compare splinters.
IN St. Louis, McCovey kick-started a two-run rally for the Giants in the fourth with a single, and hit a three-run homer off Bob Gibson to blow the game open in the fifth. Billy O'Dell shut down the Cardinals' tough lefty hitters (Stan Musial and Bill White) and held his own against the righties, spinning a four-hit shutout as San Francisco kept on rolling. Final score: Giants 6, Cardinals 0.
SEASON RECORDS: SFG 22-7, LAD 18-11
