SP: John, You’re a Dothan native, aren’t you?
JO: Yes, I was
born and raised here, went to Dothan High School. I went to college at
Howard College, which is now Samford Univeristy up in Birmingham.
SP:
Were you always a baseball fan?
JO: Always. That
was really the only thing we had to do around here. As a young kid, we’d
go out to Wiregrass Stadium and chase balls. We chase three balls and bring
two of them back. I started going to games when I was about seven or
eight years old, back in the mid-forties. Those were the days of Frank Martin,
Emory Lindsey, Glenn Clark,…. those guys. That’s back when they
were the Dothan Browns. They changed the name to Cardinals and then Phillies
later on, but that was when they were the Browns.
SP: Frank Martin
was the manager back then, right?
JO: Right. They’d have at
least one fight a week back then. It would seem almost like wrestling.
That, of course, would get the crowd all wound up. They had some big
rivalries because many of the cities were real close to each other: Enterprise,
Headland, and Ozark were all real close and you had a natural rivalry because
of the proximity.
SP: You mentioned Emory Lindsey.
He was a mainstay in the league.
JO: He played for Dothan quite
a while. Everybody used to just call him « Big Em ». He was the clean-up
hitter and catcher. I had the privledge of teaching his daughter
in junior high school.
SP: How well-received was the team
at that time?
JO: Well, to me, it seemed like they were real
well received. In the latter years of the team, it kind of faded out because
of television and little league, and then integration stopped the league
for good. At the time of my youth, television hadn’t caught on yet and little
league hadn’t got started, so seeing the Browns was the thing to do.
I remember the Andalusia Arrows, back when Manny Russo was there, they had a
catcher named Reid (Russ Reid) who was getting ridden pretty hard by a guy up in
the stands that had two little boys with him, who by the way, both grew up to
be doctors here in Dothan, anyway, he rode Reid so hard that Reid set his mask
on the concrete dugout and jumped over the dugout into the stands and chased that
guy clear out of the stadium. He left his two little boys just sitting
there! I’ll never forget the way people would ride the opposing players.
Usually a third baseman, or shortstop, whoever wais close enough to the fans
to here it.
SP: I’ve heard a few stories of fans coming onto the
field, and some pretty heavy heckling from some other players too.
JO:
Yeah, that’s true. I guess it was the entertainment of the era.
SP:
You mentioned Manny Russo. Any memories of him as
a player?
JO: I really just remember the name and that he’d been
around a long time.
SP: You started your playing career in
Panama City.
JO: That’s right, 1959, right out of college.
I joined the team and played about 80 games that year. The next season
I went to spring training. I was teaching, so I left my teaching
job and ended up playing in the sophmore league out in Odessa, Texas. I played
with or against a lot of good players, I just never happened to be one of
them!
SP: You were mostly known for your glove, right?
JO:
Well, if you look at my batting average, you’d say « He’s better
be known for his fielding ». I had always had real good hands and I
always did field well. My last year (1962), I had the Silver Glove Award.
That was kind of unique to win the Silver Glove and be in a Class D league.
The infields were not the greatest. I’ll tell you though, all I
remember of my playing years was the great things. I don’t remember the
bad things.
SP: What lead you to try for a pro ball career out
of college?
JO: My college coach was a bird dog for the Dodgers
organization. I had some offers as a junior. We had a really good
baseball program up there at Howard, and we lead the nation in hitting
and I lead my team in hitting, so we got some notice. There wasn’t any draft
back then so any team could come after you. I set a goal of sorts
of what they’d have to offer to get me to play because I wanted my college degree.
I’m glad that they didn’t make that offer because I’m glad I got my
degree. A lot of guys played ball then had nothing to fall back on.
You don’t find many guys going from D league to the majors, at least not for
very long.
SP: You did play in the AFL in 1959 when probably
the best crop of future major leaguers was in the league: Max Alvis,
Larry Brown, Steve Barber, Dick Egan……
SP: I played semi-pro
with Max in Louisiana before the AFL, then of course, I played against him
and Brown, and (Doc) Edwards when they were at Selma. They had Jerry Fosnow,
too. They had a really good team which was really just put together
at the last minute.
SP: That’s right. I believe they
put the franchise together in about a week.
JO: Selma and Montgomery
were both really strong teams. We were very poor that year
The Dodgers had four D League teams that season, and they would choose a team
each year to load up. In 1959 they didn’t load us up, but in 1960 they did.
In 1960, Panama city wiped the rest of the league out. That was
the year I wasn’t there! They put a good bunch of guys there in 1961 too.
We had some really good guys: Brack Bailey lead the league in hitting,
Mickey Strickland was up there, Bobby Cox, a guy named Bob Loftin, Gary Dempsey.
In fact, I saw Gary Dempsey just a few months ago. He came
through town on his way to spring training. I hadn’t seen him in forty
years. We rehashed old times and remembered things that probably didn’t
happen! You know how it is. It was fun to see him. He’s a
retired coach now. We played under George Scherger. Geroge was the
first base coach for the Big Red Machine years in Cincy. There really have
been some good people that have gone through the AFL.
When they did
that movie (Long Gone) that was about the league, there was a lot of truth in
there that they would make anybody with dark skin a Puerto Rican because of the
integration issues of the time. When we grew up, the blacks had a certain
place in the stands and the white had another place, and they weren’t allowed
to mingle. Of course, nobody black could play on a team.
SP:
Which is interesting since there were a fair amount of Latin players, some
fairly dark, that were allowed to play and were, at least on the surface, accepted
by the fans.
JO: Yes, but you know, we never really thought
about it. I remember the first time I went to spring training I went
into the club house and I had thought I’d gone through the wrong door because
there were so many black players in there. As a kid growing up, I’d always
been around the separate entrance situation. I said, « Where’s the other
door? » They said, « That’s the only one ». As it turned out, a lot
of my close friends there were black ballplayers. I had never had a relationship
with a black kid before in my life. Growin up where I did, it wasn’t
like anybody I knew had a significant beef about it (integration), it was just
they way we grew up. We didn’t think about it.
Sp: Who
was your manager at Panama City in 1959?
JO: A guy named Al
Ronning.
If you look at the years that I played, three of those four years
our leading pitcher was a guy who was a real head-case named Dennis Midgette.
He was one of the guys with a million-dollar arm and 10 cents everywhere
else! He was really a good guy, he’d just get lost on the mound.
He thought he was supposed to be in charge. Everywhere I played, he’d be
there too.
SP: In 1962, you played for the Andalusia/Ozark team.
JO:
Yeah, the guy who was in charge back then was C.C. « Mutt »
Hodge. I was coaching my high school baseball team and Hodge came up
to me and said, « We need a second baseman ». I said , « Well, I’ll see when
I can get out there » and he said, « No no, we need one tonight! ». I said,
« I don’t have a uniform, I haven’t been practicing or anything! » He said,
« Just be at Paterson Field in Montgomery tonight. There will be a uniform
waiting for you and we’ll sign a contract. » So I just got a bunch of the
kids together and we rode up to Montgomery. Sure enough, I was in the
starting line-up and I got a double the first time at bat! I had swung and missed
the first two pitches, then the guy threw me a curve and I was able to get around
on it. I helped win the game on a defensive play too. Scherger
was managing there, too, and he had been my manager previously. During my playing
career, I was also coaching high school ball, so I knew what coaches
liked to see in a ballplayer. I did all the little things: I was the
first one there, I helped with the equiptment, did all that stuff. They
kept me around for four years while they cut better players!
SP:
But in 1962, you were one of the better hitters. You and Dick Strutz.
JO:
Yeah, Dick Strutz was a character too. Gary Dempsey
played third, Mickey Dobbins played short. We lead the league in
double plays. John Heck, who wrote to your web page told me, « I still
don’t know how you got all those double plays! ». I told him, « You were
one of the pitchers; you were part of the reason. You put so many men on base!
(laughs) ». We had a great time back then. I think Ron Buchanan was
the first baseman on that team. I saw that picture Gordy Scott gave you
of some of the players, but I don’t think there ever was a complete team photo
taken of the 1962 team. I have a copy of that 1961 Panama City picture on
your page. That was a special picture to me. Bobby Cox is in there
and Bobby and I were roommates. There are three of us in a row in that picture
(Scherger, Cox and Oppert) and two of us made it to the majors.
SP:
When you played with Bobby Cox, did you think he’d be a major leaguer?
JO:
No, I never thought any of us would ever make it.
When your way down on that level, you don’t really think about it. I was
just hoping to get to the next level, because at each level, if you get a break,
you might be able to go all the way up. I saw some guys that I played
with that I didn’t think were any better than me that did make it. I played
with Jim Fregosi out in Texas and I never thought he’d make it. Two
years later, the Angels drafted him in the expansion draft and he ended up setting
a lot of records for them. Eddie Brinkman was a shortstop in the league
in 1961, with Pensacola. You had to be with the right organization.
Pensacola was the Senators farm team, and you could move right
up with them. Before then, Steve Barber went from the Pensacola Dons
right up to the Orioles in one year and he won a lot of games. They had
Cal Ripken, Sr., Bo Belinsky. They had quite a threesome on that team:
Steve Barber, Bo Belinsky, and Steve Dalkowski. He was the wildest man
in captivity. We we going to play them in a series, and I was lead-off
hitter. We were out there taking batting practice, and the umpires
came in and the umpire had what looked like a white turban on his head.
I went over and asked him what the story was. He said he was umpiring the
other night with Dalkowski, and the catcher gave him a change-up and Dalkowski
don’t throw nothing but fastballs, so the catcher missed the ball and it hit the
ump’s mask and broke it and gave the ump a concussion. Then he said to
me, « And you’re batting tonight! ». The first time up, the catcher
said to me, « Oppert, you better put one foot in the dugout and the other on a banana
peel because this guy is wild ». Dalkowski had big thick glasses and
was kid of a little guy, and at that time, they would let you keep the ball in
your glove and not have to keep it in your hand. The first pitch, and this
is no lie, it came in and I swung at it, and the catcher caught it standing
up. I didn’t swing again, and by the forth inning we were leading something
like 11 to 3 and we’ hadn’t got a hit yet! He was usually wild outside
because he had hit a guy and broke his arm before. I saw a magazine thing
of him about four or five years ago and he was laying on top of a mound of beer
cans. It was one of those « Where is Steve Dalkowski now? » things.
He just became a total waste of talent. He may have been the fastest there ever
was but they couldn’t time him because the radars weren’t as good as they have
now.
SP: Do you think he threw over 100 mph?
JO:
Oh yeah, I think he did. Ted Williams went in to take a swing against
him in practice back in the late 1950’s and after one pitch he stepped out
and wouldn’t take another. Dalkowski was just an engima. Looked up
some records on him and he’s always be leading the league in strikeouts and walks.
SP:
He really was a failure in the AFL. His ERA was
above 12.00.
JO: They would try everything to harness his pitching
but they never did. Montgomery put out some good pitchers: Pat
Dobson, Dick Egan. The Rebels were a Tiger farm team and you could move
up quick there too.
SP: In 1959, they had Chico Fernandez who
made it to the big leagues. Pete Walski and J.J. Bethea were good hitters who didn’t
make it.
JO: And Legrant Scott was a good second baseman.
SP:
His dad made it to the majors.
JO: They
were a strong club: Bob Patrick played first base, they had a good pitcher
named Jose Mejias. I was way out of my league when I got in there in 1959.
In college, you’d see one good pitcher out of maybe three, then in the
pros you saw good ones all the time. Usually, these guys were in the lower
minors because the were wild and the teams were trying to harness it.
That didn’t help much if you’re a batter. It also didn’t help that
the lighting systems weren’t exactly top of the line.
SP: How
was the travel?
JO: In 1959, the first year I was in the league,
on my first road trip, I got on the bus, which wasn’t air conditioned, and
threw my gear up on the rack above the seat and hit a guy in the head. I
thought to myself what on earth is a guy doing laying up in the luggage rack?
About a week later, I was up there! It was the only place you could
stretch out. In 1961, when we had a real good team, we’d go around in vans.
It wasn’t really a bad trip anywhere except Panama City to Selma.
Any trip to Selma was bad. I think I got two hits there in three years! They
had good teams and a lot of those guys made it to the Indians.
SP:
Lou Piniella was there in 1962, Duke Sims in 1961.
JO: Lou
had a wild temper. If he didn’t get a hit, he’d go into the dugout and
throw gloves, kick the water cooler. He was about 18 years old back then.
A real feisty guy, but a good hitter.
SP: Anybody stick
out in your mind as a player who you thought should have made it but didn’t?
JO:
Probably Brack Bailey. I thought he’d make it.
Mickey Dobbins was an excellent shortstop. Those are the guys I played
with that I thought might have a chance. The Dodger farm system was just
too big though, it was hard to advance. They kept a lot of guys in the minor
leagues just to keep them off of other teams. That caused a domino effect:
If they keep a Triple A guy down, then the Double A guy can’t move up and
so on. Atlanta was our Double A team then and Montreal was our Triple A,
Spokane was Triple A too. They had more minor league teams than anybody.
There was a guy named Jim Lehew that made it to the majors.
I didn’t think any more of his pitching a than any other guys. The best hitter
in the league, I thought was a guy at Fort Walton named Carlos Pascual.
He was already 25 years old, which was pretty old for that league. We
called him « Tater » Pascual cause he could hit the ball so far. He could
also come in and relieve and throw knuckleballs. He was a veteran who had
been around some. Another veteran that was a good player was Fred Waters.
He’d already been to the big leagues with the Pirates, and he was just
coaching and playing part time, which is easier to do if you’re a pitcher.
He was the toughest pitcher I faced. He was a real good guy too. We all
got along real well. Although there was a lot of fighting and stuff going
on in the 40’s and early 50’s, in our era, there wasn’t any of that. Having
more people in an affilated organization made things different. As
a kid, I thought guys on the Dothan Browns were the greatest thing in the world.
Then I became a player in the league and found out it wasn’t so hot after
all.
SP: After the 1962 season, the league dissolved.
That didn’t happen until November. Had you planned on coming back in 1963?
JO:
I was released in September. I had won that Silver
Glove award and they usually present that at the beginning of the next season.
The league had contacted me about possibly being a player-manager for the
Dothan team in 63, so that was an option I had. Then the integration issue
stopped the league. After that, they contacted me about the Silver Glove.
I ended up writing the Sporting News and thanked them for the award
and the notice and everything. They wrote me back and said of all the awards
they gave out, I was the first one that wrote them back and thanked them.
It was unusual to have two players in the a D league win the award in back
to back years, but Bobby Cox and I did it and we were roommates, too. I
am as proud of that award as of anything I’ve ever done. I’ve been
coaching for 45 years now in the Dothan area. I either like what I do, or
I’m a real slow learner!!
SP: What level are you coaching at?
JO:
I’ve coached high school for the last 11 years. Before that,
I coached at George Wallce Community College for 26 years.
I’ve coached
just about all sports over the years. I found I wasn’t very patient coaching
baseball so I concentrated on basketball for a while.
I see where
you talked to Edsel Johnson about his brother Ottis. I was there at that
game.
SP: Really?
JO: Yeah. Jack Clifton
was pitching and he was the hardest thrower in the league at that time.
It was at Headland at the old baseball stadium there that’s still used for football.
Ottis Johnson was a coach at Midland City at the time, and he was doing
like I did: Coaching and playing at the same time. It was his second
year playing, and he was leading the league in home runs, I think he had about
10. Anyway, it was just a high fastball. It hit him and the ball rolled
all the way past the pitcher’s mound. It hit him in the temple area.
They didn’t have helmets back in those days. I didn’t think there
was anything intentional about it. I did a follow-up story a few
years ago about it for the local paper and the write up for that date mentioned
that Jack Clifton went to the hosptial to check on Ottis. They thought
he was going to be okay but he died about a week later. The day of the funeral,
Dothan and Headland were scheduled to play again. I was at that game,
too. Headland started Jack Clifton, and the Dothan team walked off the field.
Their owner, Mr. Smith, had them not play if Clifton pitched, and the
league almost folded because of that.
SP: I talked to Clifton
recently.
JO: He married a Dothan girl.
SP: It
seems that everybody but Smith and the press wanted to point the finger
at Clifton, but the players all knew it was just part of baseball.
JO:
Johnson was just one of those players that leaned in on the plate
and he couldn’t react and get out of the way. I’m sure it affected Jack
a lot too. By the way, I’ve never seen on your site a reference
to my favorite Dothan player back then: Doc Bowden. He was a shortstop
that played for Dothan back when Jim Colley and Glenn Clark played.
SP:
I just talked to him recently. I will make up for that oversight.