Alabama Florida League Interviews – Wayne Robbins

I played for the Pensacola Dons in 1958 as a left-handed pitcher. I started
in the AFL after graduating from Mississippi State and three years of baseball
in the Southeastern Conference. I compiled a 6-2 record for the Dons that
year. Pensacola was a Baltimore Orioles farm team then, and I had signed with
the Orioles on the day I graduated. My first game was in Panama City and it was
a disaster. I didn’t last through the first inning and took the loss. It was
an inauspicious beginning of my pro career. The next game, however, was better
as I won 5-3 over Fort Walton Beach at Jets Stadium in Fort Walton. The opposing
pitcher was Lee Stange who went on to the majors and compiled a pretty good record
for the Cleveland Indians and Boston Red Sox before becoming their pitching
coach. I think both of us went all nine innings–I know I did. In my first time
at bat, Stange grooved one for me and I hit it over the right field fence,
but the right fielder reached over and caught it. I still gnash my teeth over that
one.
My most memorable game was played against the Cloumbus Foxes at Columbus,
Georgia. We won in a fairly high scoring game, but I pitched all 14 innings
and drove in five runs with my bat. Because of my performance, I got to sleep
on our bus’s only bed all the way back to Pensacola that night. The « bed »
consisted of the rearmost two seats pulled together with a pillow and a couple
of blankets added. I must admit that I didn’t sleep much that night, but I enjoyed
the « honor » of having the only bed, and basking in my temporary glory. We arrived
after daylight the next day. Our schedule called for playing two games at
home, followed by two games on the road. You can imagine how tiring the travel
got with that schedule, but I didn’t mind it at that age.
A gentleman named
Fred Davis owned the Dons that year. He also owned one of Pensacola’s radio
stations–I believe it was the same station broadcasted the Dons games, but not
sure of that. Because I had some announcing experience prior to my baseball career,
Davis used to have me go up to the broadcast booth and do some play-by-play
when I wasn’t pitching.
The ace of our pitching staff was Jim Lehew, a
right-handed submariner, who won 20 games that year (Lehew went 20-9, 3.11 ERA).
He had a « cup of coffee » with the Baltimore Orioles a few years later. The Dothan
Cardinals had the former Brooklyn Dodger pitcher, Karl Spooner, who was trying
to make a come-back that year. Unfortunately, He wasn’t successful and quit
after only a few games. Another memorable name from the league that year was
Neb Wilson. I think Neb was 39 years old that year. He began the season as the
player-manager of the Fort Walton Beach Jets, then came to Pensacola and dominated
the league with his big bat. He was poison to the umpires and stayed on them
viciously. He was thrown out of several games and I marveled that he wasn’t
thrown out of more. I don’t think he would survive very long with the umpires of
today. Our manager in 1958 was Lou Fitzgerald. He was a great guy, and we all
liked him very much. I believe he managed as high as Class AAA before retiring.
Another memorable player was Frank Roland who pitched for Selma that year. He
had a good record, going 19-7, and I have always wondered what happened to him
after that. Frank and I were old rivals from way back. We played against each
other in high school, American  Legion, college, and the pros. He was at Alabama
while I was at Mississippi. I remember in my very last at bat for the Dons
when I got a hit off him and knocked him out of the box. He passed me at first
base on his way to the showers and grinned at me. That game put us back in first
place where we were most of my time there. Sometime toward the end of the
season I began to worry about some shoulder pain that I was experiencing. In what
turned out to be a bad decision, I reported this to the manager and allowed
him to send me to the team doctor. The doctor diagnosed bursitis, and I was released
the very next day. I know today that I did not have bursitis, I had a partially
torn rotator cuff. Of course no one knew anything about rotator cuffs in
those days, and that was my bad luck. Actually, I had played with that pain since
I was sixteen years old, and I could have gone on. My college coach chided
me for not consulting my own doctor instead of the team physician, but what did
I know at that age?
After being released, I went into education and I coached
baseball at Riverside Military Academy in Gainesville, Georgia, in 1959. We
won the Mid-South Conference (a military prep school conference) with an undefeated
conference record. I left after only one year and returned to graduate school
for three years. Then, I went to Bluefield College in Virginia as Dean of
Men and revived that school’s baseball program, which had been absent for fifteen
years. In 1965, I coached the first season of their revived baseball team.
Coincidentally, Bluefield, West Virginia was an Oriole farm team in the Rookie
League. Baltimore almost sent me there as a first baseman after I was released
by the Dons. I was a pretty good hitter and Lou Fitzgerald had used me for several
games in the outfield at Pensacola. The state line between West Virginia and
Virginia runs just beyond the pro team’s right field fence, and our college was
on the Virginia side. The ball park would have been visible from our campus
except for a hill between us. We were able to play our games at the stadium because
the Rookie League started late after we were through. I left Bluefield in
the fall of 1965 and went to the University of Arkansas to pursue my doctorate
in higher education. I was elated when the athletic director offered me the head
coaching job for baseball. After a disastrous first season, we had a winning
year the next year, winning more games in a season than Arkansas had won since
1911. I was there four seasons when I completed my graduate work and moved on to
college administration positions here in Tennessee. My assistant coach who succeeded
me, Norm DeBriyan, is still there, and has really taken Razorback baseball
to new levels. He credits me with doing the groundwork for him, and I have
been very proud of his record. In subsequent years, I have scouted some for the
Yankees and Angels, but have been out of baseball for a number of years. I am
now retired after serving sixteen years as president of an educational foundation. 
I was certainly not a star for Pensacola, but I was thrilled to be there.
I proved I could win at that level, and not many get a chance to play pro
ball at all, so I look back with nothing but satisfaction.