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Tony Conigliaro

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For the bartender and mixologist of the same name, see Tony Conigliaro (mixologist).

Tony Conigliaro
Conigliaro in 1966
Right fielder
Born: (1945-01-07)January 7, 1945
Revere, Massachusetts, U.S.
Died: February 24, 1990(1990-02-24) (aged 45)
Salem, Massachusetts, U.S.
Batted: Right
Threw: Right
MLB debut
April 16, 1964, for the Boston Red Sox
Last MLB appearance
June 12, 1975, for the Boston Red Sox
MLB statistics
Batting average.264
Home runs166
Runs batted in516
Stats at Baseball Reference Edit this at Wikidata
Teams
Career highlights and awards

Anthony Richard Conigliaro (January 7, 1945 – February 24, 1990), nicknamed "Tony C" and "Conig",[1][2] was an American Major League Baseball outfielder and right-handed batter who played for the Boston Red Sox (1964–1967, 1969–1970, 1975) and California Angels (1971). Born in Revere, Massachusetts, he was a 1962 graduate of St. Mary's High School in Lynn, Massachusetts. Conigliaro started his MLB career as a teenager, hitting a home run in his first at-bat during his home field debut in 1964, and reaching 100 career home runs faster than any player in American League history.

During the Red Sox "Impossible Dream" season of 1967, he was hit in the face by a pitch that caused a severe eye injury and derailed his career. Though he would make a comeback from the injury, his career was not the same afterwards, as he lost vision in one eye over time. After retirement from baseball, he had a heart attack and suffered brain damage at age 37, leaving him severely impaired for the last eight years of his life. Hall of Fame baseball writer Peter Gammons' article in Sports Illustrated at the time of Congliaro's 1990 death is entitled "A Life Torn By Tragedy".[3][4]

Early life

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Conigliaro was born in Revere, Massachusetts, on January 7, 1945. He was raised in Swampscott and Nahant, Massachusetts.[5][6] He attended St. Mary's High School in Lynn, Massachusetts, where he played starting quarterback on the football team and starred in baseball.[6][5] In 2020, the school retired his jersey number (12), and unveiled a portrait of Conigliaro that is in the lobby of its Tony Conigliaro Gymnasium.[6]

Baseball career

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Conigliaro was signed by the Red Sox in 1962, at the age of 17, for $20,000.[5] In 1963, he batted .363 with 24 home runs, with an on-base plus slugging (OPS) of 1.139, playing for the Wellsville Red Sox in the Single-A New York–Penn League.[7][8] He was the league's Rookie-of-the-Year and its Most Valuable Player.[9] In the fall of 1963, he played instructional league baseball in Sarasota, and was included on the Red Sox 1964 roster coming into spring training. At 19 years old, he made the team going into the 1964 season without returning to the minor leagues.[9][3]

During his 1964 rookie season, Conigliaro batted .290 with 24 home runs and 52 RBI in 111 games,[10] but broke his arm[11] and his toes in August. On the first pitch of his first at-bat in Fenway Park, in the team's 1964 opening home game, Conigliaro hit a towering home run in the second inning against the White Sox.[12][13] The proceeds of that game went to the John F. Kennedy Memorial Library, to honor the recently assassinated President, and those in attendance that day included among others Robert F. Kennedy, Ted Kennedy, and Governor Endicott Peabody.[12] (His first major league hit came a day earlier against the New York Yankees, in New York.[14])

In 1965, Conigliaro led the league in home runs (32), becoming the youngest home run champion in American League history. He was selected for the All-Star Game in 1967. In that season, at age 22, he not only reached a career total of 100 home runs, but attained that milestone at the youngest age for an American League player.[15]

Conigliaro in 1965

On August 18, 1967, the Red Sox were playing the California Angels at Fenway Park. This was his 95th game of the season, and he had already hit 20 home runs in only 349 at-bats.[10] Conigliaro, batting against Jack Hamilton, was hit by a pitch on his left cheekbone and was carried off the field on a stretcher. He sustained a linear fracture of the left cheekbone and a dislocated jaw with severe damage to his left retina.[16] The batting helmet he was wearing did not have the protective ear-flap that has since become standard, partly due to this incident.

A year and a half later, Conigliaro made a remarkable return, hitting 20 homers with 82 RBI in 141 games, earning Comeback Player of the Year honors. In 1970, he reached career-high numbers in home runs (36) and RBI (116). That season, he and his brother Billy formed two-thirds of the Red Sox outfield. After a stint with the Angels in 1971, he returned to the Red Sox briefly in 1975 as a designated hitter, but was forced to retire because his eyesight had been permanently damaged.

Conigliaro in 1975

Conigliaro batted .267, with 162 home runs and 501 RBI during his 802-game Red Sox career. With the Angels, he hit .222 with 4 home runs and 15 RBI in 74 games. He is the second-youngest player to hit his 100th homer (after Mel Ott), and the youngest American League player to do so.[17]

Final years and death

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After his retirement, in the fall of 1975, Conigliaro opened a restaurant in Providence, Rhode Island, managed by his brother Billy. In September of that same year, he was hired by WJAR TV 10 in Providence as a sports anchor. In August 1976, he moved to a similar position at KGO-TV Channel 7 in San Francisco.

On January 9, 1982, then 37-year-old Conigliaro was in Boston to interview for a broadcasting position when he suffered a heart attack while being driven to the airport by his brother Billy. Shortly thereafter, he suffered a stroke and lapsed into a coma. Conigliaro never fully recovered and suffered slight brain damage due to the stroke, until his death more than eight years later, in February 1990, at the age of 45 from pneumonia and kidney failure. In commemoration, the Red Sox wore black armbands that season. He is interred at Holy Cross Cemetery in Malden, Massachusetts.[18]

Since 1990, the Tony Conigliaro Award, instituted by the Red Sox after his death, is given annually to the MLB player who best overcomes obstacles and adversities through the attributes of spirit, determination and courage that were considered Tony's trademarks.

Conigliaro's Corner

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Conigliaro's Corner bleacher seating (silver) can be seen to the right of the Budweiser sign in this July 2008 photo.

For the start of the 2007 season, Red Sox ownership added a new 200-seat bleacher section on the right field roof, providing an additional 200 available tickets for the season.[19] It was named "Conigliaro's Corner" in honor of Conigliaro. The seats were being marketed specifically towards families.[19] As of May 2007, the section was reserved for Red Sox Nation members on Saturdays and Red Sox Kid Nation members on Sundays.[19] The seats were removed prior to the start of the 2009 season.

Works cited

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  • Conigliaro, Tony (August 1970). Seeing It Through. with Jack Zanger. Macmillan. ISBN 978-0025272903.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Time Magazine, 1969, Conig's Comeback
  2. ^ Tony Conigliaro Forty Years Later: A Remembrance by Shaun L. Kelly
  3. ^ a b Gammons, Peter (March 5, 1990). "A Life Torn By Tragedy". Sports Illustrated.
  4. ^ "2004 BBWAA Career Excellence Award Winner Peter Gammons | Baseball Hall of Fame". baseballhall.org. Retrieved January 26, 2025.
  5. ^ a b c Pearson, Richard (February 25, 1990). "TONY CONIGLIARO, 45, DIES". Washington Post.
  6. ^ a b c Shuman, Cary (January 23, 2020). "St. Mary's High School Retires Tony Conigliaro's Jersey Number – Lynn Journal". lynnjournal.com. Retrieved January 26, 2025.
  7. ^ Linkugel, Wil A.; Pappas, Edward J. (July 1, 1998). They Tasted Glory: Among the Missing at the Baseball Hall of Fame. McFarland. ISBN 9780786404841.
  8. ^ "Tony Conigliaro Minor & Winter Leagues Statistics". Baseball-Reference.com. Retrieved January 26, 2025.
  9. ^ a b Nowlin, Bill. "Tony Conigliaro, Society for American Baseball Research". SABR.org.
  10. ^ a b "Tony Conigliaro Stats, Height, Weight, Position, Rookie Status & More". Baseball-Reference.com. Retrieved January 26, 2025.
  11. ^ Carry, Peter (August 10, 1964). "BASEBALL'S WEEK". Sports Illustrated. 21 (6).
  12. ^ a b Anderson, Dave (June 7, 1983). "SPORTS OF THE TIMES; A BIG NIGHT FOR TONY C." The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved January 26, 2025.
  13. ^ "Box Score for White Sox (1) vs Red Sox (4) on April 17, 1964 at Fenway Park". www.baseball-almanac.com. Retrieved January 26, 2025.
  14. ^ "Box Score for Red Sox (4) vs Yankees (3) on April 16, 1964 at Yankee Stadium". www.baseball-almanac.com. Retrieved January 26, 2025.
  15. ^ "Tony Conigliaro". Retrieved May 21, 2012.
  16. ^ "Return From The Dark", Sports Illustrated, June 22, 1970
  17. ^ "Home Run Records by Age". Baseball Almanac. Retrieved May 17, 2017.
  18. ^ Berkow, Ira (March 3, 1990). "A Shooting Star Named Tony C". The New York Times. Retrieved May 17, 2017.
  19. ^ a b c "Conigliaro's Corner' addition part of Fenway changes". ESPN. Associated Press. April 4, 2007.
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