Playing Career
Pole attended Northern Michigan University and signed with the Boston Red Sox as an amateur free agent. He quickly developed into a top pitching prospect. With Class AAA Pawtucket in 1973, his 2.03 earned run average and 158 strikeouts led the International League. That same year, he pitched a no-hitter against Peninsula.
Pole made his major league debut on August 3, 1973, starting the second game of a doubleheader against the Baltimore Orioles. He surrendered six runs in 3⅔ innings pitched and received the loss, as the Orioles won 8–2. He remained with the team, and spent the next four seasons moving between the rotation and the bullpen for the Red Sox.
Pole's career was nearly ended by an injury during a game against the Orioles on June 30, 1975, when a line drive by Tony Muser struck him in the face. The ball had been hit so hard that it bounced into foul territory near third base, scoring two runs on the play. Pole sustained a broken jaw and damage to the retina of his right eye. The damaged eye never fully recovered, and he ultimately lost ninety percent of the vision in that eye. Pole recovered from his injuries in time to pitch in the 1975 World Series, walking the only two batters he faced in a 6–2 loss to the Cincinnati Reds in Game 5. The Red Sox ultimately lost the series in seven games.
At the end of the 1976 season, Pole became one of the inaugural members of the Seattle Mariners franchise, as they selected him from the Red Sox with the seventh pick in the 1976 MLB expansion draft. Pole spent 1977 and 1978 with the Mariners, but his performance was not up to the standard he had set in Boston, possibly due to effects from the injury. His most memorable moment with Seattle came on August 5, 1977, when he surrendered Reggie Jackson's 300th career home run. On March 24, 1979, the Mariners released him.
Pole ended his time in the majors with 25 wins, 37 losses, one save, and a 5.05 ERA in 122 games pitched and 531 innings. After the end of his major league career, he continued to play professionally in Mexico.
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