Reversal of Fortune in St. Louis
In 1964, Rickey (then 82) was semi-retired but still in baseball as a top advisor to St. Louis owner August "Gussie" Busch. In mid-August 1964, with the Cardinals seemingly about to finish well behind the first-place Philadelphia Phillies, Busch fired general manager Bing Devine and replaced him with Howsam — reputedly at Rickey's urging. But the team Howsam inherited ended up winning the NL pennant and the 1964 World Series when the Phils collapsed in late September.
Howsam's two full years as Cardinals' general manager (1965–1966) were not successful. The team fell back to .500 and many St. Louisans felt that Devine, a well-liked hometown figure, had been wrongly fired. Howsam installed popular Red Schoendienst as manager and he rebuilt the Redbird infield, trading away veterans Ken Boyer, Bill White and Dick Groat in a bid for more pitching help. In 1966, he acquired future Baseball Hall of Fame first baseman Orlando Cepeda from the San Francisco Giants in midseason and right fielder Roger Maris from the New York Yankees (in exchange for infielder Charley Smith, who was the other part of the Boyer trade) during the winter interleague trading period. The Cardinals were poised to win back-to-back pennants in 1967–1968. However when the opportunity arose to start fresh with the Cincinnati Reds as their general manager in January 1967, Howsam departed.
Read more about this topic: Bob Howsam
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“Perversity depends on reversal and substitution.”
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—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
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