Dal Maxvill

Dal Maxvill
Shortstop
Born: February 18, 1939 (1939-02-18) (age 72) Granite City, Illinois
Batted: Right	Threw: Right
MLB debut
June 10, 1962 for the St. Louis Cardinals
Last MLB appearance
September 28, 1975 for the Oakland Athletics
Career statistics
Batting average	.217
Hits	748
Runs batted in	252
Teams
St. Louis Cardinals (1962–1972) Oakland Athletics (1972–1973) Pittsburgh Pirates (1973–1974) Oakland Athletics (1974–1975)
Career highlights and awards
4× World Series champion (1964, 1967, 1972, 1974) Gold Glove Award winner (1968)

Charles Dallan Maxvill (born February 18, 1939 in Granite City, Illinois) is a former shortstop, coach and general manager in Major League Baseball. A graduate of St. Louis' Washington University, where he earned a degree in electrical engineering, Maxvill signed a professional baseball contract in 1960 with the hometown St. Louis Cardinals.

Maxvill appeared in 1,423 regular-season games for the Cardinals (1962–72), Oakland Athletics (1972–73; 1974–75) and Pittsburgh Pirates (1973–74). He batted and threw right-handed.

A smooth fielder but a notoriously weak hitter, Maxvill batted only .217 with 6 home runs over his 14-year major league career. He appeared in five World Series - three (1964, 1967-68) with the Cardinals and two (1972 and 1974) with the Athletics. All but the '68 Cardinals won the world championship - in that series, Maxvill went 0-for-22. In the 1964 World Series, which the Cardinals won over the New York Yankees, Maxvill caught Bobby Richardson's pop-up for the final out. His overall World Series batting record was 7-for-61, a .115 percentage. Both of those figures are record lows for a position player.

Although comfortably above the hitting prowess of the legendary Casey Wise, Maxvill does hold the National League record, through the 2006 season, for fewest hits for a batter playing in at least 150 games: 80, achieved in 1970, in 152 games, 399 at-bats, just barely over the Mendoza line at .201. (Sporting News Baseball Record, 2007, p. 19)

Cardinals fans of that era sometimes said that when pitching ace Bob Gibson took his turn, Gibson should bat ahead of Maxvill in the lineup, since he was the better hitter. Gibson's career average was only 11 points lower than Maxvill's, and he was much more productive at the plate. Gibson had 24 career home runs in some 2,000 fewer at bats than Maxvill. He also had 144 runs batted in compared with Maxvill's 252, meaning that Gibson had an RBI about every 10th at bat, whereas Maxvill had one about every 14th turn.

After his playing career ended, Maxvill served as a coach with the A's, Cardinals, New York Mets and Atlanta Braves (where he served on Joe Torre's staff). After the 1984 season, he became general manager of the Cardinals, spending a decade as the Cardinals' top baseball executive, and the team won two more National League pennants in 1985 and 1987. He resigned in 1994.

External links

• Baseball Reference

Preceded by Joe McDonald

St. Louis Cardinals General Manager 1984–1994

Succeeded by Walt Jocketty

Persondata
Name	Maxvill, Dal
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	February 18, 1939
Place of birth	Granite City, Illinois
Date of death
Place of death