Recently we've looked at some of the advertisements that appeared in The Sporting News in 1960, especially as they relate to the baseball card/memorabilia hobby.
One item that particularly caught my eye was a small ad placed by former major league pitcher Virgil Trucks in the Feb. 10 issue.
Actually it shouldn't be surprising that Trucks chose the pages of TSN for his "Situation Wanted" ad. At that time, virtually everybody that was involved in baseball, from the American Legion to the Commissioner's office, read the paper every week. It was THE venue to reach everybody who was anybody in professional ball, from club owners to the groundskeepers.
When Trucks placed his ad, he had recently ended his career as a pro pitcher. After 17 major league seasons, he had pitched briefly in 1959 for the Miami Marlins of the International League.
Trucks had signed as a free agent with the Tigers at age 21 in 1938. In Class D ball that season he won 25 games to lead the Alabama-Florida League.
He made his major league debut in 1941, and after spending all of 1944 and most of 1945 in the Navy, he came back to Detroit in time to beat the Cubs in Game 2 of the World Series. He went to the Browns in 1953, was traded to the White Sox in mid-season, then went back to the Tigers for 1956.
Trucks pitched for Kansas City in 1957 and until June of 1958, when he was traded to the Yankees, who released him after spring training in 1959.
Trucks won 20 games in 1953 and 19 each in 1949 and 1954. In 1949 he led the major leagues with 153 strikeouts and tied for the lead with six shutouts. His lifetime big league record was 177-135 with a 3.39 ERA.
I'm not sure whether Trucks' ad in TSN early in 1960 resulted in any jobs in baseball, but he did hook on with the Pittsburgh Pirates as a pitching coach for the 1963 season.
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