Denver Bears players

Jim_French_(baseball)

Richard James French (born August 13, 1941) is an American former catcher in Major League Baseball who played between 1965 and 1971 for the Washington Senators. Listed at 5' 7", 182 lb., French batted left-handed and threw right-handed. He was born in Warren, Ohio, and was signed by Washington in 1963 out of Ohio University.
The Washington pitchers liked French behind the plate for the way he called games and by his strong arm and defensive skills. The Senators hoped he would be an eventual successor for Mike Brumley, but French never came within 86 points of his .297 rookie average. His most productive season came in 1970, when he appeared in a career-high 69 games while hitting .211 with 29 runs and 13 RBI.
In a seven-season career, French was a .196 hitter (119-for-607) with five home runs and 51 RBI in 234 games, including 53 runs, 17 doubles, four triples, three stolen bases, and a .328 on-base percentage. In 220 catching appearances he posted a .982 fielding percentage (22 errors in 1203 chances).
French also played in the Washington, Detroit and Atlanta Minor league systems. French received his Juris Doctor at The John Marshall Law School, and is still a practicing attorney to this day.

Ethan_Blackaby

Ethan Allen Blackaby (July 24, 1940 – January 16, 2022) was an American professional baseball player who was an outfielder in Major League Baseball, appearing in 15 games for the Milwaukee Braves during the 1962 and 1964 seasons. He threw and batted left-handed, stood 5 feet 11 inches (1.80 m) tall and weighed 190 pounds (86 kg).
Born in Cincinnati, Ohio, Blackaby attended Canton, Illinois, High School, where he was a multi-sport standout athlete. He played baseball and football at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign before signing with the Braves in 1961. His nine-year professional career included 1,073 games in minor league baseball, punctuated by his two trials with the Braves in the closing weeks of the 1962 and 1964 campaigns, when MLB rosters expanded to 40 players. In his debut on September 6, 1962, he doubled in his first MLB at bat against Ernie Broglio of the St. Louis Cardinals. He had entered the game as a pinch hitter for Braves' catcher Bob Uecker, who later became both a film and television actor and Baseball Hall of Fame play-by-play broadcaster. Blackaby collected only two other hits in the majors, both singles, in 25 at bats over his two brief trials.
After his playing days were over, Blackaby was part-owner and general manager of the Phoenix Giants of the Triple-A Pacific Coast League in the 1970s and early 1980s.
Blackaby died on January 16, 2022, at the age of 81.

Will_McEnaney

William Henry McEnaney (born February 14, 1952) is an American former professional baseball player. He was a left-handed pitcher over parts of six seasons in Major League Baseball (1974–79) with the Cincinnati Reds, Montreal Expos, Pittsburgh Pirates and St. Louis Cardinals.
McEnaney was one of five children of William and Eleanor (Grieb) McEnaney and attended Springfield North High School in Springfield, Ohio. He was drafted by the Reds in the eighth round of the 1970 amateur draft. He made his Major League debut at age 22 on July 3, 1974, in relief of starter Clay Carroll in a 4–1 Reds loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers at Riverfront Stadium. McEnaney's first-ever inning was a 1–2–3 one as he induced popouts from Tommy John, Davey Lopes and Bill Buckner, and for the game he pitched two scoreless innings. In his rookie season, he pitched 24 games, with a 2–1 record and a 4.44 earned run average.
McEnaney was a key member of the bullpen of the Big Red Machine Reds teams that were the 1975 and 1976 World Series champions. In 1975, he posted a 5–2 record with a 2.47 ERA and 15 saves in 70 pitching appearances. But he is best known for his performance in the Series, in which he pitched five games (6+2⁄3 innings) in relief with a 2.70 ERA and one save. He earned the save in the seventh and final game as he pitched a perfect three-out ninth inning.In 1976 he fell to 2–6 with a 4.85 ERA in 55 games. But he again excelled in the World Series, pitching 4+2⁄3 scoreless innings in two games and earning two saves. And, just as in the previous World Series, he closed out the series with a 1–2–3 9th inning, for a four-game sweep over the New York Yankees.In December 1976 he was traded to the Expos. In 1977, he pitched 69 games with a 3–5 record and a 3.95 ERA. He was then traded to the Pirates for the 1978 season and pitched only six games with a 10.38 ERA. Released by the Pirates, he played for the Cardinals in 1979. In that season, he pitched in 25 games with an 0–3 record and a 2.95 ERA, but it was his final season in the majors as the Cardinals released him prior to the 1980 season. For his Major League career he compiled 12–17 record with a 3.76 earned run average and 148 strikeouts in 269 appearances, all as a relief pitcher.
McEnaney played in Mexico with the Águilas de Mexicali and the Plataneros de Tabasco, as well as for the West Palm Beach Tropics of the Senior Professional Baseball Association. In 1980, while pitching for Mexicali, McEnaney hurled a 1–0 no-hitter against the Algodoneros de Guasave.McEnaney lives in Florida with his second wife, Cindy. They have two adult sons. He also has a daughter from his first wife, Lynne Magaw. After baseball, he has been an investment banker, had a painting business, later a bathtub refinishing business for 12 years and was most recently the scoreboard operator for the Miami Marlins minor league affiliate Jupiter Hammerheads.

Rich_Reese

Richard Benjamin Reese (born September 29, 1941) is an American former professional baseball player who played first base and outfield in the major leagues from 1964 through 1973 for the Minnesota Twins and Detroit Tigers. Born in Leipsic, Ohio, Reese threw and batted left-handed, stood 6 feet 3 inches (1.91 m) tall and weighed 185 pounds (84 kg). He attended Deshler, Ohio, high school.
Reese's pro career began in the Detroit organization and he appeared in 59 games for the Tigers in his final MLB season in 1973, but he spent the bulk of his big-league tenure—807 games played—as a member of the Twins, who drafted him away from the Tigers in November 1962. In his finest season, 1969, Reese batted a career-best .322 in 132 games, with 16 home runs and 69 runs batted in, also personal bests. He tied for the American League lead in pinch hits with 13 in 1967. He is also the co-holder of the major league record for pinch-hit grand slam home runs in a career with three. One of those pinch-hit slams, on August 3, 1969, snapped the Baltimore Orioles' Dave McNally's consecutive win streak at 17, one short of the American League record.
Reese is also in the record books for two strikeouts: as the final out in Catfish Hunter's perfect game on May 8, 1968, and as Nolan Ryan's 383rd strikeout victim of the 1973 season (September 27), the still-standing single-season record, breaking Sandy Koufax's record of 382 in 1965.
In 866 games over ten seasons, Reese compiled a .253 batting average (512-for-2,020) with 248 runs, 73 doubles, 17 triples, 52 home runs, 245 RBI, 158 base on balls, 270 strikeouts, .312 on-base percentage and .384 slugging percentage. Defensively, he recorded a .992 fielding percentage at first base and left field. In the postseason, in the 1969 and 1970 American League Championship Series, he appeared in five games and hit .158 (3-for-19) with two runs batted in.
Reese went on to a career in the distilled spirits industry, retiring in 2003 as CEO of Jim Beam Brands headquartered in the Chicago suburb of Deerfield, Illinois.