Dave Ferriss | |||
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Pitcher | |||
Born: Shaw, Mississippi |
December 5, 1921|||
Died: November 24, 2016 Cleveland, Mississippi |
(aged 94)|||
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MLB debut | |||
April 29, 1945, for the Boston Red Sox | |||
Last MLB appearance | |||
April 18, 1950, for the Boston Red Sox | |||
MLB statistics | |||
Win–loss record | 65–30 | ||
Earned run average | 3.64 | ||
Strikeouts | 296 | ||
Teams | |||
Career highlights and awards | |||
David Meadow Ferriss (December 5, 1921 – November 24, 2016) was an American Major League Baseball player who pitched for the Boston Red Sox from 1945 through 1950. Ferriss was given the nickname 'Boo' as the result of a childhood inability to pronounce the word 'brother'.
After Ferriss's MLB playing career was over, he returned to the Mississippi Delta for two stints as the head baseball coach at Delta State University where he retired as the school's all-time leader in wins with 639. In November 2002, he was inducted into the Boston Red Sox Hall of Fame.
Ferriss received the first full baseball scholarship to Mississippi State University, where he pitched in 1941 and 1942 and joined the Kappa Sigma fraternity. He was signed by the Red Sox in 1942, and he appeared in 21 games for the Greensboro Red Sox of the Class B Piedmont League, compiling a 7–7 record. Shortly afterward, he was called by the military for World War II service, where he served for over two years at Randolph Field in Texas, during which time he was able to continue playing baseball, in a military league. After an early discharge in February 1945 due to asthma, Ferriss was assigned by the Red Sox to the Louisville Colonels, although he did not appear in a game with them.
When the Red Sox started slowly in 1945, Ferriss was called up and made a spectacular major league debut with a five-hit shutout against the Athletics on April 29. He went on to set a longstanding American League (AL) record for scoreless innings pitched at the start of a career with 22, which stood until 2008, when it was broken by Brad Ziegler. Ferriss compiled a 21–10 win-loss record for the Red Sox in his rookie season.