Ralph Kiner

Kiner c. 1953

Left fielder

Born: October 27, 1922
Santa Rita, New Mexico

Died: February 6, 2014 (aged 91)
Rancho Mirage, California

Batted: Right

Threw: Right

MLB debut

April 12, 1946, for the Pittsburgh Pirates

Last MLB appearance

September 25, 1955, for the Cleveland Indians

MLB statistics

Batting average

.279

Home runs

369

Runs batted in

1,015

Teams

Career highlights and awards

Member of the National

Baseball Hall of Fame

Inducted

1975

Vote

75.41% (thirteenth ballot)

Ralph McPherran Kiner (October 27, 1922 – February 6, 2014) was an American Major League Baseball player. An outfielder, Kiner played for the Pittsburgh Pirates, Chicago Cubs, and Cleveland Indians from 1946 through 1955. Following his retirement, Kiner served from 1956 through 1960 as general manager of the Pacific Coast League San Diego Padres. He also served as an announcer for the New York Mets from the team's inception until his death. Though injuries forced his retirement from active play after 10 seasons, Kiner's tremendous slugging outpaced all of his National League contemporaries between the years 1946 and 1952. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1975.

At the time of his death, baseball writer Marty Noble named Kiner "one of baseball's genuine and most charming gentlemen".

Kiner was born in Santa Rita, New Mexico, and raised in Alhambra, California by his mother, Beatrice Grayson Kiner, after his father Ralph died when he was 4 years old. He was of Pennsylvania Dutch (German) and Scots-Irish ancestry, although his maternal grandmother was Jewish. Kiner served as a U.S. Navy pilot during World War II.

Kiner made his major league debut on April 12, 1946, with the Pittsburgh Pirates. He finished the season with 23 home runs, but 109 strikeouts. After the season, the Pirates convinced future Hall of Famer Hank Greenberg not to retire. Greenberg gave Kiner hours of instruction, and in 1947, Kiner led the major leagues with 51 home runs while striking out fewer than 100 times. Many of Kiner's homers were hit into a shortened left-field and left-center-field porch at Forbes Field (originally built for Greenberg and known in the press as "Greenberg Gardens"); the porch was retained for Kiner and redubbed "Kiner's Korner". Kiner would later use "Kiner's Korner" as the title of his post-game TV show in New York.

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Wikipedia