{"id":557121,"date":"2026-03-22T13:58:17","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T13:58:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/557121\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T13:58:17","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T13:58:17","slug":"hall-of-fame-honors-exec-who-helped-save-the-giants-next-felipe-alou-deserves-a-call","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/557121\/","title":{"rendered":"Hall of Fame honors exec who helped save the Giants. Next, Felipe Alou deserves a call"},"content":{"rendered":"

Want more ways to catch up on the latest in Bay Area sports? Sign up for the Section 415 email newsletter here<\/a> and subscribe to the \u201cSection 415″ podcast <\/a>wherever you listen<\/a>.<\/p>\n

First of all, congratulations to former Giant Bill White, the winner of the latest prestigious Buck O\u2019Neil Lifetime Achievement Award who\u2019ll be honored during Hall of Fame weekend in late July in Cooperstown, N.Y.<\/p>\n

White, 92, was a splendid player and broadcaster, but it\u2019s his work as National League president in November 1992 that should make every Giants fan forever grateful \u2014 he had a heavy hand in preventing the Giants from relocating to St. Petersburg, Fla.<\/p>\n

White spearheaded a group of National League owners including the Dodgers\u2019 Peter O\u2019Malley that rejected then-Giants owner Bob Lurie\u2019s sale to Florida interests by a 9-4 vote, which opened the door for a local group of investors led by Peter Magowan to buy the team and keep it in San Francisco.<\/p>\n

Second of all, with all due respect to any other candidates for the next Buck O\u2019Neil Award, which is presented every three years and next given in 2029, Giants legend Felipe Alou ought to be a cinch to win. He hasn\u2019t been inducted into the Hall of Fame, and winning the Buck O\u2019Neil Award would be a perfect way to honor and secure his legacy as one of the sport\u2019s great ambassadors.<\/p>\n

For years, I\u2019ve believed Alou, 90, has deserved recognition in the Hall of Fame because of his overall impact on the game. He never campaigned for a spot in Cooperstown but recently told me, in typical humble fashion, that if it were to happen, he\u2019d like his brothers to get equal billing. Felipe, Matty, and Jesus played together with the Giants in the early 1960s and formed MLB\u2019s only all-brother outfield in 1963.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou put all of us together, and we\u2019re one pretty good ballplayer,\u201d he said. Actually, no. All were tremendous players, combining for more than 5,000 hits, which is more than the three DiMaggio brothers.<\/p>\n

What sets Felipe aside is that he was a trailblazer for Spanish-speaking players. He was the first born-and-raised Dominican to play in the majors (Ozzie Virgil Sr. came from the Dominican Republic but largely was raised in New York) and then the first Dominican born manager. He\u2019s known as the \u201cJackie Robinson of the Dominican.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alou\u2019s Hall of Fame case should be judged in a different manner than other managers considering he was denied a chance to manage in the majors for so long because of the color of his skin and his primary language. As he repeatedly was passed over, he plugged along for 17 seasons as a minor-league manager in the Montreal Expos\u2019 system.<\/p>\n

Major League Baseball wasn\u2019t ready to embrace a manager who was both Black and Latino. Decades after he experienced harsh racism as a minor-league player in Lake Charles, La. \u2014 he couldn\u2019t stay or eat with his white teammates and was forced out of town and moved to another affiliate after just five games \u2014 Alou was being denied again. When he finally got his chance to manage in the majors, he was 57.<\/p>\n

\"AnAlou played for 17 seasons and managed for 14 more in the majors. | Source: Tony Avelar\/San Francisco Giants\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Peter Kerasotis, who co-authored with Alou the 2018 book (\u201cAlou: My Baseball Journey\u201d), told me, \u201cFelipe should not have been held back to his late 50s until he became a big-league manager. If Felipe got a chance earlier, he could\u2019ve been top five in wins today.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hall of Fame manager Tony La Russa told me Alou should have joined him in Cooperstown long ago: \u201cHe paid a hell of a lot more dues than I did to manage in the major leagues, and he opened the door for Latin Americans as a player and with his success as a manager.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alou never got serious consideration to reach the Hall of Fame\u2019s hallowed grounds as a player through the writers\u2019 ballot \u2014 he received three votes and came off the ballot \u2014 and never appeared on a veterans\/era committee ballot as a manager, which is a shame and an injustice.<\/p>\n

Alou was an original San Francisco Giant in 1958 (like White) and played 17 seasons, becoming one of just three men with 2,000 hits and 200 homers as a player and 1,000 wins as a manager. The other two are enshrined in Cooperstown, Frank Robinson and Joe Torre.<\/p>\n

By the way, when a manager is considered on the Hall of Fame\u2019s Contemporary Baseball Era Committee ballot, the totality of his career is supposed to be discussed. That was the case with Torre, who would have been inducted anyway based solely on managing the Yankees\u2019 dynasty, but his 18 years as a player also were part of the equation \u2014 the process never got that far with Alou.<\/p>\n

Again, Alou\u2019s numbers don\u2019t define him. As a young outfielder with the Giants in the early 1960s, the most diverse team in the majors, Alou stood up to divisive manager Alvin Dark, who embarrassingly insisted that all Spanish speakers speak English in the clubhouse, even when Felipe was alongside his brothers.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

That Alou challenged Dark and spoke out against racism was a reason he was traded after the 1963 season, he told me, but he never stopped serving as a role model for other Latinos. After playing alongside Willie Mays for six years, he spent the next six seasons as a teammate of Hank Aaron and wound up with a .286 career average and .761 OPS with six clubs.<\/p>\n

White had his own challenges with racism, including in the very city that he denied a major-league franchise in 1992: St. Petersburg. He played for both the New York Giants and San Francisco Giants and was traded to the Cardinals before the 1959 season because the Giants had too many quality first basemen. When he reported to spring training, he was told he couldn\u2019t stay with white players and had to move to a Black section of St. Petersburg.<\/p>\n

1 day ago<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

4 days ago<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

Friday, Mar. 13<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a><\/p>\n

In White\u2019s 2011 autobiography, \u201cUppity,\u201d he wrote that a couple of prospects including Bob Gibson greeted him when he arrived, and White told them, \u201cSo this is the way it is here? Black players can\u2019t stay in the team hotels?\u201d<\/p>\n

Gibson: \u201cWelcome to St. Petersburg.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was a recurring theme for White, Alou, and many other players of color. Alou began his long minor-league managing career at 41, and five Expos managers were hired before he got his chance. He took over a team that lost 90 games and started winning right away. His 1994 team was probably the best in Expos history and seemed World Series bound, but a labor strife ended the season in mid-August, the Expos finishing 74-40. He was named National League manager of the year.<\/p>\n

After 10 years in Montreal, Alou was hired by the Giants in 2003 to replace Dusty Baker and won 100 games his first of four years. He remained with the team as a special assistant and was an influential voice during the Giants\u2019 championship runs in 2010, 2012, and 2014.<\/p>\n

\"TwoAlou managed Hall of Famer Tim Raines, right, during his tenure with the Expos. | Source: Ryan Remiorz\/Associated Press<\/p>\n

Through it all, Alou managed more than 3,600 games in the majors and minors and too many winter-ball games to count, including as a player-manager, winning championships in the Dominican and Venezuela. He\u2019s in both the Caribbean Baseball Hall of Fame and Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n

The Buck O\u2019Neil Award is named after the legendary player-manager in the Negro Leagues who was the award\u2019s first recipient in 2008. According to the Hall of Fame, it honors \u201can individual whose efforts broadened the game\u2019s appeal and whose character, integrity, and dignity is comparable to\u201d O\u2019Neil\u2019s.<\/p>\n

Other winners were Roland Hemond (2011), Joe Garagiola (2014), Rachel Robinson (2017), David Montgomery (2020), Carl Erskine (2023), and now White. If Alou were to win the award next time, he\u2019d be the first Latino recipient.<\/p>\n

The award is voted on by the 17-member Hall of Fame board of directors, six of whom are Hall of Famers: Torre, Craig Biggio, Tom Glavine, Ken Griffey Jr., Cal Ripken Jr., and Ozzie Smith.<\/p>\n

Anyone can nominate anybody for the award, and the Giants were among those who submitted a nomination for Alou. As was I.<\/p>\n

Does Felipe Alou deserve recognition in Baseball\u2019s Hall of Fame? Let us know in the comments, a new feature exclusively for SF Standard members.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Want more ways to catch up on the latest in Bay Area sports? Sign up for the Section…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":557122,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[558],"tags":[64,63,591,5157,85],"class_list":["post-557121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-mlb","tag-san-francisco-giants","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/557121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=557121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/557121\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/557122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=557121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=557121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=557121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}