Encyclopedia > Johnny Bench

  Article Content

Johnny Bench

Johnny Bench (1947), professional baseball player

Born Johnny Lee Bench on December 7, 1947, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States, he grew up to become a professional baseball player who spent his entire 17 season major league career with the Cincinnati Reds, and was a key part of the dominating "Big Red Machine" of the early 1970s. Some consider him to be the best catcher ever to play the game.

Coming up with the Reds' organistion, his promise was immediately apparent, winning him the 1968 NL Rookie of the Year. Whilst possibly not as great a threat on offense as some (such as Roy Campanella or Yogi Berra), Bench was a solid power hitter, and his great defensive skill won him 10 Gold Gloves as well as the NL MVP award in 1970 and again in 1972, helping the Reds to the World Series title on both occasions, He also hit 389 career home runs, and held the record for most home runs by a catcher (a record since broken by Carlton Fisk[?]). He was elected to the United States Baseball Hall of Fame in 1989, appearing on 96% of the ballots.

Regular season stats

GABRH2B3BHRRBISBCSBBSOBAOBPSLGTBSHSFIBBHBPGDP
215876581091204838124389137668438911278.267.342.4763644119013519201

External link: Link to Bench's page on the Baseball Hall of Fame website (http://www.baseballhalloffame.org/hofers_and_honorees/hofer_bios/bench_johnny.htm)



All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License

 
  Search Encyclopedia

Search over one million articles, find something about almost anything!
 
 
  
  Featured Article
Great River, New York

... 65 years of age or older. The median age is 39 years. For every 100 females there are 104.2 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there are 97.8 males. Th ...

 
 
 
This page was created in 72.7 ms