Dave Van Gorder

Just about six months ago to this date, Spitballin’ wrapped its four-year run on BallNine with our 200^th installment. The series mostly featured former Major Leaguers telling their stories and reflecting on their careers. We interviewed umpires, managers, coaches, scouts and family members of players from previous generations as well.

It produced an epic library of over a half a million words’ worth of incredible baseball stories. We loved giving a platform for these great folks to tell their tales.

What we didn’t count on when we started this back in 2020 was that some of these features might be the final long-form interview some of these folks do in their lives. Providing one final chance for people to tell their stories is a tremendous honor and the gravity of that is not lost on us.

Guys like Rocky Colavito, Luis Tiant, David McCarty, Larry Miggins and Tom Browning sadly passed not long after sharing their stories with our readers.

Former Reds catcher and USC National Champion Dave Van Gorder passed away on February 4 and now his Spitballin’ interview will run posthumously.

I had emailed Van Gorder for an interview as we were nearing the Spitballin’ finale, but never heard back from him. After the finale ran, I got a response from Van Gorder, who was more than happy to share his stories.

Even though we stopped publishing Spitballin’, I wasn’t going to turn down a guy who was drafted to replace Johnny Bench, made his MLB debut catching Tom Seaver and who was heavily involved in Pete Rose’s record-breaking 4,192 game.

How involved was he?

He caught in the game and was the one who encouraged Pete Rose Jr. to go out of the dugout and join his father on the field to share the moment.

Oh, and he was also a First Team NCAA All-American at USC where he won a National Championship in 1978.

He was a great family man and a fantastic baseball player who played ten seasons professionally, five in the Big Leagues, so please join us as we go Spitballin’ with Dave Van Gorder.

Thanks for joining us, Mr. Van Gorder! We have a lot of interesting stuff to get into from your time at USC and the Reds, but let’s go back to the beginning first. What was baseball like for you as a kid?

I was nine years old when I started playing, which is too late by today’s standards. I have grandkids who started playing when they were six, which in my opinion is a waste of time. They spend half the time picking their nose or picking flowers! My dad played college baseball and he blew his arm out in college, so I don’t know if he was angry or didn’t have any desire to get me started, so I had to search baseball out myself. I came home one day and said that I would like to play Little League, so my dad signed me up and became my coach. I then jumped from Little League to Pony League which was a big jump because the bases were now 90 feet. I couldn’t make the throw to second as a catcher, so they moved me to second base, but as I grew into my body, I was able to make that throw and move back to catcher. I was a pitcher in high school too, but my coach said that I had one of the better arms he had ever seen and didn’t want to take a chance on hurting it, so I became a catcher full time and it worked out for me.

I would say that it did! As a Southern California guy, did you grow up a Dodgers fan?

Growing up, I despised the Dodgers because my dad was a Yankees fan. I was at so many Dodgers games though because I loved baseball. I even got to meet Tommy Lasorda. I used to actually joke that I saw more Dodgers games than Tommy Lasorda. My hero, who I can say without any second thought, was Vin Scully. I was the stereotypical kid who would lay in bed listening the Dodgers games and Vin Scully on the radio. He said things about me when I played for the Reds that were just amazing. I would never own a Dodger hat or wear a Dodgers shirt, but I have two Vin Scully t-shirts.

Vin Scully said, “I don’t know Dave Van Gorder, but I really like him. He wanted me to send Happy Father’s Day wishes to his dad in Los Angeles, so I would like to do that. I bet poppa is a proud dad today.” I looked over and my dad was crying.

You obviously played against the Dodgers and had Vin Scully announce your games. Did you ever get a chance to interact with him?

Yes, I have a great story about that. The good thing about playing for the Reds was that when we played the Dodgers, the games were on TV in Los Angeles, so my dad would get to watch me play. One year, we were playing the Dodgers on Father’s Day and before the game, I sauntered up to Vin Scully at the batting cage. I had never met him before. I asked him if he could wish my father a Happy Father’s Day on the broadcast. He said, “That’ll be my pleasure!” I didn’t think much about it, but that offseason I was visiting my dad and he said he wanted to show me something. He popped in a tape of the Dodgers-Reds game. I told him I remembered that game and he said, “Just keep watching.” I came up to bat and my dad turned up the sound. Vin Scully said, “I don’t know Dave Van Gorder, but I really like him. He wanted me to send Happy Father’s Day wishes to his dad in Los Angeles, so I would like to do that. I bet poppa is a proud dad today.” I looked over and my dad was crying. That Vin Scully story is one of my favorites.

That’s really incredible – I love it! Now before all of that, you were a National Champion at USC. First, how did you end up at USC?

My girlfriend at the time, who has now been my wife of 45 years, was going to the University of Arizona. Both of her parents were professors there. I made a trip down to Tucson and it happened to be the day Arizona was playing their Red-Blue Spring Ball game. I met with Jerry Kindall and told him I would like to play baseball at Arizona. I was living in Chandler, Arizona and was pretty good. He said, “Well, you know, we have some catchers already…” I said that I didn’t want a scholarship; I just wanted a chance to play. He said, “Well, I don’t know.” As he was talking to me, Bob Horner and Hubie Brooks were walking by. He turned, left me and went to talk to those guys. If that was me, I would have done the same thing.

A few weeks later, Jim Brock, the coach at Arizona State took me out to dinner. My mom really wanted me to go there because it was close and I could live at home. I went back home and was at high school practice one day. The assistant coach from the University of Arizona, Jim Wing, said they wanted to offer me a full scholarship. I told him that I was there about a month and a half ago and Coach Kindall said he didn’t have any place for me. What happened was the draft was coming up and my name was being mentioned, so that got their attention. I said, “You guys had your chance, so I am not going there.” Out of the blue, I got a call from Justin Dedeaux, Rod Dedeaux’s father. He invited me to come to the campus of USC. My lifelong dream was to play for the Trojans. They were going to give me a partial scholarship and I said, “Perfect!” I lived at home first semester, driving 40 miles each way.

Having that dream to play for USC, what was it like to put on the uniform?

I remember the first game, I didn’t get in. I was in uniform, but I just sat there and watched. I was wondering if I made the right decision. But within a couple of weeks, I was playing every day and starting as a freshman. We didn’t do very well, but the next year we got better. We lost in the playoffs my sophomore year to Cal State Los Angeles and it was heartbreaking. We said we weren’t going to let that happen again. The next year we went out and our record was 54-9, which was the best winning percentage in NCAA history at the time. The only games we lost were the ones where we didn’t show up or didn’t care. It’s interesting, the three colleges that recruited me the hardest, ASU, Arizona and USC, were all National Champions at some point during my college career.

That’s incredible! What was it like playing for a legend like Coach Dedeaux?

He knew fundamentals better than anyone who ever coached baseball. He would tell you that Casey Stengel, his mentor, knew fundamentals better than he did, but he was the best I ever saw. Coach Dedeaux was able to give those insights without showing you. He didn’t say, “Move your feet;” he would tell you, “Shuffle your puppies!” He would tell people that playing catch was the single greatest fundamental that you could practice. We’d be warming up and he would be walking around and say, “Tiger, you gotta hit him in the chest!” He wanted every throw right in the chest. If you were doing something wrong, he would come up and put his arm around you. He’d say, “Now Tiger, do you see so-and-so doing it this way? No. So let’s try to do it like this.” He would make it sound logical to do things his way.

What a legend he is. After that, you were the Reds second round draft pick in 1978 and a year later, there were talks that you would be the heir apparent to Johnny Bench. Was that something you were aware of or were you just focused on your own development?

When I was in junior high school, the Big Red Machine started their crusade. In 1970, they lost to the Orioles and I was graduating from junior high. In my yearbook, one of my buddies wrote, “You’re no Bench, but you’re a good catcher.” Bench was always one of my heroes and when I was drafted, he was getting towards the end of his career, so that thought was only natural. I got invited to Spring Training in 1979. If it wasn’t your turn to hit, you had to go shag balls in the outfield. I was in left-center field and I looked over to left field and Johnny Bench was standing there. I walked over and introduced myself to him. I was in heaven. We didn’t say much, but I thought it was important to do. From that point forward, he treated me like I really was supposed to take his place. He never said a bad thing about me, never said, “Who’s this kid?” He never asked me to carry his stuff. When my first daughter was born, he had this person make a picture of her with a Reds uniform on. He was the real deal. He also made it really clear to me that his name was “John,” not “Johnny.”

You were called up in 1982 for the first time. The floor is yours to tell us your callup story!

I was in Indianapolis and we were in Des Moines. I had a roommate named Orlando Isales and I kid you not, he was the spitting image of OJ Simpson. We called him “Juice” and he loved it. About 7:00AM the phone rang and he answered it. It was George Sugar, our manager. He asked me to go to his room. Orlando looked at me and said, “You’re going to the Big Leagues!” He was right. I got on a flight and showed up in Cincinnati. John McNamara was the manager, so I went in his office to meet him. McNamara said, “Welcome to the Big Leagues. You’re in the lineup tonight and you’re catching Tom Seaver.” I was like, “What?!”

That’s a pretty tall task to have as a first assignment. How did that game go for you?

I had caught Seaver in Spring Training in the bullpen, but I don’t remember if I caught him in a game. The way the locker room was set up, I was directly across from him. His locker was right as you walk in the door and right next to Seaver was Johnny Bench. They had two lockers each; everyone else had one. As it was getting closer to the game, I walked over to him and asked him questions about the game. He said, “Just sit right in the middle of the plate.” That was the whole conversation. It was against the Giants and an overcast day. It started to rain and was one of those two-and-a-half-hour games that turned into five hours. The tarp was on, the tarp was off; one of those games. He pitched five innings and we lost like 3-2. He did well and there was no real conversation after the fact. But just like Johnny Bench, he realized that I was going to be a teammate. I caught him about six or seven times. He wasn’t in his prime anymore, but he was still a fastball-slider guy and he still threw hard. They talk about guys throwing harder today and I have my doubts about that. I caught a guy, Jim Kern, and he was legitimately 100 MPH. He was almost impossible to catch, he threw that hard.

I interviewed Jim Kern and remember him well. He threw as hard as anybody, without question. I’m a Mets fan and Tom Seaver is one of my favorites – what was your relationship with him like?

I’ll tell you a story. We were flying to the west coast out of Chicago and sitting at O’Hare. Seaver said to me, “Hey, you go get the beers, I’ll get the food and meet me right over there.” I went and got the beers and when I got back to the table, he had lobster sitting on our plates. I said, “Where in the hell did you get lobsters from at the airport?” He laughed. It was just two of us and people were walking by, not paying attention. Then this guy walks up and I figure he was going to ask Seaver for his autograph. He looked at us and said, “Excuse me, aren’t you Dave Van Gorder?” I was like, “What?!” The guy said he went to school where I did and he knew my mom. Then he just said, “Well, nice seeing you,” and walked away. Seaver looked at me and said, “Are you kidding me? We’re in O’Hare Airport and somebody walks up and asks who you are?!”

That’s great. I totally could picture that. I wanted to ask about another legend too, Pete Rose. What was your relationship with Pete Rose like?

You know, I owe a lot of my time in the Big Leagues to Pete Rose. He got to the Reds in 1984 and we weren’t having a great year. We were kinda just wallowing along in the season. Pete showed up and automatically brought a spark to the team. When he came back, we all had “Pete’s Back!” shirts. He put me right in the lineup and I did pretty well. Pete appreciated that. The next Spring Training, I didn’t have to worry about making the team because Pete told me he liked the way I played and I would make the team. That took an incredible amount of pressure off me.

You were in the game when he broke Ty Cobb’s record. What was your experience like playing in that historic game?

Before he broke the record, we were in Chicago. Pete was in a platoon with Tony Perez and Steve Trout, a lefty, was supposed to pitch so Pete wasn’t in the lineup. However, Trout got in a bicycle accident the day before and when he got to the park, he couldn’t pitch. He was replaced by Reggie Patterson, a righty, so now Pete was going to be in the lineup. All the reporters who had been going to the airport to get to Cincinnati for the next game, had to scramble to get back to Wrigley Field. Pete ended up hitting a home run to tie Ty Cobb’s record and they ended up throwing the ball back!

We went back to Cincinnati and Marge Schott was excited about that. Eric Show was pitching and Pete, or course, broke the record. The place went crazy and everyone went running on the field to hug Pete. Everyone came off the field and Pete was standing there in the moment. I was standing in the dugout next to Pete Rose Jr. I said to him, “Go out and be with your dad.” He looked at me and ran out on the field to hug his dad. The crowd went crazy. The story was that Tony Perez told him to go out there, but Pete Rose said it was Dave Van Gorder who did it. There’s a clip of it somewhere.

That’s really incredible. The scene with Pete Jr. is so iconic and it’s amazing you were the one who initiated that. What an awesome memory from that game.

What I remember too is that Pete was already into memorabilia back then, so he wore like six different uniforms that day to have all these uniforms from that game. Also, every time he got a hit for the rest of his career, it was a new record, so they kept taking those balls out of the games too. We were in Houston and Pete got his 4,200 hit. They threw it in the dugout and I happened to catch it. I brought it over to Pete and asked him if I could have it. He said, “Sure, you can have it.” About 20 years later, I was cleaning the yard and I found the ball, all chewed up by the dog. I took it to my kids and they said they were playing catch with it in the yard. It was so slimy and chewed up, that I couldn’t even keep it.

Ah man! It’s amazing to think of how many other historic baseballs probably met that fate over the years. It’s been fantastic reliving these memories with you. I grew up watching baseball in the ‘80s so all of this resonates with me. Last question as we wrap things up. What are your reflections when you look back on your baseball career?

My memories are great ones. Most of them. I went to salary arbitration in 1985 and won a $150,000 salary. To me, that was more money than God at the time. The Reds didn’t like that I won, especially Marge Schott. I said that for years, they paid me what they wanted to pay me and now I had an opportunity to earn, so I took it and won. That was the end of my career. I broke my wrist in Spring Training on a play at home plate and when I was ready, they sent me on a 20-day rehab assignment. I went to Denver for rehab and after the 20 days, they told me to just stay in Denver. That was the end of me in Cincinnati.

While I don’t regret going to arbitration, the only regret I have is the negative impact it had. After the Reds, I went to Baltimore and was backup for Terry Kennedy, which was fine. My last game with the Orioles was with against Twins. Frank Viola started and won the Cy Young Award that year. It was the Saturday before the All-Star break and I got two hits. On the Sunday after the game, one of our coaches, Terry Crowley, told me that Cal Ripken Sr., our manager, wanted to see me. I went in there and he told me they were sending me to AAA. We were the worst team in the American League East and they were making a change at backup catcher? It didn’t make sense. The Orioles GM was Hank Peters and it turns out that I was one day short of having a Major League medical pension for the rest of my life. I didn’t think about that then, but I found out years later. You know they’re looking at that stuff all that time. How much money did Hank Peters save Major League Baseball by doing that? I mean, really.

Those were the nasty parts of the game. But for me, it was a lifelong dream to play baseball in the Majors. I went to college to play baseball in the Major Leagues. I didn’t go to college to be an engineer, doctor or scientist, I went there to be a baseball player. And some people don’t get that. I got married to the woman of my dreams. I had told her that there was going to be a lot of travel and a lot of hard times, but if you were willing to do it, this is how we could do it. She said, “I do,” and all these years later we’re still together. That’s what baseball afforded me. It molded me into who I am.