Farewell to the Firebirds

A colorful 34-year baseball era came to a close on September 11, 1997 when the Firebirds played for their final time in Game Four of the Pacific Coast League championship series.

It's fitting that the local Triple-A franchise went out as a PCL championship contender, because that's the way it came in.

When Horace Stoneham moved his National League team from New York to San Francisco in 1958, he needed a Western location for his Triple-A club, which had been operating in Minneapolis. Stoneham chose Phoenix, a sleepy desert community that was just beginning to show signs of vitality that one day would see it erupt into a major metropolis.

The First Two Seasons. The beginning was auspicious. The first Phoenix Giants team arguably was the best. Manager Red Davis' club finished 89-65 and won the PCL pennant by 4.5 games over San Diego. Old-time Phoenix baseball fans still speak in reverent terms about the '58 Giants.

Willie McCovey was the first baseman. Andre Rodgers played shortstop. Tom Haller was the catcher. Joey Amalfitano played second and third. Dusty Rhodes, Leon Wagner and Felipe Alou made up the outfield.

The Giants bashed a league-record 205 home runs that season at old Municipal Stadium at Central Avenue and Mohave, just south of downtown. McCovey, a raw rookie who went on to become one of the most feared sluggers in the major leagues, was not one of the leaders of the '58 power brigade.

"I only had 14 home runs, but I had a bunch of doubles," McCovey would recall many years later. "I didn't get the ball up, but I rattled the scoreboard 47 times."

McCovey's memory was flawless. He hit 14 homers, 37 doubles and 10 triples that season. Rodgers, who hit .354 and won the PCL batting title, led the club with 31 homers. Rodgers also hit 43 doubles, a club record that stood until the 1997 season, when former Arizona State star Jacob Cruz topped Rodgers' mark in mid-August.

McCovey said the '58 Giants were "too good for Triple-A." The next year, however, the league was too good for the Giants. A potentially good club was destroyed by major league call-ups and finished last with a 64-90 record, 21 games behind champion Salt Lake City.

McCovey learned how to get the ball in the air, however. He was batting .372 with 29 homers and 92 RBIs after 95 games when he was called up to San Francisco.

As quickly as they arrived in the desert, the Giants were gone. Lured by greener pastures in the Pacific Northwest, Stoneham moved his team after just two seasons to Tacoma, Washington, where a sparkling new park, 8,000-seat Cheney Stadium, had been built.

But Phoenix city fathers figured two could play that game. It took them a few years, but they got a new stadium built where East Van Buren makes a big bend south toward Tempe.

Return to Phoenix.