[Tiger Fan]

The mid 70's is when I really got hooked on baseball. I will go into much more detail on that decade over the next few posts. A lot of great things happened in the HOB3 in that decade so I will push my focus on the fictional aspect of the HOB3 (post 2015) back a few weeks. Before I get the the full 70's recap here is Toby Harrah's career.


TOBY HARRAH
The big surprise in Toby Harrah's career was that he retired following the 1985 season while still at the top of his game. Harrah was coming off his 5th straight allstar season and hit a solid .339 for the Pirates in 1985.

Harrah made his major league debut with the Washington Senators midway through the 1971 campaign. He played 45 games that season and batted .356. The team moved to Texas the following season and Harrah started at shortstop for 2 years before moving to second base. He would hit for the cycle in a game against Detroit in 1973.

The Rangers, a consistant last place club, dealt Harrah to Oakland in the spring of 1979. Harrah would hit .352 platooning with Jorge Orta at second as the A's won the World Series that season. Harrah played in 5 of the 6 series games, batting .318 in the postseason. It would be the only postseason action of his career.

Harrah, looking to play everyday, signed with the Indians as a free agent. He would make the allstar team in both 1981 and 1982 and finish third in the American League batting race both seasons. In 1981, his 215 hits were tops in the AL. In 1983 he signed with Pittsburgh and finished second to Dave Winfield in the NL batting race. He would finish second again in 1984 but would increase his allstar game streak to 4 games. He would make his final allstar team in 1985, the final season of his career.

In the allstar games, Harrah went 8-for-18 with 1 homer and 5 rbi's.

HOB3 totals 1980 games, 179 HR, 875 rbi, .322 avg, 2141 hits
Real Life 2155 games, 195 hr, 918 rbi, .264 avg, 1954 hits