John Gamble

John Robert Gamble

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 5' 10", Weight 165 lb.
• High School Carson City High School
• Debut September 7, 1972
• Final Game May 25, 1973
• Born February 10, 1948 in Reno, NV USA
• Died September 1, 2022 in Orovada, NV USA

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Biographical Information

Shortstop John Gamble played major league baseball with the 1972 and 1973 Detroit Tigers.

John Gamble was born in Reno, NV in 1948. He played shortstop at Carson City High School in Carson City, NV, from where he was selected by the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 2nd round of the 1966 amateur draft. Gamble spent his first five years in the minors with the Dodgers organization. In his first minor league season, with the Ogden Dodgers of the Pioneer League in 1966, he was managed by Tom Lasorda and Bill Russell was a teammate. Russell played the outfield, while Gamble, who hit .225 in 45 games, was the shortstop; Russell would of course go on to play shortstop with the Dodgers until the mid-1980s.

In 1967, Gamble was back with Ogden but did much better. He batted .298 in 58 games, then was promoted to the Daytona Beach Dodgers of the Florida State League in 1968. There, he emerged as threat on the basepaths, stealing 38 bases in 46 attempts while batting .254 in 132 games. He made 76 errors however, putting in doubt his future as an infielder. He started 1969 with the Bakersfield Dodgers of the California League, but after 37 games of hitting .248, he was back with Daytona Beach and hit .317 in 70 games. He was at Daytona Beach for a third stint in 1970, hit .258 in 126 games, stole 60 bases, and playing mainly third base, cut his errors to 25. This performance caught the attention of the Detroit Tigers, who selected him in the minor league phase of the 1970 Rule V draft after the season. He spent 1971 with the Montgomery Rebels of the AA Southern League, splitting his time between shortstop and third base. He hit .252 and stole 38 bases in 137 games, and when 1972 started, he was in AAA, playing third and short with the Toledo Mud Hens of the International League. He batted .268 in 128 games that season and in September got his first taste of the big leagues when the Tigers, locked in a tight pennant race with the Boston Red Sox, called him up. He played six games, went 0 for 3 at the plate and played one game at shortstop. He was mostly a pinch runner, but was not eligible for the postseason after the Tigers edged the Red Sox by half a game in the AL East.

In 1973, John Gamble started the year in Toledo but was recalled to Detroit in mid-May and played another 7 games, all as a pinch runner, scoring one run. He played his last game on May 25 and was sent back down to Toledo where he finished the season with a .291 batting average in only 38 games, his season being cut short by an injury. Still in the Tigers' organization, he was loaned to the Memphis Blues, the top farm team of the Montreal Expos, for 36 games in 1974, after which he went to the Evansville Triplets, which were now the Tigers' AAA affiliate. He was no longer a starter however and hit a combined .240 in 82 games that year. He spent 1975 and 1976 at Evansville, hitting .288 the first year, but a poor .210 in 90 games to close his career in 1976.

Further Reading

• Clifford Blau: "Leg Men: Career Pinch-Runners in Major League Baseball", in The Baseball Research Journal, SABR, Volume 38, Number 1 (Summer 2009), pp. 70-81.

Related Sites

• ¸John Gamble at the SABR Bio Project