A two-time All-Star player, Blair excelled as a defensive player, winning the Gold Glove Award eight times, including seven consecutive years from 1969 to 1975.[2] One of the best defensive outfielders of his era, and "perhaps the finest" he had excellent range and was brilliant at tracking fly balls.[3][4] He challenged hitters by playing shallow, then running down balls hit over his head.[5] In 1984, Blair was inducted into the Baltimore Orioles Hall of Fame.[6]
Early life
Blair was born on February 1, 1944 in Cushing, Oklahoma but grew up in Los Angeles where he attended Manual Arts High School. An accomplished athlete, he played basketball, baseball and ran track and was a high jumper while a student.[3][7] Blair was originally signed by the New York Mets as an amateur free agent in 1961 as a shortstop, but moved himself to the outfield. After spending the 1962 season in their farm system, he was selected by the Orioles in the 1962 first-year draft on November 26, 1962. He played in Baltimore's minor league system in 1963 and 1964, and came up to the Orioles for the first time on September 9, 1964 at only 20 years old.[3][8][9]
Major league career
Baltimore Orioles
He broke into the Orioles' lineup in 1965 and started in center field on opening day.[3] Despite hitting only .234 with five home runs and 25 runs batted in,[9] impressed many with his defensive skills. In 1966 he batted .277[9] on an Orioles team that won the World Series. In Games 3 and 4 of that series, which the Frank Robinson-led Orioles swept from the defending champion Los Angeles Dodgers in four games,[10] Blair played a major role in 1–0 shutouts by Wally Bunker and Dave McNally respectively, hitting a 430-foot home run off Claude Osteen in Game 3, and robbing Jim Lefebvre of an eighth-inning home run that would have tied Game 4.[11] Blair also caught Lou Johnson's fly ball for the final out of the Series.[12]
Blair in 1966
In 1967 Blair established a career high .293 batting average with 11 home runs and 64 RBIs, along with an American League-leading 12 triples.[9] He also won the first of his eight Gold Glove Awards.[13] After slumping to .211 in 1968,[9] Blair had perhaps his best season in 1969. Batting second behind Don Buford in the Orioles' lineup, he hit .285 with career highs in home runs (26), runs batted in (76) and runs (102).[14] His 26 homers along with 20 stolen bases made him the first Orioles player to achieve at least 20 in each category in the same season.[15] He also made the All-Star team for the first time; he would repeat this feat in 1973. His Orioles won the pennant, with Blair becoming the first player to have 5 hits in a post-season game, with 5 hits in 6 at-bats against the Minnesota Twins on October 6.[16] The Orioles lost to the Miracle Mets in the World Series. Blair went 2-for-20 in that Series, including being the victim of one of Tommie Agee's two spectacular catches in Game 3 (Agee had also robbed Elrod Hendricks earlier in the game). On that Agee catch, Blair was the first batter Nolan Ryan faced in a World Series—the only World Series game the Hall of Fame pitcher would participate in. One of Blair's two hits came in the seventh inning of Game 2; it broke up Jerry Koosman's bid for a no-hitter.
In 1971 Blair took up switch-hitting but stopped after batting only .193 (11-for-57). He finished the season hitting .262. His Orioles won another pennant, but lost the World Series to the Pittsburgh Pirates in seven games.
During the 1971 World Series, Blair earned a place in baseball history in Game 4 by being the first man to bat in a World Series night game. Leading off the top of the first inning, Blair singled off Pittsburgh's Luke Walker.[23]
Blair's speed going back in the outfield enabled him to play shallow, and make catches à la Willie Mays.[12] In each of the Orioles' three straight World Series seasons, Blair won a Gold Glove. He also won a Gold Glove over each of the next four seasons, his last Gold Glove in 1975 coinciding with teammate Brooks Robinson winning his 16th consecutive — and last — Gold Glove at third base.[24]
New York Yankees
Blair was traded by the Orioles to the New York Yankees for Elliott Maddox and Rick Bladt on January 20, 1977.[5] The transaction was driven by general manager Gabe Paul's desire to exile Maddox from the Yankees.[25] Blair was primarily a defensive outfielder replacement in the late innings.[26] On June 18 of that year in a nationally televised game against the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park, he was tangentially involved in one of the most bizarre scenes in baseball history. Yankee manager Billy Martin took right fielder Reggie Jackson out of the game and replaced him with Blair after Jackson had misplayed Jim Rice's fly ball for a double. As the cameras watched, Jackson and Martin nearly came to blows. Blair's walk-off RBI single to left off Rick Rhoden won Game 1 of the 1977 World Series for the Yankees.[27]
After winning World Series titles with the Yankees in 1977 and 1978, Blair was released early in the 1979 season. The Cincinnati Reds signed him as a free agent less than a month later, and Blair returned to the Yankees in May of 1980.[5] He retired after the Yankees released him a second time, on July 1 of that year.
Career summary
In his 17-year career, Blair, whose nickname, "Motormouth",[3] came from his talkative nature, batted .250 with 134 home runs and 620 RBI, 1513 hits and 171 stolen bases in 1947 games played.[9] Three times he had more than 17 home runs and 20 stolen bases in a season.[5] He was also one of the top bunters in the game, recording at least 10 sacrifice hits four times in his career (1969, 1974-1976), including 17 during the 1975 season.[9] In the very first playoff game in American League history, between the Orioles and Minnesota Twins on October 4, 1969, Blair's 11th inning bunt single off Ron Perranoski won the game for the Orioles.[29] Twins manager Billy Martin said after the game, "'There’s no way to beat a perfect bunt.'”[30] He had a .288 batting average, .347 on base percentage, and .379 slugging percentage over 28 World Series games.[3][14]
Blair led the American League in putouts twice, and threw out 104 runners from center field over his career. His career "range factor" is superior to that of hall of fame center fielders Willie Mays and Ken Griffey, Jr.[3]
Palmer loved having Blair in the outfield because of his fielding ability. In his 1996 book Palmer and Weaver: Together We Were Eleven Foot Nine, he reminisced about the time the Orioles have of fame manager Earl Weaver gave him three batting lineups to choose from for a game. "I'm looking basically for one thing," Palmer wrote. "Center field. We've got Paul Blair, who I personally think can field anything." According to Palmer, Blair caught 12 fly balls that night.[31] Palmer also thought Blair "was worth two runs, defensively, every game."[32] Weaver said that Blair never had to make great catches because he was always standing under the ball when it came down.[3]
Coaching career
At the end of his playing career, Blair was hired as an outfield instructor for the Yankees in 1981. In August 1982, he was named the head coach at Fordham University. Blair coached only one season at Fordham (1983)[12] with the team finishing with a 14–19 record. He then went back to work as an outfield instructor with the Houston Astros and as a third base coach for the Orioles Triple A team in Rochester and worked in that capacity until 1985.
In 1989, he played for the Gold Coast Suns in the newly formed Senior Professional Baseball Association, though the league folded after the season. Blair got his next shot at coaching in 1995 when he was named the manager of the Yonkers Hoot Owls in the newly formed Northeast League, an independent league of professional baseball. The team lasted just one season and finished a dismal 12–52.
Blair got his next, and last, shot at coaching in 1998 when he was named as the head coach for the Coppin State College baseball team. Blair coached the team from 1998–2002.[12] Unfortunately, his overall record at Coppin State was a disappointing 30–185.[11]
In the mid-1990s Blair was named the assistant general manager of the yet-to-be named New Orleans franchise in the United Baseball League (UBL) (which was a planned third major league).
While residing in Woodstock, Maryland, over the years Blair would work as a spring training instructor for the Orioles.[5]
Later life and death
Blair in 2007
After his retirement from coaching, Blair lived in Woodstock, Maryland with his wife, Gloria.[1] In his retirement, Blair often appeared in celebrity golf and bowling tournaments.[1] At the time of his death, he was known for working out at Triangle Fitness in Eldersburg, Maryland and bowling at Kings Point Lanes in Reisterstown, Maryland. His son Paul Blair III played eight years in the minors for the San Francisco Giants and the Chicago Cubs.
On December 26, 2013, Blair suffered a heart attack and lost consciousness while playing in a celebrity bowling tournament in Pikesville, Maryland. He was taken by ambulance to Sinai Hospital in Baltimore, where he was pronounced dead.[1][33]
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