KIRK McCASKILL AND THE GRIFFEYS, CIRCA, 1990

Kirk McCaskill was one of the greatest athletes in University of Vermont history, keeping the company — among select others — of Burlington’s Ray Collins, who parlayed a stellar high school career in the early-1900s to winning 37 games as a Catamount pitcher, before joining the Boston Red Sox.

Collins, a portsider who could hit and field too, pitched for the Sox from 1909–1915, compiling a record of 84–62 with a 2.51 ERA and 511 Ks in 1336 innings, including 19 shutouts and 90 complete games.

His control was his greatest strength on the mound.

Collins consistently ranked among the American League leaders in fewest walks allowed per nine innings, finishing third in the league in 1912 (1.90); second in 1913 (1.35); and fourth in 1914 (1.85).

He averaged 16 wins per season from 1910–1914, including a combined 39 victories in 1913 and 1914, and was a member of the Red Sox 1912 and 1915 World Series championship teams.

While it would not be unfair to posit that Collins had a far more prodigious career than McCaskill by the numbers, the latter was undeniably a legitimate two-sport phenom, who managed to acquit himself nicely in the bigs, just the same.

And perhaps McCaskill’s career line — 106–108 W/L; 4.12 ERA; 1003 Ks; 1729 IP; 665 BB; 1.396 WHIP; 14.3 WAR — is not so pedestrian, after all.

He debuted in 1985 and his breakout season came in 1986 with the American League West champion California Angels, when he compiled a 17–10 record with a 3.36 ERA and 202 Ks.

He threw 10 complete games that year and would go on to enjoy six seasons of ten or more wins; throw a pair of one-hitters; and rank in the AL Top Ten in both shutouts and ERA three times each.

Yet the first baseball player from UVM to reach the major leagues since the late, great Jack “Tomatoes” Lamabe in 1962, may have been an even better hockey player.

(Lamabe was nicknamed “Tomatoes,” oh, so imaginatively, due to his florid facial complexion).

McCaskill’s father Ted, was a professional hockey player and the family moved several times during the boy’s childhood, spending time in outposts stretching from Nashville and Memphis to Vancouver, Phoenix, Newport Beach and Huntington Beach, before settling in Paradise Valley, Arizona.

After his freshman year at Edison High School in Huntington Beach, McCaskill elected to go the boarding school route, enrolling at the Trinity-Pawling School in Pawling, NY where he played soccer, hockey and baseball.

His numbers stood out.

During his senior year, he was the varsity soccer team’s leading goal-scorer; he recorded 26 goals and 22 assists in 17 hockey games; and he was 8–0 with an 0.97 ERA and 97 Ks on the mound for the baseball team.

Turning down a baseball scholarship to Arizona State University afforded McCaskill the opportunity to pursue both hockey and baseball at UVM, where he starred in both sports.

As a centerman and right winger from 1979-’83, he was a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award in 1982 and was named to the NCAA East All-America First Team and the ECAC All-Star First Team.

The team captain during the 1982-’83 season, McCaskill won the Cunningham Award as the Catamounts MVP and was drafted in the fourth round (64th overall) by the Winnipeg Jets in the 1981 NHL Entry Draft.

During the 1983-’84 campaign, he played for the Sherbrooke Jets, a Winnipeg farm team, tallying 10 goals and adding 12 assists before retiring from professional hockey to focus solely on baseball.

With an athletic portfolio bursting at the seams, a most noteworthy accomplishment of Kirk McCaskill was one which held a rather dubious distinction.

The date was September 14, 1990.

That day, McCaskill found himself on the wrong end of history.

Ken Griffey Sr. and Ken Griffey Jr. were the history makers, the first father-son duo to ever play together on the same team.

And then they became the first and only father-son duo to hit back-to-back home runs.

Griffey Sr., at age 40 was the seventh-oldest player in the game at that time, while Junior, at 20, was the majors’ youngest.

Sr. batted second and played left field, and Junior hit third and patrolled center field.

The back-to-back blasts were the third of the season for Sr., and the twentieth for Junior.

The Griffey name appeared in big league box scores from 1973–2010, 37 straight years.

And Kirk McCaskill — though not the pitcher of record — had a pretty fair line that night: 6.1 IP; 5 H; 4 R; 3 ER; 3 BB; 4 K in a 7–5 Angel victory.

But it was a tough first inning for him, as he was the one to give up those back-to-back dingers, before he retired a single man.

Wrong end of history, indeed.

[Editor’s Note: This piece was written by Mr. Kaplan in May 2021.]

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