Just A Cup of Coffee

Rick Paulas writes about some of the 974 players who only appeared in one major league game:

 The most famous Cup of Coffee player of all time, due exclusively to his appearance in W.P. Kinsella's 1982 novel Shoeless Joe and its subsequent film adaptation Field of Dreams, has to be Archibald “Moonlight” Graham. His story is now well known: He entered a 1905 game for the New York Giants as a defensive replacement in the eighth inning. Three outs later, he trotted in from right field and picked up a bat. He was due up fourth, meaning the team would just have to muster up one base-runner for him to see a Major League pitch. But, alas, his teammates failed him and he was left in the on-deck circle when the umpire called the final out. He never got to take a single hack at the ball.
Like Graham, fellow Cup of Coffee player Ralph Gagliano never got a chance to swing a bat either. But unlike "Moonlight," he didn't get a chance to wear a mitt either.
“Digging up old bones, eh?” he said, when I reached him after a short game of phone tag.
During his time as a Major Leaguer, the only part of the field that Gagliano's spikes treaded upon was the 90 feet of dirt between first and second base in the Bronx, where old Yankee Stadium used to reside. "I could've had the shortest career in history," Gagliano told me with a laugh.
Drafted by the Indians in 1964, Gagliano was a “bonus baby,” a top prospect to whom the team signed to a Major League contract in order to keep other teams from stealing him away. “A number-one pick these days,” he said with pride. Gagliano tore knee ligaments during his first spring training, sending him to the DL until he was finally activated and placed on the big league roster on the first day of September. The shy 18-year-old kept a low profile for his first few weeks in the majors, never even speaking to manager Birdie Tebbetts. “He probably thought I was just some guy hanging around the locker room.” But Tebbetts must have just been playing dumb. In the 9th inning of a 9-4 game, he decided to give shortstop Larry Brown a break and called out Gagliano's name to punch run.

I recently reread Shoeless Joe.  The Moonlight Graham story line was a good idea on Kinsella's part. Also effective was the use of J.D. Salinger as the writer Kinsella went to meet. That became the fictional James Earl Jones character Terrence Mann in the movie.  Less effective was the Eddie Scissons character, who lied about being the oldest living former Chicago Cub.  Anyway, the tales of the Cup of Coffee players is pretty interesting.  Of all the disappointments one may face in life, only playing in one major league game in your life seems relatively minor, as Burt Lancaster points out in "Field of Dreams."

Update:  The Cup of Coffee Club player I remember is Stephen Larkin.  The Reds brought him up for the last game of the season in 1998 as a favor to his brother, Hall of Famer Barry.  I happened to listen to the game that day as we combined beans over at my grandpa's farm.