Episode description

If you wanted someone who could hit for power in the expansion era, you wanted Orlando Cepeda. The so-called 'Baby Bull' would be in contention for the leading batting, home run, RBI, slugging, and total bases awards every year for his first five years. He would alos be the first Puerto Rican All-Star, taking to the field in 1959.

His first nine years saw him play first base for the San Francisco Giants (at the same time as Willie McCovey was also staking his claim to the same position). At the time he was second in the Giants' all time right-hand slugging list, just behind Willie Mays. The forever Giant saw his #30 retired  in 1999, and he is one of only four Giants immortalised with a bronze statue at Oracle Park.

He wasn't always on the Giants roster though, having played for six different teams. Following injuries in 1965, he was traded to the St Louis Cardinals. Once settled, it was time to rack up some more records. 

1967 saw Cepeda unanimously voted the National League's MVP. He was only the second player to achieve this distinction following the New York Giants' Carl Hubbell achieving a clean sweep of the votes in 1933; he's also one of only five players to win both the Rookie of the Year and the MVP unanimously; and the first Latin player to win RBI and Home Run titles.

For today's classic, we join Cepeda early in that key 1967 season. The Cardinals are visiting Shea Stadium to take on the New York Mets. Cepeda is batting fourth, and he's going to have a rather productive game. So will the Mets…

The team of Lindsey Nelson, Ralph Kiner & Bob Murphy take you through the various innings on the Mets Radio Network.

You can find the boxscore here. 

This game was played on May 20th, 1967.