Tuesday, July 28, 2015

Player Profile: Nelson Briles

Check out my retrospective of the baseball cards of Hall of Very Good inductee Lee Smith over at the HOVG.
I have two cards of Nelson Briles. This one is from 1978 Topps.

Playing career: Nelson Briles pitched fourteen years in the major leagues for five teams, most notably the Cardinals. He was a key part of the 1967 World Champion Cardinals team, going 14-5 with a 2.43 ERA. His .737 winning percentage led the National League, and he went 1-0 with a 1.64 ERA in two games in the World Series. He also won a World Series game in 1971 as he helped Pittsburgh beat Baltimore in that series. A fuller account of his career can be found at the 1972 Topps blog.

Post-baseball career: After his retirement he was a broadcaster and front-office executive for the Pirates. He died of a heart attack while golfing in 2005.

My memories: Before my time. Only know him from his card.

Google Autocomplete results: He is sixth when you type Nelson Br, between Nelson Broms, former CEO of Equitable Life, and Nelson Bryant, an outdoors writer. There do not appear to be any other prominent Nelson Brileses.

Coming up next: The next profile will be Greg Briley.

2 comments:

  1. Wow. For a guy I've never heard of... he has solid World Series numbers.

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  2. this card and the 1976 topps gaylord perry made me think these guys were old when i first saw those cards in the late 70's. now i know that briles would have been only 34 when that photo was taken.

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