Along with Merv Rettenmund, Crowley had the extreme pleasure of playing for both the American League’s and National League’s top winning teams of the 1970’s, the 1970 Baltimore Orioles team and the 1975 Cincinnati Reds.
Not too shabby!
However Crowley, who originally came up with Baltimore in 1969, was purchased by the Texas Rangers in December of 1973 before being purchased by the Reds in March of 1974, which leads me to this question: why didn’t Topps have an image of him suited up with the Reds since played in 84 games for them in ‘74?
Odd that they needed to go ahead and airbrush an image after over a half a season’s worth of action the year before.
Nevertheless, Crowley got to be a part of the “Big Red Machine’s” 1975 championship team before moving on to the Atlanta Braves for seven games at the beginning of 1976 before getting released in May, then picked up by his original team, the Orioles, for whom he’d play through the 1982 season.
He would play his final year in 1984 with the Montreal Expos, appearing in 50 games, before retiring with a .250 career average with 379 hits over 1518 at-bats in 865 games.
Never more than a fill-in/pinch hitter, Crowley never had more than 283 plate appearances in any one season through his career, with only two years of more than 200.
But he lasted 15-years in the Big Leagues, playing on two World Champ squads, and five Pennant winners.
