THIS DAY IN BÉISBOL September 10: Alou brothers Felipe, Matty, Jose have consecutive at-bats for Giants

There have been more than 400 sets of brothers who have played in the Major Leagues, but only a handful of instances when three siblings have been big leaguers.

The most well-known trio is arguably the Alou brothers, who not only have the distinction of playing for the same team at the same time in the modern era (the Wright brothers, Harry, George and Sam, were all members of the 1876 Boston Red Caps), but hold the record for most games appeared in by brothers — 5,129 games combined.

On this day in béisbol, Sept. 10, 1963, Felipe, Matty and Jose not only appeared in the same game for the San Francisco Giants, but batted consecutively.

Trailing 3-0 in the top of the eighth inning against the New York Mets, San Fran skipper Alvin Dark sent up Jesus and Matty as pinch hitters, followed by Felipe, who was batting lead-off and playing right field.

It was a baseball rarity — and it didn’t work out at all for the Giants or the Alous.

Mets starter Carl Willey got Jesus on a groundout to short, struck out Matty, and then induced a dribbler back to the box from Felipe for the third out. 

The Giants lost, but not before Willie McCovey and Orlando Cepeda hit meaningless 9th-inning homers in a 4-2 defeat to the hapless, last-place Mets (49-97).

Also on this day: In 1999, Red Sox righty Pedro Martinez dominated his daddies, hurling a one-hitter against the hated Yankees at The Stadium. Bombers DH Chili Davis’ second-inning homer is the only New York hit in a 3-1 gem in which Martinez fanned 17 batters. 

The Yankees’ Chuck Knoblauch was drilled by Martinez leading off the bottom of the first and promptly caught stealing, and Martinez ended up facing the minimum 27 batters.

— Robert Dominguez

Robert Dominguez is co-author of “Bronx Bummers: The Unofficial History of the New York Yankees’ Bad Boys, Blunders and Brawls” and writer of the upcoming “El Salón: The Trials and Triumphs of Baseball’s Latino Hall of Famers.”

rdominguez@latinobaseball.com

Photos: Felipe Alou, Matty Alou, Jesus Alou — Unknown authors, public domain