SLOW & STEADY FOR OCALA / JACKSONVILLE

The Ocala Owls completed the 1977 MWWL season, the team’s 2nd, in fine fashion by winning their final series to finish with a record of 78 – 84, good for 4th place in the strong National League West. That 4th place finish matches last year’s placement however the 78 wins was 4 better than the expansion team’s 1976 total of 74. The Owls two year combined record is 152 wins and 172 losses. While the Lauderdale’s and Germantown’s of the National League are not exactly quivering in their cleats, the progress made by the expansion Owls is resp ectable, at least to the team owner. They made up 10 games on first place finishing ‘only’ 31 games behind the front running Germantown Grays. The optimistic Owl fan points to the fact that they ended 1977 a mere 12 games behind the 2nd place Berryhill Sledge Hammers. They say Slow and Steady wins the race. I s’pose if the race is a marathon, that might be true.

The Owls had their share of fine individual performances, including rookie Warren Cromartie who came to the Owls after making only 1 plate appearance in 1976 for the S Hammers. Warren’s .340 batting average was good for 2nd place in the National League. He tallied 181 hits, 7th in the NL, with 42 of those being doubles. Is a Rookie of the Year award in this flychaser’s future? Another fine performance by veteran Willie Montanez who followed up a career year in 1976 with another stellar performance in 1977. His bat ting average of .330 was even higher than last season’s mark of .324. On the flipside, even with these two performances, the Owls scored fewer runs than all but 2 teams in MWWL. Montanez’ 16 HR’s was the team high as were his 67 RBIs. Those numbers spelled a sub-.500 record even though the pitching staff was one of the leagues best.

Rookie of the Year candidate #2, Dave Rozema’s ERA of 2.21 along with Rick Rhoden’s 2.39 were the major reason the Owls staff had the MWWL’s 4th lowest team ERA, ending the campaign at 3.30. Only the league’s most dominant clubs; Demolition, Grays and Breakers were lower. Rozema, with a record of 12-7 was the league leader with 4 shut outs. Spot starter Fred Holdsworth added 3 white washings. Rick Rhoden was the team leader with 15 wins while suffering just 8 losses.

1978 should see a slow and steady climb in winning percentage as some of the young hitters gain experience. Team leaders are expected to be Cromartie, Lee Mazzilli (.273 BA), Larry Parrish, Gorman Thomas and prospect Willie Wilson. Dusty Baker (.239 BA, 11HRs) and Frank Tavares (.219 BA) will be expected to carry more of the load than they did in 1977. Rozema and Rhoden will continue to anchor the pitching staff although guys like Joe Coleman and Jim Lonborg are beginning to see the end of the line as far as being major contributors.

On the business front, the team announces they will move east to the owner’s home town, the metropolis of Jacksonville and beginning in 1978 will be known as the Jacksonville Red Caps, paying tribute to the city’s Negro League team of the 1930’s.