A 1961 Phillie recalls record losing streak as White Sox close in: ‘Have you ever been booed by 30,000 people?’

The flight to Philadelphia was delayed, proving that a single win was not enough to solve everything for the Phillies. They lost 23 straight games in the miserable summer of 1961 before ending a road trip with a win in Milwaukee. And now they had to wait to take off.

When the plane landed, the players noticed a group of 500 fans waiting for them near the tarmac. The Phillies were the worst team in baseball. No way was this a hero’s welcome.

“They’re selling rocks at $1.50 a pail,” pitcher Frank Sullivan told his teammates. “Leave the plane in five-minute intervals. That way they can’t get us all in one burst.”

But the Phillies were safe at home. The fans cheered, waved banners, threw confetti, and lifted manager Gene Mauch on their shoulders while a band played. Wins were rare that summer so the fans savored what they could.

“That meant a lot,” pitcher Art Mahaffey recalled Monday.

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The Phillies’ 23-game losing streak has stood for more than 60 years as a major-league record in futility since 1900, but it is being challenged this week by the Chicago White Sox, who lost Monday for the 21st straight time. Only three teams — the 1961 Phillies, the 2024 White Sox, and the 1988 Orioles — have lost 21 straight.

The ‘61 Phillies lost 107 games and the current White Sox are on pace to lose 123. Both teams know what it feels like to lose.

“When you get into a losing streak, it just happens and you can’t get out of it,” the 86-year-old Mahaffey said. “It was just tough losing. It was awful. The publicity and people talking about it everywhere you went. Away from the park, people would mention it. It was just terrible, really.”

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The ‘61 Phillies were outscored by 79 runs in their losing streak, which came against six teams and lasted more than three weeks. They were shut out four times during the streak and swept twice in doubleheaders. They finished that season with the worst attendance in baseball as fans were not flocking to Connie Mack Stadium to see a team that made the previous year’s 95-loss campaign feel like a success.

Mauch shuffled his batting order during the losing streak, used relief pitchers as starters, and starting pitchers as relievers. Nothing worked for the Phillies. While Roger Maris chased Babe Ruth’s home run record in New York, the Phillies chased their tails. Even their brushback pitches turned into home runs.

Three days before they finally won, Mauch visited Mahaffey on the mound in the middle of an at-bat. Mahaffey had an 0-2 count in the eighth inning against Milwaukee’s Joe Adcock so it seemed like a strange time for his manager to leave the dugout.

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Mauch became the manager a year earlier when Eddie Sawyer quit after opening day, saying, “I’m 49 and I want to live to be 50.” Mauch was tightly wound, stern, and known as “The Little General.” Mahaffey knew he wasn’t coming to the mound to make small talk.

“He said, ‘I want you to knock him down. I want you to throw at him and I mean throw at him,’” Mahaffey recalled. “Now, what are you going to do?”

Mahaffey, knowing he would get fined if he didn’t follow the general’s orders, fired a high-and-tight fastball with his next pitch.

“He just picked guys,” Mahaffey said as there was no real reason Mauch wanted him to throw at Adcock. “It was his way or no way. He was tough. He had his riot meetings where he yelled at just about everyone in the clubhouse. That was the way it was.”

Adcock stepped his front foot away from the plate, widened his stance, and hammered Mahaffey’s inside pitch 410 feet for a two-run homer to tie the game. Another loss — their 20th in a row — was soon sealed.

“I’ll never forget that,” said Mahaffey, who lives near Allentown and is recovering from a fractured hip he suffered in January. “Adcock was one of those guys who stepped in the bucket. In other words, he stepped away. If you threw on the outside, Adcock couldn’t hit it. But Mauch said knock him down. So I threw chin high, Adcock stepped in the bucket, hit a home run, and I lost the game. We wouldn’t have lost the 23. He tomahawked the ball over the left-field fence. There’s a lot of games that you don’t forget losing.”

The White Sox last won a game on July 10 as their 1961 Phillies impression started five days before the All-Star break. If they eclipse the Phils’ mark, the White Sox will have gone more than a month between wins. They have scored the fewest runs (3.07 per game) in baseball this season and their batting average (.216) could finish as the lowest since 1920. They’ve averaged 2.3 runs per game during the losing streak and have been outscored by 87 runs.

“The losing streaks are terrible,” said Mahaffey, who appeared in five games of the 23-game skid. “It was terrible losing that many games. Getting booed every day. Have you ever been booed by 30,000 people? Try it sometime.”

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Robin Roberts won just one game in 1961 as the Hall of Famer pitched his final season for the Phils. They had the youngest lineup in baseball and their hitters were often overmatched. The pitching staff struggled once the summer started and Mahaffey — who struck out 17 batters in April — went 1-19 over a 10-week stretch. It was the perfect recipe for a historic streak.

Finally, there was a reward. John Buzhardt, the winning pitcher a day before the 23-game drought began, earned the win in Milwaukee in the second game of a doubleheader. Buzhardt, acquired a year earlier in the trade that sent Richie Ashburn to the Cubs, fittingly wore No. 23 and was born in a South Carolina town called Prosperity.

Sullivan quipped afterward that the Phils had lessened the deficit for the pennant — they were 42 games behind the Reds — by a half-game. A crowd of fans waited for them as if they had won the pennant. Instead, they were 57 games below .500. There was joy in Philly. But it didn’t last long. Three years later, a September collapse scarred a generation of Phillies fans and made a 23-game losing streak feel like a bad night.

“You can’t ever forget it,” Mahaffey said of the 1964 Phils. “I lost the first game, 1-0. Chico Ruiz stole home.”