Jay Ritchie, American baseball player, Died at 79

  Sports

Jay Seay Ritchie was born on November 20, 1936, in Salisbury, North Carolina and died on January 5, 2016, in Rockwell, North.

He was a right-handed Major League Baseball pitcher.

He played from 1964 to 1968 for the Boston Red Sox, Atlanta Braves and Cincinnati Reds.

Jay was 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m) tall and weighed 190 pounds.

Jay Ritchie attended Granite Quarry High School in Granite Quarry, North Carolina where he starred in baseball and basketball.

Both his pitching record for his junior and senior years was 24-0 and upon his graduation, he was also the county’s all-time basketball scoring leader.

Ritchie was first originally signed by the Red Sox as an amateur free agent in 1955.

Jay Ritchie spent several years in the minors before making his big-league debut with the Red Sox on August 4, 1964 in a road game against the Minnesota Twins.

Jay’s early season overall was the best season of his career—in 21 games, he had a 1-1 record with a fine 2.74 ERA in 46 innings.

During the 1965 season was the most successful one for Ritchie, as he was 1-2 with a 3.17 ERA in 44 relief appearances, as was 1967, when he was 4-6 but again posted a 3.17 ERA in 52 relief appearances (which ranked 10th in the National League.

Mr.Ritchie was sent to the Braves, on January 11, 1966, as the player to be named later in a deal that was made on December 15, 1965.

Jay had spent two seasons with the Braves, appearing in 22 games and posting a 4.08 ERA in 1966 and appearing in 52 games in 1967, posting a 3.17 ERA.

In the year 1967, jay tied for 10th in the league with Bob Miller in pitching appearances.

However the season he spent with the Braves in 1967, he pitched the equivalent of a perfect and then some, retiring 28 batters in a row over a span of four consecutive outings.

Then, later during the 1967 season, Jay was traded to the Reds with Jim Beauchamp and Mack Jones for Deron Johnson.

He played his final season in 1968, appearing in 28 games for the Reds, starting two of them.

Jay was inducted into the Salisbury-Rowan Sports Hall of Fame, in 2004.

Before his death, Jay Ritchie lived in Kannapolis, North Carolina.

Jay Ritchie passed away at 79 yrs old.