Baseball Way Back: Part 2 of our chat with Roe Skidmore, the player who might have suceeded Ernie Banks

Part 2 of 2

Roe Skidmore didn't need 3,000 hits to grab a share of baseball immortality. All he needed was one.

Skidmore belongs to a rare group of players who own a perfect 1.000 batting average.

Although his pinch hit for the Chicago Cubs on Sept. 17, 1970 turned out to be his only major league hit, it was far from his only professional baseball hit. During a pro career that lasted from 1966 to 1975, he collected 1,078 hits.

Robert Roe Skidmore grew up in Decatur, the son of lifelong Cubs fan Roe C. Skidmore, who died in 2020 at 104 years old.

"When I was a little kid, he had two radios, one listening to the Cardinals and one listening to the Cubs. He would rather the Cardinals lose than the Cubs win."

A salesman at Raupp's Shoe Store in Decatur who worked on straight commission for 42 years, the elder Skidmore saved enough money to put his son and daughter through college, taking a bite of his sandwich here and there between customers in lieu of a lunch break.

Young Roe played third base for Decatur Eisenhower high school and was an all-tournament selection when his team took the Illinois High School Association state crown in 1962, edging out Lyons of LaGrange 3-2.

Skidmore went on to play for Millikin University before he was drafted as a catcher by the Atlanta Braves.

But in 1967, Eddie Haas, his manager at Class A West Palm Beach, told him he had no future as a catcher in the Braves organization.

Skidmore put his wife, who was about due to have their first daughter, on a plane to Decatur, and then drove straight from West Palm Beach to his parents' home. He then called San Francisco Giants scout Swede Thompson, the first major leaguer from Decatur to play in a World Series. Thompson, who had scouted Skidmore at Millikin, hooked him up with the Giants farm team in Decatur, the Commodores, and in Skidmore's first game, a doubleheader against Quincy, he went 6-for-7 with two homers. Finding his niche as a first baseman in Decatur, he wound up hitting 14 home runs in 1967 and 27 in 1968.

The Cubs selected him in the minor league draft, and he spent 1969 in AAA Tacoma.

After hitting 16 homers and driving in 84 runs for Whitey Lockman's Pacific Coast League champion Tacoma squad and making the PCL All-Star team, Skidmore was the heir apparent to none other than Ernie Banks.

Skidmore pinch ran for Banks and had two at-bats playing for the Cubs in an exhibition game to benefit boys baseball against the White Sox at Comiskey Park on Aug. 18, 1969.

Studying Skidmore in the batting cage, Banks observed, "He's a mighty fine looking ballplayer," wrote sports writer Bob Fallstrom.

After the game, Cubs manager Leo Durocher shook his hand and said, "Glad you could come. I'll be seeing you soon."

Although Skidmore said he had a "pretty decent spring" in 1970, Durocher filled the final Cubs roster spot with veteran Al Spangler.

While Skidmore toiled in Tacoma, the Cubs spelled Banks at first with Jim Hickman and Willie Smith and then acquired Joe Pepitone.

Durocher, Skidmore said, would not get close with the younger players, preferring to communicate to them through coach Joe Amalfitano.

"No disrespect, but quite honestly, that guy was one of the nastiest guys that I've ever been around in my life," Skidmore said.

Skidmore finally got his only chance to swing a major league bat on that memorable September day, when he hit a single to left off the Cardinals' Jerry Reuss.

It was a joyous moment for Skidmore's parents. His dad was getting some shoes for a customer when he happened to hear his son's name announced on WGN radio.

His mom Mary also was able to listen to the game on WGN in her car.

Skidmore said he still talks with Reuss, who also gave up the first major league hit to Dave Winfield in 1973. "I tease him and I say, 'You made me famous.'"

Banks would wind up playing one more year in 1971, and the Cubs traded Skidmore to the White Sox, along with Dave Lemonds and Pat Jacquez, for Jose Ortiz and Ossie Blanco.

Sox manager Chuck Tanner held out the promise of a starting first base job, only to hand it to Carlos May.

For Skidmore, it was back to AAA, this time with the Tucson Toros, where he hit .299 with 20 homers and was tried in the outfield and other infield positions.

Rick Davis of the Arizona Daily Star wrote on April 2, 1971, "His name is Roe. He's a big, soft-speaking guy with 'Midnight Cowboy' looks and a drawl to match. And he can hit a baseball the proverbial country mile. But there's one riddle that his coach, Gordon Maltzberger, has been trying to figure out: What to do with Roe when the other team is at bat?"

With the acquisition of Dick Allen in 1972, the Sox had first base solved for the next three years. Skidmore was sent to the Cincinnati Reds to complete a trade for Buddy Bradford. But the Reds already had a first baseman, Tony Perez.

Skidmore spent the remainder of his career in AAA, shuttling through the Reds, Cardinals, Astros and Red Sox organizations.

"I could have played a few more years, but I had kids that were in grade school," he said, adding that in his final year, his children were in four different grade schools, as they followed him through spring training in Florida and minor league stops in Iowa and Rhode Island.

Skidmore, now 77, settled into a successful career in financial planning and raised five children.

He still watches the Cubs on the Marquee network - he especially enjoys Nico Hoerner.

"If I had had one more at-bat, or had gone one-for-two, nobody would have heard of the name."