Bo Belinsky

Bo Belinsky (December 7, 1936–November 23, 2001) was a baseball pitcher who had a Major League record of just 28–51, but threw the first no-hitter in the history of the Los Angeles Angels, beating the Baltimore Orioles 2–0 on May 5, 1962. It was Belinsky's fourth consecutive win to start his rookie season; he would be 5–0, then 7–1, before finishing the season with a 10–11 won-lost record, a 3.56 earned run average, and the league lead in bases on balls (122), the only time Belinsky ever led his league in any pitching category.

After the no-hitter, Belinsky said, famously enough, "If I'd known I was gonna pitch a no-hitter today, I would have gotten a haircut." Perhaps more tellingly, however, Belinsky also said, "If music be the food of love, by all means let the band play on." Known notoriously enough for his night life before he pitched his rookie no-hitter, "within days of his no-hitter Belinsky would be heralded as sport's most original and engaging playboy-athlete," as pitcher-turned-journalist Pat Jordan wrote in Sports Illustrated. "His name would become synonymous with a lifestyle that was cool and slick and dazzling . . . But in time the name Belinsky would become synonymous with something else. It would become synonymous with dissipated talent."

Belinsky became a kind of protege to fading but still influential and show business-connected newspaper columnist Walter Winchell; he was linked romantically, at one time or another, to such beauties as Ann-Margret, Connie Stevens, Tina Louise and Mamie Van Doren, the latter his fiancee for a year. Contemporary player Mike Hegan once said, "Bo had more fun off the field than he did on the field."

And it took the inevitable toll on the field. Belinsky fell to 1–7 in 1963 and earned a farming out to the Angels' minor league team in Hawaii, where he pitched his way back and finished the year with a 2–9 major league record. But Belinsky was 9–7 with a career-best 2.86 ERA in August 1964 when came the incident that ended his days with the Angels: a hotel room fight with elderly Los Angeles Times sportswriter Braven Dyer. Belinsky was suspended from the Angels, then traded to the Philadelphia Phillies after the season. He also pitched for the Houston Astros, the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Cincinnati Reds, with his career ending in 1970.

Belinsky married and divorced Playboy Playmate of the Year Jo Collins, then heiress Janie Weyerhaeuser. He eventually overcame alcoholism to become first a counselor and spokesman for the alcohol abuse program he entered in Hawaii and, then, an auto agency representative in Las Vegas. Clean, sober, and a born-again Christian ("Can you imagine," he was quoted as saying, "finding Jesus Christ in Las Vegas?"), Belinsky battled bladder cancer before his death of an apparent heart attack at age 64.

Veteran sportswriter Maury Allen wrote a biography of Belinsky, Bo: Pitching and Wooing, "with the uncensored cooperation of Bo Belinsky," in 1973.

I came to the Angels as a kid who thought he had been pushed around by life, by minor league baseball. I was selfish and immature in a lot of ways and I tried to cover that up. I went from a major league ballplayer to hanging onto a brown bag under the bridge, but I had my moments and I have my memories. If I had the attitude about life then that I have now, I'd have done a lot of things differently. But you make your rules and you play by them. I knew the bills would come due eventually, and I knew I wouldn't be able to cover them.---Bo Belinsky to Ross Newhan, in The Anaheim Angels: A Complete History.